Many companies only view employees as assets or numbers on a spreadsheet. However, every company that wants to do its best to properly foster its workforce must also realize that employees are human beings. As such, their state of physical and mental health, their wellness, matters a great deal. This wellness can, in fact, have a direct effect on employee productivity and your bottom line.
What Is Wellness?
First, it’s good to have a better overall understanding of just what wellness refers to. The original concepts that developed into “wellness” actually originate from ancient cultures in Greece, China, India and elsewhere. Over time, different ideas from philosophical, religious, and medical movements came together to better inform how human behavior and lifestyles can affect health in terms of the mind, body, and spirit. From this point of view, wellness refers to health in a more holistic sense. While things like diet and exercise may play a role, they are only components in regards to all the things that converge together to create wellness. Overall, wellness is multi-dimensional and can include different kinds of health including physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, social, and environmental health.
Wellness and Productivity
Productivity, in this context, can be defined as efficiency in regard to the work product or revenues produced by specific employees in a business. There are many factors that go into productivity. Some of these relate to the skills, knowledge, and capabilities of specific employees. However, wellness can also play a huge role. Think of the difference between an office worker that is happy, physically fit and content with their job and another office worker that is depressed, out of shape, and seems perpetually unhappy. The first worker will most likely be more productive and produce more money for the company. Each of those different elements of wellness plays a pivotal role. Just one being off can make a huge difference in regards to how an employee performs in their job. As such, the business itself has a real and vested interest in promoting wellness among its workforce.
Promoting Wellness Within the Company
Thankfully, there are strategies a company can use to promote wellness among their workers. There are third-party businesses that work to provide wellness programs for companies. You could use one, for example, to provide yoga classes to employees. Other choices may include classes and workshops on meditation, physical fitness, nutrition, Reiki, and more. Choose things that your employees would possibly be interested in. In some cases, these services could even be offered over the internet through online corporate wellness programs for employees that work from home. Consider offering benefits and perks to employees regarding their wellness as well. Access to a corporate gym for free, for example, can certainly motivate employees to become more physically fit. Also, be flexible in regards to allowing employees to pursue activities that are likely to improve their well-being such as time off to spend with family or to attend religious gatherings.
Long Term Benefits
There are also other more long-term benefits in addition to increased productivity that could greatly benefit your company. Employees that feel better and have achieved a stronger state of wellness are more likely to stick with your company for the long term. They won’t be picked off by competitors due to being unhappy with their positions. Instead, you’ll be able to keep them in the company and help develop those individuals into the future leaders of your company. Some of the best CEOs are ones that started at lower positions and worked their way up. Offering wellness services to your workforce can then be thought of as making investments into the future of your workers as well. If you ignore the importance of their wellness, you’re likely to produce workers with more negative attitudes that produce a higher rate of turnover. This can negatively affect your bottom line now and in the future as well.
Employees are more than workers. They are also people. As such, their wellness factors greatly into the work product they produce for your company. Do not ignore the importance of the wellness of your employees. If you do, your company’s profitability may be in question both in the short term and the long term. Instead, invest in your employees’ wellness by offering useful wellness-based services.
Author: Stephanie Caroline Snyder
Stephanie Caroline Snyder is a 27-year-old who graduated from The University of Florida in 2018. She majored in Communications with a minor in mass media. Currently, she is an Author and Writer. She was born and raised in Panama City, Florida, where her family still lives.
