Question: For employees, how effective are work-based mindfulness interventions, compared to any other intervention/other control group, for improving staff wellbeing, productivity and any other outcomes?

Answer:

Plain Language Summary

Only a small number of poor quality studies have looked at whether mindfulness-based programs in the workplace can help with stress and other aspects of employee wellbeing. Overall, the results of these studies do not show that mindfulness-based programs work better than doing nothing. However, better studies are needed to properly assess whether mindfulness interventions designed specifically for the workplace have any benefits.

Clinical and research implications

Overall, the available evidence does not support the effectiveness mindfulness interventions in the workplace. Very limited evidence, from two small poor quality studies, suggests that short mindfulness-based stress reduction interventions designed for use in the workplace may reduce perceived stress and improve resilience and sleep quality, however, the findings of these studies are unlikely to be reliable.

Further research is needed to adequately assess the effectiveness of mindfulness interventions which have been designed specifically for use in the workplace. As a minimum, randomised-controlled trials should provide of the comparative effectiveness mindfulness interventions versus a 'no intervention' control. Studies comparing the effectiveness of different types of mindfulness interventions, or comparing mindfulness to other psychological interventions would also be useful.

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