HR owns the budget. HR picks the vendor. HR launches the programme. And then HR wonders why utilisation sits at 2.3% while burnout scores climb. The gap between intent and impact is not mysterious. it is a pattern I have seen across dozens of Indian organisations, same mistakes, different logos.

Mistake 1: Buying a helpline and calling it a programme

A toll-free number is not a mental-health programme. it is a crisis line. Employees in distress do not cold-call a stranger. They need a pathway: awareness, trust, easy booking, a therapist WHO understands their context, and follow-up. The vendors selling "24/7 helpline + app" as a comprehensive solution are selling the minimum viable product at maximum margin. Ask for the utilisation breakdown: how many unique users, how many repeat sessions, how many managerial referrals. If they only show "calls answered," walk away.

Mistake 2: Confusing awareness with access

Posters in the pantry. A webinar on World Mental Health Day. An email from the CHRO saying "it's okay to not be okay." These are awareness. Access is: "I can book a session tonight with a therapist WHO speaks my language, understands my industry, and does not report to my manager." Awareness without access breeds cynicism, "they talk about mental-health but I still can't get an appointment."

Mistake 3: Letting the vendor define success

The vendor's KPI is utilisation rate. HR's KPI should be outcome: reduced presenteeism, improved retention in high-risk teams, lower disability claims, better manager capability. If the vendor's dashboard shows "sessions delivered", and HR celebrates 5% utilisation, both are failing. Demand outcome data. If the vendor cannot provide it, they are not a partner. They are a vendor.

Mistake 4: Ignoring the manager layer

Managers are the gatekeepers. A supportive manager refers early. A toxic manager drives the need. A clueless manager does nothing. Training managers, not on "spotting signs" but on "having the conversation," "understanding the EAP," "modelling boundaries", is the highest-leverage intervention. Most HR teams skip it because "managers are busy." The cost of skipping is the programme's irrelevance.

Mistake 5: One-size-fits-all for a diverse workforce

The 24-year-old in Bengaluru needs career anxiety support. The 45-year-old in a manufacturing plant in Pune needs marital counselling and financial coaching. The sales head travelling 15 days a month needs async therapy options. A single EAP panel with 20 therapists in metros serves none of them well. Segment the workforce. Negotiate specialised panels. Measure utilisation by segment. The data will tell you where the gaps are.

Mistake 6: No exit strategy for the "worried well"

Many EAP users need 2-3 sessions for a situational stressor. They improve. They stop. The programme counts them as "success." But the ones WHO need 20 sessions, complex trauma, personality patterns, chronic conditions, hit the session cap and get referred out with no warm handoff. The EAP becomes a revolving door for the easy cases, and a dead end for the hard ones. Negotiate flexible session limits. Build a referral network with continuity. Track the handoff.

The procurement trap: buying the vendor's roadmap, not yours

EAP vendors sell what scales: helplines, apps, standardised therapy panels. They don't sell what works for your specific workforce: vernacular therapists for your Tamil Nadu plant, trauma specialists for your journalists, career coaches for your early-career hires. The RFP process rewards vendors WHO check every box, not vendors WHO solve your actual problems. HR teams often don't know their own workforce's mental-health profile, they've never asked. They buy the industry standard, and wonder why it doesn't fit.

Before the next renewal, run a needs assessment: anonymous survey (not vendor's), focus groups by segment, analysis of EAP utilisation by role/location/language, exit interview themes, manager input on team stressors. Build the spec from that data. Then tell vendors: "Here is what we need. Show us how you deliver it." The vendor WHO says "we don't do that" just saved you a bad contract.

Mistake 9: Measuring activity instead of outcomes

HR teams often celebrate "we ran 12 workshops" or "we launched an app" while burnout scores climb. The vendor's dashboard shows sessions delivered, logins, and click-through rates. The HR dashboard should show: did the high-risk team's attrition drop? Did psychological safety scores improve in the division that got manager training? Did the contract worker utilisation reach parity with permanent staff? Activity metrics prove you did something. Outcome metrics prove it mattered. When the board asks "what did we get for this budget?", the answer cannot be "we were busy."

Mistake 10: Treating mental-health as a benefit, not a capability

When mental-health is a "benefit," it lives in HR, funded from the perks budget, measured by adoption. When mental-health is a "capability," it lives in operations, funded from the P&L, measured by retention of high performers, reduction in critical incidents, and speed of return-to-work. The companies that made this shift (from benefit to capability) changed the conversation with the CFO from "how much does it cost?" to "what does it protect?" The budget did not increase. The allocation did. The outcomes followed.

Mistake 11: Delegating vendor management to procurement

The procurement team optimises for cost per head. The mental-health programme owner optimises for utilisation by segment. These are different objectives. The RFP written by procurement asks for "therapist panel size" and "cost per session." The RFP written by the programme owner asks for "utilisation improvement roadmap, " "vernacular therapist ratio, ", and "manager referral toolkit." The vendor WHO wins the procurement RFP delivers low cost. The vendor WHO wins the programme owner's RFP delivers outcomes. The organisation that lets procurement write the RFP gets what procurement buys: a contract. The organisation that lets the programme owner write it gets what the programme needs: results.

The EAP consultant's view: procurement blind spots cost you 4x utilisation

When I was consulting inside a large corporate EAP program a few years ago, the gap between what HR requested in RFPs and what actually drove utilisation was consistent. RFPs asked for therapist panel size, session caps, and per-head cost. They did not ask for: vernacular therapist ratio, manager referral toolkit, re-engagement campaigns for dormant users, or quarterly utilisation-by-segment reporting. The vendors WHO won on price delivered none of the latter. The vendors WHO lost on price but delivered the latter saw 4x utilisation. HR teams WHO shifted their procurement criteria from "what does it cost?" to "what is your utilisation improvement roadmap?" changed the trajectory of their programmes in one cycle.

If this sounds familiar and you want to work through it properly rather than just read about it, that's exactly the kind of thing I work on with clients. Book a Session For EAP fundamentals, see What Is an EAP (Employee Assistance Program) and Does Your Company Have One? and for programme design mistakes, see Why Indian Corporates Are Investing in Mental Health Faster Than Ever.

Written by Vishal Ram, Consultant Psychologist and Founder of WayToTherapy. Vishal is an Affiliate & Consultant Psychologist with Lyra Health, a member of the MantraCare provider network, and an International Affiliate Member of the American Psychological Association. He has worked across corporate mental-health consulting (including Accenture's Project META), group facilitation, and private practice in Mumbai. Book a session or read more about Vishal.