With a little help from my friends: Introducing the Wellbeing Heroes

This year Delivery Hero launched the Wellbeing Heroes, a group of 19 volunteers dedicated to helping make Delivery Hero a safer space for talking openly about mental health and to aid colleagues in getting the help they need. The ongoing global pandemic has brought about unforeseen and unprecedented circumstances with detrimental effects on our mental health, the full extent of which is still unknown. Read on to find out more about the Wellbeing Heroes, their purpose, and how they came to exist.

The Wellbeing Heroes are a group at Delivery Hero composed of employees of all levels. Although they are not an Employee Resource Group (ERG), they do compliment our ERGs (the Female Heroes, the Muslim Heroes, and the Proud Heroes.)  According to the World Health Organization (WHO), Approximately 280 million people in the world have depression, with an increase of 13% over the last decade. As lockdown persisted and the uncertainty of the pandemic became a long-lasting situation we found ourselves living in the importance of connection and mental health became even more of a prevalent topic. A recent WHO survey found, that the COVID-19 pandemic has caused a disruption or halted critical mental health services in 93% of countries worldwide all the while as the demand for mental health has increased.

The initial spark to create the concept of the Wellbeing Heroes was an idea that was born from the Mental Wellbeing Program. The Mental Wellbeing Program was started so employees would feel supported in their mental wellbeing as well as be educated, empowered, and aware of how they can access support for themselves as well as help their fellow Heroes. Furthermore, it aims to continue to normalize, destigmatize and inform the conversation and culture around mental wellbeing and health at Delivery Hero.

“Delivery Hero is committed to championing the Mental Health and Wellbeing topics. The Mental Health First Aid training means that all heroes are well equipped to be an active and empathetic ear to those staff in need as well as a great vehicle to guide them to professional support services if they would like.”

– Patrick Rowse, Mental Wellbeing Program Coordinator & Wellbeing Hero

The first steps towards the conception of the Mental Wellbeing Program were taken in March 2020 in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. As the world transitioned into a temporary but unknown way of life, the effects of loss of connection and overall mental health were detrimental.

The program was created through a coalition of different departments.  Together Delivery Heroes’ Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), Total Rewards, and Communication teams built the Mental Wellbeing Program throughout the first two quarters of 2020 with the program being formalized in the third quarter and finally launching in the final part of 2020.

The Program team includes Patrick Rowse as program coordinator, Lucie Verneret handling internal communications, Sophie d’Arcangelo handling the content, as well as Mirna Bley and Isadora Cerri rounding out the group with their expertise in the Mental Health support channels and benefits Delivery Hero Provides

Early in the first quarter, the Mental Wellbeing Program created the idea for the Wellbeing Heroes, as an additional mental health support mechanism for our Heroes. In the second quarter, 27 key staff members were upskilled with Mental Health First Aid training and in the third quarter of the year, the Wellbeing Heroes community was launched with 19 upskilled staff volunteering their services to further help their fellow heroes.

“Being part of the Wellbeing Heroes has taught me so much – not only methods of help but how to look out for signs of anxiety and how to listen carefully to my colleagues. It helps us to strengthen our community and teams – to really care for each other.”

-Lucie Verneret, Wellbeing Hero

The concept behind the Wellbeing Heroes is to provide dedicated support from one Hero to another. The Wellbeing Heroes are a peer-to-peer support group, there to assist each other in getting help, providing a confidential person to reach out to who can guide our Heroes towards resources and professional assistance. The idea is to encourage Heroes to move past the generic “how are you” and to start having real conversations with colleagues about mental health.

The overall effect the pandemic has had on our mental health is still unknown, but as we cautiously partially emerge from the last year it is important to acknowledge that the process might be an unknown and long one. This marks the importance of groups like the Wellbeing Heroes and their role and necessity will only continue to grow as the Wellbeing Program expands, and more Heroes join the initiative.

Check out the Wellbeing website here for more information on the program.