5 Wellbeing Red Flags: How to Spot Virtue Signalling

Talking about wellbeing puts companies in the conversation, but there’s often a big difference between what they say and what they do.

It’s trendy to say you care about wellbeing, which is why every organisation does it, but not all of them mean it.

The last few years have signalled a big shift in what employees want from their organisations and the value they want to receive.

Gone are the days when companies could offer a fat cheque and then do whatever they wanted to their staff with impunity, because discerning employees have decided that their wellbeing is just as, if not more important than, money and they will choose organisations that care for it over those that do not.

But now, shrewd companies have figured this out and have learned just what to say to lure people in before letting them find out their entire approach to wellbeing is shouting loudly about it while doing the opposite behind closed doors.

So, in order to avoid this, here are 5 ways you can spot that an organisation is just virtue signalling about wellbeing:

Management aren’t involved in wellbeing

A culture of wellbeing starts at the top and filters down through an organisation, so the number one way to tell if a company is virtue signalling about wellbeing is if those at the top don’t have time for it. The C-suite have little to no input in wellbeing initiatives, none of them sit on the wellbeing committee and very few of them (if any) regularly take part in any of the initiatives.?

The work always comes before the person

There aren’t any specific wellbeing initiatives

Wellbeing is a culture, yes, but it’s also a definitive set of actions. If a company can’t articulate, in bullet points, exactly how they are impacting wellbeing, then they’re not doing it.?

The wellbeing committee doesn’t have any resources or power

The classic lip service to wellbeing is creating a committee that meet and talk about wellbeing but are given very few resources and don’t have the power to make any meaningful changes.?

This is unfortunately more common than not having a wellbeing committee at all and is basically just a distraction technique.?

Employees aren’t asked for their input

Employees are the ones who know best the ins and outs of daily work life and what it takes to do well and be well at the same time. They know where the issues are, where the greatest sources of stress are coming from, what would help and what they would engage with, and if they’re not asked for their input then their input isn’t valued.?

The wrong behaviours are rewarded

What gets rewarded gets repeated and what gets repeated becomes embedded. If an organisation says it promotes wellbeing but then rewards (and even promotes for) overwork, backstabbing and ladder climbing, it sets a standard for the culture that it not only tolerates but tacitly encourages.

These 5 examples are generally not the actions of ‘evil’ or corrupt organisations, they’re just easy traps that any of us can fall into.?

Companies actually want to promote wellbeing but often their rhetoric is outpacing their action because they lack real commitment to the cause, which is the thing most needed to elicit meaningful change.

So, if any of this sounds familiar to you, just know that these traps are actually quite common and all of the above can be remedied more easily than you might think.?

For help with this, keep an eye out for a future newsletter where we'll go through how to avoid these traps, or get in touch with us and we can steer you in the right direction.?

Question: Have any of the 5 traps caught your organisation? Do you know what can be done about it?

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My name is Phil and I'm a workplace wellbeing specialist.

Cool! But what does that mean?

It means I work with organisations to upskill their people so they can be healthy and well under any circumstances...

...whilst also helping the organisation to optimise their circumstances to make it easier for their people to be healthy and well.

If this sounds like something you could use, send me a DM.