Work ‘Wellness’ Programmes Don’t Make Employees Happier

Now it's official! Work ‘wellness’ programmes don’t make employees happier says Andre Spicer in The Guardian - backed up by a lot of important research.

(Scroll all the way down for my commentary ...)

Here are the highlights from the article -

The Problem: Companies around the world spent $61.2bn on wellness interventions in 2021.

His Solution: It turns out the most effective way to improve employee mental health is by reducing stress, rather than adding new ways to cope with it.

A new study by 英国牛津大学 ’s William Fleming examines the impact of a wide range of workplace wellbeing interventions such as stress management and mindfulness classes, and wellbeing apps. It found that almost none of these interventions had any statistically significant impact on worker wellbeing or job satisfaction. They did not improve employees’ sense of belonging at work or reduce perceived time pressures. Nor did they make employees feel supported or improve workplace relationships. In some cases, wellbeing interventions seemed to make matters worse, the study suggested. For instance, workplace resilience and mindfulness training had a slightly negative impact on employees’ self-rated mental health.

The working practices of many organisations seem to actually discourage employee wellness. Stanford University’s Jeffrey Pfeffer was part of a team that looked at how many common workplace stressors drive ill health and even death.

My Commentary

As I've been saying for many years, anything that focuses on individual success will no longer produce desired results, because from now on we need to focus on our collective success. How does this work? The more we all focus on the good of the collective the better off each individual making up the collective will be.

Bottom line - we'll all be happier when we learn to focus on others' happiness more than our own. It does come naturally to some people - but most of us will have to learn this new skill.

Even while writing this I'm aware that companies are still spending millions on wellbeing and DEI programs - none of it will improve our wellbeing.

How To Boost Employee Wellbeing

As I was saying to a young founder yesterday, the new wave of innovation is all about improving our social situation, which depends on our ability to improve the quality of our connection. One of the keys to doing that is improving our communication and ability to truly listen to each other. Listening experts have been saying for years that simply sensing that someone is genuinely listening to us, provides us with a sense of fulfillment.

The important skills for tomorrow are learning to communicate better, to listen better, and to explore more of our emotions together in an objective manner - in a safe non-judgmental atmosphere - without getting into the personal details of any situation.

So as great as this article is, reducing stress at work may relieve things a bit, but it won't actually make us happier. Because now that we're living in a world where everything is connected - our happiness at work is dependent on many other factors beyond the workplace. But it's interesting to now how in times of uncertainty and slowdowns, there are still some groups that are going to thrive no matter what. How do they do it?

Wellbeing Even in Challenging Times

The real secret to our wellbeing has nothing to do with focusing on ourselves, but rather on improving the collective. That's why people who are focused on creating good vibes in any environment will always feel a great sense of fulfillment - and when you lift others - you automatically also lift yourself.

So essentially, all this is really about having a higher purpose than the limited role our narrow ego carved out for us - to constantly try to fill ourselves. We're starting to see what an impossible mission that is. But filling others - that's the key to the good life.

When times are tough we really only have two choices -

1 - To complain and drag everyone down with us - see the half empty cup - which is perfectly natural - many of us often do this.

2 - To see the half full cup and focus on lifting everyone - making that extra human effort creates a very special atmosphere. And when we're all in this gear - it provides us all with a deep sense of fulfillment. This is by far a loftier goal.

Having a Bigger Purpose

When we're focused on the wellbeing of others everything is easier because it gives a bigger purpose. This is the key to finding happiness in any situation, including challenging times. We can always dream of bigger and better things if we think of a higher goal. And we'd be smart to always focus on doing something important for the collective, giving us a good reason to hone our natural skills.

So even in tough times, setting goals can help us be happy. If our goal involves doing for the collective, the hard work feels lighter. Doing this sets a great example, and can inspire others to also set a great goal for themselves, leading with a positive example.

The real solution is not about reducing stress or having less meetings at work - having meaningful goals and being surrounded by inspiring examples can change how we all work toward happier lives.