Improving Employee Health

Written by: Kevin Gardner

Running a business comes with an onset of responsibilities and takes time and effort to manage effectively. When it comes to employees, keeping workers is essential to growing your business and promoting a healthy face to your customers. When your company has a great longevity rate for employees, it shows that your business takes care of its people and knows how to treat customers. 

In theory, this may seem like something easy to obtain, but in reality, if you're not actively paying attention to the work culture and the environment your company provides for its employees, then you could be on the brink of fostering a high turnover rate. Below are a few reasons why keeping your employees healthy and happy will improve longevity.

Make Healthy Choices Accessible

Many employees overwork themselves and don't take care of fueling or hydrating their bodies while working. Make sure you encourage employees to drink water and get a snack on break. Keep water bottles or filtered water within easy reach of your employees and encourage them to use it. Not only are you setting a healthy environment by encouraging better choices, but you're also showing you care. You could even mention the benefits of taking a probiotic food supplement.

Why would small changes like drinking water, taking a supplement, or eating matter? With adding water alone to your daily routine, your body is able to stay hydrated, stave off mental fatigue, and detoxify.

It seems relatively simple, but adding a couple of small things like drinking water and taking a food supplement to daily routines can add a major boost in health.

Promote Mindful Focus

Mental fatigue can be a huge issue, especially when it turns into burnout. Employees who suffer from burnout just cannot perform at their best. Mind fog, exhaustion, and ambition go out the window when burnout sits in. What's worse, is burnout can last days or months depending on how bad the situation is. Avoiding it at all costs is to your business and employees' benefit. 

Preventing burnout takes being mindful. Make sure breaks are enforced for every employee so they are allowed time to recharge and get away from the task at hand. Encourage your employee to eat. Keeping snacks for the office in the break room is a great way to ensure employees can fuel their bodies and minds. If your employee is in desperate need of sleep, give them a paid day off to rest and catch up on the sleep they need to perform their job at their best.

Encourage Movement

Sitting and typing for long periods takes a toll on the body. Joints can become stiff and hurt, mental focus can wane, and productivity can lower if the employee is suffering from muscle pain. Encourage your employees to take a walk on a break, and to stretch their hands or fingers. Stiff fingers and hand cramping is a common occurrence for workers who type daily and use repetitive motion. Although exercising your hands or fingers may seem silly at first, the pain that it holds away is far worth it. 

You can start the workday by encouraging stretching and making the atmosphere fun and relaxed. Make sure you have good chairs for your employees to sit in and work, especially if they will be getting tasks done for long stretches of time. Healthy posture keeps away back pain.

Employee longevity should always be a goal of a business. Paying attention to the office culture and promoting healthy habits will aid in keeping your employees' taken care of and in turn, happy. Make sure water is accessible, stock up the break room with snacks, promote mindfulness, and encourage breaks. Showing your employees you want to keep them from being overwhelmed, stressed, and burned-out shows your company is a place to work and stay.

Related: It’s Time to Embrace Older Workers