Effective strategies for holistic employee wellness

Wellbeing for anyone is a mix of our attitudes and policies or practices and must be sustainable for it to be effective. Creating a Three-Tier System for holistic employee wellbeing offers a comprehensive and responsive wellbeing programme.

The “Insights from India's Best Workplaces in Health and Wellness 2023” report, showcases that despite a notable increase in the Workplace Wellness Index in the preceding year, 2023 saw a dip of 2 points, underscoring the imperative for consistent improvement in fostering a healthy workplace environment for employees. The decline in mental health support, professional growth and development, and effective management and engagement highlight areas needing collective action and a more transparent and supportive environment.

Tier 3 – Initiatives for the entire team

Shift your focus from individual struggles to a broader approach to mental health with a whole-group program. Making mental health a group effort, it can develop support among employees and manage costs effectively for the organization. This collective approach requires organizing regular activities that raise awareness and equip employees with practical self-care techniques in a supportive, non-judgmental atmosphere. It focuses on prevention and proactive measures, over curative responses - and involves approaches as well as policies.

Engage your people consistently

Spaces like interactive workshops, and sharing circles, that are led by trained mental health professionals as well as activities like game nights or company offsites can.

Regularly reiterating the importance of mental health self-care builds a culture of wellness. Some ways to do this are designing wellbeing content tailored to the needs of your employees and emailing or putting flyers up in the working environment. Along with this, reminding employees of the mental health services being provided can nudge even passive users to access these services. It is seen that these efforts result in a gradual increase in adoption by passive employees. Thus, the key to continuous engagement is consistency.

Create a culture of wellness

Promote work-life balance: Encourage employees to maintain a healthy balance between work and personal life. Offer flexible working hours, and remote work options, and encourage the use of paid time off.

Open communication: Foster a culture where employees feel comfortable discussing mental health concerns without fear of stigma or repercussions. Encourage managers to have regular check-ins with their team members.

Offer mental health days: Allow employees to take mental health days when needed without judgment. Recognize the importance of mental health and prioritize self-care.

Tier 2: Initiatives for specific groups

Support and activities catered to the growth of a group of individuals with similar needs and interests can help streamline the initiatives and foster a stronger sense of community and intimacy within that group.

Train wellbeing advocates

For sustaining the impact of your wellbeing programme over the long run, train your employees to become wellbeing advocates/champions. This helps in embedding new attitudes and behaviours around mental health. It also shows that the company is invested in employee wellness and encourages discussions around wellbeing and seeking support. It also can reflect the needs of individuals more easily, allow diversity in perspectives and give employees the chance to make their wellbeing a priority in the workplace.

Build familiarity within teams

An employee’s immediate points of contact in a company are typically the Manager or Team Lead and their colleagues. Having a bond with those you share workloads or similar roles can lead to having an internal support system. Have rapport-building activities, encourage transparency and avoid comparisons, have buddy systems and mentors; and create a spirit of lifting each other up and not competing against someone.

Tier 1: Individual and customised support

Flexible work arrangements: Allow for hybrid work arrangements, flexible hours and any other accommodations especially in specific situations (chronic health concerns, pregnant women, etc) to reduce stress related to commuting or rigid schedules.
Encourage individual growth: Employees who can have vertical growth, appropriate financial compensation and be given autonomy and freedom to work and be creative are the ones who are happiest in a company. Speak to your team members/ employees and help them plan goals, and career trajectories and work towards that, building aspiration and direction.
Counselling services: organizations like Manah Wellness have offerings for all employees to use individually, including counselling sessions, and help discover a diverse range of offerings tailored for your organization, and employees.

Workplace mental health requires ‘all-hands-on-deck’ to make it wholesome. This means making managers and leaders should prioritize their mental health and show behaviors and thought patterns to their team members that can be emulated. It is a balance between making informed choices and assessing whether they meet your expected outcomes while advocating for the rights and needs of the employees.

“Wellbeing is attained by little and little, and nevertheless is no little thing itself.” - Citium Zeno

FAQs

What is the difference between work-life balance and work-life integration?

Work-life balance refers to keeping work and personal life separate, often striving for an equal distribution of time and energy between the two. It can feel forced or stressful too. Instead, work-life integration recognizes that these boundaries are becoming increasingly blurred due to technology and hybrid working models. It allows for more pleasure-based choices and flexibility and encourages individuals to combine work and personal activities in a way that suits their unique circumstances. This might mean working from home, adjusting work hours, or integrating personal tasks into the workday.

How can organizations ensure that their workplace wellness programs are tailored to meet the diverse needs of their workforce?

Following a three-tier approach that caters to all employees but also focuses on more focused needs is one way to do that. Further, collecting anonymous and specific feedback regularly, keeping some wellness indicators to assess after every few months and looking at engagement with services can be inputs that help in meeting the diverse needs of a workplace.

What are the crucial components of an employee wellbeing programme?

There are six crucial components of employee wellbeing: