Happiness and health are top priorities for many individuals today, and this certainly holds true for employees. Money isn’t just the driving force for employees to stick with a company. They need to feel that they’re happy being a part of the family at work. No one wants to simply go through each of their working days dragging themselves.
You spend a majority of your waking hours at work, so it’s just natural for you to have that need to feel happy. It may mean extra effort on your part to lead employees on a higher pursuit of happiness and better health, but the returns are just as astounding.
Happy employees are productive, content, and better team players. These are only a few of the benefits your company can gain from having healthy and happy employees.
In this article, you’ll be able to check out five of the best tips and tricks to keep your employees happy and healthy.
1. Prioritize Good Work-Life Balance For Employees
Nowadays, it’s no longer just enough to give your employees a good salary or offer them a raise and competitive benefits to make them stay. Many employees now prefer working for companies that practice a good work-life balance for employees. No employee wants to feel like they’re regularly drowning from work without a break, no matter how attractive the salary might be.
- Having a good work-life balance can keep employees healthy and happy simply because they have time for themselves, their family, and their hobbies. With that said, here are some tips on how you can offer a better work-life balance for your employees:
Have set working hours and stick to it. Avoid asking your employees to do overtime if such isn’t necessary. - Create a good workspace for your employees, so they’re comfortable during the hours they spend at work. You can start with considering LaunchPad Centre, a coworking space, for meetings and other gatherings.
- Automate whenever possible, especially as of late when virtual meetings are prevalent. This means offering the option to work from home for employees who don’t have to go to the office every day.
2. Focus On General Prevention Of Diseases
Being proactive about the health of your employees is always the better approach. Prevention is better than cure, and there’s a lot of truth to that. It’s cheaper to take care of your employees to keep them healthy than to cover their medical expenses when they fall ill.
Most importantly, when your employees are healthy, the rate of absenteeism will be lower. This can avoid negative effects like the disruption of work and reduced productivity due to absent employees.
These are some of the measures to apply for the general prevention of diseases:
- Offer good health insurance incentives for your employees;
- Have a doctor visit your workplace regularly for general check-ups with your employees;
- Keep your company premises clean by sanitizing and cleaning frequently;
- Arrange onsite yearly vaccinations for common illnesses like the flu.
3. Offer Vacation Leaves For Employees
Perhaps it’s time for you to rethink your vacation incentives, especially for long-term and tenured employees. If your company can afford it, you can go beyond offering paid leaves. You can also start to give out vacation leave packages and discounts for employees who perform well or have been with you for a long time now.
A good way to be able to achieve this is to partner with travel agencies. When your business becomes a regular client, they can be more generous with their offers and discounts. You can also ask the travel agency to tailor vacation plans for employees to make it affordable while still being a memorable and worthwhile trip. You may not be able to sponsor their entire trip, but having a discount made only for your employees is already a generous offer.
Taking regular breaks or vacations can improve both your employees’ physical and mental well-being. You’ll find that when those employees report back to work after their break, they’re more productive and happier, too.
4. Recognize When Employees Do Well
Your employees don’t have to do great things for them to deserve special recognition.
Even if it’s only little achievements, go ahead and give them the congratulations they deserve. Progress, even if small, is still progress. Especially when you know the certain employee has spent so much time working on that certain project, recognize them for their effort.
Doing this is important so the employees feel appreciated for the work they do. They shouldn’t have to feel like they’re only doing futile efforts that you don’t even see. Offer incentives for top performances, too. Even a simple grocery discount coupon or free massage will be appreciated.
5. Encourage Healthy Eating In Your Workplace
You are what you eat, and this certainly applies to your employees, too. If they regularly munch on junk food, then without a doubt, they’ll fall ill regularly. Since employees spend at least one meal and one snack in your workplace, it’s significant enough to create a big impact in developing good and healthy eating habits.
Eating well is the foundation of good health. It’s also an important foundation to avoid the likelihood of lifestyle diseases in the future. Healthy employees also mean productive ones, so in essence, it’s an overall win for your business.
With that said, here are some ideas you can apply to have healthier employees:
- Choose to have on-site vending machines that offer water and healthy fruit juice, not just sodas;
- Provide a fridge in your pantry where employees can also place their packed food from home;
- When you have company lunches or dinners, choose caterers that also offer healthy meal options;
- Provide free fruits on top of coffee and water in your office pantry.
Conclusion
The tips above aren’t the only ways you can improve employee happiness and health in the workplace, but they provide a good start to achieve that goal for your company. With the employees as the top assets of any business, it’s all the more important for you to do all you can to take good care of them.
When employees feel happy and safe where they are, they’re likely to stay for long. This enables your business to retain good talents to contribute to overall business success. It pays to start applying the tips above.
