Employee Benefits

A Mediaplanet Guide on How Happier Employees Help Build Better Businessess

Employee Well-Being & Engagement

Jenn Lim The Delivering Happiness CEO on improving employee happiness for a more profitable business

How Gallup and Magellan Health are empowering people to increase their well-being Why businesses are prioritizing a corporate culture of wellness

MARCH 2022 | FUTUREOFBUSINESSANDTECH.COM

An Independent Supplement by Mediaplanet to USA Today

How Employers Can Meaningfully Support Employee Mental Health In a survey of 11,300 employees across 17 industries, employees share what workplace wellness strategies have the greatest impact on their mental health and experience at work.

In Mental Health America’s (MHA) 2021 Work Health Survey, 56 percent of employees reported spending time looking for a new position. In September 2021, 4.4 million people resigned from their positions due to inflexibility, burnout, or a re-evaluation of life priorities.

Employee expectations have shifted rapidly, emphasizing an employer’s responsibility to the well-being of their workforce. Survey findings reveal that important strategies to improve employee mental health include company leadership investment, managerial support, and employee empowerment.

The following strategies were most commonly implemented among the healthiest workplaces: • Establish employee mental health and well-being as a top organizational priority.

• Invest in developing supportive and emotionally intelligent people managers.

• Provide employees with agency over their work.

For more information on current research and workplace mental health resources, please visit www.mhanational.org/workplace.

Taylor Adams, Director of Workplace Mental Health, Mental Health America (MHA)

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The Profitability of Well-Being: The New Corporate Priority The Great Resignation is still sweeping through all sectors of the job market at different rates, but the motivation is the same: employees are rediscovering themselves and what work should mean to them.

Employees now place a greater priority on their health and well-being, and this has become one of the key conversations and benefit determinants for employers looking to retain talent. The new corporate priority, currency of the work experience, and driver of post-pandemic business success is a culture of wellness. How does your workplace culture impact your employees?

Work culture A new report has shown that toxic workplace culture is

10 times more likely to drive employees away regardless of their pay. Your organizational culture upholds what your company stands for; it is furthered by your core values and is essential to getting your employees to be “all in,” which provides the extra push towards achieving outstanding results. You must begin to integrate values and initiatives that drive employees’ personal success, while prioritizing appreciation and gratitude for corporate contributions.

Wellness offerings Workers are now drawn to employers that walk the walk when it comes to health and wellness offerings. Ramping up your wellness initiatives not only builds a healthier workforce, but it also lowers your healthcare spending. A systematic review of 56 studies

on worksite health programs revealed that well-implemented workplace wellness initiatives can lead to more than 25 percent savings on absenteeism, healthcare costs, and disability management claims.

Employee health No employee wants to return to an office that increases their risk of COVID-19 or heightens their anxiety. In fact, a 2020 PwC survey showed that 70 percent of workers said that an unsafe environment with poor COVID-mitigation measures may prevent them from returning to work. With many variants and sub-variants emerging, one sure-fire way to attract and retain the best talents is ensuring your work environment is safe to work in. n Jonathan Edelheit, Co-Founder & Chairman, Global Healthcare Resources

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PLEASE RECYCLE

Publisher Camilla Salemme Business Developer Neetu Wadhwani Managing Director Jordan Hernandez Lead Designer Kayla Mendez Designer Keziah Makoundou Lead Editor Jon Adams Copy Editor Taylor Rice Director of Content and Production Jordan Hernandez Cover Photo Sarah Deragon All photos are credited to Getty Images unless otherwise specified. This section was created by Mediaplanet and did not involve USA Today.

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A Comprehensive Solution to Employee Burnout As the workforce mental health provider for more than 2 million Americans, Lyra Health is transforming the way companies care for the well-being of employees and their families.

T

he COVID-19 pandemic has had a massive impact on the global workforce and its collective mental health. In a recent survey, nearly 1 in 4 American workers reported feeling burnt out “very often” or “always.”

It’s no surprise then that many have reevaluated what work means to them. More than 33 million U.S. workers have left their jobs since April 2021, in a phenomenon dubbed The Great Resignation.

This event highlighted what employers were already starting to realize: Workers need to feel supported and valued in order to be engaged and productive.

“In dealing with issues such as chronic stress and burnout, people feel overwhelmed and unable to perform their job fully,” said Joe Grasso, Ph.D., clinical psychologist and senior director of workforce mental health at Lyra. “As a consequence, they pull back from work. They’re also susceptible to presenteeism, meaning they

are mentally elsewhere even if they’re physically working.”

Transforming mental health Offered as a benefit for self-insured companies, Lyra Health is changing the way employers across the globe offer mental health care services.

With Lyra, your employees and their dependents can access a network of worldclass therapists, mental health coaches, and more. Appointments are available the same day you book (the national

average wait time for a mental health visit is three weeks).

Plus, employees who have Lyra have 24/7 access to live messaging with mental health professionals and unlimited access to self-led cognitive behavioral therapy lessons and exercises.

“Organizations should prioritize psychological safety and mental wellness while modeling healthy self-care behaviors,” said Grasso. “Having a quality mental health benefit is a part of that equation.”

More than 1 in 5 Americans has a mental health issue like depression or anxiety. If employers want an engaged workforce, they need to end the stigma and support their employees’ mental health. n Dustin Brennan

Join Lyra’s effort to transform the way our nation confronts mental health by visiting lyrahealth.com.

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PHOTO: SARAH DERAGON

How Happier Employees Help Build Better Businesses

The U.S. workforce is currently experiencing what many are calling “The Great Resignation.”

There’s some truth to that notion: The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that in November, a record 4.5 million U.S. employees quit their jobs.

This means more people are quitting, month over month, since the beginning of 2021.

What makes this even more remarkable is that resignations are happening in a time of unpredictability and a global recession.

If you’re an employer, the statistics raise a question: With employees quitting at this rate,

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how do you attract and retain engaged, productive, and happy employees?

Jenn Lim, CEO of Delivering Happiness, has made solving this conundrum her life’s work. The company she co-founded in 2010 consults companies on improving culture and employee happiness for a more profitable and sustainable approach to business.

Values and culture The first step toward sustaining employees, Lim says, is making sure the company has clearly defined purpose, values, and behaviors that its employees can align with. “Once you get that codified, you can see their

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light bulbs go off in how they’re bringing their own personal purpose and aligning that to the company’s. Then it becomes more meaningful work that goes beyond just a paycheck,” Lim explains.

Keeping culture alive in a time of remote work is something larger companies like Automattic (the company behind WordPress, the most popular website platform in the world valued at $3B), which has been remote since its inception in 2003, have mastered, Lim says. And if you’re an employer in a remote or hybrid setting, Lim says we can learn from those that have a history of success with remote work, and

begin testing how to do it yourself to recruit and retain your best talent.

Delivering Happiness follows a specific framework to this end, which includes increasing engagement between team members through scientific factors like control, progress, connectedness, and purpose. There are several online platforms that employees can leverage to cultivate their unique culture, such as Facebook Workplace, Culture IQ, or Slack, Lim adds. That said, “There’s more to it than the tools you use,” Lim says. “It’s how you recognize, incentivize, and prioritize the initiatives that mean the most.”

Empathy and compassion Another key to keeping employees happy is ensuring leaders create workplaces with “psychological safety.” Giving employees free access to mental health apps like Calm and Headspace is nice, but less than half the battle, Lim says.

More important for employee well-being are compassion and connectedness. “From a team or company perspective, it’s as simple as embedding in your culture, like, ‘Let’s be real with each other.’ If someone seems a little off or disruptive in a meeting, let’s embed a behavior where you feel safe to say, ‘Hey, are you okay?’

“When we’re being human, we empathize and respond with how we’d personally want to be treated in that situation.

We don’t assume the worst of that person because everyone is going through an internal battle that we have no clue about. I think that comes into codifying values and behaviors, so everyone is clear on the way this company works together.”

This point in time, when employees are being more selective about the work they accept and stick with, is an opportunity for employers, Lim strongly encourages. “What’s coming with the Great Resignation is the Great Awakening or the Great Reset or the Great whatever-you-want-to-call-it. But that’s not the point. The point is competitive advantage comes as people are resigning, sometimes without even a place to go.

The stakes — and possibilities — are even greater for companies to be really intentional about how they want to attract, retain, and grow the right people, especially when they’re doing it for the right reasons with purpose and values in place. ” n Melinda Carter

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Why a Caring Culture is Essential for a Healthy Employee Experience

Companies that create and nurture a culture of care have more engaged employees and reduced turnover. That’s according to Limeade, an immersive employee well-being company that creates healthy employee experiences.

“A caring culture is the biggest driver of organizational commitment,” says Jessi Crast, advanced researcher at the Limeade Institute, part of the company’s team of researchers and advisors, who conduct research and share insights on the science of creating great employee experiences.

Limeade, which has 16 years of experience as pioneers in employee health and well-being in the workplace, is on a mission is to transform work into a source of posi-

tivity, energy, humanity and purpose. Limeade solutions are a refreshing way to infuse well-being into work — across all levels of an organization.

By putting well-being at the heart of the employee experience, Limeade reduces burnout and turnover while increasing well-being and engagement — ultimately elevating business performance.

Backed by science Millions of users in over 100 countries use Limeade. The company’s Limeade Institute provides industry insights and resources including research, e-books and guides to help improve employee well-being. Findings from their Limeade institute support the company’s solutions and help drive innovation, including their “Limeade Results Model,” which is

backed by research and rooted in care and illustrates that an active and reciprocal commitment between companies and employees ultimately leads to better people and business results.

“When companies care for their employees, they support them in a variety of ways,” says Crast. “Employees have the space and the time to really care for themselves, and they can invest that energy back into their company. And that cycle of mutual commitment is what helps drive people in business results.”

Caring culture Companies are always looking for effective strategies to boost employee participation and well-being outcomes. Limeade research shows the biggest predictors of participation include a caring culture, communica-

tion, listening and learning, and leader involvement.

A caring culture can be represented in many ways. When a caring culture is present, for example, employees may say they feel trusted, included and invested in; and they may feel they’re heard, valued and informed. They may also report trusting organizational leadership and feeling the company supports work-life balance and flexibility.

Limeade Institute research shows when employees feel cared for, 94 percent report feeling personally engaged in their work, compared to 43 percent who don’t feel care; 60 percent say they plan to stay at their company, compared to 7 percent who don’t feel cared for; and 91 percent report being likely to recommend the organization as a great place to work, compared to 9 percent who don’t feel cared for.

Whole ecosystem approach The software company has a whole ecosystem approach to amplifying care at a workplace.

“Organizations really need to focus and work synergistically together and the way we do that is through partnership,” says Crast. “It’s really the key to helping us create this this synergistic integrated whole ecosystem approach.”

She says companies can show care by providing organizational support for employees. For example, they can work with managers on messaging to talk with employees about well-being and how to overcome challenges; encourage employees to connect socially and cheer them on for their achievements; pay attention to the

employees’ physical environment, such as loud noise or too much foot traffic; and create well-being champion support networks to connect employees across different business groups.

Limeade helps companies extend and strengthen the organizational support employees feel from their managers with tools and resources designed to be targeted and personalized for their employees. Employers can use Limeade solutions to provide this care and support, such as messaging employees to go for a walk, or celebrating a team member’s successes.

The messaging can be tailored for the recipient’s needs, such as email for someone who works in an office, or printed flyers for employees who don’t work from a set space.

Creating a culture of care yields big results. Of the companies who have used Limeade, 86 percent of employees report being engaged or highly engaged; and 56 percent of employees with unmanageable stress lowered their stress levels year-overyear. There’s also a 2X increase in employee usage; and a 3X reduction in turnover.

“Limeade helps accelerate mutual commitment between the company and its employees and have really good outcome comes for everybody,” says Crast. n Kristen Castillo

Find out more about Limeade and request a demo: limeade.com

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The First Step in Increasing Well-Being Is Measuring It A new collaboration between Gallup and Magellan Health seeks to empower people to increase their well-being.

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t’s not news that negative emotions are on the rise. “Gallup has been tracking global trends for quite some time, and we’re seeing that the percentage of people who are thriving in their overall lives is just 29 percent,” says Dr. Jim Harter.

“So, about 70 percent are either struggling or suffering in their overall lives.”

Negative emotions not only impact our mental health, but they’ve also been shown to have an impact on our physical health as well. That makes increasing well-being and reducing negative emotions like anger, stress, and anxiety a priority.

The Wellbeing Project Gallup has partnered with Magellan Health to create the Wellbeing Project, which combines deep research data with healthcare solutions designed to personalize the

approach to mental health.

“Gallup has been studying human behavior through global analytics for the past 80 years,” notes Harter. “And Magellan has been developing huge expertise in behavioral health for over 50 years. We decided to combine forces because we felt that together our organizations could do a lot more than either one alone.”

The unique approach taken by the Wellbeing Project starts with research. Gallup has conducted global surveys and has identified five core “dimensions” of well-being: career, social, financial, physical, and community. Magellan Health then added a sixth element around emotional well-being.

“For each of these dimensions, we can measure both high energy and points of pain,” explains Harter. “There’s thriving and suffering in each one.”

It’s important to note that these dimensions interact

with and affect each other.

“We found that when well-being drops for people, it tends to be the result of not just one thing going wrong,” Harter notes. “People are pretty resilient to one thing going wrong — it’s usually compounding effects. And in the past couple of years, we’ve had a lot of compounding effects coming at us.

So, keeping your eye on all elements and how they affect one another can have a big impact on whether people have a chance to continue thriving during tough times.”

Measurement is key What makes the Wellbeing Project unique is its focus on real data and actionable insights.

“We need to first understand what dimensions we can measure,” Harter explains, “and whether we can act on them to increase the likelihood that we’re thriving in our overall lives, having more good days

and less of those negative emotions. We have to get ahead of it by helping people measure what matters the most and give them some insights into how they can improve their overall lives. That’s one side. The other part is to make it personalized.”

To that end, the Wellbeing Project is leveraging Magellan Health’s millions of members to create what Harter describes as “probably the largest well-being study that’s ever been done.” Ultimately, he hopes the evolving data will help organizations develop and support a “thriving culture.”

“A thriving culture will be one of the most sought-after characteristics of organizations,” Harter asserts. “An authentic culture where people come to work and their lives get better, in addition to being productive, creates an employment brand that will attract people.”

Knowledge is power, and Harter believes the secret

is combining data with self-awareness of strengths.

“Get the starting point right,” he advises. “We don’t have to pursue the same solutions that other people are using. Take a step back and say, ‘Here’s who I am individually, here’s what I lead with, here’s what I’m best at,’ and aim that at improving your career, social, financial, physical, community, and emotional well-being. I think we have a better chance of being resilient and thriving if we do that.” n Dr. Jim Harter, Chief Scientist of Workplace and Wellbeing, Gallup

To read more about this project visit gallup.com

Magellan Health and Gallup have joined forces to empower individuals to improve their wellbeing. Why? Because everyone deserves a thriving life, a resilient mind and a healthy body.

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How To Develop a Culture That Puts Employees First Having proved that they can work productively from home, many workers are demanding to be able to continue to work remotely at least part of the week.

Amid the competitive war for talent and labor shortages, now is the time for employers to step up and ensure their culture is one that focuses on employees’ experience in the world of work.

Of course, that is much easier said than done. What precisely do employers need to ensure their culture puts employees first and stops them from quitting?

Ensuring inclusivity First of all, employees want to work for purpose-driven organizations — they

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want to work for companies that are diverse, equitable, and inclusive.

Now is the time for companies to be clear about walking the walk — not just talking the talk — on diversity and inclusion. Being an inclusive workplace is about more than ticking a box, it is about actually wanting to create a workplace environment where everyone can thrive — and this is ultimately good for business.

Are you prepared to change track if they disagree? The answer to all these questions must be yes.

Employee engagement surveys are a good start, but they are not enough on their own. The surveys are passive, and to genuinely show employees you are listening to what they have to say; managers and leaders need to regularly check in personally with their workers and teams.

Giving employees a voice While ensuring employees have a good experience at work, employers must go further and ensure their workers are engaged. Does your staff have a voice and feel empowered to express their opinions? Do you listen to their views?

Appreciating staff work The third and final way to develop an employee-first company culture is to properly appreciate your staff’s work.

Yes, they get paid, but they want to feel like their work is genuinely important to the company.

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The best way to start is simply by thanking them for working hard — whether that is after the completion of tasks or at the end of each day.

Another option is to regularly reward the whole team for collective good work. This could be through sending everyone gifts or by giving everyone a day off.

Now is the time to act and upgrade your company culture if you want to survive, and thrive, in the Great Resignation. UNLEASH America is the place to discuss solutions to this and other contemporary business issues of our time. n Allie Nawrat, Senior Journalist, UNLEASH America

How to Navigate the New Normal of Employee Well-Being

Meg Donovan Chief People Officer, Nexthink

Jeremy Beament Co-Founder & Director, nudge

Are there any initiatives or upcoming trends in employee health that you personally support?

Meg Donovan: There is a movement toward humanity in the workplace that I was always a proponent of, and the pandemic really brought this to the forefront. How employers responded to the needs of their employees and how they demonstrated that they cared for their employees’ health and well-being throughout the pandemic mattered.

Richard Branson: First and foremost, I believe in flexible working. It is important that employers appreciate their employees’ work-life balance and give them the flexibility to work around their personal lives. We have embraced flexible working since 2013 and allowed our people to work from home or remotely and stagger their working hours if they wish to. We trust our employees to work from wherever and whenever they like as long as they get their work done on time and to a high level.

Why is company culture so important for employee well-being?

Jenna Mons Anderson: Employees spend more than half their day, in most cases, where they work. The company culture impacts all aspects of their well-being. People want to be

Frank Wolf Co-Founder & CSO, Staffbase

supported, inspired, and empowered.

A good employee well-being program is diverse and well-aligned with the corporate culture. It needs to offer a variety of options and meet each employee where they are.

Arianna Huffington: There’s a direct connection between the health of a company’s bottom line and the health and well-being of every company’s most important resource — its people.

In the same way well-being boosts our immune system, culture serves as a company’s immune system, giving it the resilience to meet inevitable challenges.

What is one piece of advice you have for company leaders who feel a disconnect with their employees?

Frank Wolf: Company leaders first need to listen carefully and be open to having conversations with their employees in an effort to understand their point of view, questions, and concerns. Studies have found that 90 percent of employees desire communication from their organization’s leadership at least once a week. Effective employee communications management helps bridge the gap between a company’s workforce and its leaders, creating direct and meaningful engagement for all concerned.

Jenna Mons Anderson CEO, AccessElite

Arianna Huffington Co-Founder, The Huffington Post

Where should leaders start when it comes to implementing employee engagement and wellbeing practices into their team’s routine?

Jeremy Beament: Understanding your people and their needs is always the first step. Clear business objectives like driving employee benefit uptake and creating an inclusive workplace ensures you can choose a program that is relevant, which in turn will increase uptake. Regardless of what you offer, impartial, personalized education to drive understanding of how to utilize your employee benefits must underpin the program. Only then will employees know how to improve their well-being using the support you offer.

Are there any specific tools or services that organizations are using to overcome some of the impediments they might face in the shift to the employee experience?

FW: Employee experience is the key to creating an environment that encourages employees to be at their best in a workplace where people want to work and succeed. To quote Richard Branson, “There’s no magic formula for creating great company culture. The key is just to treat your staff how you would like to be treated.” I’d like to add that the key is to also treat your staff how you would like your customers

Richard Branson Founder, Virgin Group

to be treated — the Golden Rule for creating an amazing workplace culture. What is abundantly clear is employee experience represents a game-changing transformation in workplace culture that will foster employee loyalty and performance for years to come.

What are some key strategies companies can employ to prevent employee burnout and retain top talent?

JB: Financial stress is a top cause of poor mental health. In fact, 45 percent of people globally feel anxious about their financial situation. It might not always be those that are on lower incomes; many are supporting others on their salary that employers don’t know about.

Impartial financial education gives employees the skills and knowledge to reduce stress. We know that 85 percent of financially healthy workers feel more productive at work, ultimately reducing the risk of burnout.

JMA: Make diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging (DEIB) part of your well-being program. A good employee well-being program is diverse and wellaligned with the corporate culture. Your programs should be representative of your employee population from the classes/events offered to content selected and instructors used. n MEDIAPLANET

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When public speaker Mark Levy worked at Airbnb, he and his team pioneered a system called an employee experience approach, or EX, billing it as an alternative to human resources.

Levy, who now advises other companies on EX, says the center of this concept is creating a two-way dialogue between leaders and employees. It’s about “doing things with and for your employees, not to them,” he explains.

A more responsive model He rattles off the benefits of EX, which arguably are all the things employers want: more engaged, productive, sustainable, focused, fulfilled, solution-oriented employees who naturally, by way of being satisfied, become brand ambassadors.

“There are limited costs

Ditching HR: Why One Thought Leader Is Pushing an Employee Experience Approach to making this shift, and in fact, you could say it saves you money,” Levy says. “You’re no longer making the mistakes of choosing the wrong priorities or implementing programs, processes, systems, or tools that are not going to effectively address the real challenges or resonate with employees.”

With EX, companies can better meet potentially less obvious needs of employees, such as those of prospective parents who are looking for resources to confidently grow their families then return to work, Levy says. Separately, tending to mental health has been a top priority of many

employees during the COVID19 pandemic, and employers who choose to take an employee-first approach can help destigmatize this issue by talking about it and providing resources such as telehealth to address problems like depression, loneliness, and substance abuse.

“The expectations for a company are much higher than they’ve ever been as the fight for talent gets more difficult,” Levy says.

A sustained culture In taking an EX approach, Levy explains, employers in remote workspaces can meet

their employees’ needs by keeping their company culture alive, whether through maintaining company traditions, holding all-hands meetings and conducting surveys, or continuing to advocate for the company’s values, such as fighting climate change, addressing systemic racial injustice, or the like.

Making employees content also means treating them like people, not workhorses.

“Best in class is to start with treating your employees like humans, recognizing that they have a life, and spending time getting to know them

and their individual situations,” Levy notes. “Balance is important — focusing on trust and support in order to have employees then be willing to make sacrifices.”

Many companies, and employees themselves, have experienced dramatic changes since the COVID-19 pandemic began, but Levy suggests the future workplace may be better off for it.

“I hope we learned a lot from these past few years,” Levy says. “That life and work can be more meaningful, and that people become more engaged in their work because their employers trust them, support them being their best selves, and take a stand on making the country, the work, and the planet a better place for all of us.” n

Melinda Carter

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The Future of Work: Architecting Tomorrow’s Digital Experiences Today employees are working inside software more than inside the walls of an office. In this new world, IT teams must move beyond just monitoring employees’ devices, applications and software to truly understanding the employee digital experience.

Office spaces used to be critical resources for employers to establish and gauge workplace cultures. Discussions over the water cooler and forged relationships between managers

and employers provided honest, organic insights about what people were experiencing and what solutions would help them thrive.

Two years into a global pandemic, and with remote work likely to stick around for the long term, many of those lines of communication no longer exist.

While many enjoy the freedom and flexibility of working from home, there’s a prevailing sense of disengagement and it falls on IT teams to overcome this.

“What used to be the mis-

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sion of HR, to architect the workplace, is now on the shoulders of IT teams,” said Yassine Zaied, Nexthink’s chief strategy officer. “They are the architects of the increasingly digital workplace.”

A better digital workspace Companies have at their disposal more software tools than ever before to get work done no matter where employees are. But the key to getting the most out of any of these solutions, Zaied explains, is under-

standing what your employees need and how they’re engaging with technology once it’s deployed.

“If IT teams do not understand what employees need, what they use, what incidents they’re facing, or what their work style is — how will they be able to architect a great digital workplace?” he said.

Nexthink helps organizations and their IT teams architect better, more personalized digital work solutions by delivering actionable insights. The platform goes beyond tracking back-end data by looking at how different solutions and applications are used from the employees’ perspective.

Without pestering employees for feedback, Nexthink can identify problem areas for

individual and entire groups of employees, and deliver solutions for those issues in real time. It also helps IT teams make data-driven decisions about the software employees use and how work gets done.

“You need to make your employees feel heard and seen,” Zaied said. “Make them feel they are receiving the digital workplace they dreamed about without wasting their time. This is becoming crucial for business.” n Dustin Brennan

See how you can create better digital employee experiences today by visiting nexthink.com

Cause the Effect: Financial Wellness Benefits Have Value for Employers and Employees Alike In the wake of the pandemic, employees are placing great importance on financial wellness programs and benefits.

Historic turnover, sustained wage inflation, and a widening skills gap is producing an ultra-competitive talent market. “The Great Resignation” is leading to losses in productivity, performance, and, ultimately, profit. Organizations are scrambling to find a competitive edge in the labor market to boost recruitment and stave off attrition. In the race to find strategic solutions, businesses are scrutinizing

everything from compensation to workplace culture.

Today, businesses can reset their workplace strategies to transcend the current economic trends and discover new avenues for success.

Workers’ financial stress presents a window to broaden businesses’ appeal to current and prospective talent.

Strengthening your workforce Financial well-being ascribes individuals the ability to meet current and ongoing financial obligations, secure their financial future, and make choices that allow them to enjoy life.

But until recently, employers paid little attention to their employees’ personal financial circumstances beyond providing standard retirement savings plans.

Offering tailored financial wellness programs can generate a strong return on investment via a less stressed and more engaged workforce. For workers, financial wellness benefits represent an opportunity to magnify the impact of their income by helping workers utilize sound financial strategies.

For employers, it strengthens their position in the talent market for attracting new workers and retaining current ones.

Financial wellness programs Financial well-being benefits encompass financial education, coaching, and planning. Finance seminars and webinars on investing basics and planning for retirement fall under the umbrella of financial education. Financial coaching offers more detailed advice about the basics of personal finance, e.g., budgeting, savings, debt, and credit management. Financial planning offers the most personalized support, with individual sessions with a financial advisor on wealth management, investments, and estate planning.

The expansion of financial wellness benefits is critical to addressing the previously unmet needs of workers and candidates who have endured two years of economic upheaval, while simultaneously advancing talent recruitment and retention.

This represents an opportunity to strengthen the connection between workers and the workforce, as each has a vested interest in the success of the other. n

tion a compelling benefit in a competitive job market where employees hold more power than ever.

platform like what nudge offers as an underpin to everything else you’re doing,” says Beament, “then people will be able to make better and more active decisions about their stock plan, about their retirement funds, about their healthcare benefits and deductibles, and their other compensation.”

This is a new — and permanent — paradigm that companies should take seriously.

“Wellness used to be a nice cuddly benefit,” Beament says.

“Now it’s being seen as something incredibly important.” n

Johnny C. Taylor, Jr., CEO, Society for Human Resource Management

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How Does Financial Education Improve Your Workplace?

Around the globe, employers are recognizing the benefits of improving the financial wellness of their employees.

When 6 out of 10 American employees are living paycheck to paycheck, financial literacy is more important than ever. Increasingly, companies around the globe are moving to include financial education in their benefit offerings — and for good reason.”

Benefits of financial literacy Employees increasingly demand financial education, including financial coaching, emergency savings help, and financial planning — alongside traditional benefits like a 401k retirement savings plan.

In fact, a recent study found that 92 percent of Millennials wanted to increase their financial management skills. hat education improves their holistic well-being.

“Financial literacy is about being able to make a proactive

decision about whatever’s going on in your life—and being able to do so confidently,” notes Jeremy Beament, co-founder and director of nudge, a global financial education company.

“Financial education and wellness programs are critical for employees because they help them achieve their dreams and goals,” explains Beament.

“Having children, getting married, getting on the housing ladder — all the things that touch our lives.”

That makes financial educa-

Employer benefits But it’s not just employees who benefit from financial education. Employers are realizing that these programs benefit them as well. Improving employee financial literacy results in improved productivity and less absenteeism, and leads to more effective recruitment and retention. These programs also reduce financial anxiety and stress, which in turn lowers overall healthcare costs.

Another crucial aspect of financial education is how it helps employees appreciate their other benefits. “If you’re offering a financial wellness

Jeff Somers

Learn how nudge can improve your employees’ financial well-being, visit nudge-global.com

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Chade-Meng Tan Explains Why Being Good Is Good for Business The thought leader, motivator, and former Google employee wants businesses to ditch the dog-eatdog incentive model in favor of a more compassionate one.

In a time when employees are quitting historic numbers and “burnout” is the word of the day, it’s time for corporate culture to rethink how business is done.

Tan argues that an empathetic approach that emphasizes human beings’ social instincts creates better long-term outcomes — for the employees, for the consumers, and for the bottom line.

According to Tan, compassion for employees helps companies thrive in a myriad of ways. “One is by greatly increasing team effectiveness,” he says.

“At Google, we discovered that one of the most important qualities that all high-functioning teams possess is psychological safety. Psychological safety allows people to feel safe enough to honestly admit their own failings to their team members. As a result, those teams spend time productively understanding problems and solving them together, rather than wasting their time playing politics, hiding information from each other, and making each other look bad.”

Implementing goodness So, how can companies implement “goodness” into their business models?

According to Tan, compassion must be built into an organization’s incentive structure. If managers incentivize unethical behavior just because it is profitable, the company will grow into an unethical organization, which is bad for business in the long run.

“The key lever that moves corporate culture is deciding what gets incentivized and what gets punished,” Tan explains, “and top managers are usually the ones with their hands on that lever.”

Pure profit, fear of punishment, and office politics are generally poor motivators. Working for a higher purpose, on the other hand, can be a powerful incentive. “In the long term, being good is good for business.”.”

Lynne Daggett

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Improving the Wellness of a Diverse Workforce Employees believe their employer has a responsibility to make sure they are mentally, physically, and emotionally well — yet many find that employers fall short.

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he 2021 Workplace Wellness Survey finds an important disconnect between what employees expect from their employers when it comes to workplace wellness, and how they rate employers’ efforts. While approximately three quarters of employees believe their employer has a responsibility to make sure they are mentally, physically, and emotionally well, just half say their employer has done an excellent or very good job.

Additionally, Black and Hispanic workers are less likely than White workers to give high ratings to employer efforts. Our results show that 45 percent of Black and 47 percent of Hispanic workers rate as excellent or very good their employers’ efforts to help employees improve their physical well-being, compared to 54 percent of White workers.

46 percent of Black and Hispanic workers rate as excellent or very good their employers’ efforts

around emotional well-being and mental health compared to 54 percent of White workers. More specifically, higher-income Black workers reported being less satisfied than higher-income White workers with their employers’ efforts to improve employees’ physical and financial well-being, while higher-income Hispanic workers are less likely than higher-income White workers to be satisfied with employer’s efforts to improve employees’ emotional well-being.

Tailoring workplace wellness This raises the question of what employers can do to better help address and improve the work-life balance of workers. Our findings show that flexibility to use paid time off and more benefits to help with emotional well-being and mental health would be the most valuable improvements employers could make. Going forward, employers may look to close the gap between awareness and participation in wellness programs

as a way to improve financial and emotional stress, satisfaction with employee benefits, and overall job satisfaction. This may include communicating and delivering these programs differently, rethinking their approach or format, or building trust.

Further, the findings highlight the need for employers to do a better job of tailoring workplace wellness programs to fit the specific needs of diverse workers at different income levels. Specifically, we should challenge ourselves to better understand why Black and Hispanic workers at the higher income level are sharing quite different experiences than White workers with similar incomes. By taking a more nuanced approach, employers have an opportunity to build program offerings and devise communication strategies that more effectively support a diverse workforce. For more information, visit www.ebri.org. n Lori Lucas, President and CEO, Employee Benefit Research Institute

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These three approaches that any company can do will create healthier, less burned out, more engaged employees.

We’re two years into a pandemic and remote work, and we’re all familiar with the mental health and burnout fallout. Gallup recently found that 57 percent of North American workers are now experiencing high daily stress levels and lower engagement at work.

These unprecedented realities are creating a seismic shift in what “workplace wellness” means. We’re entering a new era for the employee well-being concept that expands beyond the compartmentalized wellness program to more meaningful, “get real” approaches.

Many of the new, meaningful approaches — from flexible

The Future of Workplace Wellness: From “Programs” to Some Get-Real Wellness work to financial wellness — have been well-covered. Here are three approaches that any company can embrace to create healthier, less burned out, more engaged employees:

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Work-life balance The digital age eroded the line between “life” and work, and remote work has only decimated it further.

Forward-thinking companies and countries are reinstating a very hard line between day and night, workweek and weekend, to tackle burnout and restore what people crave most: their time. France and Portugal have enacted legisla-

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tion banning employers from contacting staff outside work hours, and more companies will adopt such a disciplined, company-wide policy. The four-day work week has serious momentum, as countries such as Iceland, Finland, New Zealand, and Japan are reporting eye-opening outcomes: vastly improved work-life balance and employee happiness while maintaining the same productivity levels.

in nature is one of the easiest ways to improve mental and physical health. Offering employees subscriptions to digital wellness solutions such as meditation apps and fitness platforms can be helpful, but it’s throwing more digital time at digital burnout. Innovative companies are thinking outdoor, not indoor, wellness — from walking meetings to outdoor fitness classes to biophilic office spaces.

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Nature-forward The pandemic revealed the power of nature to everyone, and hundreds of studies concur that spending time

Purpose-driven The pandemic has made people soul-searchers that seek more meaning in their lives. They value purpose,

diversity, equity, and inclusion in companies as never before, and they’re leaving organizations that only care about making money and not making a difference. Identify your company’s core values and what community issues your employees are passionate about, and do something more tangible than mere donations.

Work has changed forever, and more companies are thinking outside the checkthe-box wellness programs, experimenting with creative ways to keep people healthy and engaged. There is no one right solution; for leaders it must come from a place of empathy and common sense.

What would you want in a workplace? n

Susie Ellis, Chair and CEO, Global Wellness Institute and Global Wellness Summit

I Miss You! A Well-Being Crisis on the Horizon In a recent global study conducted by The Inspiring Workplaces Group, it was discovered that we not only miss human interaction at work, but we actually need it. .

When asked “Since Feb 2020, do you miss human interaction in the workplace with colleagues or customers?” 41 percent responded they missed and needed it, 40 percent said they missed it , and only 7 percent said they don’t miss it at all.

That’s 81 percent of us having something we miss or find essential being reduced dramatically or removed altogether due to the pandemic.

For many, it won’t return.

For the record, I founded Inspiring Workplaces as a fully remote organization. It has taken years to create the boundaries and process to make it work. People have been hired with that expectation firmly set ahead of time. Millions of organizations have not had that luxury. They had to do it overnight and have been constantly playing catch-up ever since.

The new silent stigma Now don’t get me wrong, the pandemic drove decades’ worth of positive change in just a few months — changes I have been campaigning in favor of for years. However, they were born out of necessity. These positive changes

include CEOs trusting their people to work from home, giving them the tools to do so, realizing productivity is more important than presenteeism, smashing the stigma around mental health, less commuting, more time with family, and more money in people’s pockets.

I am not suggesting for a minute that I want to reverse all of these changes or return to the office five days a week, but we must find a balance. I believe people are staying quiet on wanting to return to the workplace — mute on needing that social interaction. Are we creating another silent stigma?

They are staying quiet as it is seen as unpopular on social media. Some are happier at home with family, some have bigger houses, and some have a more professional setup, whereas others may have no family or are working out of a bedroom 24/7.

My main driver is this though — whoever you are, regardless of your social standing or salary, human interaction is vital for our well-being.

Therefore, if we don’t have it, we will be creating a negative impact on millions of people’s health all over the United States. If that isn’t enough of a reason, then from a business

perspective we will be creating a huge pent-up productivity timebomb. Whatever your drivers, we need to be responsible and act now.

Socializing for health Jane E. Brody, in her New York Times article “Social Interaction is critical for Mental and Physical Health,” cited a review of research indicating that “social isolation is on a par with high blood pressure, obesity, lack of exercise, or smoking as a risk factor for illness and early death.”

People who are chronically lacking in social contacts are more likely to experience

elevated levels of stress and inflammation. These, in turn, can undermine the well-being of nearly every bodily system, including the brain. Even how genes are expressed can be adversely affected, impairing the body’s ability to turn off inflammation. Chronic inflammation has been linked to heart disease, arthritis, Type 2 diabetes, and even suicide attempts.

Emma Seppala of the Stanford Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education, and author of the 2016 book “The Happiness Track,” wrote, “People who feel more connected to others have lower levels of anxiety and depression. Moreover, studies show they also have higher self-esteem, greater empathy for others, are more trusting and cooperative and, as a consequence, others are more open to trusting and cooperating “with them”.

“In other words,” Dr. Seppala explains, “social connectedness generates a positive feedback loop of social, emotional, and physical well-being.”

It’s time to evolve our workplace well-being strategy.

Start a conversation with your people immediately, share the facts, build trust, become an enabler of social interaction, and find a path forward together. Be inspired. n Matt Manners, CEO & Founder, Inspiring Workplaces

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