Where do EAPs come from?
- Claire Baker
- Dec 26, 2025
- 2 min read
Ever wonder where EAPs come from?
Explosions. Real ones.
Maybe you’ve had this experience: You’re in crisis. You can’t work, so you call in.
A well-meaning person you hardly know sends you information about the Employee Assistance Program (EAP).
You look into what it covers and wonder how this could possibly help.
What problem was ever solved in 3 emergency therapy sessions or a single session with a financial counselor?
It seems like a cruel joke.
Theater.
The minimum CYA measure to guard against the wild things that people in crisis do.
Which, yes. It is that.
But it’s also meant to keep the plant from blowing up. Metaphorically, but sometimes literally.
World War II era factories had to work with a lot of flammable materials.
The workers were brilliant engineers,
hard to replace,
and doing work that was important to the war effort.
But some of the workers had a drinking problem.
Which is a issue when you work with blowey-uppey things like bombs.
There was a shortage of skilled engineers during wartime.
If the factory fired them for showing up drunk, they would lose valuable talent and have trouble finding a replacement.
Most of them were probably good guys going through a rough time.
In other words, they were worth rehabilitating.
EAPs were meant to stop avoidable injuries while at the same time giving workers a way to get their lives back together.
Programs were more successful when they followed a few best practices:
1️⃣ No moral flaw
❤️🩹 They saw dependence as a treatable condition. This judgment-free approach made it easier to ask for help.
2️⃣ Confidentiality
😶 Workers’ requests were confidential, so they wouldn't need to worry about retaliation for participating.
3️⃣ A second chance
🧸 The company didn’t care that you were an alcoholic, as long as you didn’t come to work drunk. By focusing on the behavior, the company avoided liability without alienating talent.
4️⃣ Job protections
💼 By protecting people’s jobs when they asked for help or were in treatment, it made the program more accessible.
5️⃣ Employer-funded care
🧾 If the employer paid for it, people would be more likely to take advantage of the program than one they had to pay for themselves.
It wasn’t “woke,” to support these workers through crisis rather than blaming them for their faults.
It was just good business.
Looking for ways to make sure that your benefits actually help your employees like they're supposed to?
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