Most organisations today care deeply about wellbeing.

They all invest in programmes, training, mental first aiders, and support services.

And yet absence rises, managers feel a bit lost, and good people still leave.

In my experience, the problem isn’t a lack of care or commitment from managers. It’s a failure of capability at the point of contact. It goes wrong the moment a manager sits down with someone who is struggling.

Senior leaders will recognise the pattern. I hear about it all the time:

• Managers hesitate because they don’t want to say the wrong thing.
• They soften conversations to avoid distress, or avoid them altogether.
• Or they default to policy because it feels safer than uncertainty.

The result is rarely malicious, but it is expensive. Those delayed conversations, unresolved issues, escalating absences, and the unnecessary pressure on HR teams. It all adds up, and then subtracts from the bottom line.

Not to mention the human cost.

What’s missing is not empathy. It’s the ability to have clear, adult-to-adult conversations under pressure.

When managers learn how to listen without rescuing, respond without diagnosing, and address work impact without losing humanity, things change quickly. Conversations become healthier (not necessarily easier). Trust improves. Issues surface earlier.

In the end, people stay engaged and are much more likely to stay in work. I know, because I've helped lots of organisations, teams and managers to learn how to do this.

Which isn’t about turning managers into therapists, or even coaches (well, maybe a bit). It’s about teaching how to care about people and care about productivity at the same time.

Because wellbeing doesn’t live in programmes and slogans.

It lives in everyday conversations.

And those conversations can be learned.

Stephen

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