How Organizations Can Thrive By Prioritizing Employee Health And Well-Being

A call for organizational reforms and supportive work environments

By Laura Neuffer, CoreHealth Technologies

Employees are becoming increasingly worried in 2023; concerns stemming from financial constraints such as inflation and recession to a new focus on employee health and wellness (H&W) are contributing to worker dissatisfaction, with more than one in three employees stating their employer is doing the bare minimum to support their work experience and employee health. The call for improvements in the workplace can no longer be ignored. Why? Because employees are leaving in large numbers.

We are experiencing an employee exodus from jobs, whether that be for a new job, a new career path, retirement, or simply exiting the workforce. A recent AON report noted that approximately 40 percent of employees globally planned to leave their jobs in 2022, which is similar to MetLife’s 2022 annual U.S. Employee Benefit Trends Study, indicating that 70 percent of employees intend to still be working with their current organization in 12 months. Employees report leaving due to various reasons, including:

● To prioritize personal life and health due to Covid-19 safety concerns, irregular work hours, work environment, burnout, and toxic cultures

● Concern about job security and financial stability as individuals (or their loved ones) lost their jobs or endured additional financial strain

● Opportunity to explore new jobs/careers, especially ones that offer higher pay, better work-life balance, employee wellness programs and benefits, a positive work culture, and better alignment with their personal values

While employees sometimes leave for reasons outside an organization’s control, there are important steps that employers can take to mitigate the losses they can control. Fortunately, organizations are well-positioned to make a significant difference in overall employee health and ultimately make the workplace a more positive environment.

Emphasizing Organizational Changes

Beyond traditional workplace H&W solutions, employers need to target organizational structures and work environments – the factors and systems beyond the individual that can influence health and well-being. One need not look further than the various frameworks for psychosocial risk in the workplace for opportunities to effect change at the organizational level, as they often lay the groundwork for how employers can most purposefully support their employees.

Like most things, there is not a one-size-fits-all approach, nor will changes occur rapidly. A multi-pronged, intentional strategy with consideration of the unique aspects of the workplace and population is needed. Below are the most pressing organizational changes companies should adopt

Flexible work: Employers have several, often interacting, opportunities for organizational changes. Perhaps the most prescient of which is adopting flexible work. The data have made this quite clear, with almost 60 percent of employees who intend to leave their jobs saying that flexibility is an action their employer could take to retain them. Giving employees the capacity to choose the hours they work and where they work is a way to accommodate those whose personal lives inhibit them from working easily a typical “9-5”.

Organizations need to reframe their views on how they believe work should be done in order to achieve productivity and meet the key performance indicators. Specifically, flexible schedules or remote/hybrid work is not a threat to productivity but instead is a change employers can make to uphold work-life balance, a key feature of employee H&W.

Improved benefits & H&W programming: A second vital organizational change that employers need to make is improving their benefits and overall H&W programming to ensure they are holistic, offering breadth and depth of services. This recommendation may seem obvious, but this is beyond just adding something new to the gamut of resources every year.

Instead, this means reviewing existing solutions and benefits to meet the needs of an ever-changing workforce, removing unhelpful solutions, and – most importantly – removing barriers to participation (i.e., accessibility, time, financial constraints, etc.) and promoting the resources available. Of course, employers cannot offer their employees every service available as there are very real barriers to an organization’s capacity to act, too. However, simply offering an employee assistance program or solutions that are not personalized is not going to suffice.

Thoughtful DEI: A holistic approach to H&W should be considered, in tandem with organizational improvements in diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). The focus on DEI has continued to grow over the years, and companies are modifying their policies and practices to ensure the appropriate support is in place, from recruitment to retention. Importantly, employees should not prioritize diversity during hiring if they do not provide a safe environment for diverse individuals to work in.

Organizational culture and psychological safety need to be preserved if employers are to maintain a safe work environment for current and future employees. Improving DEI does not just mean ‘improved DEI’, it is directly relevant to the health and well-being of people, and it should be viewed as such.

Positive organizational culture, management, and leadership: An organization’s culture is dependent on its leadership. This is not a provocative assertion –data has clearly demonstrated that top-down leadership and culture are psychosocial risk factors and can pose a serious threat to employees’ mental health and well-being.

Additionally, poor culture, mismanagement, and lack of effective leadership negatively impact employee satisfaction, productivity, and retention, among a plethora of other essential workplace outcomes. Research from MIT Sloan Management Review found a toxic corporate culture is 10x more predictive of turnover than compensation. Most proponents of workplace H&W have heard the term “culture of care”, and it is absolutely essential that leaders embody this.

Everyone Wins

Organizational changes are systems-level changes that benefit current and future employees, as well as the organization. Businesses can benefit as these modifications contribute to higher employee attraction, satisfaction, retention, and productivity – among various additional important outcomes. Considering that 86 percent of human resources (HR) leaders identify a talent shortage as their top concern, keeping existing employees is vital to mitigating losses, especially the financial cost of high turnover. The best part is that so many organizational changes can be made without additional financial burden to the company.

Perhaps most important is the fact that these changes greatly support employee H&W, especially for historically underserved populations. For instance, individuals with disabilities can access accommodations without being required to disclose their condition, in turn setting them up for success with the tools they need; caregivers are given the flexibility they need to provide care to their loved ones knowing that they can still get their tasks done when they have time; and marginalized communities may benefit from more supportive environments with less/no fear about stigmatization or discrimination they may face.

Without effective work environments and benefits, organizations cannot reasonably expect their people to be as impactful as they may be if they were provided the resources and set to succeed – this is what organizational changes stand to impact.

The main message is that organizations need to step up and make the necessary changes for their people. While organizations have limitations to the changes they can make, there are myriad ways they can improve. Many organization-level changes are within reach, and the gains for employers are undeniable. An investment in their people is an investment in the business.

Resources

● https://www. forbes.com/sites/ jeannemeister/2022/04/19/ the-great-re-shuffleof-talent-what-canemployers-do-to-retainworkers/?sh=7e3ae2734cf3

● MetLife_EBTS_2022.pdf

● AON - A-Guide-To-WorkforceResilience_Dec2022.pdf

Laura Neuffer, M.S., has more than 10 years of experience in corporate wellness. She now works at Carebook Technologies to help create technology and programming that is used in worksite wellness programs around the world. Laura is also a registered yoga instructor and a former university adjunct professor of communications

Would you like to comment?

Sponsor any of this year’s state of the industry research topics and come away with your very own affordable and branded research report and infographic, establish yourself as an industry thought leader by presenting at a one-day Virtual Event, and bolster sales through the generation of qualified leads. See

The Future of Performance Management Virtual Event

July 12-13, 2023

Learn more at: hr.com/PMResearch

The State of Human Experience in the Workplace Virtual Event

Aug 16, 2023

Learn more at: hr.com/ HumanExperienceResearch

The Future of Talent Acquisition Virtual Event

Sept 6-7, 2023

Learn more at: hr.com/FutureTalentAcquisition

By Davida Rivens, MD of Growth & Development, E4E Relief

By Russell Glass, CEO, Headspace

The HR Research Institute, powered by HR.com, the world’s largest social network for Human Resources professionals, is a key part of our mandate to inform and educate today’s HR professionals. Over the past three years, the HR Research Institute has produced more than 85 exclusive primary research and state of the industry reports, along with corresponding infographics in many cases, based on the surveys of thousands of HR professionals. Each research report highlights current HR trends, benchmarks, and industry best practices. HR Research Institute Reports and Infographics are available online, and always free, at www.hr.com/featuredresearch