Healthy employees are motivated employees, who improve performance and productivity, translating into healthier profits. But when times are tough, employees are increasingly likely to suffer from stress, anxiety and ill health. Employers have a duty of care to look after the physical and emotional wellbeing of their staff. This article provides a twelve-step process for promoting employee wellbeing.
1. Identify the need for wellbeing initiatives
Quantify the impact that sickness absence and health-related issues have on your organisation. You can do this by:
looking at sickness absence records
investigating accident report forms and compensation claims
looking at the findings of exit interviews - do a great majority of people cite stress, or ill health caused by work as a factor in their leaving the organisation?
This will help you decide whether there is a need for wellbeing initiatives, and help you in preparing the business case.
Gather evidence by talking to your employees to determine if there is a need for health promotion in a particular area (e.g. are many office-based employees complaining of Repetitive Strain Injury (RSI), or senior managers suffering from stress?). This is also the time to find out what kind of wellbeing initiatives your employees would like to see. You can do this by distributing surveys or questionnaires, by consulting employees individually, or at team meetings.
2. Decide on the focus of your wellbeing initiative
It could be specific to an identifiable target audience (e.g. improving lifting/manual handling procedures for warehouse employees to reduce back pain, or easing RSI for computer-based staff) or an issue affecting the whole organisation, like:
exercise / weight loss
healthy eating
smoking
back pain / musculoskeletal disorders
mental health
sun awareness
sleep
You could combine any number of these to create a programme devoted to improving general wellbeing.
3. Define the target audience
This will generally be guided by the health issue in question. Most organisational wellbeing campaigns should be wide-reaching, available to all employees, and appealing to all ages. Ideally, you want a simple message that can be delivered effectively.
4. Set objectives
Define the overall purpose of the wellbeing initiative. For example, is it to improve awareness, educate employees, or encourage behavioural changes?
5. Decide on the type(s) of intervention you want to use
Many different types of activity fall under the wellbeing umbrella - their common denominator is that they help employees improve their lives. There are three main types:
awareness raising programmes, such as health fairs, newsletters or education classes
specific programmes to modify lifestyles, like fitness programmes, which involve active participation by employees and self development
programmes that create environments in which employees can sustain healthier lifestyles over the long-term (e.g. by providing healthy food in staff restaurants, ensuring workstations are ergonomically designed, or providing gym memberships)
You could focus on providing a programme to help employees with their diet and physical exercise, or you could provide classes on dealing with stress and anxiety, especially in difficult times. Whatever you choose, make sure there is a range of options to suit all employees. For example, if improving general fitness is your focus, then don't just opt for the most obvious solution, such as gym membership, which not everyone will use, and may be expensive to implement. Think about other, lower-cost alternatives, such as offering a library of fitness / self improvement books, or curating a selection of online articles and videos. If you are offering a class on relaxation techniques, consider supplementing this with a selection of relaxing music.
Employee development is a key component of most organisations, and by offering people the opportunity to develop new skills, you will improve their mental wellbeing, social and emotional intelligence, self-esteem and morale. Consider allowing them to take a sabbatical in another organisation or take lessons in something they have always wanted to learn. By helping an employee to further their interest in, for example, art, music or photography, or increasing their exposure to other organisations, you will be developing that person's knowledge and helping them to grow as a person. They are likely to be more confident and motivated, and your organisation will benefit from employing a more well-rounded individual.
If you are not sure what types of wellbeing initiatives you should implement, ask your employees directly what they would or would not use.
6. Identify the resources required (time, people, money)
This will determine the range of approaches that can be developed. Factor in all potential costs, like equipment hire, marketing materials, speakers / healthcare professional fees, venue hire, catering etc.
7. Create a realistic budget
You want a balance of what is required versus what is realistically feasible to get from the company budget, with the business benefits in mind. That said, don't be afraid to aim high, if you think it's justified.
8. Get top-level support for your plan
A well-presented business case, backed up with relevant data, will help to get buy-in from the highest levels. To make your case, combine your research on where the needs are in your organisation with some stats on the business benefits of wellbeing programmes.
9. Involve the right people
You may need to buy in some health/wellbeing expertise if it does not exist in-house, so ensure there are sufficient funds in the budget for this. Some health promotion campaigns may require specialist health professionals, such as occupational therapists or dieticians. You might also need communications experts such as designers, writers and marketing professionals. However, if the budget is tight, there may be other ways of accessing this expertise, for example by tapping into networks or asking around to discover what other talents employees or their families / friends may have beyond their current roles. Ask for volunteers to champion the initiative and ensure that it is supported and used by employees.
10. Promote your initiative
Don't assume that just because the resources are in place, people will take them up. Ongoing promotion is essential to making an initiative work. Evaluate the nature of the information to be communicated, the target audience and the resources available. Think about using leaflets, your company intranet, team meetings, newsletters, posters, emails and social media.
11. Do it!
Put your wellbeing initiative into action.
12. Evaluate
After a set period, measure success and decide whether your objectives were met. This could be done by distributing questionnaires or surveys, speaking to participants, and through simple observation. This will provide valuable information on what went well, what didn’t and how future wellbeing campaigns can be more effective.
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