A company, no matter how successful and rich, is nothing without its employees.
That is why it is essential to take care of their health and overall happiness in the company.
One of the most important parts of the modern company management is the management of human resources.
The phrase “human resources management” may sound a bit dehumanising, but what’s behind it is a set of measures that every company needs to take if they want their workers to feel like they are treated with respect.
Wellness refers to the overall health of employees covering all aspects: from the physical, mental, to the emotional and psychological.
Employers who tend to their employee’s wellness will benefit from the greater productivity it brings. Aside from lowering health care costs, wellness programs in the workplace can also help in reducing employee absenteeism.
Whatever the company’s size, these wellness programs for employees make a great impact on the bottom line. In fact, the American Journal of Health Promotion has published a study on workplace wellness programs that showed 26% lower healthcare costs, 26% less sick leaves, and 32% showed a decline on workers’ request for disability claims and compensation.
In this piece, we look at five lazy ways to get a leg-up on workplace wellness. We call it lazy because we don’t believe you have to stress out over wellness! That, after all, won’t make you all too well, now would it?
1. Understand The Problem
The first thing to do in order to plan your wellness programs properly is to establish the current state of affairs. If you don’t know how your employees feel, you won’t be able to solve their problems in an effective way.
A good way to start is by creating a questionnaire and asking some physical wellness questions followed by questions about their psychological and emotional well being. This way you will have covered all the important points and you will get a clear picture of the current condition your workers are in.
2. Start Small
Get your workplace wellness program started with simple steps. These can include stuff like disseminating useful information on healthy diet and exercise, or providing healthier options for meals in the cafeteria.
These may seem like baby steps that your employees may not take seriously at first but they are better than not having started anything at all.
Come up with fun and creative ways to promote your wellness advocacy in the workplace and you can expect your employees to start reconsidering their lifestyles. The next thing you know, cigarette breaks will no longer be a thing and your employees just might start living active, healthy lifestyles.
3. Empowered Employees Are Better Employees
Part of wellness includes making your employees feel empowered. In order to be better at their leadership and other skills, a lot of employees go for seminars or classes. Those that can help them be better workers for the company.
Unfortunately, they often go for classes that are still work-related thinking that can boost productivity and enhance their employee’s lives. While that surely does one of those things, serious work-related seminars will only remind them of their work.
Why don’t you try something different? Something they probably didn’t think they need but is actually very useful. A First Aid course with Alsco not only takes them out of the cycle of perpetual work, it also gives them important life skills.
4. Pay Attention To Environmental Aspects Of Wellness
If you are still unsure about where to start with improving your employees’ hours at work, try making their work environment cleaner and healthier. Hygiene is an extremely important factor in the workplace. If your company is a breeding ground for bacteria, viruses and other germs, nothing else you do will make any difference.
But making sure your office is clean and environmentally friendly is not only important for physical health of your employees. It will also make them happier and more willing to come to work regularly. This will, in turn, reduce sick leaves and absenteeism rates, positively affecting your finances.
The best places in your building to start your clean office effort are washrooms. Alsco’s range of washroom products enables you to always have eco-clean premises no one will be weary of visiting.
Another area in which Alsco can be of great help is odour control. Use this in areas that are the most frequented! Our system can be customised to release subtle fragrances at timed intervals.
These two little tweaks combined provide great passive sources of wellness.
5. Be Friendly And Learn To Listen
Lastly, a great thing you can start doing for overall wellness in your workplace is keeping your door open for when your people need to talk to someone.
It might take some time to get them comfortable enough to open up completely so be encouraging but not forceful, friendly but still professional, and eventually, you will find them coming in more and more to open up about what frustrates them.
Naturally, it’s just as important to act on their concerns if possible. Especially, if it actually involves the workplace. You’ll find that something this simple works wonders.
Alsco can help you go a long way in ensuring your employees’ well being.
Our products and services are designed to create a friendly environment at work and make doing business a pleasure. Call Alsco today and find out about all the ways in which we can help you make your company even better.
Photo courtesy of Freepik Images by pressfoto
