The Ultimate Guide to Improving Workplace Wellness

Over the last twenty odd years, workplace wellness has emerged as one of the most popular topics among HR and benefits leaders—and for good reason. People are the most valuable assets for nearly every organization. That means investing in the health of your employees is investing in the health of your entire workplace.

Still, so many leaders misunderstand what it means, fail to implement effective strategies to improve it, or both. 

This guide offers a complete look at workplace wellness, laying out all of the information HR and benefits leaders need to create a working environment centered on well-being. 

Defining Workplace Wellness

Many people errantly believe that workplace wellness is one dimensional. If you offer health benefits to your employees, you’ve got it covered, right?

Not exactly.

The more our understanding of high functioning workplaces grows, the more we can see that workplace wellness encompasses a broader definition than just the absence of illness and injury. 

Let’s break it down.

What is workplace wellness?

To understand what workplace wellness means, we first need to understand what it means to be “well.”

The Global Wellness Institute defines wellness as “the active pursuit of activities, choices, and lifestyles that lead to a state of holistic health.” In other words, wellness isn’t a passive state of being. Instead, it’s a condition we constantly improve upon, advancing us closer to a complete picture of health.

In the workplace, wellness means exactly the same, plus the addition of the professional dynamic. That includes: How employees fit in among their co-workers, how they’re supported to grow in their careers, and how they feel about their work in general. 

The 3 cornerstones of workplace wellness

Workplace wellness can be broken down into three elements. Each one is equally important, helping workers pursue a holistic state of health. They are:

  • Physical health — The ability of employees to understand and care for their bodies, encompassing fitness, nutrition, sleep, and managing chronic health issues. 
  • Mental health — The ability of employees to manage their emotional, psychological, and social wellbeing. In addition to coping with mental illness, it also relates to managing stress, practicing self-care, and receiving adequate emotional support.
  • Professional health — The experience of camaraderie, team cohesion, morale, and professional growth in the workplace. 

Combined, all three cornerstones create a picture of not just a productive, engaged employee, but also a balanced, happy human being. Effective workplace wellness programs address each one appropriately based on your own organization. And, when implemented correctly, the list of benefits is long.

The Benefits of Workplace Wellness

There’s an obvious moral incentive to help out our fellow human beings. But when it comes to improving wellness at work, the benefits extend further than simply “feel-good” metrics. Workplace wellness is tied to several important measures of both individual and organizational success. In other words, the wellness of your employees is inextricable from the wellness of your entire organization. 

Here are some of the positive outcomes you can expect from improving workplace wellness. 

Reduced absenteeism and healthcare costs

It’s a no-brainer: Employees can only contribute to the workplace if they are healthy enough to do so. While absenteeism due to illness or injury isn’t entirely avoidable, sick days tend to increase with higher levels of employee stress, burnout, and disengagement. Absenteeism costs your organization time and money. if you’re able to help employees achieve greater wellness, you’ll be able to reduce these associated costs.

And, this idea isn’t just some wishful theory. A recent study from Harvard found that organizations saw a 6-to-1 return on investment for money invested in employee wellness, drastically reducing costs associated with both absenteeism and medical leave. 

Increased productivity

Something amazing happens when employees realize their employers are genuinely interested in their wellbeing: They begin to feel more like members of a real community, and less like cogs in a machine. This social cohesion creates a shared purpose among your team, paving the way to higher levels of productivity and overall satisfaction.

Ultimately, employees perform their best when they feel their best. The most effective wellbeing programs increase productivity by supporting employees through all of the physical, emotional, and professional challenges they may experience so that they can bring the best version of themselves to work.

Decreased presenteeism

Presenteeism, or the feeling of being disengaged while at work, is an expensive problem that costs American organizations $150 billion annually. Stress that happens outside of work affects how employees show up to perform at work daily, and vice versa. Employer-sponsored wellness programs support emotional wellbeing in the workplace, helping employees improve their mental health, reduce stress, and enhance their capacity to grow. 

Of course, stress is not entirely avoidable. Workplace wellness programs instead aim to help employees manage this stress before it manifests as burnout, which can lead to costly, chronic presenteeism.

Improved employee retention

Workplaces with strong retention rates are those where employees feel valued, engaged, trusted, and supported by their employer. Surprisingly, these wellness metrics tend to outweigh salary to employees when questioned about workplace satisfaction. According to recent research, 70% of employees will stay at a workplace where they can trust their coworkers and managers, and a staggering 90% of employees will stick around for less pay, if they feel the work is meaningful. 

Higher employee morale

Employees are human. And like every human, employees need to meet a basic set of needs in order to feel they can perform their best. Reaching that stage of self-actualization requires a healthy dose of self-esteem and confidence, two outcomes of feeling effective and empowered.

Beyond lifting employees up through initiatives and incentives, the best workplace wellness programs give individuals the tools they need to take charge of their own health. When employees become more active stewards of their own wellness, they are more likely to adopt a sense of purpose that translates into improved morale and engagement at work. 

Strategies to Improve Wellness at Work

Just as our wellness isn’t one dimensional, the way we approach improving workplace wellbeing also needs to be holistic. The following strategies address each cornerstone of wellbeing at work: our physical, mental, and professional health. 

While each workplace wellness strategy can and should be personalized for your own organization, these proven strategies create a solid foundation that will put any HR and benefits leader on the right path. 

Physical health: Improving fitness and nutrition

Healthy eating and exercise are one of the most impactful things we can do to improve our health. When we improve our physical health, we open up a world of accessory benefits including greater focus, fewer sick days, and improved mood. 

Ready to help your team achieve greater physical health? Here’s where to start.

Support Healthier Lifestyles

There are two main components that influence an employee’s decisions around fitness and diet in the workplace: Culture and options. As leaders in your organization, it’s not your role to banish all things unhealthy at work (yes, you can still cut cake for birthdays and other occasions!). Instead, your role is to create the environment that allows employees to more easily make healthy decisions. This cultural shift can include everything from offering healthier snack options in the breakroom, to sponsoring discounted gym memberships for employees.

Gamify Fitness & Nutrition

Want to encourage healthier decisions at work? Turn it into a competition! Workplace wellness challenges are a proven—and not to mention fun—way to get your team excited and engaged in their own physical health. These challenges can be geared toward both fitness and diet. For example, you can organize challenges around daily step counts, or even how many times employees packed healthy lunches in a week. Incentives help the success of these programs in a major way, so consider what will motivate your employees most.

Mental health: Reducing stress and offering support

Mental health has a significant impact on how employees show up for work every day. Unfortunately, the mental health crisis is more widespread than you may think, with 1 in 5 Americans experiencing a mental illness each year. 

The hard truth is that the workplace can contribute to employees’ struggles with emotional wellbeing. But as an HR or benefits leader, you have the tools and ability to change this for the better. Use these strategies to help your employees improve their mental health. 

Offer Training to Managers

Managers play an outsized role in the mental health of your employees. They are on the frontlines of creating a supportive environment, encouraging development opportunities, and serving as a first responder in case of a mental health crisis. Consequently, it’s critical to ensure your managers are equipped with the proper training to identify and offer support for mental health issues your team members may be experiencing. A little bit of empathy goes a long way. 

Partner With an EAP

Of course, no matter how much training you provide, it’s unfair to expect any member of your team to serve as a mental health professional. Comprehensive EAPs like Carebridge bridge the gap between the mental health support your team needs, and what you can realistically provide. Carebridge can confidentially connect employees to licensed mental health professionals, removing an important barrier to accessing these types of resources. Whether your employees are struggling with anxiety, stress, addiction, grief, or any other challenge under the mental health spectrum, an EAP like Carebridge can help. 

Rethink Your Workplace Culture

Your workplace culture is more than a mission statement; it’s the lived experience of employees working at your organization. To build a healthier workplace culture, you need to first know how your current one operates. Solicit feedback from employees through both formal surveys and informal conversations to understand what parts of your workplace culture are hurting, and not helping, your goal to create a healthy working environment.

Professional health: Boost workplace camaraderie, social Interaction, and team cohesion

No workplace wellness plan is complete without a focus on, well, work! Under the right conditions, our jobs can give us a sense of purpose, allow us to form social bonds, and challenge us to grow as individuals. And, when employees are able to achieve this level of professional fulfillment, they are more likely to reciprocate this support and become better assets for your organization. 

Facilitate Healthy Conflict at Work

Conflict happens at every single workplace. That’s a good thing! Without disagreement, there is no growth or challenging of the status quo. However, the difference between positive conflict and toxic conflict is the difference between a healthy work environment and one where employees are more likely to flee.  Facilitate healthy disagreements at work by educating your team on how to navigate conflicts productively. Simple acts like taking a breath and expressing ourselves calmly can make a huge difference.

Enhance Your Diversity & Inclusion Initiatives

Implicit bias colors our workplace in ways we may not realize. Fostering an inclusive environment that champions diversity—in every sense of the term—helps pave the way for a healthier workplace culture that allows every employee the chance to thrive. Many of the nation’s top organizations encourage the formation of Employee Resource Groups (ERGs), give employees a platform to share their experience, and offer EAP support as just a few simple ways to build a more equitable environment. 

Support Employee’s Career Growth Aspirations

Want to engage and retain your employees? Look no farther than career development. Supporting your employees’ career goals is an essential part to the professional health and wellbeing of any workplace. Employees who feel supported to pursue their goals tend to be more engaged, productive, and happy at work. Creating career development opportunities will look different for every workplace, but usually begins with an assessment of each employee to understand their unique trajectory. Then, consider creating a mentor/mentee program, offering online education stipends, and continuing to solicit feedback from your employees to gauge how well your program is working.

Develop an Airtight Crisis Management Plan

The question isn’t if a crisis will strike your workplace, it’s when. The only thing more potentially damaging than an unexpected crisis is one that is improperly managed. Crises like cyber security attacks, natural disasters, or even product recalls can divert employees’ focus on their daily responsibilities, making them feel less secure in their role. To mitigate the effects of a crisis, HR leaders need to do the hard prep work of designing a management plan that’s ready in time of need. 

Best Practices for Improving Workplace Wellness

Not all workplace wellness programs are made equally. The chances of implementing a program that works (and sticks) improve when you follow best practices. They are accessible, scalable, and realistic for almost any organization—all it takes is a dedication to follow through.

Here are some tips to help ensure the efficacy and longevity of your workplace wellness program.

Set goals

Wellness programs aren’t “fluff.” They’re critical tools in HR and benefits leaders’ belts to address the challenges of the modern workplace. To prove their impact and help you design a program that moves the need, define the right goals first.

What challenges do you hope to improve through this program? The metrics will look different from organization to organization, but might include:

  • Absenteeism rates
  • Productivity
  • Employee satisfaction
  • Turnover rates
  • Number of medical claims

When setting goals, capture the baseline of each metric that matters to you most so you can report on the success of your wellness program later. This step is critical to help you tell the right story once it is launched. 

Personalize your approach

There’s no such thing as a one-size-fits-all workplace wellness program. Each organization offers its own culture, attitudes, and challenges that make it unique. When designing initiatives to improve wellbeing in your workplace, keeping this individuality in mind is key to your success.

Not sure where to start when personalizing your wellness program? Just ask! One of the best ways to understand what your employees need is by surveying them directly. Some questions you should ask include:

  • What are your individual wellness goals?
  • What wellness challenges do you struggle with most?
  • What can our organization offer that will help you become better in your work?

To get the most helpful replies, allow these surveys to be anonymous and consider offering an incentive to complete them. And, once your new wellbeing program is underway, follow up with your team for feedback on how it is working so you can continue to optimize and personalize your approach.

Get leadership buy-in

In the workplace, ideas tend to travel farther when they have the support of senior leaders and decision makers. Support from these stakeholders in your organization can afford you the resources you need to make a real impact, including:

  • Funding
  • Guidance
  • Improved visibility
  • Endorsements

Ultimately, support from these senior leaders typically comes down to proving both your program’s ROI, as well as its place within your organization’s larger vision. Effectively communicate those two things, and you’ll make champions of the people with the most influence in your organization.

Expand your support with an EAP

Creating a personalized, effective solution for improving employee wellness is no small task. It involves a careful consideration of goals, available resources, and ROI. This complexity is why so many of the nation’s leading organizations turn to Employee Assistance Programs (EAPs) like Carebridge to expand their capacity for support.

EAPs offer comprehensive and confidential support across a range of challenges that employees care about most. As an example, Carebridge offers 24-7-365 access to support around topics including, but not limited to:

  • Mental health counseling — support for challenges with anxiety, grief, addiction, depression and more
  • Work-life coaching — resources to help employees achieve better balance and satisfaction in their lives
  • Personal growth & training — workplace training for managers and other employees
  • Emotional wellbeing — help coping with home and/or workplace stress
  • Legal guidance — advice to navigate common legal concerns among employees
  • Financial education — consultations to help employees reach their financial goals

The right EAP can become a true extension of your team, expanding your ability to improve wellbeing at your organization in a more cost effective way than tackling the mammoth task on your own.

Measure and report on results

Is your wellness program working? In order for senior leadership and decision makers at your organization to take this work seriously, you need to be prepared to answer that question with real, hard data. Effective wellbeing initiatives have the potential to boast enormous ROI for your organization, but it’s only possible to tell that story with the right measuring and reporting systems in place. 

Using the goals you’ve already set, analyze how well your program is performing, noting which metrics have improved and which are still falling short of ideal. 

Communicate these results back to appropriate senior leadership at regular intervals. Typically, these reports are best compiled annually or bi-annually to allow enough time for your program to make a real impact.

The Road to Workplace Wellness Starts Here

Ready to unlock a new world of wellness in your workplace? Carebridge EAP helps the nation’s top organizations improve employee wellbeing with effective, people-first support. Reach out today to learn more: Get a Quote