Inside Out: Mental Health at Work and in Life

About Inside Out: Mental Health at Work and in Life

In this MHScot (https://www.mentalhealthscot.land/)-hosted podcast, we break down barriers and spark conversations about mental health. Starting in the workplace and extending outward, we’ll explore tools, stories, and initiatives that shape a healthier, more inclusive world. Whether you’re an employer, employee, or community member, tune in to discover actionable insights, challenge assumptions, and learn how nurturing well-being from the inside out helps us all thrive.

Publisher

MHScot Workplace Wellbeing CIC

Category

business · business · business · health & fitness · society & culture

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

15 Dec 2024

Latest episode

31 Aug 2026

Latest episodes

47 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   31 Aug 2026

   Talking a Good Game: Support Before the Crisis

   n this episode of Inside Out: Mental Health at Work and in Life, I'm joined by Justin Ray, a psychiatric nurse practitioner in Virginia. Justin owns South Chesapeake Psychiatry and Transforming Minds Interventional Psychiatry, and is the provider for the City of Chesapeake's Assertive Community Team. Justin spent 22 years in the US Navy, thirteen of them as a psychiatric technician, before qualifying as a psychiatric nurse practitioner. He now runs two practices in Virginia and works with an Assertive Community Team, reaching people with severe mental health problems who are unlikely ever to walk into a clinic. He calls it street psychiatry. That range gives him a particular view of where organisations go wrong. Plenty of workplaces tell people to speak up when they are struggling, then judge them when they do. As Justin puts it, we talk a good game without acting a good game. He makes the case for support that arrives before the crisis rather than after it, boundaries that leaders actually keep, and autonomy matched to what each person can carry, with room to step back and try again without it counting against them. We get into why leaders so often ask the wrong people. The most senior person in a field may not have seen a patient in years, and an answer that works on paper is not always the one that works in someone's front room. He is blunt about one-mistake cultures too: an organisation runs a process well ninety-nine times, gets it wrong once, and cancels the whole thing. Justin is just as honest about his own judgements, telling a story about a cinema in Puerto Rico, a room full of other people's children, and everything he thought before he had his own. What he takes from it is that reflection is the thing most of us skip. That sits awkwardly against workplaces now so lean that people are doing two jobs and the time to think has been designed out. 🔑 Key Topics Saying the right things about mental health, then punishing people who speak up Support that arrives before the crisis, not after it Autonomy as something matched to the person, not handed out evenly Why leaders ask the wrong people, and what gets lost between the conference and the front room One-mistake cultures, and the paralysis of needing every box ticked before anything moves Judgement, bias and the reflection almost nobody makes time for Where AI genuinely helps, and where it just adds to the pile Critical thinking, and why the best answer is rarely the only one 💡 Did You Know? Assertive Community Teams work the opposite way round to most mental health services. Rather than waiting for people to come to appointments, the team goes to them, often to people who are homeless or moving in and out of hospital. Justin says the things getting in the way are usually ordinary ones, transport as much as anything else. 📝 Actionable Takeaways Offer support before someone reaches crisis, rather than asking afterwards why nobody noticed Check who you are asking. Put the expert view alongside someone doing the work today When something goes wrong once, adjust the process instead of scrapping it Match autonomy to the person, and let someone step back without it counting against them Protect time to reflect. It is the first thing a lean organisation quietly loses Make it safe to bring an idea, and safe to question one 🗣️ Join the Conversation Does your workplace offer support before things get bad, or only once someone is already struggling? Share your thoughts and connect with us. Connect with Justin Ray: South Chesapeake Psychiatry, his Facebook, Instagram and YouTube are linked there: https://www.southchesapeakepsychiatry.com/ (https://www.southchesapeakepsychiatry.com/) LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/justin-ray-pmhnp (https://www.linkedin.com/in/justin-ray-pmhnp) The Neuropsychiatry Brief, his newsletter: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/the-neuropsychiatry-brief-7419766362270494721 (https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/the-neuropsychiatry-brief-7419766362270494721) Transforming Minds on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61583368707307 (https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61583368707307)

2. 

   24 Aug 2026

   Knowing Yourself: Values, Meaning and the Work You Do

   In this episode of Inside Out: Mental Health at Work and in Life, I'm joined by Eloise Skinner, an existential psychotherapist, former corporate lawyer and fitness teacher. Eloise spent five years in corporate tax law before retraining as a psychotherapist. She works in existential therapy, the field concerned with meaning, purpose, identity and values, and she also teaches yoga and Pilates. That mix shapes how she sees workplace wellbeing. Not mental health as a separate box, but what she calls integrated wellness, where physical health, community, a clear mission and a sense of greater meaning all sit together. We talk about what organisational change does to the people inside it. Eloise's point is that a shift in mission, or a period of scaling, arrives personally for every individual in the business, and that saying so out loud matters more than most leaders realise. We also get into distance: how easy it is in a large organisation to sit a hundred steps away from the person your work eventually helps, and how much motivation goes missing in that gap. The practical heart of the conversation is values. Eloise walks through an exercise anyone can do with a sheet of paper, and explains why an argument at work that upsets you far more than it should is often a value conflict rather than a personality clash. 🔑 Key Topics Integrated wellness, and why mental, physical and emotional health can't be split apart at work What organisational change does to the people inside it, and why acknowledgement matters The distance between someone's daily tasks and the person their work eventually helps Leaders embodying what they ask of others, and the existential idea of dialogue The knowledge held by people lower down an organisation that never travels upwards A values exercise you can do on a sheet of paper Why a disproportionate reaction at work is often a value conflict Career change, portfolio working, and why fewer young people want to become managers 💡 Did You Know? Eloise estimates that around 90% of people entering psychotherapy come to it as a career change, often later in life. Her own route was five years in corporate tax law first. 📝 Actionable Takeaways Write down every value that matters to you, group the similar ones together, then narrow it to about five. For each of those five, write an example of what it looks like in practice. It brings them to life. Through the week, notice when you're living those values and when you're in conflict with them. A repeated conflict is telling you something. If your organisation is changing, name the personal effect out loud. Don't assume people will simply switch over. Connect the daily work to the person it eventually helps, and make that connection visible to the people doing it. If a job isn't a long-term fit, making the plan matters even when the move is years away. The autonomy is what helps now. 🗣️ Join the Conversation When did you last stop and ask what actually matters to you at work? Share your thoughts and connect with us on social media. Connect with Eloise: Website (https://www.eloiseskinner.com)| Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/eloiseallexia) https://www.eloiseskinner.com (https://www.eloiseskinner.com) https://www.instagram.com/eloiseallexia (https://www.instagram.com/eloiseallexia) UKCP research behind the 90% figure: https://www.psychotherapy.org.uk/news/personal-experience-in-psychotherapy-is-a-growing-motivator-for-joining-the-profession/ (https://www.psychotherapy.org.uk/news/personal-experience-in-psychotherapy-is-a-growing-motivator-for-joining-the-profession/)

3. 

   17 Aug 2026

   Not a Personality Flaw: Stress, the Nervous System and Work

   In this episode of Inside Out: Mental Health at Work and in Life, I'm joined by Charmian Johnson, a former global law firm partner, now founder of Charm Johnson Coaching and a Partner of The Mental Wellbeing Company. Through nervous system-aware training and coaching, she helps law firms reduce absence and attrition while improving performance and wellbeing. She also helps female lawyers move from overthinking and self-doubt to self-trust and feeling more like themselves again. Charmian trained in trauma-informed coaching at weekends while still practising, and what she learned changed how she understood herself and her own career. She had received feedback that under pressure, she could sometimes come across as frosty and irritable which she hated. At the time she struggled to see how she could do anything about it without changing the demands of the job. What she had never been taught, during three decades in law, despite mental health training, awareness sessions and resilience training, was anything at all about the nervous system. We talk about why organisations are spending more on wellbeing than ever and still asking why it is not working. Charmian believes an often overlooked piece is biological: understanding how our nervous system influences the way we think, feel and behave under pressure. Once people understand why they show up the way they do, the question in a workplace can change from "what is wrong with Dave in accounts" to "I wonder what is going on for him", and that small shift can change almost everything that follows. We also get into language. Charmian has learned that walking into a corporate environment and talking about being "trauma informed" can create misconceptions about what the work involves. In the workplace it doesn't mean a therapist digging into their staff's childhoods. However talking instead about being "nervous system aware" can open the door to the same important conversation about stress, behaviour and performance in a way that feels relevant and accessible in the workplace. 🔑 Key Topics Why wellbeing budgets keep growing while the results stay flat Nervous system awareness as the piece traditional wellbeing strategies leave out The invisible backpack of trauma we all carry into work, and why nobody else can see it Why "trauma informed" can close doors that "nervous system aware" opens Training everyone rather than a few, and the gap it creates when you don't 💡 Did You Know? A CIPD finding Charmian cites: half of organisations taking steps to reduce workplace stress did not think their wellbeing initiatives were effective. [Source: CIPD, Health and Wellbeing At Work: Survey Report, September 2025] 📝 Actionable Takeaways Notice the body before the behaviour. Shoulders around your ears, a clenched jaw and shallow breathing are early signs of a stress response, and they arrive before the outburst does Change the question. "I wonder what is going on for them" gets you somewhere that "what is wrong with them" never will Train the whole workforce, not a handful. When some people understand this and others don't, you have built a gap between them Ask someone for a coffee and a catch up. Charmian found some people who had not been asked once in five years Look at your data for overworking as well as absence. Both tell you something is wrong 🗣️ Join the Conversation Has anyone ever explained to you why your body reacts the way it does at work? Share your thoughts and connect with us on social media. Connect with Charmian: LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/charmian-johnson-4a99725b/) | Website (https://charmjohnson.thementalwellbeingcompany.com/) https://www.linkedin.com/in/charmian-johnson-4a99725b/ (https://www.linkedin.com/in/charmian-johnson-4a99725b/) https://charmjohnson.thementalwellbeingcompany.com/ (https://charmjohnson.thementalwellbeingcompany.com/)

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Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.