A growing number of companies are offering recovery-supportive workplace policies, Marketplace reports. The initiative received a recent boost from the White House.
Late last year, the Biden administration released the Recovery-Ready Workplace Toolkit to help businesses prevent and respond more effectively to substance use disorder among employees. The initiative builds on a New Hampshire state initiative, which offers training, certification and ongoing dedicated advisers to help businesses in the state to become recovery-friendly. More than 350 New Hampshire companies are participating, the article notes.
Some large national employers have adopted more recovery-friendly policies, including Amazon and Google. Amazon offers a number of resources for virtual and in-person substance use disorder treatment, according to the company’s director of global benefits, Lian Neeman.
Dr. Rahul Gupta, Director of Drug Control Policy at the White House, said companies have a financial incentive to support recovery. “It allows them to retain those hardworking employees, which is, of course, better for the bottom line of the businesses as well,” he said. He said research has found that recovery-supportive workplace policies can reduce turnover costs, injuries, accidents and health care costs.