Workplace wellbeing initiatives are a great way to celebrate mental wellbeing and allow your employees to recharge at the office. If you're planning your first wellbeing day at work, we have some great ideas for days in the office, as well as some work-at-home options, to ensure that all your employees are relaxed, recharged and ready to work. But first, let's explore what office wellbeing initiatives are and how they benefit the mental health of your staff, shall we?
What Are Office Wellbeing Days?
Health and wellbeing initiatives encourage employees to check in on their physical health and mental health. They are great ways to reduce stress, have some fun in the office and offer employee recognition.
The idea is simple, create a fun office experience that you can use to raise awareness of how important physical and mental wellbeing is in life. The day can provide employees with the tools they need to thrive at home, in the workplace and in life. Your employees will gain personal and professional development which will make them happier and healthier.
From walking meetings to installing standing desks in the office, there are loads of ways of improving wellbeing in the office. You could even get an office fruit delivery to ensure that your employees have healthy snacks to enjoy every day. But that's enough of a plug from us, let's explore the benefits of wellbeing initiatives in the workplace before diving deep into some ideas for your next wellbeing day.
The Benefits Of Office Wellbeing Days
One of the biggest benefits of office wellbeing days is that they can create a positive work environment for everyone. The other benefits include:
- Improve the physical wellbeing of your staff
- Reduce workplace stress
- Reduce sick days
- Improve work performance
- Encourage a healthy work-life balance
- Improve employee happiness
- Improve financial wellbeing
- Help with employees' mental health awareness
Wellbeing in the workplace is a fantastic way to help your staff with personal development. However, a single wellbeing day won't cut it. You need a good wellbeing strategy and employee assistance programme in place to ensure that your employees are happy and thriving at work. So, here are 10 ideas for office wellbeing days throughout the year that can help you plan the ultimate wellness activities for your staff.
10 Ideas For Your Office Wellbeing Day
As we said, wellbeing days should be part of a more comprehensive wellbeing strategy that is built into your company culture. However, if you're struggling to come up with ideas to improve employee engagement and overall wellbeing in the office, here are some ideas:
Yoga at work
Yoga can be fantastic for your employees whether they are on their feet or sat at desks all day. Yoga helps to strengthen the body, work out kinks and overcome mental health issues. Most yoga instructors will host a session in person or via video call too, so all your employees can join in whether they are in the office or working from home. Encouraging employees to try a new physical activity like yoga is a brilliant way of improving mental health.
Wellbeing workshops
Workplace wellness workshops are an excellent way of introducing your staff to lots of different ways of improving physical and mental health in one go without it becoming overwhelming. The workshop could promote employee wellness in a variety of ways, including:
- Tips on healthy food to bring for lunch
- Stress management workshops
- Exercise tips
- Webinars on building confidence and boosting productivity
- How to set goals for personal and professional development
Be sure to include a good mix of things that can help with employee health as well as career development. This means that everyone will be able to take something away from the event.
Volunteering
Create volunteering days so that your employees can give back to their local communities. You could encourage them to get out into the community and offer the skills they use at work, a skill they practise in their spare time or to try something new.
It's a great way of getting out there and meeting people. It gets people out of their comfort zone and provides a sense of fulfilment within your team.
Duvet days
Some days we all need a duvet day, so why not treat your team to one? Schedule a duvet day for your employees every quarter. Allow them to recharge in their own way. It's a brilliant way of reducing stress, especially when facing tight deadlines.
Diary days
Many of us stop writing diaries as we grow older, but they can be fantastic for your mental health. Writing down how we are feeling can really help us to understand what's making us feel that way and take steps to improve the situation.
Cooking clubs
A healthy diet is just as important to your health as a great working environment. It can benefit our immune systems, give us energy and help us focus. So, why not organise some cooking clubs throughout the year? You could dedicate a cooking club to healthy meals, have a bake-off event or have a virtual cook-along. It's a great way of giving employees something fun to do and encouraging teamwork which builds friendships within the team.
There are loads of ways of introducing your staff to healthy meals, you could use our healthy snacks as the perfect starting off point. As well as our fruit boxes, we have plenty of delicious and healthy snacks for the office. We also stock fresh vegetables and deliver across London, so if you do want to do a cooking class at work, we have the healthiest and freshest ingredients right here at Ripe.
Paint or pottery nights
If you're planning a wellness activity outside of work, why not try pottery or painting? Getting creative and trying new things is a great way to treat employees and have some fun! It can also help to reduce stress and maybe someone on your team will pick up a new hobby.
Wellness subscription box
Yes, this may be another plug for our office fruit boxes, but having wellness subscription boxes delivered to the office every week/month gives your staff something to be excited about. It also makes them aware that you are invested in their mental health.
Workplace massage
A massage at work is a brilliant way of unwinding. A neck and shoulder massage for office workers can really help them relax and work out any tension. Use a meeting room for privacy and hire the best local masseur you can find to ensure that your employees are as relaxed as possible afterwards.
Puppy therapy
If you have a team of dog lovers at your office, what better way of getting rid of some stress and having some fun for a while than having a bunch of cute puppies come to the office? There are many companies around England now offering puppy therapy. Put mental health first and invite some good boys and girls into the office for an afternoon of fun and chaos!
You could also do fitness challenges, healthy eating challenges like Veganuary, team building activities like escape rooms and a great deal more.
How To Plan Your Workplace Wellbeing Day
Planning a workplace wellness day takes some time, particularly if you want to tackle stress, staff wellbeing and job performance in a focused and specific way. So, here's some tips on how to plan your day.
Does the wellness day complement your wellness plan?
The goal of a wellness day is to try and improve wellbeing, of course. While most wellness days make a huge difference, they should align with your overall wellness plan. This means that goals for these events should be mapped out within your plan. You can then plan days targeting specific areas. This could be a fitness challenge where people get out into the fresh air to try and boost physical health. Or perhaps a meditation class that gives your staff the tools to combat mental health issues.
Include employees in choosing the activities
Including your team in choosing which activities they do is a great way of getting them involved and allowing them to help themselves. They likely already have wellbeing ideas that can help everyone. So, make sure to include your staff wherever possible.
When it comes to events, make sure that everyone can make it. Consider offering flexible working hours on wellness days. That way, every employee can come and join in without feeling rushed.
Think about the support you need
Planning these kinds of events takes a lot of time as we said. You're going to need support from different areas of the business, and often people outside of the business to get things moving along. So, don't be afraid to reach out for help. After all, this is all about mental health, and you should take your mental health into account during the planning stage. There's no need to stress yourself out to ensure employee satisfaction. So, ask for help when you need it!
Work with local businesses to offer wellbeing discounts and perks
Speaking of reaching out, it's a great idea to reach out to local businesses to ask for perks and discounts. Many local businesses will relish the idea of welcoming in all of your employees for a discount. This could be subsidised gym memberships with a local gym, a discount on healthy food at a local restaurant or 15% off massages, for example.
Shout about your office wellness days from the rooftops
Once you have your wellness days planned, tell everyone you can! Post it everywhere, get people excited and make sure everyone is talking about it. Not only does this promote the event you've put so much effort into, but it puts the idea of mental health in the minds of your colleagues, and this will help people talk about it moving forward.
Get feedback from people who attend your wellness days
Once you've had the event, get some feedback. Most people will have lots of ideas about what events you could put on. Make a note of staff wellbeing ideas for the future, and try and improve the events throughout the year based on feedback from each event.
Prioritise employee wellbeing every day with Ripe
Improving mental health at work is an ongoing process. Having a good wellness plan in place is vital and then planning exciting events throughout the year that align with this plan is sure to help employee wellbeing.
To find out more about office fruit boxes, pantry supplies and healthy snacks, please explore Ripe further or give us a call.
