Clinically reviewed by Chris Mosunic, PhD, RD, MBA, Chief Clinical Officer, Calm
Organizations are actively looking for more effective ways to support employee well‑being and improve performance. This trend creates a meaningful opening for consultants. As employee expectations shift and mental health technologies evolve, consultants are positioned to guide clients toward stronger and more strategic approaches to reaching their goals. Below are five workforce well‑being trends every consultant should understand to capture the opportunity ahead next year.
Trend #1: Workforce well-being becomes a strategic priority, not a perk
As the calendar flips to 2026, employers face a triple whammy: poor employee mental health, higher risk of attrition and productivity losses, and steep increases in healthcare costs.
Nearly half of employees in the US and Canada report experiencing high stress on a daily basis, for example. Nearly one-third of US employees report feeling burned out often or always, and one in four employees say they’ve considered quitting their jobs due to mental health challenges.
The employer cost is high. For example,
- Burnout-related productivity losses and turnover cost organizations $322 billion annually, and
- Absenteeism rates are three times higher in employees with mental health conditions than those with physical health conditions (excluding progressive physical illness).
Of course, poor employee mental health also contributes to rising healthcare costs, which are already escalating sharply. The medical cost trend is expected to reach 8.5% in 2026, while prescription drug costs keep climbing. On top of that, more than half of employees say they’re living with chronic conditions, which increase the risk of anxiety, depression, and higher costs.
It’s an unsustainable, vicious cycle that employers must address; workforce well-being is a strategic imperative, not a nice-to-have. What’s more, employees—especially younger generations—expect their organizations to invest in their mental health and well-being.
Amid heightened employer urgency, consultants can and should play a critical role in shaping long-term workforce well-being roadmaps.
Trend #2: Personalization becomes the standard for mental health support
No clear, evidence-based standard for workplace mental health programs and products exists, according to the National Alliance in Mental Illness (NAMI), but consumer expectations are helping shape key criteria.
Consumers have come to expect personalization as the default standard for engagement with any type of program. Younger generations, in particular, expect consumer-grade personalization in their health benefits, including mental health support.
It’s about not just personal preference but also outcomes. Tailored digital interventions have been shown to significantly reduce depression and anxiety in employees with higher levels of psychological distress. They’ve also shown promising results with regard to improving sleep and reducing stress levels, presenteeism, and physical symptoms related to somatization.
When it comes to digital mental health apps, standards for what true personalization means are rapidly evolving. For example, Calm Health
- Uses validated screening tools that indicate whether a person may have symptoms of anxiety and depression, and then tailors recommendations for evidence-based programs, mindfulness tools, and other resources—e.g., an employee assistance program (EAP)—based on the results;
- Prompts users to retake the screening regularly to ensure that personalized recommendations remain appropriate; and
- Incorporates a person’s self-reported goals (e.g., stress management, weight management, or help with burnout or anxiety) and topics of interest (e.g., caregiver stress or reproductive health) into a personalized support plan.
Personalized mental health resources help build employee trust, satisfaction, and sustainable engagement.
Personalized recommendations are a competitive advantage for consultants
Personalized digital mental health products offer competitive advantages for consultants. For example, consultants can
- Make recommendations to organizations with specific and diverse employee populations, such as parents, caregivers, active military, veterans, educators, and healthcare workers;
- Help clients drive higher employee utilization of mental health resources, such as EAPs, therapy, weight management programs, and other benefits; and
- Help clients’ employees get the mental health support they need sooner by directing them to appropriate resources.
Trend #3: Support for specific health conditions and life experiences takes center stage
As understanding of the mind–body connection deepens, so does the expectation that care for chronic conditions must address mental health needs.
Yet traditional approaches to care treat physical and mental health separately. For example, although people with diabetes are up to 3 times more likely to have depression, only 25% to 50% of people with diabetes who have depression are diagnosed and treated for it. The rest are left on their own to identify their mental health needs, find appropriate and affordable care, and stay engaged in their journey.
Similarly, people often aren’t provided the mental health support they need for common and potentially traumatic life experiences such as caregiving, infertility, grief, and postpartum recovery.
Consultants can help employers close these gaps by recommending mental health products that guide employees to evidence-based programs targeting their unique experiences and challenges. When such programs are developed by psychologists with deep subject-matter expertise, they help employees easily access the specialized mental health support they need, anytime or anywhere.
Calm Health offers an extensive library of evidence-based programs authored by licensed psychologists to support people facing common life and health challenges. Some of these programs are Parenting Teens with Mental Health Conditions; Grief Support: A Guide to Coping After Loss; Thriving Through the Menopause Transition, Transforming Loneliness: Tools to Reconnect, Type 1 Diabetes Support; Tools to Cope with Cancer; Hypertension & Health for Your Black Wellness; and Mental Health for Pregnancy and Postpartum.
Trend #4: Employers demand integrated benefits ecosystems
Amid escalating healthcare costs, employers are looking carefully at their vendor relationships, including those related to mental health and well-being. In addition to proven outcomes, they’re requiring that products work together so the employee and administrator experiences are simplified.
According to the 2025 NAMI Workplace Mental Health Poll, about one quarter of respondents don’t even know whether their employer offers mental health benefits, an EAP, or sick days for mental health. By offering products that work together in a single, integrated ecosystem, organizations can make it easier for employees to find and use the mental health programs they need while reducing administrative complexity.
Calm Health not only links to an organization’s EAP and other benefits but also guides employees to the resources that are right for their needs based on their mental health screening results, self‑reported goals, and topics of interest.
Integrated benefits offer consultants the opportunity to help build unified benefits ecosystems for organizations and deliver a more efficient employee experience.
Trend #5: Data and analytics drive year-round well-being strategy
HR administrators traditionally haven’t had insight into the mental health of their teams, making it difficult to know what types of programs might deliver the most value. Access to population data and analytics capabilities can change that by providing insights from digital screenings and behavior patterns for earlier visibility into emerging workforce mental health needs.
For example, Calm Health offers a dedicated analytics portal that allows HR professionals to view aggregated, anonymized data across their population, including
- The top self-reported conditions (e.g., obesity, burnout, or anxiety),
- A breakdown of anxiety and depression symptoms across their population over time, and
- Data about the personalized recommendations provided to users, including user behavior in response to the recommendations (e.g., user views and click-through rates).
HR leaders would be able to see symptoms of anxiety spiking across the employee population during a performance review cycle or quarterly business review. By identifying these trends as they’re happening, they can make targeted interventions to support their teams in the moment.
This type of data and analytics enable consultants to
- Help client organizations build a targeted workforce well-being strategy for the year and make informed adjustments along the way;
- Flag emerging risks to workforce well-being and intervene early to improve outcomes;
- Gain insight about the utilization and value of specific mental health benefits;
- Tie well-being investments to business outcomes, such as lower attrition rates and enhanced productivity; and
- Turn renewals into strategic discussions about trends and how support needs to evolve.
As workforce well‑being becomes a strategic business priority, consultants have a pivotal opportunity to lead. The trends shaping 2026 give consultants a powerful framework for guiding clients toward meaningful impact. By helping organizations adopt solutions that are evidence‑based, personalized, and connected, consultants can strengthen employee well‑being, help to prevent productivity losses and control costs, and deliver lasting value in the year ahead.
