Hello! How have you been?
At Wellbeing4Life we are celebrating! Can you believe it is our 10th birthday!!
How are we celebrating, you might ask? By launching this newsletter because, after 10 years, we’ve got a lot to celebrate and share.
There’s been a little blood, much sweat, occasional tears, and lots and lots of learning over the last 10 years. So now we want to share all of that with you—the learning and maybe some laughter, not the sweat and tears!
They say time flies when you’re having fun, and since we really do not know where the last 10 years have gone, we’ve definitely been having some fun too!
We have many proud achievements and have faced our fair share of challenges. Of course, what business doesn’t face challenges?
In the beginning, it was all about making the business case for workplace wellbeing, but as the evidence became undisputable and then when COVID hit, things shifted up a gear for Wellbeing4Life. Like many, we vividly remember 23rd March 2020 (the first day of lockdown) and for us, the start of a steady flow (and then flood!) of phone calls and messages from business owners and leaders who were concerned about the wellbeing of their teams.
What a scary time it was; businesses were dealing with uncertainty alongside managing a workforce becoming increasingly isolated, stressed, and anxious. We responded quickly with support, including morning check-ins on Zoom with employees, 1:1 coaching with those who were struggling, and webinars packed with practical advice employees could use immediately.
For some, the mental health concerns triggered at that time still remain today. In particular, there’s growing research about the mental health of young people. A survey by Mental Health UK found that nearly one-third of employees aged 18 to 24 took time off work due to stress in 2024, a significant increase compared to older workers. Some research suggests this may be linked to remote working (we’ll cover both of these in a future Newsletter; there is so much to talk about!).
The purpose of this newsletter is to draw on our 10 years’ experience to offer a practical resource for the business community. Our aim is to improve workplace wellbeing, one business at a time, and we can only do that by sharing and learning together.
Wellbeing4Life has come a long way, as has workplace wellbeing, but we’ve got a lot more to do, so get involved, and let’s get on this journey together.
This month's Hot Topic: Why your wellbeing initiative could be a waste of time and money or worse!
Over the last 10 years, we’ve seen growing recognition that workplace wellbeing is not just a ‘nice-to-have’; it’s a business imperative. But all workplace wellbeing initiatives are not equal.
Many initiatives have good intentions to raise awareness and offer tools to their people to support their wellbeing. Free fruit, healthy snacks, access to apps, tips and tools can be a great part of a broader strategy but on their own, they are simply not enough, and worse, they can serve to disengage a workforce who may feel their needs are not being taken seriously and their wellbeing is being paid lip service.
The hard truth is that many organisations are wasting money on ineffective (though often, well-intentioned) initiatives that barely scratch the surface of employee mental health challenges. This is not just our observation. Research from leading institutions like the Wellbeing Research Centre, Great Place to Work UK, and the London School of Economics (LSE) makes one thing clear—if you’re not embedding wellbeing into your organisational DNA, you’re throwing money down the drain.
The Problem with Quick Fixes
Too many organisations rely on superficial solutions to tick the wellbeing box. Meditation apps, subsidised gym memberships, yoga classes, and even free lunches sound great in theory. But do they work? According to the Wellbeing Research Centre’s latest study, individual-level interventions like these have shown negligible impact on improving overall workplace wellbeing. Instead, they often create a false sense of progress while leaving systemic issues—such as excessive workloads, poor leadership, and toxic cultures—unchallenged.
LSE’s research backs this up. Their findings reveal that pouring resources into wellness perks can be costly if those initiatives aren’t aligned with a broader strategy. It’s like putting a plaster on a bullet wound—superficial fixes won’t address deeper organisational pain points.
The Need for a Strategic Approach
The most successful workplace wellbeing programmes take a strategic, embedded approach that aligns with business goals and addresses the root causes of employee stress. The 2024 Workplace Wellbeing Report from Great Place to Work UK found that in workplaces where wellbeing is deeply integrated into company culture, employees are more engaged, productive, and less likely to experience burnout.
Our top tips for a strategic approach with impact
Our experience tells us that…
Visible leadership buy-in: Senior leaders need to champion and role-model wellbeing initiatives, not just fund them. Their actions set the tone for the rest of the organisation.
Employee involvement: A core wellbeing value is listening as well as hearing employees and responding with programmes built around their actual needs, not assumptions or trends. It also means managing expectations; resources are generally limited and its not realistic to address every single need immediately. Clear, open and honest communication is essential to build trust and keep engagement.
Accountability and measurement: Wellbeing strategies should include clear metrics and KPIs to track progress and ROI, otherwise how do you know it’s making a difference or that your approach continues to address changing needs? Measuring success isn’t just about reduced absenteeism; it’s about improved engagement, retention, and overall business performance.
The long game: Having a strategic approach means embedding wellbeing across the business so that it is reflected in knowledge, attitudes and behaviours but that doesn’t mean doing everything overnight. Having a short, medium and long term plan that is flexible and responsive to changing needs is realistic and most impactful.
So what?
Knowing stuff isn’t useful if we don’t take action which is why we often ask these three coaching questions in the work we do:
- What…. has resonated with you?
- So what…does that mean for you? Why is it relevant?
- Now what…will you DO?
So, if you have read this article with interest, what will you do next?
Why not share by Contacting Us Here.
Not sure where to start? Check out our 10 Year Anniversary Offer below and get some help to get started.
Sources:
Wellbeing Research Centre: More ambition needed to improve workplace wellbeing
Great Place to Work UK: Workplace Wellbeing Report 2024
London School of Economics: Workplace wellbeing initiatives
Your Wellbeing Challenge Answered
We talk to a lot of businesses and get to understand their wellbeing pressures and challenges. While every business is different, there are often some common challenges; our job is to support our clients to get clear on these challenges and put steps in place to remove barriers and take meaningful action.
So, we had an idea! Wouldn’t it be useful to have a regular feature in our newsletter where we share some common business challenges and, of course, our top tips for addressing them?
To be honest, we actually started with a list of 10 to share in Newsletter 1 (well, there are lots to choose from!) but then we thought that might overwhelm you! So, if you want to catch them all, sign up to get our newsletter direct to your mail box.
So, let’s kick off with this one:
This month’s challenge
“Managers are too overwhelmed to perform their roles effectively.”.
We are facing uncertain times: the continuing impact of the latest budget, economic uncertainty, the continuing cost-of-living crisis, conflict or threat of conflict, not to mention the potential impact of another Trump administration. Its clear that this is taking its toll on businesses we talk to, many of whom are dealing with constant change and juggling with the consequences of making cuts, freezing recruitment, and asking staff to do more with less. The weight of this often sits with managers who are asked to get the job done efficiently, support struggling team members, and keep themselves physically and mentally well, because if they’re not well then everything else falls down.
What to do?
Take action and protect your biggest assets! We would argue that managers have the biggest impact on wellbeing in the business; they are often in a position to spot the signs of poor wellbeing early, and their wellbeing impacts the rest of the team and the business in so many ways. Put simply, a stressed manager creates a stressed team, which adds to the stress of a manager! Therefore, if you can only do one thing this year, provide your managers with the knowledge and tools to support colleagues and to manage their own wellbeing. The ripple effect could be huge.
Over to you… as we’ve mentioned, real change happens when we share, debate, and learn together, so please give us your thoughts on the challenges we’ve discussed this month. Comment below.
Perhaps you have some specific challenges right now that you’d like us to cover in a future addition; then let us know and let’s get you removing barriers and moving forward.
Finally, What are we excited about this month?
Apart from turning 10… we’re excited about two new offers we have created in recognition of the challenges we’ve talked about in this newsletter and that we know businesses are facing right now.
That’s why we are offering:
- A 20% reduction on our 1:1 Coaching Packages for managers for Q1* – That’s just £720 for 6 x 1 hour sessions
- PLUS a FREE 1 hour consultancy session with any Business Owner/Wellbeing lead booking one or more coaching packages. Why? Because we know today’s priority might be fire-fighting with quick, effective interventions, but we know that long-term impact and success comes from an embedded strategic approach. In our 1 hour session we will explore your goals, help you to get clear on priorities and support you to set some meaningful actions to keep you moving forwards. With absolutely no obligation to work with us…these sessions are as valuable to us in getting closer to the business community to understand challenges and needs.
*For packages booked between 31st January and 31st March 2025 inclusive.
See what Simon Wycherley, Director, Express Asphalt, Aggregate Industries said:
“I started working with Elain after a very difficult time in my career and needed to work through some challenges that I hadn’t faced previously. Elain gave fantastic structure and helped me break down the issues and work through things one at a time. I learnt a number of tools from working with Elain that I will take forward with me to handle stress, work challenges and work/life balance.
I cannot thank Elain enough for the fantastic coaching that we went through and would highly recommend her work to anyone.”
Until next time…
We hope you’ve enjoyed reading our new newsletter. Our aim is to make this a practical and useful resource for anyone tasked with workplace wellbeing, and we can only do that with your feedback.
So please do tell us what you liked, what you found less helpful, and what you’d like to see more of or less of.
Look out for our next addition dropping at the end of February.