Are Smoking Cessation, Alcohol Advice, Food and Nutrition sessions, coupled with Fruity Friday, and a restroom in the building, and so on….., enough to address well-being in the workplace? All good initiatives to aid healthy lifestyle and work-life balance. It’s excellent that the organisation is educating the staff too. But what about your management, leadership and organisation culture?
So how are we doing in the UK in our attempts to address well-being – is it working?
Health & Safety Executive (HSE) 2013 figures:
- There were 487,000 Cases of Work Related Depression and Stress from a total of 1,241,000 Cases of Work Related Absence
- 244,000 were New Cases
- Total of Days Lost was 11.3 Million ~ An Average of 23 Days per Case of Stress, Anxiety, or Depression
Causes reported were Work Pressures, Bullying / Harassment, and Changes in Resources (Additional Responsibilities Resource Reductions).
Our research and subsequent work with organisations has identified the following as being major causation factors:
- Management and Leadership issues
- Bullying & Harassment
- Lack of Strategic Direction
- Personal Issues
- Communication
- Work-life Balance
- Pace of Change
- Being trapped within an Organisation that has outgrown them
Organisations quite often think they have a good well-being strategy by putting in place Alcohol programmes, Food Awareness, Stress courses, Smoking Cessation etc. But that can just scratch the surface. If you’re looking to effectively address and promote well-being, it should be integrated into Organisation Culture, Learning and Development, and People Strategy, with a clear Leadership commitment. Importantly staff need to be engaged and the organisations commitment clear to all from joining an organisation to leaving, the entire employee journey.
To illustrate the point that well-being is closely integrated with the people strategy, if we look at the 8 points above how many of those causation factors are well-being alone?
Management and Leadership issues
Organisation Culture, Organisation Behaviours, Management Development, Recruitment & Selection.
Bullying & Harassment
Organisation Culture, Dignity at Work, Organisation Behaviours
Lack of Strategic Direction
Corporate & Business Planning, Communication, Leadership Development
Personal Issues
Flexible Working, Counselling, Coaching, Organisation Culture
Communication
Leadership, Management, & Staff Development, Recruitment & Selection, Organisation Culture.
Work-life Balance
Organisation Culture, Organisation Behaviours, Flexible Working, Resourcing.
Pace of Change
Change Management, Organisation Development, Corporate or Business Planning, Communication, Learning & Development.
Being trapped within an Organisation that has outgrown them
Learning & Development, Performance Management, Success Strategy, Talent Management.
The Well-being Strategy Cycle is used to assist organisations with high absence levels to undertake a diagnostic into their organisation well-being. The diagnostic supports the Well-being Strategy development, together with informing the organisations People or HR Strategy content, thus developing a holistic approach to well-being.
Article by Beverly Sherratt of Profectus 4 People.
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