Behind every successful business, there are healthy and fit employees. The health of your employees is one of the determining factors for amazing productivity at the workplace. So, what is health when it comes to employees?
Health is a state of complete mental, physical, and social well being of employees. To achieve this, a company has to make sure that its employees exercise regularly, have a balanced diet, have enough sleep, and work in an environment that is free of stress.
Why should a company strive to make sure that its employees are healthy? Healthy employees are very productive and also encourage those around them to perform to expectations. They are motivated to work well and avoid absenteeism. By making sure that your employees are healthy, you help avoid workplace accidents and illnesses. You also help reduce fatigue and mental burnout among the employees.
Furthermore, it shows that you are concerned about your employees, something that works well in creating a good working relationship between the employees and yourself. So how do you encourage your employees to live healthily?
Encouraging Your Employees to Live Healthily
There are a number of ways through which one can encourage their employees to live healthily. Although most people think about exercise as the only way of doing it, there are a number of other ways that have a very huge impact on encouraging a healthy lifestyle among employees. They include;
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Healthy Snacks
Providing healthy snacks for work is one of the amazing ways of creating the perfect office environment. Healthy doughnuts in the morning when they arrive, having healthy cakes when it is one of the employees’ birthday or a sweet healthy snack in the evening when almost everyone is tired in the office can work wonders in keeping your employees fit. This will create a good work environment and your employees will always look forward to being in the office and doing their work well. This will definitely have a positive impact on your company.
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General Health
General health means that you have created avenues for your employees to get checked and prevent illnesses that otherwise would affect their performance in one way or another. You can do this by making it easy for the employees to get treatment, have insurance companies offering on-site shots for things like flu and general health screenings that help detect serious complications before they get out of hand.
On the other hand, cleaning office supplies and using environmentally friendly building structures can also promote general health among your employees. Also, if it is possible, encouraging a work from home strategy can help in making sure that employees with any form of transmittable illnesses do not spread it to other employees. If this works for your company, then it could be a good strategy for encouraging general health among the employees.
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Fitness Among Employees
A bigger percentage of companies cannot afford a gym in the office. However, this does not mean that it is impossible for a company to encourage exercise among its employees. Things like having showers and lockers in the office are way cheaper than having a gym.
The good thing with them is that they encourage your employees to commute to work by bike and even have others working out during their free time such as lunch hours. A company can also implement fitness programs with extra benefits or prizes to encourage its employees to exercise and remain fit at all times. You can also get health insurance policies that offer programs to keep your employees fit. After all, your insurer wants to keep your employees fit to avoid spending money on health-related complications.
Workplace fitness programs teach employees ways through which they can feel better mentally and physically at the workplace.
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Mental Health Among Employees
Mental health is very important in ensuring the overall health of your employees. Good mental health makes it easy for your employees to make good choices in life, reach their full potential, and have healthy relationships. These aspects of their life have a positive impact on their performance in the workplace.
One of the best ways of improving the mental health of your employees is by inviting a counselor to talk to your employees regularly and train them on mental health. This will help them deal with their issues using strategies that work and that help avoid a mental health breakdown.
Conclusion
Health is more than just being physically fit. A company that wants to have the full potential of its employees has to make sure that the employees are not just physically fit, but also mentally and socially fit. This will create an environment where the employees are overly happy, dedicated, and ready to work every day. Your company, in return, will benefit in many ways among them meeting its expectations and being profitable.
Interesting related article: “What is Motivation?“