Substance use disorder (SUD) or substance addiction has devastating effects on communities globally. When someone is suffering from a substance addiction, they experience a range of discomforting physical and psychological symptoms. These symptoms can come in the form of headaches, cramps, nausea, vomiting, or more severe issues such as psychosis or seizures that lead to death.
On a community level, substance addiction or alcohol addiction leads to antisocial behaviour, an increase in violent and petty crime, among other issues. Communities and public services struggle to keep up with the social and economic demands of addiction. Studies suggest that the economic impacts of drug and alcohol addiction in the United States surpasses $740 billion annually, and £21.5 billion in the United Kingdom annually.
From hospitals that struggle to keep up with the demand of people suffering from physical and psychological effects, to the level of policing, counselling, and social housing that is required to help people who are suffering from addiction, the community effects are transparent. Additionally, substance addiction leads to significant economic losses and production issues in the workplace.
Why Addiction Prevention Matters in the Workplace
If you’re a full-time worker, it’s estimated that you’ll spend around 90,000 hours – from one-fifth to a third of your lifetime – working. Because of this astounding figure, it’s important that we optimise our workplace in order to support our mental health, physical health, career progression, and so on.
There are many aspects that can affect our wellness and performance in the workplace, whether it be our relationship with co-workers, any toxic behaviours, our quality of sleep, diet, and so on. If someone is suffering from a substance addiction, it will affect their performance – and potentially their livelihood – significantly.
The Hidden Cost of Addiction in the Workplace
Co-workers having to redirect their focus will experience a reduction to their work productivity. Whether they are worried for their co-worker, or want to avoid confrontation with their co-worker suffering from addiction, there are many ways that an entire team can be affected.
- Team morale: Having an employee suffering from substance addiction in the workplace can affect team morale significantly, whether it’s the CEO or a junior employee. While some addicted people are “high-functioning” and can complete basic work tasks and responsibilities, others may display their symptoms outwardly. These symptoms can manifest in the form of erratic behaviour, irritability, sickness, and so on, which can affect other co-workers.
- Productivity and performance: Someone suffering from substance addiction may experience a significantly impacted performance. If they’re suffering due to a combination of compulsive thoughts, lack of sleep, malnutrition, and other issues associated with addiction, it will significantly affect their productivity in the workplace.
- Workplace safety: Having an intoxicated person – or someone suffering from withdrawal symptoms – in the workplace can be particularly dangerous. If the worker has additional responsibilities that require health and safety training, they are also putting their co-workers at risk.
- Attendance and punctuality: In addition to the level of productivity when in the workplace, addicted people ma struggle with their attendance and punctuality. Whether this means they turn up to work late, miss important meetings, or miss work entirely, it has an affect on the company’s rhythm, productivity, and reputation.
A case study from Canada discovered that the annual cost of lost productivity due to substance use was $15.7 billion. The three substances that were most prominent among addicted workers were alcohol, tobacco, and opioids.
Understanding Workplace Addiction: Causes and Risk Factors
Substance addiction can be caused by a combination of factors, such as genetic, social, environmental, and so on. In fact, a significant amount of substance addiction cases can be attributed to mental health disorders such as anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and more.
Many of these factors or symptoms of mental illness can be exacerbated by someone’s work. Here’s how someone might be affected by their work, and how it can exacerbate their substance addiction.
- Work-related stress: Many people work in an environment that brings forth feelings of stress and anxiety. This can be due to toxic work environments and conflicting work relationships, or a heavy workload, or the feelings of vulnerability that someone has regarding their job security. Work-related stress can lead to or increase symptoms of anxiety and depression, and workers often turn to alcohol or drugs to self-medicate. Additionally, those in higher up positions – particularly men – may avoid expressing their problems due to fears of being judged.
- Burnout: Working at an intense level for a sustained period of time can lead to burnout. Burnout can be a symptom of work-related stress, and it can lead to increased consumption of drugs and alcohol to manage these feelings outside of the workplace.
- Poor sleep & nutrition: Combining work-related stress, long hours, and a sedentary lifestyle can lead to a range of physical issues. Workers may experience decreased quality of sleep, and they are more likely to make poor nutrition choices when fatigued or inundated with work. Due to the lack of time, increased stress and tiredness from work, employees are more likely to purchase convenient food that is processed and unhealthy.
The Benefits of Prioritising Employee Wellbeing
In addition to being considerate, there are many business benefits to prioritising your employees’ and your co-workers’ mental wellbeing. Here’s how you can expect your business and workplace to flourish if you take action towards protecting their mental health:
- Increased productivity: Studies show that companies that focus on their employees’ mental wellbeing saw greater levels of productivity in the workplace.
- Reduced absences and lower employee turnover: Companies and brands that emphasise the importance of wellbeing saw lower levels of absences, and also lower employee turnover rates.
- Improved morale: Employees felt that they could confide in others and communicate in an inclusive, non-judgemental environment reported greater levels of job satisfaction. In the long-term, this can positively reflect on a brand’s image.
How to Implement an Effective Workplace Wellness Strategy
It’s important to not only be proactive when an employee is suffering from substance addiction, but also to be precautionary. There are a range of strategies that employers and companies can implement to improve wellness in the workplace:
- Establish an Employee Assistance Program (EAP): An EAP is a confidential and work-based program that provides support and discretion to employees who are suffering with issues, whether it comes in the form of social, psychological, financial issues, and more. Studies show that companies that integrate EAP initiatives into their programs experience greater levels of wellbeing and productivity, and lower levels of absences. EAP benefits include but are not limited to counselling sessions, professional intervention, financial guidance, and more.
- Wellbeing workshops: Companies can incorporate mental health and wellbeing workshops in order to emphasise the importance of self-care beyond the workplace. Employees face many problems, whether it be social issues, financial insecurity, legal issues, physical problems, and more. A wellbeing workshop can help not only increase awareness of these problems, but also provide inspiration on how to improve your physical, mental, and spiritual health in a holistic approach.
- Offer support resources: Employers and companies can also offer external resources that can support their employees’ wellbeing. From support hotlines, self-help groups, and counselling options, introducing employees to these excellent sources of support can get the ball rolling and encourage them to seek support.
Building a Supportive and Stigma-Free Workplace Culture
It’s important that those in leadership roles – whether it’s the CEO or a manager – emphasises the importance of maintaining your mental and physical health. While implementing counsel and workshops to encourage people to seek support is helpful, employees need to know that this isn’t just a formality or a health and safety quota, but a proactive and healthy workplace.
Here’s how you can harness a safe and healthy workplace:
- Reduce mental health & adduction stigma: Unfortunately, people who don’t suffer from mental health issues or substance addiction may scoff at the idea. As someone who operates in a leadership or managerial role, it’s important to take the concerns of employees seriously, and to help find ways to reduce the mental stress that they’re experiencing in the workplace.
- Use inclusive language: Terms such as “addicts” can be offensive to those suffering from addiction. This is because calling someone an “addict” minimises them to that single characteristic. Rather, consider using more inclusive language such as “addicted person”.
- Educate: To improve mental health and substance addiction awareness in the workplace, consider educating your employees and co-workers. Addiction is a chronic brain disease, and it’s important that people understand the severity and consequences of such conditions.
Harnessing a Productive and Healthy Future
Substance addiction is not just an individual struggle, but a widespread social and economic challenge that affects workplaces, families, and entire communities globally. If an addiction – or another mental health problem – goes unaddressed in the workplace, it can erode productivity, morale, and safety, placing both employees and businesses at risk.
While investing in addiction prevention and mental health awareness is the decent and humane thing to do, it will also greatly improve workplace morale and a cohesive environment. Creating a culture that values wellness and understands addiction as a health condition (not a lifestyle or a personal decision) empowers employees to seek help without fear of stigma. Programs like Employee Assistance Programs (EAPs), wellbeing workshops, and open conversations around mental health can foster resilience, trust, and higher performance across teams.
