Making the business case for employee wellbeing
In August 2015, Morgan Redwood conducted a poll of 250 HR directors which showed that less than half of those polled that considered employee wellbeing to be an ‘employer’ issue. This result shows us that we still have a long way to go in ensuring employers understand the link between business performance and employee wellbeing.
The result comes in spite of heavy media coverage and research around high levels of absence, and increasing problems with ‘presenteeism’ – the practice of being at work but not performing optimally.
Forward thinking organisations need to consider wellbeing as something that should be holistic, embedded and integrated with their overarching business strategy – as opposed to merely an added ‘benefit’. This means several things:
Considering the impact of wellbeing beyond sickness absence
Counting sick days is not enough of a measurement of employee wellbeing. Survey tools, such as our predictive wellbeing diagnostic survey tool ‘wellbeing insight’ (Wbi), can help measure beyond this. The tool examines factors such as current staff wellbeing levels, causes of impaired wellbeing, factors that will drive improvements and the returns you can expect from interventions, causes of impaired productivity, the level of discretionary effort, the appropriateness of work volumes, the impact of line manager behaviours and coping skills/levels.
Ensuring that factors such as mental, physical and financial wellbeing are all considered
Wellbeing should be considered from a holistic perspective in any organisation, in order for it to be effective. This goes beyond the usual schemes that prioritise physical health such as health insurance, gym membership or cycle-to-work: it is about organisational values strategies that manage issues around mental health and financial wellbeing, so that individuals thrive at work. From a business perspective it means creating a productive workforce that is motivated and well and engaged
Introducing a wellbeing programme
A wellbeing programme means you are strategically embedding these drivers in your organisation. This is a holistic programme that improves the wellbeing of the workforce by looking at how individuals are employed, the nature of their work t, how they are managed, their role and activities that can improve self-care. Our blog post on this is a useful insight into how and why wellbeing programmes are so crucial to organisations.
Why not consider how an assessment of where you are now could identify real business benefits at a modest cost.
For further information on how to make wellbeing a priority in your organisation, contact us on 0191 224 8030 or email us.
