Photo: VitalikRadko/Depositphotos
Nowadays, more and more companies are beginning to take heed of their employees' mental health. However, there's still much that could be done. When a woman named Madalyn Parker decided to take a couple of mental health days, she let her team know via email. What she didn't expect was the reaction of her company's CEO, who reached out with a supportive message.
The woman, who goes by the username @madalynrose on X, shared the original email and the response, which dates back to 2017. “Hey team, I’m taking today and tomorrow off to focus on my mental health. Hopefully, I should be back next week refreshed and back to 100%,” reads her message.
Knowing the importance of mental health, Parker has strived to be vocal and explicit about it, hoping to inspire her peers to do the same. “I'm specific to be an example so my team knows that they can feel comfortable taking sick leave for mental health, even if they don't say it,” she later added.
Many managers would be somewhat reluctant about her choice. But Parker's boss, Ben Congleton, completely supported her and thanked her for her transparency. “I just wanted to personally thank you for using emails like this. Every time you do, I use it as a reminder of the importance of using sick days for mental health—I cannot believe it's not standard practice at all organizations,” he wrote. “You are an example to us all, and help cut through the stigma so we can all bring our whole selves to work.”
Today, Parker continues her mission to put mental health at the forefront. She is a Senior Engineer working on the Accessibility Insights team at Microsoft, where she builds Open Source tools that make it easier to know if an app is accessible during development. “I hope you’ll join me in my mission to make the web a more inclusive, safer place,” reads her website. “I believe that it’s difficult to be your best self when you stifle parts of your identity so I work hard to be vulnerable and honest about where my brain is at.”
To stay up to date with her, you can follow her on X.
When a woman named Madalyn Parker decided to take a couple of mental health days, her company's CEO reached out with a supportive message.
Photo: yanlev/Depositphotos
“Hey team, I’m taking today and tomorrow off to focus on my mental health. Hopefully, I should be back next week refreshed and back to 100%,” reads her email.
Photo:alexey_boldin/Depositphotos
Parker's boss, Ben Congleton, completely supported her and thanked her for her transparency. “I just wanted to personally thank you for using emails like this.”
Photo: fizkes/Depositphotos
You can read the original messages.
When the CEO responds to your out of the office email about taking sick leave for mental health and reaffirms your decision. pic.twitter.com/6BvJVCJJFq
— madalyn (@madalynrose) June 30, 2017
h/t: [Good]
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