A healthy workplace is not only good for your workers, it can also be very beneficial for your business. Implementing Wellness or Work Health Programs that focus on preventative health and lifestyle improvement often lead to greater productivity, less absenteeism, fewer injuries and a reduction of longer term costs. Even small changes can have a huge impact. For 5 Tips for a Healthier Workplace
5 Tips For A Healthier Workplace – A healthy workplace is not only good for your workers, it can also be very beneficial for your business. Implementing wellness programs and policies that focus on preventative health and lifestyle improvement can lead to greater productivity, less absenteeism, fewer injuries and a reduction of long-term health care costs for employers and employees.
This means encouraging employees to focus on key health behaviours such as increasing physical activity, improving eating habits, reducing stress, and ceasing tobacco use. It makes sense that healthy workers are fitter, more aware, alert and resilient against illness. Healthy workers are also less likely to sustain manual handling injuries and strains, and are more likely to recover faster from injuries and strains.
The rationale behind wellness programs and policies is that encouraging healthy habits now can prevent or lower the risk of serious health conditions later. Similarly, adopting these same habits can help those with an existing health condition manage it.
Even if you are a small employer with limited resources, there are several things you can do to effectively encourage your employees to get healthier. Even small changes can have a huge impact. Here 5 tips for a Healthier Workplace:
1. Aim to improve workers’ eating habits – Encourage staff to bring their own meals, offer your employees fruits and healthy snack options that help fuel their performance while also meeting their nutritional need, order healthier food when catering, change the contents of vending machines for nutritional options and promote the use of water bottles.
2. Encourage your workers to be more physically active – especially if jobs involve little movement for long periods of time. Offer flexible working hours to allow exercise time, organise discounts at local fitness clubs, encourage staff to exercise more on their morning commute.
3. Help sedentary workers incorporate activity into their daily routines. Provide exercise routine guides, if possible consider hiring a personal trainer to visit the workplace, position printers and scanners further away from desks to promote walking and encourage car-bound staff to take regular stop and stretch breaks.
4. Be mindful of mental health – Workplace pressure combined with external factors can affect social and emotional wellbeing. Unmanaged stress has been linked to heart disease, high blood pressure, and sleep trouble. At the workplace, it can lead to inefficiency, job dissatisfaction, and absence from work for related health conditions. Be flexible with working arrangements, set up a break room for personal calls and quiet time, and organise advisory posters from mental wellbeing organisations and encourage employees to take simple steps to reduce stress, like taking several breaks a day to go for a walk, chat with a co-worker, or just get outside for a breath of fresh air.
5. Recommend behavioural changes – Helping workers to quit smoking has major benefits; not just in terms of increased productivity due to less smoking breaks but making them healthier too. Non-smokers are more likely to exercise and are less vulnerable to potentially terminal diseases. Provide quit-smoking information and allow workers time to consult with GPs.