Why It’s Important to Promote Health and Wellness to Employees

The hard work your employees put in is central to your business’s success, so put effort into taking care of their needs. As well as providing standard benefits like a 401K, put together a company-wide health and wellness program, which will help to boost productivity, increase morale, and reduce sick days. Understanding the benefits of a health program will help you to decide whether or not to integrate one into your business strategy.

Boosts Productivity

There has been ample research to prove that healthy employees are more productive because they’re energized, rested, and full of motivation. By Introducing a health and wellness program, your employees are more likely to engage in regular exercise and have the proper amount of sleep, which is proven to increase workplace productivity. 

Reduces Healthcare Expenses

When companies cover healthcare expenses, it can become expensive if employees aren’t taken care of. By allowing your team access to a health and wellness program, you will reduce the number of sick days, meaning less money spent on treatments. As part of your wellness program, you can use third-party providers for prepaid cards, which allow your employees to pay for OTC medication and much more. From there, your employees can just search for a term like “dentist near me Germantown” or “physician near me” to find a medical professional, and they can use the prepaid card to cover some of the expenses. There are many different providers out there but one stands out above the rest; you can see how they compare to Solutran here.

Improves Employee Health and Behaviors

When employees have healthy habits, they’re less likely to face medical issues like heart disease. Your wellness program can work to encourage your team to ditch bad habits like smoking and excessive drinking. Instead, you can work to replace them with healthy eating and exercise.

The key to changing habits is education and swapping one action for another. For example, if an employee is craving a cigarette, you can encourage them to go for a short walk to help take their minds off it. Alternatively, some people find flicking an elastic band on their wrist can help distract from bad habits.

Lowers Stress Levels

Work and stress go hand in hand, but the scales need to tip more toward work for everything to run smoothly. By implementing a health and wellness program, your employees can access facilities designed for reducing stress including spa treatments and other activities designed for unwinding. When your employees are stress-free, they’re much more likely to focus on the task at hand.

Encourages Employee Engagement

When businesses create a company culture centered around employee well-being, they find engagement levels increase. There are countless activities to bring together wellness and business including company-wide “Step Count” competitions, which you can launch by providing cheap wearables to track activity. These activities help to improve health and bring your team closer together, which encourages teamwork and boosts output quality.

Take Away

When team members phone in sick it has a knock-on effect across your whole business, especially if you can’t find cover at short notice. To take care of your daily operations, put measures in place to look after your employee’s health and well-being. Implementing a health and wellness program doesn’t have to be complicated, you just need to provide rewarding reasons for employees to engage.