More organisations are turning their focus towards wellbeing of their employees, and reaping significant benefits.
Organisations that focus on the wellbeing of their employees are likely to reap significant ROI, new research from Davidson Trahaire Corpsyche (DTC) has found.
A direct cost benefit to organisations that invest in employees’ wellbeing was found to be over of over $10,000 pa, per employee. Additionally, absenteeism was slashed by a third in some organisations.
“We all know that looking after employees is the right thing to do for the health of your people, but now we know it’s also the right thing for the financial strength of your business”, Michele Grow, CEO of DTC, said.
Grow stressed that a ‘tick-the-box’ approach was not suitable, and that managers would need to have an active role in supporting their staff if they wished to see the significant dividends come to fruition.
In order to help achieve this, DTC recommends organisations implement employee assistance programs (EAPs). These programs provide employees and their families with confidential counselling, coaching and information on both work and personal issues, with no cost to the employee.
For organisations, EAPs can provide risk management advice and support for all levels in dealing with both day-to-day and major issues/events.
EAPs provide improvement to a number of facets of wellbeing – with mortal and motivation improving by 51% following the use of the service.
DTC’s analysis found its EAP clients gained a cost benefit of $10,187.99 pa in productivity improvement for each employee.
“Employees can be impacted by any number of stressors affecting both their personal and work functioning, which, in turn, can have a negative impact on an organisation’s productivity and profitability,” Grow said. “Investing in the health and wellbeing of employees through interventions such as [EAPs] can help ensure they are operating at optimum levels, thereby benefiting the business’s bottom line.”
Grow commented that the improvements went across a broad range of industry sectors, with both males and females responding positively to EAPs. The increase in productivity and decrease in stress additionally resulted in many organisations cutting down on absenteeism, as well.
