Feature
Workplace wellness programs went through a substantial evolution over the last few years. Companies spent an estimated $52.2 billion in 2019 and are projected to spend $58.4 billion on programs that encompass mental health, financial wellbeing, equity programs as well as the standard physical wellness programs, according to The Global Wellness Institute.
But companies may have been putting the cart before the horse with these efforts. In fact, some say those carefully crafted employee well-being programs may have been a waste of time.
Recent findings shared in a report by Wellbeing Research Centre Research Fellow William Fleming last month have been making the rounds through the employee experience ecosystem. Fleming surveyed 46,336 UK workers and found no evidence that individual-level well-being programs benefit workers, according to his report, “Employee Well-Being Outcomes From Individual-Level Mental Health Interventions.”
While that may sound shocking, when you dig into it, the results really aren’t that surprising.
The Disconnect Between Well-Being Efforts and Job Demands
Stand-alone programs of every variety are common in companies, but successful ones are rare — and with good reason. Siloed areas in an organization always teeter on the brink of annihilation or under threat of replacement. They aren’t workplace-wide, foundational necessities built into the fabric of an organization, but something one sub-section finds useful for its purposes. One-off well-being programs are very much the same.
“[Well-being] programs that are for individual employees do not work unless there is also a focus on workplace culture,” shared Beth Kanter, a training consultant in workplace wellbeing. The struggle, perhaps, comes from a disconnect between availability and utility.
Company-wide well-being programs aren’t offering the desired adoption rates or results in part because they make little impact on workers’ actual job demands.
As Fleming elaborated in his report: “Well-being is the product of an imbalance between job demands and resources. These interventions are designed to enhance people's psychological resources, e.g., 'coping mechanisms', time management skill recovery periods. [But] if they did enhance these resources, employees would be better able to handle the demands and expectations of their job, therefore well-being measures would be higher.”
Yet, the report findings show there’s no discernible benefit from these interventions, leaving us with two options, according to Fleming: “Either [the well-being programs] are not actually enhancing psychological resources at all (no additional resources), or if they are enhancing psychological resources, they are not relevant to the demands of the jobs (not appropriate resources).”
Preston Lewis, founder and CEO of Intactic, said the disconnect may be due to the natural evolution of decades of trying to find what works, then further exacerbated by the pandemic. “These efforts have been accelerated since COVID-19 disrupted workplaces around the world. Employee engagement, culture and other general listening efforts surfaced well-being as a key priority to improve and manage through the disruption.”
By placing a macro priority on improving the employee experience, companies raced to identify the micro-elements that could impact critical business and people objectives, but may have erred along the realm of experimentation without mapping impacts back to the overarching goal.
Related Article: Mending the Disconnect Between Well-Being Efforts and Results
Finding the Way Back to Organizational Well-Being
At the heart of it, “well-being is not the problem of individuals; it is an organizational culture problem,” Kanter said.
And according to Lewis, improving well-being at the organizational level is a challenge primarily because of “employees' complicated and diverse spectrum of needs at work.”
He believes it’s time companies got back to basics. And the first place to start, he said, is with Maslow’s hierarchy of needs: ensuring people feel safe. He offers a number of measures to help:
- Revisit the definition of well-being: Organizations may want to expand the definition of well-being to add digital well-being, including building more awareness of how digital platforms, screens and experiences influence our anxiety levels, lives and work.
- Focus on recognition: Leaders should ensure there are opportunities for employees to be recognized, acknowledged and appreciated at work. This directly impacts measurable EX components, including trust, engagement, performance and other measures connected to improving relationships.
- Lean into financial well-being: This is also directly connected to stress and anxiety levels. When effectively managed or addressed, people have more mindshare for work, which directly impacts performance, productivity and morale.
- Prioritize manager enablement: People managers need to be retrained with a focus on relationship management, inclusive of empathetic leadership skills and a focus on psychological safety and wellness.
Although some companies have a smattering of those items in place, many do not, with wellness programs too often only paraded to woo top talent who are equally unaware of how meaningless they are.
Related Article: Can Wellness Initiatives Wipe Out Employee Stress?
An Echo Chamber
Is Fleming’s study an anomaly or are there other works discounting, or at least showing skepticism of, wellness programs?
“There are some studies conducted by successful academics which are similarly skeptical,” Fleming said. “However, it might be a case of framing of the narrative.”
At a time when employee experience programs are on the chopping block in some organizations, some might misinterpret this study as justification to do away with EX programs entirely — but that is far from the point.
Instead, Fleming sees a growing around individualized approaches to well-being. “Many people have seen stresses and demands increase and found organizations responding with lip service on well-being or unhelpful band-aid solutions,” he said.
He reads all of the attention his report is receiving as such: “People are ready for organizations to take seriously the causes of poor well-being.”
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Related Article: Well-Being Efforts Need to Start in the C-Suite
A Culture Problem
If culture is the root source of the disconnect, curing the culture problem requires a top-down approach.
“Leadership needs to be onboard to prevent a toxic work environment, workload overload and other culture issues,” said Kanter.
Easier said than done, as many organizations tend to be resistant to change.
“Some organizations will be resistant to change, some will not realize there is a need to change, and some will not know how,” Fleming said. “It is hard work to transform working conditions, but it must be done for the well-being of workers and for employers to improve performance.”
Lewis suggests companies look into the link between their wellness models and behaviors to the ways of working. “Companies must expand beyond the traditional definition of wellness and connect actions directly to everyday tasks and activities,” he said.
Relieving workplace stress by making the workplace less stressful should also be a top goal. It seems intuitive but feels revolutionary in a sea of mish-mashed wellness initiatives that have laid claim as the salve for struggling internal environments. It may be time to rip off that band aid and tend to the underlying wound.
