In a modern world full of pressures pushing and pulling in different directions, awareness of mental health is becoming increasingly crucial to maintaining employee welfare and engagement.
In the spirit of member engagement and working for the greater good that is a burgeoning hallmark of the MIA, Pam at Moseley Violins has kindly pointed us towards Music Support and we feel it is an invaluable resource to share with the wider industry.
Music Support is a registered charity run by industry veterans and started as a result of the founders’ own experiences of various mental health and addiction issues. They had seen industry colleagues lose their careers, friends, families and lives as a result of mental pressures, and decided it was vital to find a better way of offering support.
Your own experiences will tell you that a happy and supported team is vital to the ongoing success of your business whether you are a retailer or manufacturer, and being able to signpost colleagues and staff to sources of support when they need it is essential to retaining talented people who need some TLC. This also encourages long-term loyalty from your staff, knowing that they will be supported rather than vilified if they go through a difficult spell.
This is also a service that you can share with your customers who may be battling with a range of mental and emotional challenges. It’s a simple way to show customers that you care and to demonstrate that you have awareness of the society in which you do business.
The charity’s values chime with those of the MIA and are encapsulated in a few bullet points:
- Inclusion. Music Support is open to everyone in the industry regardless of background, role or music genre.
- Safety. We create a confidential environment and observe the highest standards of personal data protection and governance
- Courage. We’re proud to stand for who we are and what we believe in and support others to do the same
- Passion. We believe in the power of transformational change because we have experienced it in our own lives
- Innovation. We find new solutions to addressing mental health and addiction problems in the music industry
- Understanding. We are shaped by our experience of the unique pressures wrought by our industry
Take a few minutes to look at the Music Support website, and to discover the support that you can guide your team members towards as and when they need it.
