In recent years, workplace health and wellbeing has been one of the hottest topics in the HR world. More and more employers are looking for ways to introduce health and wellbeing into their employees’ day to day lives.
Everyone knows that good health and wellbeing is good for individuals, but employers benefit too – happy, healthy employees are more likely to be more motivated and productive as well as being less inclined to take time off sick.
Caboodle’s 10 steps to kick-start workplace wellbeing:
Research the issues and look for trends
Collect as much information as possible – this could include management reports, staff surveys, performance reviews and health reports. The stats are useful for identifying the trends and focussing on the areas that need attention.
Set smart objectives
So, you’ve done your research and you know generally what the issues are, but before you steam ahead to fix them all – you need to decide what you want to achieve. What does good look like? How achievable is it? Set short-term and long-term objectives you can measure so you can monitor progress. Think about quick wins to get started and build enthusiasm with employees.
Involve senior managers
Ensure senior managers are clear about what you’re trying to achieve and make them accountable for the health and wellbeing of their people. Be clear about the issues in their area of the business. Ensure that staff wellbeing forms part of staff appraisal discussions.
Keep your people informed
Be open with your employees about what you’re trying to achieve and invite their support and feedback. Make it clear what’s been achieved and what the next stage is.
Talk tactics
So, you know what you want to achieve, it’s important to use a tactical approach to get you there. Think about how you can address your issues for example:
- You want to improve team work or team morale – think about running team fun events that don’t break the budget such as an after work sports event or ten pin bowling maybe
- Break down barriers between management and staff – have a team lunch, get management involved in team events.
- Encourage staff to get involved and arrange events themselves and offer support.
Recruit the right people
Look for people, both managers and staff who fit with your company values and have positive attitude and the right personality to fit with your team – remember that old saying ‘One bad apple can spoil the bunch’!
Reward and recognition
This could be a formal bonus scheme or tangible rewards for achievements. But don’t forget – just saying thank you regularly goes a long way too and random acts of kindness – such as sharing the odd tin of biscuits with the team doesn’t cost the earth either!
Review your benefits and policies
The benefits that are right for your workforce will to some extent be dependent on what your research tells you the issues are. Some ideas to get you started might be:
- Flexible working policies – but make sure it’s not just for people with families
- Years’ service awards are great for rewarding loyalty
- Lifestyle benefits with a broad appeal always go down well
- Gym scheme to help get them more active
- Lunchtime activities to get them away from the desk – team walks, table football in the break rooms
Whatever benefits you choose, remember to keep adding to your benefits offering so they can see it’s an on-going plan.
Monitor progress
Having regular check points in place will help you to see what progress is being made. How you do this will depend on the size of your organisation. Some ideas to consider might be employee surveys, exit interviews, appraisal feedback, employee suggestion scheme and employee forums.
Re-evaluate and review your plan
So over time with persistence, good management and a willingness to listen and react to your employees’ needs, you should achieve the goals you set out at the start. But Remember this needs to be an on-going plan and you should think about what want you to achieve next. Are you and your employees happy to maintain the status quo or perhaps you have bigger ambitions!
So, there’s your 10 steps to success!
Top Tip: Don’t forget to monitor your employee feedback and sickness stats regularly and address potential issues on an ongoing basis and compare to what you started with, so you can see the difference you’ve made.