17 Surefire Ways to Boost Employee Wellbeing

Let’s face it – we spend the majority of our waking lives at work.

For most us, our lives are made up mostly of work.

Companies are learning that acknowledging – rather than denying – this fact is not just the right thing to do, but also a sound business decision.

In a recent interview, Life is Good founder Bert Jacobs emphasized that focusing on things like Employee wellbeing have an often under-acknowledged business benefit for organizations.

According to Jacobs, focusing on Employee Wellbeing and purpose is “a smart strategy for building a strong business….The organization only hurts themselves if they’re not working in the best interest of everybody at their organization.”

Why is this the case? Employee wellbeing is linked to engagement and productivity, and your organization becomes stronger across the board when you make it a priority.

Your company isn’t the product you make, your intellectual property, your patents, or even the customers you serve. First and foremost, your company is your people. (Literally. The word “company” comes from the military, and simply refers to a body of soldiers.)

Before we get to brass tacks, first a quick note on what we mean by employee wellbeing:

“Employee happiness,” “employee engagement,” and “employee wellbeing” are terms that often thrown around interchangeably. While they’re all related, they mean different things and imply different strategies.

What’s the difference?

Specifically, employee wellbeing is about how your job – your duties, expectations, stress level, and environment – affects your overall health and happiness.

And while it certainly includes things like exercise and nutrition, well-being isn’t just about physical health. It’s about mood and cognition, and less tangible factors like a sense of purpose. Above all, it’s about understanding your employees from a holistic perspective, taking into account the totality of their lives, and considering their overall quality of life.

Easier said than done, we know. But we’re here to help.

Here are 17 proven and powerful ways to boost employee wellbeing at your company.

1. Throw Down Fitness Challenges

Fitness challenges are one of the best ways to kickstart your company’s wellbeing into gear.

Why are they so effective? Fitness challenges unlock the spirit of fun and friendly competition. Peer involvement will encourage greater participation, and inspire your team to push themselves further than they would on their own.

Here at SnackNation, we recently launched the “Walk it Out” step challenge, during which the entire org received Jawbone fitness trackers, and logged our steps daily.

The goal was to “walk” from LA to San Francisco as a team over the course of 4 weeks – that is, log the 772,000 steps between LA and the city by the bay.

In addition to the team goal, prizes were awarded for individual step leaders after each week. It was that combination of shared and individual goals that held the key to the program’s success. Our team felt a sense of togetherness and esprit de corps as we strove for common goals, and celebrated individual leaders throughout the week.

Fitness challenges don’t cost much to launch (fitness trackers are great, but definitely not required), and provide outsized benefits to your organization, fostering both team building and overall wellbeing.

2. Give Employees The Tools to Discover Their Purpose

Jenn Lim, the CEO and Chief Happiness Officer at Delivering Happiness – a company she co-founded with Zappos’ Tony Hsieh to help companies unlock the business potential of happiness – is a huge proponent of purpose-driven cultures.

Lim and DH take a scientific look at happiness, drawing on positive psychology to determine how companies can optimize their cultures. One of their primary insights they found is that a sense of purpose is key to creating a sustainable culture of happiness and wellbeing.

According to the team’s research, there are three levels of happiness:

• pleasure – a fleeting form of happiness
• passion – a more sustained form of happiness that continues to deliver as long as you are performing the activity about which you are passionate
• purpose – the highest level, which permeates your daily life with happiness and energy

Under this rubric, the best thing you can do for employee wellbeing is to infuse your culture with a sense of purpose.

How is this done?

Chris Cutter, CEO of LifeDojo wellbeing, says,

“We believe that when you put genuine employee engagement first, permanent positive health habits follow.” So what makes “genuine” engagement in wellbeing? According to LifeDojo, a few things:

First, focus on your employees’ intrinsic motivation (everyone has very specific, individual goals and reasons for working on their own health).

Second, foster a sense of ownership by encouraging employees to personalize what health and wellbeing habits they’ll work on as part of your wellness initiatives.

Third, offer a coach who can treat employees not as problems to be solved, but as human beings to empower. Finally, give employees the opportunity to be champions of the program, encouraging your team to grow interest in new initiatives from the bottom up…instead of imposing new programs from the top down.

Engagement has an incredible impact on your company culture. When an employee sees wellbeing as a perk instead of something they ‘have to do,’ you start to see job satisfaction, productivity and appreciation skyrocket.”

(For more on the power of purpose, check out our Ultimate Guide)

3. Break Out in an Impromptu Dance Competition

This idea comes from the awesome folks at Sonic Boom wellness, based in Carlsbad, CA:

“Sitting at a desk for an entire eight-hour shift (or longer) can take its toll on our physical and mental wellbeing. As one of the many creative ways we help keep Sonic Boom employees engaged while at work, our Co-founders suggested that we participate in random two-minute dance parties – an idea borrowed from the popular Ellen daytime talk show.

When the music starts playing in our colorful Think Tank, Boomers are encouraged to stop what they’re doing, get up from their computers, and let loose with some sweet dance moves. Not only do we get our blood flowing, we also experience a healthy mental release by dancin’ like we just don’t care (and building some special camaraderie with our coworkers in the process).

A bit silly? Of course. But is everyone smiling at the end? You betcha.”

4. Get Some Steps in During Your Meetings

Want another way to help your team “hack” their way to improved health? Hold your next meeting on foot.

Walking meetings are a great way to add a little movement and exercise into your schedule, without sacrificing productivity.

In fact, you’re more likely to enhance your productivity.

Take your business meetings a step further – with a walking meeting. It works for me: http://t.co/laCOwqQ57D pic.twitter.com/dyIyi07i8y

— Richard Branson (@richardbranson) April 6, 2015

The benefits of ditching stuffy conference rooms for meetings on-the-go are plentiful: the added blood flow and shifting environment will enhance focus and spur creativity.

Think we’re making this up? Some of the greatest thinkers in history – including Steve Jobs, Harry S. Truman, and even Aristotle – swore by walking meetings.

El Segundo, California-based skincare brand Murad came up with an ingenious way to encourage walking meetings. They painted a walking track in their new, 45,000 global headquarters. The track, which snakes through and around the floor of their offices, enables employees to stretch their legs and discuss work on the fly.

5. Institute Flexible Work Hours for Improved Work/Life Balance

As we mentioned in the beginning, employee wellbeing isn’t just about physical health. It’s about one’s overall quality of life.

Our lives are multi-faceted. Work is important, but there are so many other things outside of work that give our lives meaning and purpose – things like family, faith, community, and hobbies.

It goes without saying that these things require our time and energy. More often than not, work obligations get in the way, and our wellbeing suffers as a result.

Allowing for flexible work hours does two things. It empowers employees to alter their work habits to fit their family needs or to keep working on the projects that give their lives additional meaning.

Perhaps more importantly, it sends a signal that you trust your employees. When you enable employees to set their own schedules as long as they hit deadlines and deliver results, they feel more like partners than corporate drones – and they’ll work that much harder for you.

6. Fight The Harmful Effects of Sedentary Lifestyles with Standing Desks

Do you know that sitting is the new smoking?

It’s true. Sedentariness represents a grave threat to the health of millions of American office workers.

Don’t take it from us. According to the New York Times, “It doesn’t matter if you go running every morning, or you’re a regular at the gym. If you spend most of the rest of the day sitting — in your car, your office chair, on your sofa at home — you are putting yourself at increased risk of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, a variety of cancers and an early death.”

One way to offset this dangers of sitting too much is by… standing. Sitting is one of the most passive things you can do. By standing while you work, your body will burn energy as your leg, core, and back muscles tense to balance.

Many employers are put off by the cost of replacing existing desks with expensive standing ones.

Fortunately, Oristand has solved that problem with their totally functional, totally affordable cardboard standing desks. This simple yet sturdy design is only $25, and is used by more than 20,000 professionals across the world to decrease sedentariness and increase wellbeing.

7. Focus on Personal Development

No one wants a dead-end job.

In fact, it’s quite the opposite. Your employees – especially the younger folks in the group – crave progress. They need to feel like they are on a path that leads somewhere.

One way to ensure that your employees are learning and growing is by aiding their personal and professional development.

At SnackNation, we do this in a few ways. We have a personal development library, where all employees are encouraged to borrow books from an array of personal development titles.

We also have every employee complete IDPs – individual development plans. Employees develop goals, and then work with managers to develop a path to achieving those goals. Monthly check ins assure accountability.

Finally, we hold weekly “Sensei Sessions.” These are hour long personal and professional development sessions led by senior leadership. It’s a great way to inspire your team and share knowledge and experience.

Here’s one of our Sensei Sessions presented by our Head of Sales. Kevin Dorsey:

8. Allow Remote Days to Renew Focus and Remove Distractions

Sometimes, you just need to change things up.

If it’s feasible, allow your employees to work from home or from an offsite location (like a coffee shop, park, or the beach) one day a week. Doing so allows for greater focus, and a change in scenery can inspire new ideas.

Additionally, this flexibility sends a signal that you trust your employees to be self-directed, and will result in greater emotional wellbeing and engagement.

9. Encourage Bike to Work Days

Biking to work is a great way to kill two birds with one stone – that is, knock out your commute and your exercise at the same time.

Plus, biking to work saves the planet… and gas money. It’s a win-win-win.

Need help convincing your company that biking is a viable option? Don’t go it alone. Enlist the help of The League of American Bicyclists, who raise awareness for National Bike to Work month, week, and day every May.

According to The League, 40% of most trips in the U.S. are two miles are less, making biking a viable transportation option in most instances. And while commutes are often a bit longer on average, you can combine public transit with cycling to make biking to work a reality. In fact, most major cities offer free rides for cyclists on public transportation during bike to work week.

You can also throw in some gamification here to add an extra layer of fun. My Virtual Mission allows you to create a long distance route from one location to another (i.e. Chicago to New York). See who can bike to the “finish line” first.

10. Practice Guided Meditation to Help with Presence

The benefits of meditation are almost too many to list. They include things like better sleep, improved metabolism and weight loss, reduced stress and aging, and improved mood and cognition.

In fact, productivity expert Tim Ferriss often states that his one regret when it comes to meditation is that he didn’t start ten years earlier.

At SnackNation, we perform an employee-led guided meditation session every Wednesday at 2 pm. Our resident meditation expert, Spencer Carlson, studied the practice in India, and helps our team become more mindful and present.

The result is a noticeably calmer, more-focused team on Wednesday afternoons.

If you don’t have a Spencer (and really, there’s only one), there are some great apps that can aid your meditation practice. Healthline published a great list earlier this year.

11. Extend Trust by Offering Unlimited Vacation

Yes, you read that correctly.

Companies like GE, Netflix, Hubspot, and yes, SnackNation, are just a few who are hopping on the unlimited vacation trend.

If you answer emails after work, you should be getting unlimited vacation https://t.co/IgyQtc87vq

— Quartz (@qz) July 24, 2016

Now, before you dismiss this outright, unlimited vacation doesn’t mean employees are free to collect a paycheck while they relax on a Mexican beach for six months out of the year.

In practice, unlimited vacation connects time off with results. The policy states that as long as you meet your deadlines, goals, and deliver results, you are free to take as much vacation as you want.

Unlimited vacation works because in emphasizing results, you again demonstrate that you trust your employees to do the right thing by their company and teams. Employees appreciate being treated like adults, and are inspired to deliver outsized results in order to justify a little extra R&R.

It’s a win-win for the company and employee alike, and results in boosted sense of employee wellbeing.

12. Grant Sabbaticals to Celebrate Individuals and Reduce Burnout

Sabbaticals work like this: after an employee reaches a certain tenure – usually 3-5 years at a company – he or she is eligible to take 6-8 weeks off to go on a trip, or work on a passion project or perform a public service at home. (The only thing that is off limits is sitting at home doing nothing!)

The idea is to embark on a journey that will be personally enriching, and that will yield new perspectives, new ideas, and new learnings that he or she can bring back to the company.

And before you assume 6-8 weeks is too long to be away from one’s job, consider that after 5 years, that represents a very small fraction of one’s total time at a company.

13. Give Unlimited Paternity/Maternity Leave

Netflix made headlines this year when they announced they were offering unlimited paternity/maternity leave. Employees are free to take as much time in the first year after a child is born or adopted.

Compare this to existing federal law, which guarantees up to 12 weeks of parental leave, but only for companies with fifty or more employees.

The benefit here again is that it signals to your employees that you understand that their lives outside of work – particularly their family lives – are important.

This emotional connection helps to contribute to an overall greater sense of employee wellbeing.

14. The “Undercover Boss” Competition

This fun idea also comes from the good people over at Sonic Boom:

“Ever dreamed of giving your boss a big ol’ pie to the face? Those dreams become reality for the Boomers at Sonic Boom Wellness during our “Undercover Boss” competitions.

With Undercover Boss, everyone participates under a secret identity – so no one knows who’s topping the leaderboards until the very end. And the reward for out-striding your boss during this three-week activity contest? Catapulting a whipped-cream-loaded pie straight into her/his face.

But beware! Your ‘punishment’ for being out-strided? The winning bosses get to randomly draw the name of a losing employee, and send that big-ol’ pie flying into their face.

In the most recent contest, our amazingly active accountant, Matt, out-strided our President, Bryan. The photo speaks for itself…”

15. Make Recognition and Praise Part of Your Company’s Culture

One of the most desired – and easiest to implement – wellbeing initiatives is simply to recognize employees for their effort and achievements.

This is especially effective for Millennial employees, who are accustomed to receiving praise from a very young age. Being part of the so-called “self esteem generation,” they often crave recognition more than a pay raise.

A handwritten thank you note, or formal recognition recognition program – an employee of the month award, for example – all go a long way towards creating a positive emotional environment that supports wellbeing.

Or you could do a “Crush It Call”. Here’s how we do them at SnackNation HQ:

16. Take the Vegan Challenge

Eating vegan is not only compassionate, but promotes healthy and mindful eating. The practice forces you to consider everything you put in your body, and virtually eliminates mindless consumption.

Your team will be eating lighter, more nutritious foods, and will be properly fueled to take on challenges and perform at their peak.

Challenge your team to eat vegan for a week. Not only will your team be more focused and productive, you might be surprised by how many people stick with it.

If a week sounds like a stretch, start with 1 day and then keep extend the challenge timeline.

17. Incentivize Preventative Care, Like Flu-Shots

While this may not be the “sexiest” item on this list, one of the best ways to improve overall health in the office is to address potential illnesses before they happen.

Case in point? The flu.

Cold and flu season can decimate your office. Flu viruses spread during the winter months, and take hold when cold weather weakens our immune systems.

In total, cold and flu season costs our economy an estimated $40 billion every year in lost productivity due to illness.

One way to curb these losses? Incentivize flu shots. Offer a small cash bonus, gift card, or giveaway (like a stress ball, t shirt, or mug) for employees who get the shot in October or November. Your company will more than cover their losses by avoiding mass absenteeism.

Conclusion

What about you? What are the benefits of employee wellbeing in your eyes, and what do your companies do to ensure that wellbeing is a priority? Let us know in the comments below!

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