The overall experience of working for Google’s parent company Apple Inc. is pretty awesome, Why?, This is because it has set its Mountain View campus to be one of the most conducive and productive company workplaces.
The multi-billion dollar company has a work environment that focuses on well-being and health for its employees, its offices equipped with slides, so workers simply don’t have to take the stairs, ping-pong tables, free healthy food and snacks.
Employees are provided with free food and snacks, and wellness programs featuring healthcare services, physicians, yoga, physical therapy, and massages. They are also provided with access to fitness centres, group cooking classes, a bowling alley and community bikes.
In the workplace environment nearly a third of workers say work causes high or extremely high stress levels for them; however, Google aims at creating workspaces that focus on wellness and health, as wellness is undoubtedly effective so much so that it has been proven over and over again to be able to increase productivity and performance.
Employee well-being has not only shown its benefits towards society and employees themselves but it has also proven itself to be beneficial to organizations. There are many reasons why every organization should include wellness programs, these include:
1. Improved productivity
Well-being and productivity are linked as employees who are satisfied with their work and participate in wellness programs are in a much better place to perform better on tasks. They feel more motivated and energized to accomplish much more than their counterparts.
Let’s face it, Employees tend to get drained by 9 to 5 work hours which include boring, repetitive and energy draining tasks. These activities greatly reduces employee productivity and morale.
Statistics have shown that organizations with well-being, health and productivity programs prove highly effective as they reported 11% higher revenue per employee and 28% greater shareholder returns.
The wellness and well-being of employees is extremely important for the performance and growth of organisations. Happier employees work harder and perform better together in teams, are more loyal and are generally more productive.
2. Employee satisfaction
Organizations that prioritize employee well-being and wellness create an environment that increases how much their employees are satisfied with their jobs as it allowed them to be able to engage, communicate, feel valued and appreciated.
Wellness programs let employees know that they are an integral part of the organization and the organization is focused on their health and progression.
A study shows that Employees that participate in workplace wellness programs are far more satisfied in their jobs (70%) than those who don’t participate in their companies’ programs.
3. Employee health
Organizations should prioritize the health and fitness of their employees. Offering employees with fitness and health programs helps maintain their overall health, reduces stress levels and thus reducing chances of stress related illnesses, and also helps encourage a healthy lifestyle for employees.
Giving employees time for fitness exercises does not reduce their dedication to work in fact it has shown to effectively increase, studies have shown that wellness programs has reduced Healthcare costs of about 62% of participants.
4. Employee recruitment and retention
Organizations make their companies more attractive to current and prospective employees by having wellness and well-being programs.
Although prospective employees look to find jobs with good salaries, they are also interested in finding organizations with wellness initiatives especially millennials.
Wellness packages don’t just help recruit prospective employees but also help retain current employees.
According to a Xerox study, about three fourths of employers view wellness programs as a useful tool for recruiting and retaining staff
5. Reduced Absenteeism
A study has shown that employees who have good health are not as absent from work as often as unhealthy employees who may have high stress levels, unhealthy blood pressure, high glucose and cholesterol levels or any other medical condition caused by an unhealthy lifestyle or lack of exercise.
Employee absence costs employees a staggering 3.5 billion annually in Canada alone.
38% Employees of organisations who offer wellness and happiness programs said it helped them take sick days than employees that did not participate.
Conclusion
Organizations should make wellness and well-being an important aspect of their company workspaces and culture as its benefits can not be simply overstated.
Rather than overlooking these initiatives, organizations should look for ways to incorporate well-being and wellness programs into their workspace to benefit both the employees and the corporations themselves.