Employee case study

The client

Organisations increasingly realise the importance of structured investments in employee health and wellness. A medium-sized corporate had concerns about low morale amongst its staff, which was thought to be due to an increase in job stress as a few of their staff members had been put on temporary disability for “burnout”.

Employee wellness does not have an open-ended budget and, in lean times, this becomes a conundrum as stress in the workplace increases (as we all try to do more with less) while less is being availed to invest in staff wellness. Using their available budget, this corporate decided to face the challenge head-on with the specific brief that work-life balance should be addressed by designing an ongoing wellness programme that suits the work environment of this highly committed, yet stressed workforce.

The problem

The client presented the following information in the brief: They have a staff complement of about 100 people per branch, adding up to a total of 500 employees. Their HR department has a dedicated wellness officer, but being aligned with head office, they found that a constructive programme will have to be rolled out at all branches to engage people in a co-operative wellness programme.

Individuals work in an open-plan environment, often work through lunch and just as often work late as they struggle to get to work in time due to traffic congestion. The nature of this business also has a seasonal component, as they have very high workloads and tight deadlines at certain times of year.

The plan

The managers’ and wellness officer’s keen interest in investing in employee health enabled us to design a “stress busting” programme which they called “Project Upbeat”. The program was initially run at one of the peripheral centres for a period of six months. A combination of high-impact events that got some energy and vibe going was dispersed in between an ongoing wellness awareness campaign. The workshops created a drumbeat and followed a theme aligned with the brief, including the topics:

• About balance (work-life balance and stress management)
• About focus (optimal performance )
• About choices (time management)
• About knowledge (lifestyle awareness – impact on wellness)

Ongoing awareness was created with the “In Touch” programme. This programme offered:

• Weekly info-mailers
• Access to a health library
• Health calculators and trackers, designed for personal health monitoring and
• Email health campaigns including stop smoking, stress management, heart health and weight management

The drumbeat was maintained through regular drop-offs of stress bands, a series of nutritional cards, an on-site at-your-desk exercise programme and on-site massages.

Successful implementation of an initial awareness campaign was followed by a sustained integrated programme. Not only did employees express their enjoyment, but objective positive outcomes were recognised as there were no disability applications for the 12-month period following the intervention. The programme is ongoing.