The Importance of Employee Health
The importance of employee health cannot be overstated. It goes beyond smooth day-to-day operations. For a business to succeed, its people need to be mentally and physically healthy — after all, it’s hard to be productive when you’re not well.
Employee Health and Its Importance: Understanding the Basics
What is employee health, and why is it important? Taking care of your employees’ health in the workplace is not only beneficial to them; it also creates an effective and efficient working environment that benefits the business. Employee health and productivity go hand in hand: A mentally and physically healthy individual is more optimistic, creative, and motivated. Taking care of your employees’ wellbeing also means:
Staff who feel cared for and appreciated
Increased morale and job satisfaction
Reduced absenteeism
Better staff retention
A good work culture with positive relationships between coworkers and supervisors
What is HR’s Role in Employee Health?
Ensuring a company invests in the wellbeing of its people is one of the primary purposes of human resources management (HRM). As an employee advocate, the HR manager should focus on keeping workers motivated, contributing, and happy. The key to achieving this is prioritizing employee health in HRM. HR health initiatives should proactively improve employee wellbeing. One of the most common ways to do this is to provide employees with access to medical care through insurance, office pop-up clinics, and more.
One approach that is proving to be useful for many businesses is adopting wellness programs for staff. When done well, these programs can lead to an 80% improvement in organizational performance. Though these programs may seem more elaborate, the cost of unhealthy employees is ultimately a more significant setback.
Employee Health Associated Costs
What is employee health and wellbeing going to cost my company? The relevant question is, what is a lack of prioritizing it going to cost you? Rising healthcare costs and health-related absences are constant challenges for employers. In the U.S., the costs of poor employee health totals $530 billion a year for employers. This cost includes things such as lost productivity due to worker absence, chronic conditions that cause impaired performance, and workers’ compensation.
It’s important to note that these absences are not just a result of sickness. Stress, burnout, and low engagement levels are all major challenges posed by poor overall health. A joint study by The Conference Board, Sirota-Mercer, Deloitte, ROI, The Culture Works and Consulting LLP, found that disengaged workers cost American companies $550 billion a year.
Top Ways to Improve Employee Health
Improving employee health doesn’t need to be an expensive undertaking. In fact, small solutions go a long way toward creating a healthy and happy environment for your workers. These include:
Providing health and wellness programs to your employees. An integrated wellbeing program addresses all areas of employee health, be it physical, mental, or emotional health.
Enlist help from a primary care and insurance navigation company.
Provide annual health screening tests and health services for your employees to make your staff aware of underlying health issues and prevent bigger health problems down the line.
Encourage regular exercise in your organization. Promote running groups, grant access to gyms and other facilities, or just encourage employees to make small day-to-day decisions that improve their health, like taking the stairs instead of the elevator.
Invest in an adequate space for your employees. Elements such as access to natural light, proper office chairs, and desks go a long way toward keeping your employees motivated and healthy.
Create a workspace that supports mental health with supportive management, regular breaks, vacation time, and more.
Offer healthy lunches. Remove soda and snack vending machines and replace them with a water cooler and fruit bowls.
Provide health education with practical and straightforward advice that your employees can put into practice.