How to Establish Optimal Employee Wellness at Work?
Maintaining employee wellness is important for business. Read some helpful tips below.
Prioritizing one’s own wellness can bring about positive results in nearly all walks of life. Caring for your employee’s well-being can truly create a world of a difference for your employees and your business.
Post the global health crisis, individuals have been reevaluating what is of utmost importance to them. One of the key aspects people are very cautious about is how they spend their waking hours. Most people want jobs that are intertwined with their real life. Nearly all of us want a supportive and conducive environment that allows us to prioritize our personal time with family, friends, hobbies, and health. To put it simply, employees don’t want to work themselves to exhaustion anymore.
Apparently, hustle culture isn’t relevant anymore. The great resignation says a lot about our previous workspace cultures where employees were simply fed up. By now all of us have realized that work and life can’t be separated entirely, and one needs a true balance. If a workspace is causing feelings of anxiety and depression, things need to change.
What Does Maintaining Optimal Wellness Mean to You?
Wellness is a very holistic concept, yet a very personal one. Your body, mind, and soul are interconnected and constantly rely on one another to function properly. A general wellness routine might involve enriching your body with nutrient-dense foods, engaging in regular movement to build stamina, strength, and muscle, getting a good solid sleep every single night, nurturing your social connections, spending time in nature, meditating/connecting with your spiritual self are some of the key elements of overall wellbeing. Whatever optimal wellness means for you will set the tone of the workspace for your employees.
Importance of Considering Employee’s Mental Health
There is no doubt about the fact that someone dealing with mental unwellness won’t be a self-motivated, driven, caring, and collaborative resource of your organization. Happy individuals eventually translate into happy employees which is essential for flourishing your business.
Tips to Ensure Optimal Employee Wellness at the Workplace
Here are a few things you need to do in order to ensure the wellness of your employees:
Respect the Time Off
Honor and respect when your employees need to take time off from work regardless of the cause. It might be that they have a doctor’s appointment or are hoping to attend a family event or simply wish to take some time off from work. Respect that.
Build Trustworthy Leadership
Create a space where managers are trusted. It will make everyone feel safe instead of feeling threatened. Make sure that the leadership is sensitive to DE&I, values interpersonal communication, and is aware of emotional intelligence and implicit biases.
This essentially means that expectations between all parties are clear, employees are welcome to share their feedback, equal opportunities are provided to all, and hard work is rewarded and recognized.
Reevaluate Your Office Space
Your office space also plays a very important role in ensuring optimal employee wellness. Your office needs to have both collaborative and private spaces for the employees to thrive. The first step is making sure all the hardware and software are in place and running smoothly so that your employees can have a seamless working experience. Make sure that the space is airy. Having indoor plants can have a very positive impact on people’s moods. You can add luxuries like a well-stocked pantry, quality beverages, free parking, accessibility, indoor sports, etc.
Flexible Work Schedules
One thing that we have all learned through the pandemic is that we don’t need strict work schedules to be able to meet deadlines. Working in an office isn’t necessary. In fact, a lot of people perform better when they are working in a space, they feel comfortable. Do not restrict your employees to office premises unless absolutely needed. Allow them to work freely. In fact, it is recommended to create a relaxing working space in the office as well. Sure, you can have your steady desk and chair set up but do have a lounge area with plenty of comfy bean bags so employees can work as they please.
Be Well Staffed
One of the prime reasons behind the great resignation was overworked people. This is due to the fact that employers hire fewer people than they need. As a result, employees have an extensive workload and end up working themselves to exhaustion. None of these things is a recipe for healthy, happy, and productive employees. It is important to have realistic expectations from the employees when it comes to workload management.
Encourage Social Interaction
One of the prime reasons people go into depression is social isolation. Supportive relationships with colleagues can help improve the mental health of your employees and create a more positive workspace environment. Creating an environment for social interactions will work wonders for you. Try to have a get-together once every month. You could decide on different themes for each month where people share their experiences regarding a particular topic. Arranging group activities will also work wonders for bonding and building trust.
Identify and Solve Workspace Problems
Create room for employees to identify and solve problems they experience in the workspace. You can try suggestion boxes, have open communication with employees, encourage one on one interactions with the managers and give them the confidence to come up with possible solutions. You don’t have to agree with everything they say but do take their opinion into account.
Final Takeaway
Employee wellness will automatically have positive impacts on your business. If you make it a priority to keep your employees happy, I am sure they will be more than willing to return the favor. Happy employees often translate into flourishing businesses.
If you have taken any steps to ensure the well-being of your employees in the past, we would love to know what measures you took. Maybe we all can inspiration by your ideas. If you are going to try using our tips, which one are you most excited about? Let us know in the comments section below.
If you have any questions, queries, or concerns, reach out to our team.