Attention Corporate Employees: Prioritize Your Wellbeing and Mental Health
Today, in the fast-moving corporate world we all live there is tremendous pressure to perform for better outcomes sometimes resulting in burnout and stress deteriorating mental health. From the fixed deadlines to endless meetings and fulfilling professional and personal expectations, employees rarely pay heed to one important thing in their lives — wellbeing. This blog discusses why corporate employees need to focus on their mental health and wellbeing, the impact of mental health on performance, and steps that can be taken towards positive developments in this area.
Why Mental Health in the Workplace is More Relevant Than Ever
The landscape of corporate culture has changed a lot throughout the years. Though the ease of sharing ideas and transmitting messages helps many engage their job passions productively, it has equally caused difficulty in distinguishing between work life and home life. As a consequence, many us are taking longer working days, even when exiting the workplace or signing off.
The global economic impact of lost productivity due to depression and anxiety disorders is $1 trillion each year, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Thus, the mental health has shifted from an individual challenge to a corporate matter. If the employees are mentally fit then he will be more engaged, motivated and productive.
For organizations and Corporate Training Companies, this creates an opportunity to address mental health proactively. Here are some signs that you might be neglecting your self-care:
Are you always tired or irritable, unable to concentrate? These could be signs of declining mental health. Here are some other common indicators:
- Physical Symptoms: Weariness, bodily aches, or chronic headaches.
• Emotional exhaustion: A sense of detachment or lack of drive.
• Poor Work Performance: Having trouble keeping quality or fulfilling deadlines.
• Social Withdrawal: Steering clear of conversations or team meetings.
It’s time to sit back and reevaluate how you handle work and life if any of these apply to you.
Why Prioritizing Wellbeing Matters
It is the employers’ duty to provide their workers with the necessary support and care for their physical and mental health. Despite this, many organizations still don’t have a dedicated wellbeing strategy. A wellbeing strategy can help employees feel valued and supported at work. It can also improve employee engagement and motivate teams to reach their goals.
Issues such as excessively long work hours, insufficient rest periods, and inadequate compensation have taken a toll on employee health across the board. Many individuals have come forward to articulate how the lack of attention and action toward improving employee wellbeing has personally impacted them.
Clearly, employee wellbeing serves as a foundational element in all organizations. Regardless of the size or industry of your company, there are numerous meaningful avenues to enhance the quality of life for everyone involved. Taking proactive steps toward employee wellbeing now can have a positive impact on future lives, potentially even saving them.
Strategies to Improve Your Employees Health & Well-Being:
- Give workers more control over how they do their tasks
Research indicates that a lack of control over one’s employment is associated with higher rates of heart disease and poorer mental health. Furthermore, a combination of high work demands and limited job management significantly increases the risk of diabetes and cardiovascular death. Even small changes to worker autonomy can have an influence on the well-being of employees.
- Give workers more freedom over where and when they work
Giving employees greater choice or control over their work schedules has been shown in numerous studies to benefit their mental health. This can be as simple as allowing different start and stop hours and making it easier to switch shifts for jobs that need to be completed on-site. Employees’ physical and mental health improved, and the company’s turnover decreased, as a result of a more comprehensive work redesign at a Fortune 500 company, where IT staff members were allowed autonomy over their work schedules and locations while still working together to ensure necessary coordination. - Make the schedules of employees more stable
Today, a lot of service and retail businesses aim to match labor to changing demand by using “just in time” scheduling. However, frontline workers find it challenging to balance their personal life and family obligations due to their unexpected and irregular schedules. According to research, employees who have this kind of unpredictable work schedule experience a number of detrimental effects, such as worse sleep and increased emotional distress. Conversely, a study at Gap found that greater schedule stability can benefit both companies and employees. - Give workers the chance to recognize and resolve issues at work
Offering workers the chance to contribute to workplace enhancements can be a successful strategy for promoting their wellbeing. According to one study, physicians, physician assistants, and nurse practitioners who were asked to take part in an organized process of recognizing and resolving issues at work showed higher levels of job satisfaction and lower burnout rates. One important advantage for companies looking to keep valuable personnel is that workers who had the chance to collaborate on problem-solving were also less likely to express a desire to quit. - Make sure your company has enough employees so that workloads are manageable
High work expectations, such as long hours or pressure to work quickly or hard, have been shown to have a significant negative impact on employees’ health and well-being. High demands combined with little control really raise health risks, such as the prevalence of cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, and depressive symptoms, according to a number of studies. Employers pay a significant price when sick or tired workers resign, miss work, or burn out, even though it may appear expensive to hire more staff to spread out the responsibilities. Targeted personnel changes could be the answer for it.
Encourage managers in your organization to support employees’ personal needs
Supervisors who are more understanding of the difficulties people encounter in juggling their personal and professional life are beneficial to the many workers who also serve as caregivers for aging parents or children. According to a study conducted in nursing homes, staff members who had managers who were more understanding of their family’s requirements slept better and had fewer cardiovascular disease risk factors. Training programs for managers to enhance family-supportive behaviors have been studied in grocery stores and health care settings, with encouraging results for health and work-life balance. Because employees whose supervisors received this training reported greater job satisfaction, improved job performance, and decreased interest in quitting, employers also benefited.
Conclusion:
Many management techniques that enhance employee well-being also benefit companies, as these examples show. It should come as no surprise. In the long run, businesses that prioritize the health and well-being of their workers are more likely to have workers who share those values. And all effective leaders desire that result. For this reason, Corporate Training Companies play a vital role in equipping leaders with the tools and strategies to foster such environments.
Do you have strategies that have worked for you? Share them in the comments—we’d love to hear your thoughts!
