At Ukuqina we are passionate about Workplace Wellbeing
Workplace Wellbeing relates to all aspects of working life, from the quality and safety of the physical environment, to how workers feel about their work, their working environment, the climate at work and corporate culture. Workers wellbeing is a key factor in determining an organisation’s long-term effectiveness. Many studies show a direct link between productivity levels and the general health and well-being of the workforce.
Workplace Wellbeing relates to all aspects of working life, from the quality and safety of the physical environment, to how workers feel about their work, their working environment, the climate at work and corporate culture.
Workers wellbeing is a key factor in determining an organisation’s long-term effectiveness. Many studies show a direct link between productivity levels and the general health and wellbeing of the workforce.
Enhancing employee wellbeing in the workplace is a crucial step towards looking after your people and improving organisational performance.
By improving organization performance we will create strong businesses and strong businesses will create a strong economy. Which is what we need more than ever.
Employee wellbeing has 3 dimensions
Understand them to guide your organization
Psychological and social health in the workplace has long been an important lever in organization performance. Covid-19 has accentuated the need of positive emotions due to heightened stress, fear, and uncertainty in the workplace along with social distancing and isolation restrictions affecting social health.
In 2019 South African college of applied psychology reported as many as one in six suffer from some Psychological problems (Does not include the serious cases of poor mental health). Invisible disabilities affect work performance. Many people find it hard to understand that disability can exist even if it is not clear in a visible way. The list of invisible disabilities is endless but includes psychosocial disabilities such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and anxiety disorders, and post-traumatic stress disorder.
The work environment can act as an inhibitor or promotor to good mental health, not only is it the ethically right thing to do, but many studies have shown improved organization performance occurs when creating a positive work environment. A positive work environment starts with leadership, which foster positive emotions and relationships, provides meaning in what needs to be accomplished.
Physical health goes beyond health and safety committees for the workplace, it extends to the overall physical health over employees that include managing the conditions on how well employees sleep, what nutrition they are receiving and what exercise they are performing to maintain a healthy life habits so that they may not fall sick. Therefore, many organizations have implemented new initiatives and communication programs to protect their employees’ health to provide opportunities to employees to improve their health.
It’s no secret that employees with sub-par health contribute to higher healthcare costs. And while some of that may stem from mental health issues, some studies observed that employees with poor health had 3 times more expenses than their health co-workers. All these expenses translate to organizational expenses. A large portion of those costs stem from presenteeism (when employees come to work but function at reduced capacity due to illness) and absenteeism (when employees miss work altogether because of sickness). With the shift to remote work, working environments have also been disrupted. Many employees don’t have adequate remote working conditions, which may affect their employees’ productivity levels.
The importance of a balanced diet really can’t be overstated, but it is often overlooked. In addition to helping employees feel great physically, studies show that with a healthy diet they’ll experience more brainpower and higher efficiency. Diets high in refined sugars can be particularly harmful to the brain. They increase inflammation, worsen the body’s regulation of insulin, lead to other imbalances in the body (like oxidative stress) and contribute to the amount of waste in the brain. On the flip side, a diet rich in vitamins and minerals nourishes the brain, protects it from injury and leads to improved function and better moods.
The impact of sleep on wellness and productivity cannot be overemphasized, and recent estimates have revealed that one-third of adults report not having enough sleep. A recent study shows that sleep loss causes a significant decrease in some cognitive functions including creativity, divergent thinking, decision making, short-term and working memory, and execution of tasks, even if the employee regains alertness with the use of stimulant measures. These result in a lot of work errors which may include errors of commission and omission which can affect the sustainability and profitability of a company in the long run.
Every good wellness program includes financial wellbeing. Employees are really feeling the inflation pinch. As a result, many workers find themselves in tighter financial circumstances than ever. Like it or not, people tend to look to their employer to help ease their financial woes – especially in today’s cutthroat labour market where stand-out compensation is crucial to attracting and retaining talent. Most organizations can’t double their employees’ salaries to edge out competitors and keep up with inflation increases. But fortunately, for many workers, compensation doesn’t strictly mean salary.
Advice through consultants is seen as a positive force for financial wellbeing; Budgeting/ planning, Retirement planning and Debt management are some of the aspects that could be considered.
Provide clear guidance around what side-hustles can be tolerated and provide up-skilling for those side hustles chance are those new skills will improve their current jobs.
With unlimited data packages, provide data packages, not only can they be in constant connection with work, but they can also use it in they personal capacity and this will help with the budgets.
You will be surprised that some employees rely on the food you provide, it can be incredibly helpful to cover a meal here and there for employees and allow them the option of saving that money for another use. Even a Bar-one here and there can make an important difference to workers who are pinching pennies, which frankly, is most of us.
Probably the least expensive of the lot, the right employee discount program will save your employees hundreds or even thousands of Rands over the year on everyday purchases like dining out and their vacations with theme park tickets, hotels, and car rentals.
