Five former staff of the government’s mental health watchdog say they quit because of a workplace environment that they alleged was “toxic” and dysfunctional, and impacted their well-being.
Te Hiringa Mahara, the Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission, was established nearly three years ago to track the progress of Labour’s $2 billion mental health reforms. It claims to be a “courageous” advocate for people who have experienced psychological distress and addiction.
The fledgling agency, which has about 20 fulltime employees, has been accused of fostering a workplace where some former staff became so stressed that they left, according to interviews with multiple sources and documents obtained by the Herald.
“This position has been the most stressful, awful experience of my working life,” one former employee claimed in an exit interview that was shared with the chief executive Karen Orsborn and chairman Hayden Wano.
“I have been stressed since day one, regularly work weekends, [and] have had to go on antidepressants to cope.”
That former employee described numerous alleged problems at the commission, including excessive workloads and poor planning around major projects. “I’ve observed staff regularly crying at work,” they claimed.
Orsborn and Wano declined to be interviewed. In an emailed statement, Orsborn said the commission “takes a different view” of the matters raised in the exit interview and would not comment on specific details about an individual’s employment because of privacy obligations.
“I categorically reject the extreme description of the workplace environment of Te Hiringa Mahara,” Orsborn said.
Four other former employees told the Herald they shared their former colleague’s concerns about the workplace culture and left because of this. None wanted to be identified because they feared it would jeopardise their employment prospects in other government departments.
Contact the reporter on this story: alex.spence@nzme.co.nz
“There was a lot of pressure on employees to get quite a large volume of work done, fast turnaround, in a way that didn’t necessarily make sense,” said a second former employee.
This former employee claimed they told their manager they had felt close to burning out on a project and were told that burnout does not exist.
“The work was really affecting my mental health, but it felt like that was a personal failing of mine,” the former employee said. They said the experience wrecked their professional confidence and they left the commission soon after.
Another former worker said they believed there were unrealistic expectations placed on the commission’s small teams which resulted in “gruelling time schedules and being constantly under the pump”.
They claimed that concerns about workloads were raised by staff on numerous occasions in meetings, but it got to a point that some people “didn’t want to get up in the morning and go to work because it’s so stressful”.
They alleged there was a “toxic culture” and claimed they left because of the effect it was having on them.
“I couldn’t take it,” that former worker said. “This is not the place for me. Life is too short.”
“This should be the first place where you see people thriving, that people are happy,” another former employee said, and claimed, “This is the exact opposite of a workplace that has a healthy mental state.”
Several sources said they were particularly dismayed by the experience of a colleague who was allegedly put into a formal performance management process that could have resulted in termination after six weeks at the agency because they were having administrative problems. Those former staffers believed the action was harsh and unnecessary, and they said it was extremely distressing for their colleague.
According to the commission’s figures, five fulltime employees resigned in the 2022-23 financial year, which ends in June, about a quarter of the staff. Several others have resigned since then.
The commission says turnover is consistent with other government departments, but the former employees said the churn has been disruptive for a small agency trying to establish itself.
For the former employees, concerns about the workplace culture were compounded by a sense that the commission was not fulfilling its ambitious mandate. Several sources said they did not believe it had established itself as an influential voice in a mental health sector fraught with problems.
One said they felt they spent most of their time producing long reports that, in their opinion, “nobody reads”. “It’s pretty toothless,” they said.
Another former staff member told the Herald they had not had a negative experience working there. “I’ve worked in harsh cultures,” they said. “This was not a harsh culture.”
But they also believed it had not been an effective watchdog or adviser to the government. “I think they’re invisible a lot of the time,” they claimed.
The Herald also obtained summaries of staff surveys that were conducted in the past two years. According to these summaries, in 2022 the organisation had an overall score of 62 per cent. The board was told it had “a solid platform upon which to build improvements”.
Strengths included that employees were “purpose-driven and committed to the work the commission does”, but that year’s survey also identified problems relating to communication, the collaboration between teams, and complaints about “unfair and unsustainable workloads”.
Also flagged as a concern was the score when staff were asked if they “feel safe to tell the truth even when it’s unpopular”. The summary said: “This indicates a lack of trust and some of the free text comments indicate that trust is an issue.”
In 2023, the organisation’s overall survey score was 59 per cent. “Staff view Te Hiringa Mahara [as] a great place to work,” the board was told, but several problems were also raised, including frustrations among some people that “projects are not delivering outcomes that meet the needs of stakeholders” and “inappropriate or poor performance not being understood [or] addressed”.
When Te Hiringa Mahara learned that the Herald was investigating allegations from former employees, executives spent several days discussing how to respond, according to internal documents. Staff were told to expect media attention and an urgent board meeting was called.
Several drafts of a written statement were prepared and circulated among executives and board members. At first, they seemed to strive for an empathetic tone. “We are very sorry to hear that former staff members have left the organisation not feeling well supported,” said one draft.
“We acknowledge that the experiences of former staff is not what we would like any staff member to have with Te Hiringa Mahara,” said another.
Orsborn told several of her direct reports in an email: “I am not dismissing the areas that that we need to work on in any way, we are actively working on these.”
But after an urgent weekend board meeting, the commission appears to have decided to push back more firmly.
Orsborn called a meeting of the current staff, where she said: “The leadership team and board are united in rejecting these allegations.
“We have a diverse workforce and a relatively new team, and we have made good progress towards building a healthy workplace environment.
“We know there are areas where we can do better, and we have plans in place to address these areas. However, when pressure points have been identified, or staff have raised concerns, we have responded to these quickly.”
In a statement emailed to the Herald, Orsborn said: “We care deeply about our staff, and their wellbeing is our top priority.”
She said the commission actively manages workloads and expectations and provides its employees with professional development, flexible working, and counselling if they need it.
Wano said the board receives regular updates about staffing issues and is confident that effective measures are being taken to respond to any problems.
“From my interaction with staff, I see every sign of an engaged and energised team,” Wano said.
The commission said it would reach out to some former employees to ask if they want to share experiences that could improve its processes. It has engaged a dispute resolution facilitator to conduct the interviews. To date, Wano said, no one has yet taken up the opportunity.
Alex Spence is a senior investigative journalist based in Auckland. Before joining the Herald, he spent 17 years in London, where he worked for the Times, Politico, and BuzzFeed News. He can be reached at alex.spence@nzme.co.nz or by text or secure Signal messaging at 027 235 8834.
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