Your organization’s most valuable asset is its people. Maintaining their well-being, meanwhile, is both a moral obligation and a strategic imperative.
Healthy employees mean less unexpected sick days, higher productivity, and reliable company performance. When you take care of them, they’re more likely to be invested in their jobs as well, thus providing better customer service.
You may be wondering, however, in what specific ways can you foster an environment that promotes your workforce’s overall well-being? To address this concern, we’ll dive into what impacts employee health and various strategies you can employ to maintain it.
What does employee health mean?
Employee health goes beyond the absence of illness or injury, but rather encompasses overall physical, mental, and emotional well-being. To be more specific, this holistic view tackles:
- Physical health: Think of this as your worker’s access to proper nutrition, sleep, healthcare, and exercise.
- Mental health: This refers to your employee’s ability to cope with stress, anxiety, and other mental challenges, which allows them to remain stable, focused, and productive.
- Emotional health: Lastly, this touches on your personnel’s capacity to manage their emotions, build healthy relationships, and maintain a positive outlook at work and in life.
Healthy members of your workforce should feel good physically, mentally, and emotionally, as this lets them perform at their best. Achieving this, however, entails creating an environment that supports employee well-being, as well as making them feel valued and respected.
Benefits of healthy employees
Investing in your workers’ well-being can yield significant benefits for both the individual and the organization:
Better employee productivity and organizational performance
Physically, emotionally, and mentally sound employees are more energetic, motivated, and focused. As they’re in such good condition, they’re able to reach higher levels of productivity, which helps the overall organization as well.
Those who invest in and implement successful health and wellness programs, in fact, can enjoy 11% more revenue per employee and 28% higher shareholder returns!
Reduced absenteeism
When employees are healthy, they’re less likely to miss work due to illness or fatigue. Wellness programs have, in fact, been shown to reduce absenteeism by 14% to 19%. This lets organizations avoid its associated costs as well.
According to Absenteeism: The Bottom-Line Killer, a white paper by Circadian, unscheduled absenteeism can net companies up to $3,600 for each hourly worker and $2,660 for salaried employees annually. These expenses, meanwhile, can be attributed to variables such as:
- An absent employees’ wages
- The cost of replacement workers, namely overtime pay for other employees and/or pay for temporary workers
- The administrative costs of managing absenteeism
Enhanced morale and retention
Employees who feel that their health needs are supported are more likely to exhibit higher levels of job satisfaction and morale—elements that are critical to retention.
A whopping 57% of workers and 69% of executives, in fact, will seriously consider leaving their employers for another that better supports their overall well-being!
Lower healthcare costs
Promoting physical, mental, and emotional health in the workplace can reduce the prevalence of disease and other health issues. This results in lower healthcare costs for both your employees and company.
The Winning With Wellness report by the United States’ Chamber of Commerce, in fact, found 60% of its respondents saying that workplace wellness programs have reduced their company’s health care costs.
Improved employer branding
Companies that have a reputation for taking care of their people can enjoy enhanced employer branding, as a supportive and caring environment is sought after by top talent. Such a brand image eases your recruitment efforts, as it makes your organization a more desirable workplace.
Factors that affect employee health
Having healthy employees offers many advantages, but what influences their overall condition? Several variables within and beyond the workplace, in fact, play a significant role:
Work environment
A clean and safe workplace is key to preventing physical ailments and injury. Not to mention, an ergonomic design accounts for factors such as noise, lighting, temperature, air quality, color, layout, and the like, maximizing your workforce’s ability to work.
It goes beyond the physical space as well, as your culture can impact their mental and emotional state. To address such an element, you’ll need to nurture a positive atmosphere that can reduce workplace stress.
Work-life balance
Employees can’t be expected to be at their best when they aren’t given ample opportunities to rest and pursue personal commitments and interests.
Such a setup can stem from excessive workloads and a lack of flexibility, variables that can easily result in stress, burnout, and mental health issues. Preventing such problems, meanwhile, requires policies that encourage work-life balance.
Access to wellness resources
Giving your workers the means to take care of their physical, mental, and emotional well-being allows them to proactively address whatever ails them.
Wellness programs are, in fact, excellent instruments that enable this, with the International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans (IFEBP) reporting that many employers in the U.S. and Canada see the value of the following initiatives, thus making them readily available:
- Free or discounted flu shots (78%)
- Health risk assessments/appraisals (50%)
- Smoking-cessation programs (50%)
- Mental health services (86%)
- Access to mental health mobile apps (41%)
- Standing/Walking workstations (60%)
- Walking/Fitness challenges (46%)
- Ergonomic training/supports (46%)
Nutrition and exercise
Obviously, healthy food options and opportunities for physical activity considerably impact an employee’s physical condition. As seen in the previous points, your organization influences their access to such resources as well.
For example, the lack of work-life balance can restrict their time for regular exercise and insufficient compensation can limit what they eat. It’s your company’s responsibility to address these possible issues.
Management practices
Toxic leadership styles, ineffective communication, and the lack of management support can take their toll on your employees’ overall well-being.
In fact, according to the American Institute of Stress, no amount of resilience training can counteract the effects of a toxic workplace culture, which includes burnout.
Its key contributors, meanwhile, can range from heavy workloads to a lack of autonomy and control, which results in uncertainty and negative behaviors. To effectively mitigate these problems, it’s key that you enforce practices that support employee well-being, such as:
- Limiting overtime hours
- When necessary, allowing flexible workloads
- Avoiding micromanagement
- Enabling employee independence
Social support
Strong interpersonal relationships at work can contribute to overall mental wellness, as they minimize the occurrence of anxiety and depression, as well as improve productivity and job satisfaction.
69.5% of employees, in fact, say they’d be happier if they had deeper connections with their colleagues, as it can nurture a sense of belonging.
How to have healthy employees: 7 Helpful tips
Now that you understand the upsides of investing in employee well-being, as well as what affects it, we’ll share some strategies you can employ to ensure you have a healthy workforce:
Create a wellness program
We previously mentioned how wellness programs allow your personnel to take better care of themselves. So, develop a comprehensive one that provides resources for physical, mental, and emotional well-being, such as:
- Health insurance
- Regular checkups
- Psychological consultations and testing
- Fitness challenges
- And more
Doing so lets you recruit top talent as well, since roughly 87% of workers take health and wellness offerings into account when choosing an employer.
Use incentives
Rewarding employees for participating in your wellness initiatives can compel them to prioritize their health. 48% of employers in the U.S. and Canada, in fact, use gift cards as an incentive, while 43% provide insurance premium reductions.
For a unique twist, you can give your fitness challenge winners an extra day of paid time off (PTO).
You can encourage healthy habits while rewarding excellent employee performance as well. For instance, instead of giving a cash bonus for meeting quotas, give them a gym membership or a gift basket filled with healthy snacks.
Promote work-life balance
As we brought up earlier, you can’t expect your workforce to perform well without sufficient rest and time to pursue personal commitments and interests beyond work.
Such conditions can easily result in burnout, so make sure that your company emphasizes work-life balance. Some steps you can take include:
- Offering flexible work arrangements
- Encouraging regular breaks and vacations
- Providing wellness resources
- And more
Cater healthy lunches
Serve healthy lunches for employees when timely, like during weekly meetings or monthly town halls. Make sure they consist of simple dishes, such as turkey sandwiches and fresh mixed salad, or hearty ones like a tuna casserole or stew.
Whatever the case, serve them a well-balanced meal. You can provide copies of the recipes as well, particularly for employees who want to recreate them at home.
Communicate openly
Communication is critical to keeping employees healthy. The right internal communication strategies, meanwhile, can let you stay in-tune with your employees’ needs and concerns.
Just remember to keep communication channels open, regularly check in, and be transparent. These are key, as being kept in the dark regarding major organizational developments, for instance, can take its mental toll since they typically result in tumultuous periods.
Through open and empathetic communication, you not only maintain your workers’ mental health, but also build trust within the organization.
Keep workspaces sanitized
A clean environment is critical to preventing the spread of germs, so regularly sanitize your office. Provide a well-stocked bathroom as well, so employees can consistently follow proper hygiene. Also offer cleaning supplies so employees can clean their workspaces.
Encourage physical activity
Opportunities for physical activity may be tough to come by, especially for some desk jobs, but there are ways to create them.
For example, you could hold meetings outdoors or, when the topics can be discussed casually, have ones while walking. Investing in standing desks is also a good idea, as this allows employees to move and stretch their legs while working.
Wrapping up—Healthy employees are critical to organizational success
Healthy personnel are more productive and engaged, so make employee well-being a top priority. By understanding what impacts your employees’ wellness and taking steps to foster a healthy work environment, you can create a thriving organization.
Remember, investing in your workers’ health isn’t just a cost—it’s an investment in your company’s future. By doing so, you position yourself to succeed.
Published: June 16, 2015
Updated: August 12, 2024
About the Author: Joseph
