Maintaining Employee Wellbeing Whilst Working From Home

working from home

Working from home has become hugely popular (https://www.independent.co.uk/money/spend-save/working-at-home-grows-in-popularity-508071.html) over the last decade or so.

Unfortunately, the coronavirus has forced many employees to work from home if the can in order to curb the spread of the virus.

Not only does it help maintain a work-life balance, but it’s also been proven to improve the productivity and morale of your staff.

While there are many benefits to homeworking (https://www.peninsulagrouplimited.com/guides/working-from-home/policy/) it does also present some downfalls. One of which is increased solitude. Although some employees may prefer solitude it can increase the feeling of isolation and loneliness which negatively affect mental health.

This piece explores how you can maintain the wellbeing of your staff (https://www.social-circle-wellbeing.co.uk/blog/tag/employee-wellbeing/). It’ll present actionable and valuable tips that you can easily implement to support your staff.

Tips for maintaining employee wellbeing

  1. Keep in touch: To tackle loneliness and isolation during this period you should ensure that you’re speaking your staff regularly. As well as assessing their workflow and tasks, you can check on their general wellbeing. Schedule check-ins in advance, you can either di this with the whole team and with individual members of staff. Take advantage of the latest technology including Skype, MS teams, Slack, Zoom and more.
  2. Offer mental health training and resources: Consider offer employee assistance programme as benefits to your staff. These programmes provide counselling and stress management to your staff. It’s intended to support them while dealing with problems that might impact their work performance. If you provide this benefit encourage your employees to take advantage of their services.
  3. Promote a healthy work-life balance: According to research, there’s a certain level of stress facing employees working from home. They feel under pressure to over-perform to prove to their employers that they aren’t ‘taking it easy’. To remedy this, you should encourage them to work their contracted hours and that regular breaks while working.
  4. Encourage physical exercise: Remind your staff to leave the house every day to get some fresh air. Arrange a daily or weekly reminder for them to step away from the screen. You can also run some online fitness activities such as yoga and meditation.
  1. Look into ergonomics: Research suggests that one in five people in the UK consult their GP about various musculoskeletal conditions. Although most employers have accounted for this consideration, their employees haven’t at home. It’s important to find out about your employees’ home workstations and provide them with the necessary equipment needed to perform their job effectively.
  2. Remember this isn’t permanent: While we’re all unsure of what the future looks like for the workforce, it’s important to remind staff that the situation is not permanent and they’ll be back to work in due course. You should keep up to date with the latest government guidelines and carry out risk assessments (https://croner.co.uk/services/health-safety/) of the work environment to ensure it meets the requirements of the government.

Conclusion

Just to round up, you should always be looking out for the health and wellbeing of your staff. However, that’s even more important now that employees are forced to work from home. With the likelihood of increased loneliness and isolation, it’s important to both keep in touch encourage an active lifestyle.