Novo Nordisk has goals to cut workplace stress. Here’s how it plans to achieve it

“I don’t think you could run a company if more than 10% of your employees are suffering from stress,” says Novo Nordisk CEO, Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen.

The healthcare company is looking to cut the number of people in its workforce suffering from stress.

Around 14% of its 64,000-plus employees reported symptoms of stress last year, and the company has set a target of reducing that. With every passing year, the organization aims to reduce its number of stressed workers by 10%.

A “well-designed psychosocial working environment” is necessary for people to perform well in their jobs, as well as ensure their good mental wellbeing, the company believes. And while work-related stress is an occupational risk, it is also companies’ responsibility to manage stress and workplace wellbeing.

“We acknowledge that we see stress in the organization, but we also see it as a risk for working for us,” says Nadia El-Salanti, Organizational Psychologist at Novo Nordisk. “Work-related stress is linked to people being very ambitious … Having the ability to attract very talented and highly ambitious people into a very ambitious company can create a toxic cocktail because there is a risk of people becoming so engaged and so committed to our very compelling purpose that they might compromise their own mental health and wellbeing, in order to perform and deliver.”

Stress is a problem the world over. With over 1.3 billion formal workers globally, the World Economic Forum’s Healthy Workforces Initiative aims to share best practices and help organizations and communities prioritize and advance physical and mental health in the workplace.

Establishing a baseline has been an important first step in making progress at Novo Nordisk. Employees are asked about their levels of stress-symptoms in annual surveys, including how long they have felt stress and whether it can be attributed to work life, home life or a combination of the two.

Ten years ago, over a fifth of employees reported symptoms of stress. With the exception of a small peak when COVID hit in 2020, this number has fallen consistently until reaching a plateau of 14% for the past three years. Over this time, El-Salanti says, the company has grown significantly and also been under pressure to deliver and expand the product portfolio. She takes the fact that this has not resulted in increased stress as a sign the company is doing something right, but wants to continue to make progress on bringing down stress levels.

This has been achieved through a multi-pronged approach that involves engagement, understanding and training across senior management, line managers and HR. In addition, employees need to be supported in developing strategies to prevent stress and build resilience.

Novo Nordisk breaks its stress prevention strategy into three buckets. Tertiary prevention is when employees are stressed and burnt out and the company needs to take steps to support their recovery. But key to avoiding reaching that stage are the two steps beforehand. Being able to spot and support employees dealing with stress or at risk of dealing with stress – or secondary prevention – is a large part of making sure the problem doesn’t escalate. And better still is primary prevention – designing a workplace that minimizes harm and stress to employees.

Underpinning this, Novo Nordisk has made an effort to increase awareness of mental health and reduce stigma across the organization.

Stress can come from multiple interlinked sources. These can be organizational, relating to structure and changes, clarity of direction, culture, ways of working and support. They can be at a smaller unit or team-based level relating to things like management quality and leadership skills, work organization and the psychosocial element. Or they can come from an individual level relating to personal ambitions, competencies and traits or someone’s private life.

Novo Nordisk leans on six factors identified by researchers as influencing stress – they can have a positive impact when they exist, but their absence has a negative impact. These are: influence/control; social support; predictability; recognition; and meaning.

“When we see stress and people not thriving in the workplace, it is not always because of workload. There can be many factors that actually contribute – if you don't have any support, if you're working alone, if you don't get recognition, if you don't do something that you find meaningful – all of this will have an impact on our wellbeing at the workplace,” El-Salanti explains.

The company has taken a bottom-up approach, mapping out risk factors in each team and department. These are then translated into actions to come up with specific ways these risks can be addressed for each area. Any systemic root causes are escalated.

This is coupled with a top-down approach, where senior management and leaders request insights and feedback.

“People don't want to bring up bad news upwards. We also have leaders that are very ambitious so they try to contain and fix and they don't want to raise problems,” El-Salanti says. “I told our executive leadership team, you need to also request the bad news. So when are direct reports struggling? And what things as a senior leader can you do to support that? We need to have that conversation, tear down the layers and have a genuine focus on actually making improvements.”