Why health and wellbeing must be at the heart of our future workplaces - Personnel Today
Wellbeing and health promotionOccupational HealthOHW+Wellbeing
For a healthy and happy workforce, will leaders have to start looking at infection control, risk management or even health surveillance to ensure they have an effective and motivated team? Corporate wellness expert Dr Nerina Ramlakhan investigates. Over the past 20 months many of us have had to change the way in which we’re working, and this has brought disruption to our routines, uncertainty and mixed emotions; we have also seen the boundaries between work and home blur, leading to a greater need for self-care and healthy practices. Regardless of what is going on in the outside world, a productive and efficient workforce is needed, especially for the many businesses that saw their sales or customers plummet due to the pandemic. So, what is the answer to this conundrum? How can companies ensure their valued team members are healthy both in mind and body, whilst also driving them to be productive and enthused with the work they do? Now we are ‘getting back to normal’ what new procedures should be in place to ensure workplaces are safe and employee’s health is prioritised? I'd argue there are three key ways in which the workplace of the future is going to look and feel different for employees. 1) Mental wellbeing will be key. Our love affair with technology and responding reactively to 24/7 demand has played a crucial role in depleting our mental and physical health – including the immune system. Working patterns have become even more linear (go, go, go and then stop), so the need to be mindful of our own wellbeing is increasingly important.
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However, there is now a unique opportunity to take charge of our wellbeing and design our own healthy 'microculture'. Creating a structure in our schedule that maximise