By Anne Laing & Tim Bean:
At the recent Corporate Wellness Conference in Chicago, some rather shocking stats from the UK were highlighted in the delegate sessions regarding sickness, absence and disease in UK workers. It’s costing big business big bucks, and if anything was haemorrhaging money out of the UK economy, having a workforce that’s unwell has got to be one of the first things we need to fix.
But how do you attack this problem when the overall perception held by individuals, business owners and even HR professionals, is that the health, exercise and dietary habits of employees can’t be touched? In other words “What I do in my own time is none of your business!”
Our view on this is that, in fact, it IS the business of an employer what shape an employee turns up to work in, from the mailboy right through to the Chief Exec!
When sickness, illness, depression, stress, disengagement, mental performance, injury and a myriad of other complaints are a direct result of the habits people have and the shape people keep themselves in – personal lifestyle choices – then of course it’s going to affect the bottom line of the business, the relationships with customers and the value to the shareholders.
It therefore stands to reason, in our view, that if the bottom line, and other functions within the business, are affected, then those people within that business need to be accountable for their performance and contribution (or liability) to that business – whether it’s on the clock, or in their own time!
The answer may come in the form of a robust and effective workplace wellness programme. Some are good – some are less so, but do you know the one key element that separates the most successful wellness programmes from the “also-rans”?
Watch the video below to find out, and do please leave your thoughts and comments…!
The Hard Edge - Healthy, Wealthy, Wise - The Business of Brainpower 