Most modern companies pride themselves on being good employers. But even with the highest salaries and lots of sick days, your company could be hurting employees’ health and wellbeing because of the lack of support and poor organization of working processes. However, working conditions and how you treat your personnel play a great role in how they feel. And happy employees deliver much better results.
You don’t want to make your employees struggle with what they do and where they work. Even when they have interesting projects, they may experience mental burnout or health issues due to lack of sleep, motivation and high stress at work. While you lose the chance to see amazing outcomes from their work, you also fall at a higher risk of losing your experts.
For example, some studies found that strategically changing workplace conditions improve employee wellbeing while also supporting their health. This, in turn, brings beneficial business outcomes, including improved job performance and lower levels of employee burnout.
With successful stories from leading companies, we recently reviewed and synthesized research on some work conditions that affect workers’ wellbeing. Even though some believe that changing conditions usually means costly things, it will be enough to consider adopting the following effective approaches.
Give Employees Control Over How They Work
Experts believe that having no control over working time and how to work is associated not only with poor mental health but also with higher rates of lack of motivation. In addition, the combination of high workloads and lack of job control can increase the risks of mental health issues, diabetes and death from health issues.
Even small changes in reducing control of how your employees work and giving them more autonomy can bring a huge difference. People who feel control over their work hours and how they work are generally more responsible, motivated and happy. You can start by offering flexible working hours and creating Trello boards so they can do their tasks by themselves.
Offer Health Cover
Offering health cover is the simplest yet most effective way to show your employees that you care. Since some health issues may appear in your workers and they may feel left without treatment coverage, you can provide them with a healthcare plan from mosaichealth.io. This way you can show that you care about their health, support them when they can’t afford treatments and improve their wellbeing.
Allow Employees Flexibility About Where They Work
It isn’t surprising that remote work is gaining popularity. However, most companies returned their employees to the office last year. Even though office work allows for better connection and faster work, remote work is the preferred choice for most workers in 2022. Therefore, it is best to allow your employees to choose where they want to work or control their work schedules to improve their mental health.
Make Workloads Reasonable
Research has found that high workloads like pressure on specific employees, too many working hours, and a vast range of tasks can take a substantial toll on employee wellness. In fact, several studies report that high demands mixed with low or no control can lead to many health risks, such as higher rates of depression, high blood pressure, insomnia, anxiety and cardiovascular disease.
Therefore, you have to hire enough employees to make the workload reasonable and realistic. Do not put too many tasks on one person or one team, especially when they work under pressure or without extra payment for this. You should also avoid urgent tasks since they put employees under high stress, which not only leads to health issues but also usually doesn’t deliver the expected results. Unexpected situations happen, so hire freelancers so they can cover your full-time employees, taking care of their health.
Create a Stable Working Schedule
Many modern companies try to deliver results on time, increasing the load of employees and making it hard for them to work as efficiently as they can. Erratic, hassle and urgent tasks, overworking, unpredictable schedules and other related things make it challenging for most workers to succeed in their personal lives, work and family responsibilities. In addition, it will also cause mental breakdown over time and reduce the motivation to work.
Managing work-life balance is essential in 2023 since it helps us stay stable and maintain overall wellness while reducing the risk of many health conditions. Experts found that stability in the working schedule can benefit both employees and companies. Creating a stable schedule and overall stability at work can lead to better productivity and stress reduction in employees.
Provide Employees with Career Opportunities & Support
Giving employees career opportunities is an excellent way to boost their productivity and mental health. Everyone wants to be noticed and appreciated, so you should also provide efficient support when issues appear. When you hire an employee, consider what career opportunities they may have in the future. It is also best to create detailed and realistic KPIs so employees will know what to do to achieve goals. Self-realization at work and positive feedback have been shown to improve mental and physical health, reduce stress, improve mood and lead to better results at work.
Support Employees Personal Needs
Even though most modern companies provide sick days and days off to cover the personal needs of their teams, it isn’t enough in 2023. People prefer freelance work since they can sit with their children when they are ill, go to the gym whenever they want or sleep more. We are all people; we have families, some unexpected issues in our lives and personal needs. So one of the best things you can do to improve the health and wellbeing of your employees is to support their needs in ways they ask.
