A Very Warm Welcome for the Recovery-Friendly Workplace
Wanna be a boss? As in a bonafide, tried and true, leader of the pack? Then turn your workspot into a recovery-friendly workplace. This way you’ll not only be at the forefront of America’s new recovery movement, but you’ll also show both allegiance to and support for the 46 million Americans who make up that movement. And who wouldn’t want forty-six million new friends?
Recovery-Ready Workplace
We got the goods from Erika Fry at Yahoo Finance, who in turn got the goods from Fortune. The piece not only provides eye-opening information re recovery-friendly workplace culture, but it offers links to some serious recovery-friendly stakeholders, including the U.S. Department of Labor, who hosts its own Recovery-Ready Workplace resource hub.
To wit:
Recovery-ready workplaces adopt policies and practices that:
- expand employment opportunities for people in or seeking recovery;
- facilitate help-seeking among employees with substance use disorder (SUD);
- ensure access to needed services, including treatment, recovery support, and mutual aid;
- inform employees in recovery that they may have the right to reasonable accommodations and other protections that can help them keep their jobs;
- reduce the risk of substance misuse and SUD, including through education and steps to prevent injury in the workplace;
- educate all levels of the organization on SUD and recovery, working to reduce stigma and misunderstanding, including by facilitating open discussion on the topic; and,
- ensure that prospective and current employees understand that the employer is recovery-ready and are familiar with relevant policies and resources.
The Department’s handy-dandy go-to hub provides much more than helpful data though. In fact, the hub works as much as an encourager, detailing the various steps necessary for creating a recovery-friendly workplace, from Getting Started through assessment and recruitment. It’s also in the process of creating a Recovery-Ready Workplace Toolkit, so the employer is sure to have all their proverbial ducks in a proverbial row.
Recovery-Friendly Workplace
Just what makes a workplace a recovery-friendly workplace? Well, the implementation of various practices and procedures, of course. More importantly, the boss has to have a wide open mind.
It also helps to have solid support, like that provided by the good folks at New Jersey’s exemplary Community in Crisis. This outfit has the right idea alright – and it’s a bright idea too:
Being a Recovery Friendly Workplace is good economic policy. It’s also a good HR and healthcare policy.
And how! Recovery Works CT echoes the Bernardsville, North Jersey Community in Crisis crew. They also provide ammo to those ready, willing and eager to ramp up the action:
When substance use affects the health of your organization, there’s a new direction in how to handle it.
It’s called the Recovery Friendly Workplace initiative – and it can take your business to better morale, better bottom-line performance, and happier, healthier, loyal, long-term employees.
Recovery Works CT actually gets companies and organizations sorted and cited as Recovery-Friendly Workplaces. That includes organizations such as the recently-recognized DOMUS, which has a great track record helping at-risk young adults. In fact, 93% of recently-released Domus participants remained arrest-free during their first year. And 80% of Stamford High’s Domus Knights Program participants were promoted to the next grade level.
Twin Kids of Different Moms
Like Domus, Community in Crisis knows well of what they speak. Heck, since both employ national tactics to counter local issues, you might say the two are twin kids of different Moms. The North Jersey-based CIC was formed after a pair of overdose deaths rocked close-knit Somerset Hills, and a scrum of local leaders, stakeholders and faith-based organizations decided to step up before the problem got outta hand.
And boy, did they step up! Guided by the 2014 Governor’s Council on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse (GCADA) Report, Community in Crisis became one of the first few federally-funded Drug Free Communities (DFC) to completely focus on the opioid crisis. Better still, the widely diverse group still counts a 100-person strong list of volunteers, even after a full decade.
Okay, so Drug Free Communities concentrates on adolescent and young adult prevention, but that doesn’t mean recovery-friendly workplaces are out of their scope. In fact, they know how much a recovery-friendly employer can mean to a young person who’s struggling with addiction. Consequently, the Crisis crew uses its Community Hub homebase to support and encourage work place transitioning whenever and wherever possible.
Then again, when you’re an integral part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Strategies and Partnerships, providing solid support is simply a part of your mandate.
Recovery-Friendly Workplace: State by State
Ever since New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu kicked off the Recovery Friendly Workplace Initiative back in 2018, the smarter of the other 49 states have been stepping up to join him. And why wouldn’t they? After all, governors are only too well aware at whatever problems happen to be plaguing their state. They’re also generally well aware at how much those problems cost their state, in lost revenue and wages, as well as in healthcare costs. Heck, impaired productivity and absenteeism alone can cost a state for billions annually.
That’s how it was in New Hampshire, which suffered a $1.5 billion hit before Sununu stepped up to tackle the issue. That certainly must’ve been what it was like in Illinois, Nevada and Ohio, because those state’s have gone all-in with the Recovery Friendly Workplace Initiative. Okay, so Ohio calls it the Recovery Friendly Workplace Program, yet it still “provides resources and support for the businesses in Ohio that support their recovering employees.”
And at the end of the day, that’s what it’s all about. Providing resources and support to those businesses that support recovering employees. As the Washington State study indicates, 46 million Americans suffer from at least one substance use disorder. That’s one in six of every American. One in six.
This wasn’t some willy-nilly study either. In fact, it was published in Nature Mental Health, led by researchers at Washington University, and included more than 150 coauthors from around the world. You’d also be glad to know that it was supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, and the National Institute on Aging.
Really.
A Recovery-Friendly Workplace Among Recovery-Friendly Workplaces
Healing Properties isn’t just a recovery-friendly workplace; it’s a recovery-friendly workplace among many recovery-friendly workplaces. That’s right. We’ve been recovery-friendly since 2002 (then again, if a sober home can’t be recovery-friendly, who can?). And since then we’ve seen Delray Beach grow into one of the most vibrant recovery-friendly communities in Florida.
Don’t simply take out word for it though. Heck, the New York Times itself says Delray Beach is “the epicenter of the country’s largest and most vibrant recovery community.” And sober stars such as I Am Sober and Recovery.org place the town on their Top 7 places for sober living.
We certainly concur. After all, we’ve spent over 20 years helping to build Delray Beach into a thriving sober living community. We had a lot of solid help, of course. Truly solid help. From transplanted business owners to newly-arrived professionals, of every stripe. Fortunately they all had two things in common: 1) they wanted to get sober and stay sober and 2) they were determined to stay right here in Delray Beach.
You might be surprised by how much a vested interest can impact someone’s game. Then again, you might not be surprised at all. Being extra-attentive to a place where you’re staked only makes common sense. So does doing everything in your power to succeed. And at the end of the day, it’s sober folk who get the win.
How ‘bout you? You ready to be among a truly thriving sober community? Looking to get hired on at a recovery-friendly workplace? Or are you simply interested in hanging out in a recovery-friendly town? Whatever the case, give us a ring. We’ll fill you in – about Delray Beach, as well as what it’ll take to make it here. We’ll also get you sorted about sobriety real quick.
