By Sarah Nicastro, Creator, Future of Field Service
May is Mental Health Awareness Month in the United States, and the focus may be more important now than ever. At Future of Field Service and the UNSCRIPTED podcast, we try to ensure that mental health and wellbeing are topics represented in our discussions often, not only in a certain month – but I will never pass up an opportunity to call attention to stories and resources that can help reduce stigma and improve awareness and understanding.
For 2025, Mental Health America is using the theme "Turn Awareness into Action" and the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) is focusing on the theme "In Every Story, There's Strength" (personally, I agree and I love that one). In the spirit of sharing powerful stories and helping to not only create better awareness, but inspire action, here is a compilation of some of conversations and resources I’d urge you to check out during this month of focus:
Smashing Stigma Around Mental Health & Prioritizing Well-Being at Work
In this podcast, Rob Stephenson, TEDx Speaker, Mental Health Campaigner, Keynote Speaker, CEO of FormScore®, and Founder of the InsideOut LeaderBoard® shares his motivation for evangelizing mental well-being and gives advice on how companies can make progress in normalizing mental health topics and promoting well-being at work.
Rob is deeply committed to mental health awareness and actively participates in efforts to eliminate the stigma surrounding mental ill-health in the workplace. He has managed bipolar disorder throughout his personal and professional life and shares his experiences and strategies for change through public speaking engagements.
Be sure to check out the work he does with FormScore and the InsideOut LeaderBoard as well!
Building Mental Strength as a Leader
Scott Mautz, author of The Mentally Strong Leader, is a former Procter & Gamble executive who successfully ran four of the company’s largest multi-billion dollar businesses. He has been named a "CEO thought-leader" by The Chief Executives Guild and a "Top 50 Leadership Innovator" by Inc.com.
In this podcast discussion, Scott shares his strategies for building mental strength and overcoming challenges as a leader. He also explores topics such as self-regulation, the "static trap," self-doubt, imposter syndrome, navigating stress, as well as the importance of creating habits that support mental strength, providing tools and frameworks for building resilience.
Tetra Pak’s Proven Ways of Supporting Field Force Wellbeing
While looking beyond just mental health, this podcast about the steps Tetra Pak has taken to support field force wellbeing touches on many important points, including the message of “it’s OK to not be OK.” Marco Hugo Guiterrez, VP of Customer Service Operations, EMEA at Tetra Pak, shares a detailed look at what the company has done to put more emphasis on employee engagement and promote and maximize field force wellbeing.
8 Facts About Mental Health at Work to Expand Awareness and Prompt Action
When Darcy Gruttadaro, former Director of the Center for Workplace Mental Health, part of the APA Foundation, and now Chief Innovation Officer at NAMI joined our podcast for an episode on six ways to address employee burnout, we had more than we could squeeze into one discussion. As a result, I wrote this article on eight facts around mental health that I feel we all need to better understand and urge action on.
Learn more about the resources that both the Center for Workplace Mental Health and NAMI provide.
Destigmatizing, Normalizing and Prioritizing Mental Health in the Workplace
When I recorded a podcast with Johnny Crowder, suicide/abuse survivor, TEDx speaker, touring musician, mental health and sobriety advocate, and the Founder & CEO of Cope Notes, a text-based mental health platform that provides daily support to users in nearly 100 countries across the globe, I was in awe of him. Listen as we discuss the criticality of prioritizing mental health in the workplace, and also be sure to learn more about Cope Notes.
Putting Focus on Employee Mental Health
I shared on LinkedIn how sad I was to learn that Jordan Argiriou, former Director, Service Solutions APEC at QIAGEN had passed away. I will always remember when I asked him (a burly, Australian man) what he’d like to talk about in a podcast and he responded with “mental health” how surprised I was! It was a topic that was very important to him, and his advice in this podcast centers around normalizing the conversations, leading by example, and creating relationships that give people a safe place to share. Wise words from a wonderful man.
Making Mental Health a Focus in Service Leadership
This podcast is an oldie but goodie from an incredible woman, Linda Tucci. Recorded in the midst of Covid when Linda was service as the Global Sr. Director of the Technical Solutions Center at Ortho Clinical Diagnostics, we talk about why it is critical to make mental health a priority in service leadership and how she’s done so, for herself and her team.