The WellRight Blog

Stress is a fact of life. Whether it’s stress caused by personal issues, work demands, or global events, we all experience some form of negative stress in our lives. Indeed, about half of Americans report experiencing a “major stressful event” in the previous year. Fortunately, your workplace can be a surprisingly effective force for good when it comes to reducing your employees’ stress levels. Not only can you make sure your workplace isn’t unnecessarily stressful, but you can use your corporate wellness program to help employees bounce back faster and more fully when stress—from any source—does occur. 

How? By helping employees strengthen their emotional resilience.

Wouldn’t it be great to have an unlimited budget to invest in your employee wellness program? Imagine the rewards you could offer, the unique challenges you could try, the workplace wellness perks you could provide.

A full-time, onsite health food chef? Sure! Smartwatches for everyone? Why not?

Sadly, the sky is rarely the limit when it comes to creating an employee wellness program. You will likely have to make tough decisions and pass on some appealing—but too costly—options.

Make no mistake; some of your employees struggle with mental illness at least some of the time. The National Institute of Mental Health reports that nearly one out of five adults experiences mental illness in a given year. Depression and anxiety cost the U.S. economy $1 trillion per year in lost productivity.

And your workplace itself may be a contributing factor. One in four Americans say work is a source of anxiety.

How should you address mental health issues at your workplace?

Remote work was already on the rise. In 2015, 3.9 million U.S. workers were working remotely. By 2019, that number had grown to 4.7 million. 

In the past few weeks, however, that number has exploded. To support social distancing during the current spread of the COVID-19 virus, more and more companies have asked (or ordered) employees to work from home.

For your wellness program to succeed, it requires participation. But when an organization’s staff are scattered across multiple field offices, it becomes much harder to motivate people … or even to keep them informed in the first place.

The good news: Most employees are enthusiastic about wellness programs, with nearly 77% of employees agreeing that wellness programs can positively affect corporate culture, and 45% of workers in small- and medium-sized businesses reporting they’d stay at their jobs longer if their company had a robust wellness program.

The bad news? A lack of awareness may be your wellness program’s Achilles heel. In fact, as much as 60% of your workforce may not even know your wellness program exists.

It seems like the days when people would stay with a single employer for decades are long gone.

The numbers say that millennials—the most populous generation in the U.S. labor force—change their jobs at three times the rate of older generations. A resume packed with frequent job hops no longer carries the stigma it once did.

Changing attitudes about employment are combining with a booming economy to generate the highest quit-rate in years. And more than half of American workers are looking for a new job or watching openings.

In other words, if an employee isn’t highly engaged, they’re out the door.

What motivates you in wellness?

Some people love 5 a.m. boot camp workouts with a hard-nosed trainer who verbally whips them into shape. Other folks shudder at the very thought, greatly preferring a Sunday afternoon run with a group of friends.

Much as every person’s wellness journey is individual, so is their reason for staying on track. And by tapping into the type of motivation people respond to, your wellness program can be a powerful driver of success.

Who has time for wellness? We hear this question all the time on the individual level, from stressed-out parents, career-driven workers, and just about everyone else trying to balance busy lives with demanding jobs.

But just as often, the question comes from organizations. Businesses of all sizes have so much on their plates—from hiring and managing a workforce to satisfying customers and clients, to developing new and profitable products and services—that designing a wellness program can sometimes seem like one task too many.

January is the biggest month of the year for buying things we struggle to use.

In the rush of excitement to stick to our fitness resolutions, we splurge on exercise equipment, gym memberships, and sporty new workout clothes. All too often though, by February the equipment is gathering dust, the gym membership is nothing more than a monthly debit from our bank accounts, and the workout clothes still have their tags.

It’s a well-established fact: When employees make healthy choices, eat better, exercise more, and learn to reduce the stress in their lives, they engage more with their jobs. Absenteeism, presenteeism, and turnover go down, while productivity, creativity, and morale go up.

But as you probably know from your own life, reversing long standing habits is easier said than done. If you’ve become accustomed to grabbing fast food for comfort after an exhausting day of work, you may have trouble psyching yourself up for fresh produce. If you’re used to waking up to your Twitter feed, a 20-minute meditation may, at first, seem like a disappointing substitute.

That’s where an employee wellness program comes in. A good wellness program nudges your team toward healthy habits with a combination of fun challenges, community support, and education. But the best wellness program in the world won’t make much difference if your employees don’t use it.