Impact of COVID-19 on Staff Mental Health and Well-Being in SMEs:Strategies and Interventions to Support Workforce and Boost Productivity in the UK

新冠肺炎疫情已导致全球各国政府采取前所未有的封锁和经济措施应对，以遏制疾病的传播，并支持工人和企业。这一流行病对中小型企业(SME)的员工心理健康(MH)和福祉构成了真正的威胁，雇主需要认真执行计划，以支持他们在英国的员工(1600万人)。在这方面的证据有限，需要从多学科的角度进行研究，以最佳战略、干预措施和政策告知中小企业(99.9%的英国企业)如何支持员工并提高他们的生产率。由于工作压力、抑郁和焦虑，英国损失了1280万个工作日(2018-19年，大流行前)(300亿GB)。据估计，560万工人面临失业风险，受疫情影响，今年春季英国经济将萎缩35%。这场经济崩溃预计将增加中小企业员工的MH问题并产生重大影响：员工生产率，如需要履行多个角色，获得新技能，在有限支持的不同环境下工作，以及避免瓶颈的压力；企业生产率-预计将满足更高的需求和应对供应不确定性，以使供应链具有弹性，并在劳动力减少的情况下提高英国生产率。这个项目的主要目标是：(1)开发一个概念模型，通过对英国1200名中小企业员工进行多阶段调查，帮助分析中小企业员工面临的MH问题、导致这些问题的因素和各种工作层面之间的关系，以及在大流行期间对员工和企业生产率的影响；(2)制定由战略、做法和干预措施组成的新冠肺炎员工幸福感框架，考虑中小企业的需求和制约因素，并与20家中小企业进行为期6个月的纵向研究，以评估其在疫情期间和之后在不同工作环境下提高中小企业劳动力的复原力和生产力的有效性和影响；(3)开发新冠肺炎MH应用程序来监测中小企业劳动力的MH状况，并将其与纵向研究一起进行试点，以展示通过该应用程序收集的数据将如何使每个单独的中小企业了解其员工的需求，反思他们的幸福感，从而促进框架的定制，即客观地制定实践、策略和干预措施，以解决员工MH、幸福感和公司生产率相关的问题。综上所述：目标1概述了中小企业及其工作人员的需求，同时考虑到当前疫情中的业务和个人制约因素，该模型通过对1 200名中小企业员工的多阶段调查而得到验证；目标2将根据第一个目标、现有文献和指导，为中小企业制定一个循证框架，以支持其员工在疫情期间和之后的卫生保健和福利，并将通过跨学科专家和对选定中小企业的定性研究加以验证；目标3将实施和试行卫生保健应用程序，以监测和显示卫生保健状况，并检查其支持每个中小企业及其员工需求的有效性；最后，对英国15家中小企业进行的纵向研究将展示MH APP帮助定制框架的有效性，考虑到流行病中个别中小企业的动态需求，以及福祉框架和心理健康APP对中小企业劳动力和企业生产率的影响。

COVID-19 pandemic has led governments globally to respond with unprecedented lock down and economic measures to combat spread of the disease, and support workers and businesses. The pandemic presents a real threat to small and medium sized enterprises' (SMEs') workforce mental health (MH) and well-being, and employers need to pursue serious plans to support their workforce (16 million people) in the UK. There is limited evidence in this regard and research is needed from a multi-disciplinary perspective on best strategies, interventions and policies informing SMEs (99.9% of UK businesses) regarding how to support the staff and enhance their productivity.12.8m working days were lost (2018-19, pre-pandemic) in the UK (£30 billion), due to work-related stress, depression and anxiety. It is estimated that 5.6 million workers are at risk of losing their jobs and that the UK economy will shrink by 35% this spring due to pandemic. This economic meltdown is expected to increase SMEs' staff MH problems and significantly impact: staff productivity, such as need to fulfil multiple roles, acquire new skills, work under different environment with limited support, and pressure to avoid bottlenecks; business productivity - expected to meet higher demands and cope with supply uncertainties to make supply chain resilient and boost UK productivity, with the reduced workforce. The main objectives of this project are to: (1) Develop a conceptual model that will facilitate analysing the relationship between MH issues faced by SMEs' staff, factors and various job dimensions contributing to these issues, and its impact on both the staff and business productivity during the pandemic, through a multi-stage survey with 1200 SMEs' employees in the UK;(2) Develop a COVID-19 employee well-being framework comprising of strategies, practices and interventions, considering SMEs' needs and constraints, and conduct a longitudinal study for six months with twenty SMEs to evaluate its effectiveness and impact towards increasing the resilience and productivity of SMEs' workforce in varying work contexts during and after the pandemic;(3) Develop a COVID-19 MH application to monitor the MH conditions of SMEs' workforce and pilot it with the longitudinal study, to show how the data collected through the app will enable each individual SME to understand its staff needs, introspect their well-being, that will facilitate customizing the framework, i.e. objectively putting in place practices, strategies and interventions to address employee MH, well-being and firm's productivity related issues. To summarize: Objective 1 outlines the SMEs' and their staff needs, taking into account business and individual constraints in the current pandemic demonstrated using a model validated through a multi-stage survey with 1200 SMEs employees; Objective 2 will develop a evidence-based framework for SMEs based on the first objective, existing literature and guidance, to support their staffs' MH and well-being during and after the pandemic, which will be validated by interdisciplinary experts and qualitative studies with selected SMEs; Objective 3 will implement and pilot a MH app to monitor and visualize MH condition and examine its effectiveness to support the needs of each SME and their staff; and finally a longitudinal study with 15 SMEs in the UK will demonstrate the effectiveness of MH app to help customize the framework considering the dynamic needs of individual SMEs in pandemic, and impact of wellbeing framework and mental health app on SMEs' workforce and business productivity.