This guide is part of a progression set comprised of Core, Advanced, and Emerging Workplace Wellness practices.

What it is

Because of its importance to the broader community, “Wellness” can be integral to the organization’s brand. These aren’t only health-related brands. Companies like Dove, The Body Shop, Hyatt, Barclays, Ernst & Young, and Turner Construction have embraced wellness as part of their mission. In addition to supporting the wellness of their employees, organizations like these see how their work contributes to the health and safety of their customers and communities.

An integrated wellness strategy connects external and internal wellness efforts, weaving wellness into the organizational culture and often providing best practices for other organizations. A culture with roots in wellness can better amplify engagement, diversity, and retention, and there are clear bottom-line business benefits to creating a healthy and thriving organization.

Why use it

Well-being has become a global crisis over the last decade, with ongoing concerns and impacts. As one article describes it, “society as a whole, encouraged by the United Nations, is heading in the direction of sustainable development aimed at promoting the protection of people’s health and safety as well as their growth and enhanced value.” From the pandemic to AI, the stressors and strains on society have resulted in deeper personal reflection, an intolerance for unhealthy practices, and more demands for support.

Organizations with a mission to improve humanity have the opportunity to integrate wellness into their brand if they haven’t already. This approach motivates employees by fostering a shared purpose and positively impacting the bottom line. When investors look at the ESG (environmental and social corporate governance), which manages the external impacts and commitment of the business of a potential investment, wellness is becoming a more critical part of their evaluation. ESG-specific mutual funds reached a record $400 billion in 2021, up 33% from the year before, and they are expected to continue to grow rapidly in the coming years, according to diverse analysts.

Given the external and internal push for organizations that support the common good, an integrated wellness strategy and those responsible for executing it can play an important role in business success.

Outcomes

By integrating wellness into the brand and values of the organization, the business outcomes and benefits of wellness programs are inextricably linked. Investing in employee health expands beyond mere tactics and reflects a company's ethos and commitment to fostering a thriving workplace culture. As wellness efforts are prioritized and shared, it cultivates a positive organizational environment where individuals feel supported, engaged, and empowered to perform at their best. In doing so, this establishes a foundation for enhanced productivity, heightened employee satisfaction, more robust team dynamics, and ultimately, more success across all aspects of the business:

People

• Emphasizing Employee Well-Being as a Core Value: Through wellness programs, the organization underscores the importance of employee health, positioning well-being as a central tenet of its values and mission.
• Developing Healthy and Resilient Leaders: Builds resilience and empowers leaders to make a meaningful impact through their health-focused leadership approach for themselves and their teams.
• Promoting a Sense of Belonging and Support: By investing in employee wellness, the organization creates a supportive environment where employees feel valued, respected, and cared for, fostering a strong sense of belonging and camaraderie.
• Emphasizing Employee Well-Being as a Core Value: The organization underscores the importance of employee health and happiness through wellness programs, positioning well-being as a central tenet of its values and mission.

Productivity

• Effective team interactions and collaboration: Stronger team dynamics and collaboration, as a wellness-oriented culture, fosters better interpersonal relationships and teamwork.
• Innovation and a learning mindset: Healthy employees are more likely to embrace innovation and adopt a continuous learning mindset. They are open to new ideas, creative problem-solving, and exploring new opportunities for improvement, driving innovation within the organization.
• Organizational commitment: Alignment in mission and the company’s commitment to health and wellbeing increases employee commitment, making them invested in organizational success and actively contributing to the growth of the company, their peers, and themselves.
• Higher success in project execution: Teams have healthy approaches for more open communication, discuss and resolve issues quickly, meet deadlines, deliver high-quality work, and achieve project objectives with heightened success.

Purpose 

• Brand Clarity and Alignment: Connecting a wellness culture to the brand helps create focus, commitment, and engagement for customers as well as employees.
• Employee Fulfillment: Fostering a sense of fulfillment and purpose among employees, who feel valued and supported in achieving their health and wellness goals.
• Social Impact: Extending wellness efforts beyond the workplace to positively impact employees’ lives and the broader community, contributing to the organization’s social responsibility initiatives.
• Community Impact: Proactively preventing illness and easing the burden on surrounding infrastructure.

Profit

• Optimized ROI: Highest ROI from wellness initiatives as they are fully integrated into the organizational culture and lead to significant improvements in employee health, morale, and productivity. 
• VOI: Value on investment via external and internal company brand strength.
• Substantial Cost Savings: Significant cost savings from reduced healthcare costs, absenteeism, turnover rates, and presenteeism, as well as lower insurance premiums due to a healthier workforce.
• Competitive Advantage: Enhanced competitive advantage as a wellness-focused employer, attracting top talent, reducing recruitment costs, and improving employer branding and reputation.
• Sustainable Growth: Long-term sustainability in business growth and profitability, driven by a healthy, engaged, and motivated workforce.
  
  

In addition to these broader outcomes, creating the business case and critical performance metrics will identify specific initiative outcomes and goals.

Finally, as an HR team, creating and executing a wellness strategy can positively impact the goals of the function, including:

• Demonstrating commitment to employees as humans
• Improving talent attraction
• Retaining and engaging employees
• Building partnerships with initiative champions and advocates
• Decreasing healthcare costs
  
  

Beyond this, the people who work within the HR function can also benefit from a focus on a culture of wellness. This can be achieved by emphasizing human-centric approaches to work that are inherently more positive and upskilling leaders with abilities that can proactively prevent employee hardships.

Practice guides at this level

Evaluating the current state of wellness to ingrain it as an indispensable element of the organizational culture.

Assessing wellness through structured and established frameworks that guide the growth and improvement of a supportive and well-being-centric culture.

Aligning leadership competencies and development to engage management as champions of wellness for cultural acceptance.

Articulating how wellness “shows up” in leadership behaviors and capabilities and training them to demonstrate those more consistently and constructively.

Assessing health, safety, and wellness culture to reduce injury and illness risks and strengthen overall employee well-being.

Using structured methodologies and tools for evaluating risks and hazards, creating solutions, and monitoring the improvement over time.

Integrating workplace wellness into brand messaging to create market awareness and attract customers and talent.

Integrating employee wellness into organizational product/service and employment branding to communicate corporate values and attract customers and job candidates alike.