For a business to fulfil its potential, it will need to support the health of its workers. In practice, this involves a range of measures.
Why is employee health important?
It might not be obvious that health is a fundamental pillar of your business’s effectiveness. When employees are healthy, they’re able to achieve greater levels of focus and performance. They’re likely to be better motivated, and enjoy superior morale. The resulting positivity is likely to be contagious, too. The net consequence of all of this is an increase in productivity.
Reducing sickness
Another substantial benefit of health and wellness-promoting strategies is that fewer employees need to take time off sick. What’s more, fewer employees will get sick and come to work anyway. For example, if workers are encouraged to do yoga every afternoon, they’ll be at lower risk of spinal injuries resulting from sitting at desks all day. By the same token, people who lift weights every day are less likely to suffer injuries in the warehouse, and people who run regularly are less likely to suffer cardiac events (or, in fact, most other kinds of health problems).
Mental health support
Increasingly, we’re seeing focus being placed on mental health. In most cases in the workplace, this means the avoidance of mentally damaging workloads and environments. But it can also mean proactively offering counselling, and fostering a workplace culture wherein everyone feels comfortable raising their hands and pointing out aspects of the work environment that are not conducive to mental health and overall happiness.
Cycle to work
In many cases, employees can be encouraged to build exercise into their days with just a few simple tweaks. Incentivising cycling can be hugely powerful. If a worker can be persuaded to cycle just ten minutes to and from work, then they’ll be given a powerful opportunity to build exercise into the day. At the same time, you’ll be slashing vehicle miles, and making your business greener.
So, how can we give employees the necessary nudge in this direction? By providing showers and changing facilities. Install showers with shower enclosures, and allow workers to access them directly from the staff entrance.
Workers can work up a sweat in the morning, safe in the knowledge that they’ll be able to scrub up for the workday. It’s a great substitute for, or complement to, an on-site gym.
Offering benefits
You might also work with local businesses and other organisations to make health and wellness more financially attractive to your employees. You might offer gym discounts, by buying memberships in bulk from your local gym. You might use the same leverage to offer discounted sessions with physiotherapists, yoga instructors, and nutritionists. We should also consider the food on offer on your premises.