Educate Your Staff On Mental Health With A MATES General Awareness Training

A young person in construction is 10 times more likely to die by suicide than in a construction accident. Mental health is a work health and safety issue and we must do our part to address it.

Recognising it when things aren’t quite right with a mate is an important first step in the journey of improving mental health in the workplace. The next step is to act, to reach out, check in with them, and help connect them to help where needed.

Research has shown that one of the roadblocks to promoting better mental health is the fact that people in trades – particularly young men – would not ask for help for fear it might be seen as a sign of weakness. Since 2008, MATES in Construction has been helping resolve this in the construction industry by developing and encouraging different perspectives around mental health and suicide.

Nowadays, we’ve seen that the construction community has become more open to reaching out and lending a hand to their mate or colleague if they need help. It takes courage to check in with a mate when you can see or sense they are struggling. MATES in Construction believes that we need to nurture this strength and encourage openness in the workplace.

MATES in Construction can help. They conduct MATES General Awareness Training (GAT), a 45-minute training for workers on site to talk about mental health and provide practical guidance on how you can help when your colleague needs it.

The training includes valuable information to help you recognise the signs when your colleague might not be in a great space and what to do when faced with this situation. Workers who then feel that they can and want to do more after the GAT can get more training with MATES to become a Connector or ASIST worker. A Connector is a person trained to help keep someone safe in a crisis while contacting professional help, while an ASIST worker is trained to talk to a person contemplating suicide and help them reach a “safe plan.”

If you would like to host a General Awareness Training on your site or with your company, contact MATES on 1300 642 111. For more information on training and support, you can also visit the MATES website below.

MATES Training and Support