ScreenSkills & The Film and TV Charity partner to promote mental wellbeing

ScreenSkills and The Film and TV Charity have partnered to launch Mental Health Training: Guidance for Employers, a new framework to support people in the film and TV sectors responsible for mental health training.

Accessible via the ScreenSkills website, the new framework offers employers (including freelancers and anyone with line management responsibilities) a suite of resources, links and considerations to help them create and implement mental health and related training. It has been informed by independent research for The Film and TV Charity that examined existing mental health and wellbeing training provisions, as well as potential gaps and areas for innovation, development and improvement.

This ground-breaking guidance also explores other types of training linked to the underlying causes of mental health problems that are not always considered. It offers a holistic, industry-specific, and wholly integrated approach to mental health that goes beyond ‘one-off’ training, and which encourages employers to take a broader look by considering sustained and ongoing development opportunities for them and their staff.

Mental Health Training: Guidance for Employers has been developed as part of the Film and TV Charity’s Training+ project, itself part of the organisation’s larger, industry-led initiative to mitigate the mental health emergency in the film, TV, and cinema industries. The guidance has been shaped by a working group comprising the charity’s beneficiaries, freelancers, mental health and workplace wellbeing experts, as well as specialist industry training practitioners and facilitators including ScreenSkills.

ScreenSkills has agreed to host and to maintain the guidance for the whole sector to utilise. The guidance will be highlighted on the website and widely promoted across social media in coming weeks. It will also retain a prominent position in the ScreenSkills information and resources directory so it can be easily accessed by employers whenever it is needed.

Alex Pumfrey, CEO at The Film and TV Charity, said: “We are proud to be partnering with ScreenSkills to deliver this important new guidance for employers. Our research shows that we need to reassess how we think and talk about mental health and wellbeing in film, TV and cinema, and the recent launch of our Let’s Reset behaviour change campaign demonstrated that leaders from across the industry agree with that stance and are committed to taking the steps necessary to do so.

“The new guidance, adopted and developed by ScreenSkills following the charity’s Training+ project they were central to, is a perfect example of how, through partnership and collaboration, we can bring about lasting improvements to mental health and wellbeing. The framework the guidance puts in place will enable employers to equip managers and staff with the right knowledge and understanding and can act as an important step towards ensuring our working culture becomes something to be proud of.”

Seetha Kumar, CEO at ScreenSkills, added: “The work that has been underway to identify and share best practice in supporting good mental health and wellbeing in the screen industries is an important step forward in making our sector a better place to work.

“Thank you to The Film and TV Charity and to everyone in industry who has contributed to developing the guidance and to identifying useful resources and quality training that will enable everyone to play a part in addressing problems that have bedevilled film and TV for too long”