Positive wellbeing is beneficial for both employers and employees. According to research, it can impact staff turnover, absenteeism, productivity, and motivation. The Centre for Mental Health has released figures that suggest that companies in the UK lose £34.9 billion in productivity due to mental health issues.
The major challenge in attempting to cultivate a workplace culture supportive of employee wellbeing is there are several different factors involved, ranging from stress and mental health to physical factors like illness, fitness, and sleep, in addition to general job satisfaction and financial well-being. Therefore, it is very important to provide employees with a range of various support benefits and options to meet their various interests and needs.
The following are our top tips for improving your employees’ wellbeing:
1. Provide Benefits that Support Wellbeing
According to keynote speaker and wellbeing at work expert Lee Chambers there is a lot that employers can do by providing employees with benefits that help to cultivate wellbeing. Various potential relevant benefits include discounts on daily shopping, cycle to work programs, health insurance, and gym memberships.
There has been a major push made by employers to provide benefits that help to support the lives of their employees beyond the workplace. For example, lifestyle concierge services have become increasingly popular, especially services that help employees organize their personal lives, like ticketing and travel concierge, or that save them time.
Some employees might get a dedicated wellbeing portal set up that provides access to various related benefits (concierge, voluntary benefits, salary sacrifice), in addition to guidance and information on various topics that relate to wellbeing.
In addition, there are certain businesses that are taking things even further and offering support in areas that employee benefits have not covered traditionally. Two examples of this are unlimited paid leave offered by Netflix and the egg-freezing coverage provided by Facebook.
2. Educate Staff about Financial Issues
It is one thing to ease the financial burdens of daily life by providing employee discounts, but there is more to financial wellbeing than simply cash flow. Knowledge is a very powerful tool in all money-saving efforts and an increasing number of employers these days are focused on education as an effective way to help their employees.
That includes assisting people at every level to better understand such topics as wedding planning, travel money, debt, childcare, and budgeting. These topics can be integrated with other types of money-saving benefits as part of a larger package.
3. Provide Mental Health Support
There are various steps that can be taken by employers to provide mental health support. It is critical for employees to provide employees with the proper education and training about mental health issues, to provide staff with the right tools to deal effectively with it and to help reduce the stigma that is attached to mental health problems. It can range from basic awareness-raising initiative to training managers on how to identify symptoms and how to effectively deal with them.
There are many options available when it comes to providing employees with the appropriate tools for dealing with mental health issues. Supported by research and popular in many areas, mindfulness is known to help release stress and enhance the focus on improving engagement within the workplace. Recently, the Journal of Management analyzed a number of different studies and discovered that only 3 minutes of mindfulness per day can make a significant difference on mental wellbeing.
Another good tool is employee assistance programs. They provide support services and counseling for employees and/or their family members. Employee assistance programs are one of the key tools to deal with occupational anxiety and stress. More and more employers are offering employee assistance programs as part of their overall ‘well-being’ strategy.
4. Encourage Employees to make their Physical Health a Priority
Physical health is one of the key factors to overall wellbeing. There are several practical, simple initiatives and steps that can be implemented by employers to encourage improved physical health among their employees. That may include bringing nutritionists in to educate their employees on how diet impacts their wellbeing, offering an extra day of leave over the Christmas holiday to help to avoid burnout, sports-related trips, group exercise classes, or designated ‘nap rooms’ that encourage downtime during the workday.
Presenteeism – This where employees are at work physically but they are disengaged due to not being mentally or physically fit. This is becoming a growing concern for many employers and is frequently linked directly to illness and physical health. The CIPD reports that since 2010 the number of employees who show up sick at work has more than tripled, with 86% of employees having experienced this problem. Encouraging sick employees to remain at home, or offering them flexible work hours, can really help to reduce these types of problems.
5. Develop A Culture Where Individual Team Members Are Valued
Social wellness is also a key aspect to wellbeing and a lot of that is affected by workplace culture and job satisfaction. Employee recognition can really make a significant difference. When you encourage co-workers, managers, and leadership to recognize the efforts of employees it can have a significant impact on motivation, and help people feel valued, and satisfied with their roles ultimately. It can be as simple as just saying thank you. Whether at a team meeting or a handwritten note, a Glassdoor study showed that 80% of employees were willing to work harder if they had an appreciative boss and 70% stated they would feel better about their efforts and themselves if they were thanked by their boss on a regular basis.