Joe Blomeley makes it clear that executives should embrace talking about mental health. “We need to be open and honest,” says the executive vice president and head of GreenShield Health at GreenShield, Canada’s only national non-profit health care and insurance organization, who often talks to employees at his office about his own struggles with anxiety and depression. 

It’s a message companies across the country must heed today, with more people suffering from mental health issues than ever before. According to Mental Health Research Canada (MHRC), 39 per cent of employees in Canada reported feeling burned out in 2024, up from 35 per cent the year prior, while a 2025 survey from GreenShield and MHRC found that more than 80 per cent of Canadian youth are overwhelmed by stress and anxiety about their futures.

The impact of this crisis is significant: one report found that burnout-related productivity losses and salary costs can exceed $3.4 million a year for a company with 500 employees. That has a major impact on productivity at both the business and economic levels. “The numbers bear that out,” says Blomeley. “There is an actual impact on absenteeism, and that ultimately affects the challenges around Canada’s productivity crisis.”

A collection of crises

It’s unlikely Canada’s mental health crisis will improve anytime soon, says Akela Peoples, chief executive officer at MHRC. That’s because the increasing feelings of burnout and depression relate to the growing financial, societal and economic issues that are beyond one person’s control.

Whether it’s Canada’s affordability crisis, which is putting home ownership out of reach for many, the United States’ fracturing relationship with Canada, which is causing economic anxiety, or the rise of AI, which is making many worry about their jobs, there’s a lot weighing on people today. 

Those pressures are reflected in new data. A February 2025 survey by GreenShield and MHRC found that 42 per cent of Canadians report economic conditions having a negative impact on their mental health, the highest level recorded since MHRC started collecting data. At the same time, 39 per cent say they struggle to pay their bills, and 43 per cent say watching the news negatively affects their mental health. 

“We have enormous systems issues here,” Peoples said during a roundtable in January on Canada’s mental health crisis, hosted by The Logic and GreenShield. “If we’re trying to build our economy, mental health has to be addressed.”

If workplaces don’t support their employees, there’s a real risk that many will simply leave their jobs. That’s what Kearie Daniel, the founder and Executive Director of the Black Women’s Institute for Health, is seeing among Black women, who, she says, have higher rates of self-harm than the average Canadian. “I see Black women tapping out,” she says. “They’re quitting the employment space, and they’re doing freelance work or other work where they can have more control or peace of mind.”

People impact productivity

When it comes to Canada’s productivity challenges, many people talk about increasing innovation and investing in research and development. But, Candace Laing, president and CEO of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, said everyone’s forgetting “the people part of the equation,” a remark she made during the January roundtable. 

Getting this right is particularly important today, as Canada can no longer rely on the U.S. to help fuel its own growth. According to the Bank of Canada, if since 2000 productivity growth in Canada had been similar to that of other G7 nations, GDP in this country would be about 9 per cent higher than it is today. With the U.S. threatening to tear up trade agreements and impose additional tariffs, employees and businesses have to operate at a higher capacity. 

Fortunately, the private sector can help to improve people’s well-being and therefore productivity. In the past, companies that required staff to use heavy machinery or work in underground mines trained them to discuss how they felt about their work and whether there were any problems or concerns, which improved safety records, Laing noted. These workers were given the opportunity to express themselves, which could also benefit those struggling with mental health. 

As a leader, Laing went through Mental Health First Aid training, and it had a profound impact on her. “It changed how I think about mental health, how I parent, how I lead my team and coach them in conversations on a daily basis,” she said. “The private sector has an opportunity to equip ourselves and our employees to take those skills into society.”

Bringing more support to staff

During COVID-19, the private sector was much more engaged on mental health issues, says Blomeley, but the strategies many companies put in place are now falling by the wayside. “It was a big talking point, but I don’t hear organizations saying they’re setting up a concerted mental health strategy that will cascade down to all employees,” he says. 

One of the problems, especially around the productivity question, is that it can be easier to track return on investments in technology or equipment than on people. But an effective mental health strategy – and every company should have one, says Blomeley – must be rooted in returns. 

“The people who make decisions on mental health investments, often a chief financial officer, want to see ROI,” he explains. That could include metrics on employee engagement, absenteeism rates, employee assistance program (EAP) usage, and improvements in symptoms, though any programs focused on health outcomes must be clinically validated and overseen by medical professionals, he notes. 

EAPs themselves must be an integral part of an overall strategy, says Blomeley, so that staff have a place to go when they need to talk about their mental health. When assessing a plan, consider the size of the clinical network, ease of access and the breadth of integrated offerings. In particular, a good program must offer virtual support, with GreenShield finding that nearly 80 per cent of the employees who use its EAP system access care online. It’s also important that employees who need more support than the EAP have a way to access the public system for the care they need. 

For Blomeley, improving the mental health crisis—and the corresponding productivity challenge—can’t be done without companies openly talking about these issues. That means having executives stand up and share their own stories. The first time Blomeley spoke about his mental health in 2021, he received more than 200 emails from colleagues. Some asked for help and others shared their stories, he says. 

If only he could have heard from others when he was starting out. “It would have made a huge difference to hear senior leaders acknowledge that they’ve waged their own battles,” he says. “It would’ve made me feel less alone. Nobody’s perfect. Everyone goes through something.”

This content was paid for and directed by GreenShield, Canada’s first national non-profit health care and insurance organization, and was produced independently of The Logic’s newsroom in consultation with the advertiser. You can read our policies on advertising, sponsorships and partnerships here.