Effects and Side Effects in a Short Work Coaching for Participants with and without Mental Illness

Employees with mental illness are often the first to be unable to cope with increasingly complex psychosocial work demands. But people without mental illness can also suffer from, for example, high workload. This study compares a short coaching to stabilize work ability for employees with and without mental illness regarding coaching topics, effects on work-related resources, goal attainment, and unwanted events. Individual coaching of three sessions (problem exploration by behavior analysis, practice of new behavior, reflection) was conducted with employees from different professional fields. A medical history was taken to determine whether participants are affected by a mental disorder. All coaching was conducted by the same behavior therapist in training (L.P.W.) under the supervision of an experienced behavior therapist (B.M.). Two hundred and three coachings with three sessions were completed. In total, 103 participants did not have a mental illness (51%), and 100 participants reported a mental disorder (49%). The coaching participants with mental illness had lower initial levels of work-related capacities (more severe impairments) and coping behavior as compared to the participants without mental illness. In the pre-post comparisons, both groups achieved significant improvements in work-related coping after the coaching. There were no differences in goal attainment between both groups. While participants without mental illness reported more unwanted events in parallel to the coaching (30% reported negative developments in life), participants with mental illness reported coaching-related unwanted events (20% felt to be dependent on the coach). Coaching with an individual focus on one topic can improve work-related resources in participants with and without mental disorders. Since participants with and without mental illness experience different unwanted events in coaching, psychotherapeutic expertise is needed in order to set the right focus.