The Essential Role of Employee Wellbeing in Developing Workplace Resilience
Children's Nebraska
Pediatric health care leader on a mission to improve the life of every child.
At Children’s Hospital & Medical Center in Omaha, Neb., our people are the foundation—and the heart—of everything we do. They drive our mission forward, improving the lives of children and families every day. As Children’s Chief People Officer, I’m constantly thinking, “How can we make this the most amazing place to work?”
I want Children’s to be a destination workplace, not just a pitstop in people's lives—and that doesn’t happen by accident. To be an amazing workplace in 2023, I believe it’s essential to intentionally invest in our team members’ wellbeing.
How do you define wellbeing? To me, it’s the ability to be your authentic self wherever you are—and it’s unique to each person. We can’t just look left and right at what other companies are doing; it takes self-reflection and honesty with ourselves as an organization. What are we trying to accomplish—and improve? How can we continue to evolve? How do we stay in touch with our teams on what matters to them?
It’s important to realize we’re not just competing with the healthcare industry. That reality has encouraged us to rapidly invest in strengthening our culture and commitment to our people and the communities we serve. When we invest in the wellbeing of our people, it positively impacts quality and safety, patient experience, outcomes and strategic growth.
The importance of listening to employee feedback
The expectations of the workforce are forever different since the onset of the pandemic, making employee feedback more valuable than ever. In our 2021 employee engagement survey, we heard loud and clear that our team members were struggling with overall wellbeing—and it really came back to burnout, which spiked significantly among health care workers across the nation during the pandemic.
Our annual employee engagement surveys dig into categories like leadership, recognition, belonging, professional development, wellbeing, safety and others. Feedback from these surveys helps the executive leadership team understand where our workforce is strong and where there are opportunities for improvement.
As we looked to best serve the needs of our organization, we determined a holistic, multi-dimensional approach would be the most impactful. For us, broadening the definition of wellbeing is really where the magic started to happen. In 2022 alone, Children’s made strides in wellbeing, deploying programs and initiatives focused on emotional, social, financial, physical and community wellbeing. Our wellbeing programs are robust, with many dimensions to each, allowing team members to tailor resources to meet their individual needs. Here’s a glimpse into what we’re offering to put our people first:
Social
Our organization has six employee resource groups (ERGs) that focus on the experiences that make each person unique. Additionally, Children's created a new position to accelerate its People First focus: Employee Experience manager. This role is solely dedicated to improving team members’ experience and leading engagement, recognition, joy in the workplace and wellbeing efforts.
To create new and accessible ways for team members to support one another, Children’s also launched a new online recognition platform this year. The platform elevates and integrates with Children’s values, helping recognize colleagues who demonstrate Innovation, Collaboration, Accountability, Respect and Excellence. This easy-to-navigate system integrates with Amazon to offer team members the largest reward network ever. It’s also fun to use, with many of the same engagement features found on social media channels.
Financial
Beyond the educational resources Children’s has available to support team members’ financial wellbeing, we’ve also rolled out a few unique differentiators. Children's and Habitat for Humanity of Omaha have entered a partnership to get Children's team members mortgage-ready and on a path to home ownership. Additionally, Children’s recently extended its tuition reimbursement benefit to include eligible team members’ dependents and spouses pursuing an educational program that falls into one of our identified critical workforce pipeline positions: high-demand health care roles with a limited supply of qualified candidates.
Emotional
Children’s is devoted to providing emotional support to its employees and has developed a multidisciplinary program called THRIVE, which stands for “Transforming Health care through Relational, Intentional and Versatile Empowerment.” ?
The program’s mission is to provide confidential support programs that increase provider and clinical staff wellbeing and empower team members to remain resilient in response to the unique challenges of pediatric health care. This program is available on a 24/7 basis for those impacted by compassion fatigue or burnout, moral distress, secondary traumatic stress or any other type of health care-related stress. Children’s currently has 85 peer supporters trained to provide this type of support across the organization.
Additionally, the organization welcomed its first-ever facility dog dedicated to supporting the emotional wellbeing of the team in 2022. Howie, our “Chief Morale Officer,” is available to all team members—clinical and non-clinical—and works alongside THRIVE program manager David Huskey. This dynamic duo rounds the halls of Children’s main campus, as well as its many clinics, providing therapeutic interventions that help regulate stress and promote emotional wellbeing.
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Community
Our BeInvolved paid community volunteering program empowers team members to use their time and gifts to support partner organizations throughout our community. This program mobilizes our team, offering a fresh, community-centered way to serve and live out our mission beyond the walls of Children’s. Since its launch in the fall of 2022, our team members have logged more than 1,250 hours of volunteer time.
Physical
In addition to annual health screenings, gym discounts, immunizations and other physical wellbeing benefits, Children’s offers convenient, accessible care through our Employee Health & Wellness department with CARE4U—a quick care clinic where many common ailments can be treated quickly and effectively without taking extensive time away from work or busy personal schedules. This team received 2,196 visits in 2022 between CARE4U and telehealth services.
Addressing social determinants of health—for your team
We know that an individual’s overall health is impacted by many factors, 80% of which happen outside the health care system. These social factors—or Social Determinants of Health (SDOH)—can be a direct predictor of health status. The World Health Organization defines SDOH as conditions or circumstances in which people are born, grow, live, work and age. Factors can include social, economic, community, systemic, housing and physical environment and behaviors, for example.
Children’s has made a commitment in its Strategic Plan to address SDOH factors for our patients, families and the overall community. In 2022, we shared a confidential survey organization-wide to help us understand the needs and social factors affecting our team. From these honest insights, we developed a targeted plan and programming to provide necessary support for economic stability, food and transportation security and childcare. Best of all, we’ve heard positive feedback and gratitude from team members who are benefiting from these valuable resources. We are committed to doing all we can for our employees in relation to SDOH.
The power of investing in people
This year’s employee engagement survey, completed in February, demonstrated a return on our investment in employee wellbeing. We saw remarkably high levels of engagement, with 3 of 5 items scoring above 90% favorability—and all items surpassed benchmarks.
We saw an 85% participation rate, compared with 77.5% 2021, and significant improvement in many individual survey items from 2021. Notably, “I intend to stay with Children’s for at least the next 12 months,” was the most improved question, up 22% from our 2021 survey and ranking above benchmarks for other children’s hospitals and healthcare organizations. Other high-ranking questions included, “I have opportunities to develop my skills, abilities and strengths at Children’s,” “The work I do at Children’s is meaningful to me,” and “I’m proud to work at Children’s.”
These results affirm that taking care of our team’s wellbeing matters—and it strongly correlates to greater engagement. It makes sense: when people feel safe and like they belong, are cared for and supported as whole individuals, they can be more engaged and better perform at work.
We’re not stopping here. We’re committed to continuous improvement when it comes to our culture and the wellbeing of team members.
Consider the critical connection between wellbeing and the strength and resilience of your team. How are you meeting their needs? What steps can you take now—big or small—to demonstrate care and invest in wellbeing? We’d love to hear from you.
Janel Allen is the Executive Vice President and Chief People Officer at Children’s Hospital & Medical Center in Omaha, Neb. Janel is passionate about fostering a culture of purpose, joy and belonging to increase employee engagement and achieve organizational success.
To learn more, visit ChildrensOmaha.Org .