What is the impact of employer-led interventions or approaches to support young employees in the workplace? A Rapid Review

This rapid review was conducted as part of the Evidence Service’s collaboration with Heath and Care Research Wales

Next update: Update not planned

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Introduction

This rapid review was conducted by the Evidence Service in collaboration with the Health and Care Research Wales Evidence Centre. The aim of the rapid review was to explore the impact of employer-led interventions or approaches to support young employees in the workplace. The findings will help to shape Healthy Working Wales (HWW) employer engagement strategies and workplace wellbeing initiatives.

Main points

How up to date is this evidence?

Searches were conducted in April 2026, and included studies published from 2022 onwards.

What we found

• We identified nine studies for inclusion looking at a range of interventions or approaches. Interventions included flexible working, workplace culture, individual wellbeing, support for specific employee group, and employee perspectives of workplace wellbeing initiatives.
• Findings revealed a mixed picture, while all interventions resulted in some improvements in employee wellbeing outcomes, not every outcome assessed was found to improve. In addition, some findings were found to vary depending on age, or when looking at company level vs individual level findings.
• All interventions were successfully implemented into organisations although there was some variation in uptake across studies. Where reported, the interventions were generally well accepted by employees.
• The barriers and facilitators inferred highlight that successful implementation may be impacted by organisational support, workplace culture, whether the content is tailored to younger employees, engagement of those delivering the interventions and commitment of those receiving the intervention, approaches to prepare for adoption or sustain changes after, how often interventions are delivered, accessibility, and awareness. 

What this means

• Overall, there is evidence to suggest a range of employer-led interventions may help to support young employees’ mental health and wellbeing. However, given the diversity of interventions, they could not be directly compared. As such, the confidence in the findings for each intervention is low, however the findings may help to inform the development of future interventions to support young employees.
• Many of the approaches identified including flexible working options, improving workplace culture, providing tailored information, supportive supervision, social connection activities, and improved communication may be implemented with relatively limited financial investment.
• There was a paucity of recent high-quality evidence, particularly UK based, that focused on young employees. Further robust studies assessing long-term impacts of interventions designed for young employees are needed to better understand how to support those entering the workforce.

Technical information

Methodology

An abbreviated systematic review approach was utilised to generate evidence to inform stakeholders promptly whilst maintaining attention to bias. Primary studies were searched for looking at employer-led interventions to support young employees.

Stakeholders

Healthy Working Wales