Empowering Your Teams During National Wellness Month
August is National Wellness Month, making this a great time to prioritize health and wellness. Whether focusing on self-care and stress management or building healthy habits for physical wellness, this month encourages everyone to focus on nurturing all aspects of holistic well-being.
Why Celebrate National Wellness Month?
In today’s fast-paced and demanding work environment, it’s easy for the lines between personal and professional lives to blur, leading to burnout and decreased productivity.
Gallup estimates employee burnout results in $322 billion in lost productivity and turnover. This work-life imbalance is bad for business and can negatively impact employee health and well-being. However, when employers prioritize the wellness of their employees, both parties can experience several benefits, including:
- Improved mental and physical health: Establishing a wellness routine and healthy habits is crucial to improving overall well-being, as it allows employees to focus on their unique needs.
- Enhanced company culture: When employees come to work happy and healthy, it improves collaboration and fosters a more positive company culture that helps everyone thrive.
- Increased engagement and productivity: Incorporating a mindfulness practice like yoga at work can boost engagement while simultaneously improving productivity.
- Increased retention and recruitment: Employers prioritizing overall health and well-being are highly attractive to top candidates, and their current employees are more likely to stay for at least two years.
August is also the perfect time for a renewed focus on wellness. As the days get shorter and the cold weather months approach, this transitionary period can lead to changes in daily routine that impact the mind and body—from daylight savings causing shifting sleep habits to back-to-school stress and flu immunizations.
Fortunately, employers can help alleviate this seasonal stress in several ways and develop a year-round wellness journey.
Here are six ways employers can promote healthy habits during National Wellness Month:
1. Champion Preventive Care: In addition to National Wellness Month, August is also home or close to a number of different health observances, including National Immunization Awareness Month. To spread awareness and encourage participation, employers can provide relevant incentives (i.e., gift cards, extra PTO days) for completing various preventive care tasks, like receiving flu shots or eye exams.
2. Promote Physical Activity: Exercise is widely known as an effective stress management technique. However, when employees spend eight hours at work each day, it can be difficult to find time for physical activity. Setting aside time for short periods of exercise during the workday can be incredibly beneficial for employees’ physical and mental well-being.
3. Encourage Self-Care: Self-care can take many forms, from deep breathing exercises to entire days dedicated to personal well-being. It’s essential to encourage employees to take the time they need for themselves, especially when they exhibit signs of burnout. Employers may also consider offering mental health days to help employees regain their healthy routines.
4. Practice Mindfulness and Meditation: From emotional regulation and mental health benefits to reductions in chronic pain, mindfulness meditation offers many positive benefits. Incorporating this wellness practice into daily workflows can be an excellent way to help employees manage and even overcome various mental health challenges as they surface.
5. Host a Work Social or Team Event: Social well-being is an overlooked aspect of holistic wellness that employers can easily leverage in the workplace. Whether it’s a virtual coffee chat or in-person team-building events, hosting these social activities offers employees an essential sense of connection and community, especially during the warm summer months.
6. Host a Seasonal Wellness Challenge: Wellness challenges are the perfect way to combine all these aspects into one activity. Employers can boost engagement and foster a healthy sense of competition by setting goals and designing activities around healthy habits and behaviors. This is perfect for empowering workers’ overall mental and physical well-being while improving collaboration across the organization.
Make it a great month!
