Emotional Fallout from a Foundering Economy

Chris Sereno got a call at his Naples restaurant from an employee who’d gotten drunk and in trouble. He needed Sereno to get him out of jail. For the fourth time.

Roger Mann’s pool-service company lost an account when a normally reliable employee failed to show up. The tech leveled with Mann when confronted. "He was embarrassed to tell me he was depressed. He thought it would affect his job," says Mann.

Plenty of employers in those situations would have fired the offending workers, but Sereno and Mann thought their troubled employees were worth helping. Sereno gave his a choice: Go to rehab and get straight, or you’re on your own. The employee went through a 28-day program at David Lawrence Center. In the two years since, "He’s turned his life around," says Sereno. He faithfully attends AA meetings, has his own home, is engaged to be married—and holds a position of responsibility in Sereno’s business, with about 30 people reporting to him.

The pool tech "just made a judgment error and went off his [medication]," Mann says. "I made a deal that if he didn’t go off his meds again that I wouldn’t fire him." They both have kept the deal, and the tech is a "great" employee, says Mann.

According to the National Institute of Mental Health, an estimated 26 percent or more of Americans have some kind of diagnosable mental disorder—ranging from dementia to bulimia to schizophrenia—in any given year. More than 20 percent of American adults suffer each year from major depression, bipolar or another "mood disorder." Substance abuse is a common problem, and often goes hand-in-hand with other diagnoses. When the economy goes south and stresses rise, such behavioral healthcare issues often rear their heads at work.