An investment in your employees mental health is an investment in your company s future
Your top priority should always be the health of your employees. After all, if your employees aren t healthy and performing at top condition, then your organization is definitely not performing up to its full potential. Employee well-being is an essential part of a company, and your organization should absolutely prioritize it. Today, we ll take a look at the top priorities and strategies you should consider when it comes to employee well-being and the future of your employees health.
After all, it s more than likely that you definitely struggle working when your mental well-being is suffering. So then how can you expect your employees to do it with a breeze? Looking into ways to improve overall employee mental well-being is essential in creating the best work environment you can for your employees.
Employee well-being is company well-being. By focusing on promoting and nurturing a work environment that supports employee well-being you ll be revolutionizing your organization. There are an endless amount of strategies to choose from, but your priority should be to just take the time to start in the first place.
Do you create a solid work-life balance for your employees? Be honest.
Every boss wants to say that they have a healthy and happy working environment for their employees. But let s be real – if they were to do a random anonymous survey on how happy their employees are with their work environment, chances are they d be in for a rude awakening. Long gone are the days of assuming that doing the best for your employees well-being is giving them a discount on a local gym membership. Caring for your employees mental well-being starts in the workplace.
As hard as it can be to admit – you re more than likely in some way or another putting a strain on your employees mental health. Whether that s by overloading them with work or not giving them enough paid time off or sick leave – you can always find ways to make your employees feel cared for. These are just some of the many ways to improve your employees work-life balance:
- Providing sufficient sick leave so that employees stay home until fully healthy
- Generous amount of leave time for example for maternity, paternity, death of a loved one etc.
- Offering enough paid time off for employees to fully rest and recover (companies like Netflix or GitHub even offer unlimited vacation time!)
- Provide flexible work conditions (flexible hours, optional remote work, offering to pay for shared workspace subscriptions)
All of these proactive ways in which you can improve your employees well-being tend to find themselves in form of workplace policies. What better way to show off these policies to your employees than in a beautiful employee handbook! With AirMason this can all be made possible by our talented team of individuals who will work with you to guarantee all of your employee well-being benefits are easily accessible in one place. Need to update some policies or add new strategies dedicated to mental health? No problem – our employee handbook software allows for easy to update features that employees can see right away.
Benefits to improve your employees mental well-being
There is also a multitude of ways in which you can improve employee well-being by taking the initiative to encourage the professional development of your employees and their connection with co-workers. Employees often strive in a workplace in which they feel like they connect with others.
Whether that s through shared interests through workplace small talk or even get-togethers with colleagues and higher-ups outside of work – you can always find ways in which you can promote healthy employee well-being. Remember – a healthy mind is a productive mind. Here are just a few ways in which you can encourage employees to balance their well-being with their work-life:
- Acknowledge and celebrate employee achievements
- Provide leadership development opportunities
- Share employee success stories in meetings or emails
- Create mentoring opportunities between co-workers
- Establish weekly social traditions like happy hours on Fridays, or virtual board game nights
- Ask employees directly about the benefits they would like to see regarding mental well-being
Why exactly is employee mental well-being so important?
The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says that mental illnesses affect employees in several ways. Besides negatively altering job performance and productivity, mental illness also affects an employee s communication with coworkers and their physical capability to function daily.
The CDC s statistics show that depression interferes with an employee s ability to complete physical job tasks about 20% of the time. It also can cause a 35% reduction in cognitive performance. Employee mental well-being in the workplace shouldn t just be something that s recommended – it should be required. Since it s not, employers should be taking matters into their own hands when it comes to making sure their employees are looked after.
While the discount to the gym membership is definitely a starting point, a better idea would be something like putting in a mental health budget company-wide for giving employees insurance accessibility into being able to see a therapist. Or other well-being initiatives or programs designed to take care of employees needs – such as what Unilever has done. By creating in-person workshops on mindfulness and manager training on mental health issues in the workplace as well as designing an app that provides health information and urgent assistance to employees when they need it – Unilever has understood what putting employee well-being first looks like. 
You cannot understand how to create a healthy and thriving workplace atmosphere if you do not first understand why exactly employee well-being is so important. The steps that are necessary to be taken to put employee mental health first have to come from a place of genuine care and concern for your employees.
Don t forget – your company would not be where it is today if it wasn t for the employees who brought it there. You owe it to them and to your own organization to invest back into your employees what they invest in your company.
Don t waste time – prioritize employee well-being today
Now that you ve seen examples of employee well-being strategies, benefits and programs in the workplace and understand the importance of employee well-being – there s no excuse. You have all the resources you need to look into promoting a healthy workplace environment – now all you need is a place where you can put it all together. With AirMason, custom-made employee handbooks are the perfect place to store all of your employee well-being-related information, and easy access to employee mental health policies is crucial.
