“Manage my team’s wellbeing?….hummphh, not another thing to do.”

We hear this sentiment often. It’s the voice of the leader who is cynical about the overload of their demands. At times it’s the voice of Human Resources, fearful and hesitant at the thought of loading up leaders with more work and the negative push-back that comes with it.

The truth is, leading wellbeing doesn’t need to feel like another thing to do. Integrating employee wellbeing into leadership is simply good leadership. The underlying skills required to lead wellbeing already appear in the tool kit of good leaders. For example, understanding the employee experience and providing a sense of clarity and inclusivity. Showing consistent commitment to supporting employees. Navigating the complexity of fluctuating work demands and resources available to individuals and teams. Leading with emotional intelligence. Being mindful of how people are feeling and performing at any given point in time. These are core elements of leadership and core elements of leading wellbeing.

So if leaders already have the skills, why are barriers put up at the thought or mention of leading wellbeing? The fact is, leaders don’t always understand where employee wellbeing fits in. It’s not clear how the investment in wellbeing will positively impact the outcomes of their team and the organisation. It’s not often talked about strategically, if it’s talked about at all.

Many leaders see employee wellbeing as ‘none of their business’, aka ‘employees personal business’. Often health and wellbeing is seen as a perk, or a ‘thing on the side’. It isn’t clear to leaders how investment in wellbeing can result in benefits for everyone - winning on all levels - the organisation, team, leader and of course, the employee. The barriers stack up, and for leaders, wellbeing feels like ‘another thing to do’ and they neglect to prioritise and commit to leading in this critical space.

It’s time to change this. It’s time to provide leaders with a clear understanding of how wellbeing impacts the employee experience, and the impact they have in work and life. It’s time to make leading wellbeing easier.

Leaders need to understand the link between wellbeing and performance

At Benny Button, we have emerging data and loads of research clearly demonstrating how wellbeing and performance go hand in hand. Our data shows when employees have high levels of wellbeing, over 70% are also high performers. When wellbeing levels are low, high performance drops to less than 6%. This means when wellbeing increases so does people’s capacity and belief they can perform at a high level in work and in life. As wellbeing declines the individual's impact and sense of contribution also declines.

When leaders are educated, when they get the concept of wellbeing and performance, then leading wellbeing in the flow of work can be put to practice. The good news is that getting started isn’t as difficult as you think.

When leaders have a sense of confidence and understand where wellbeing fits in, it’s time to tap into those underlying leadership skills I mentioned earlier.

3 practical ways for leading employee wellbeing:

1. Checking In

Leaders can start by simply checking in on their people on a regular and consistent basis. Checking in can be done at an individual level, if time permits, or at a team level through open team dialogue. This is something good leaders do, right?

Check in by asking these five questions:

1. How are you going?
2. What actions have you been taking to support your wellbeing?
3. Looking ahead, what area of your wellbeing will you prioritise and focus on?
4. What action are you going to take?
5. How can I support you?

Leaders can show some vulnerability and share their own responses to these five questions. This is a great way to build trust. Wellbeing is such a leveller of human beings. Everyone has strengths and everyone has challenges. When leaders start to talk about their own strengths and challenges, this is where the wellbeing conversation can become normalised and comfortable.

‘Checking in’ is an effective way to build and strengthen Psychological Safety within teams. Whilst trust in the process can take time (not everyone will be ready to share their emotions, wellbeing challenges, or stories of wellbeing growth), it’s important to be patient, not forceful.

Because life at work impacts wellbeing, let’s now explore actions leaders can control and influence.

Following on from the check-in approach outlined above, leaders will need to be ready for work challenges and pressures to emerge with employees during check-in conversations. Don’t see this as a distraction to wellbeing dialogue. These conversations should not be put to one side. They are more than ok! Work design, employees experience at work, their views on workload and resources and how motivated or disengaged they are has a powerful relationship with wellbeing. Let’s look at why this is the case.

When people are overloaded with work or if they are disengaged, a natural tendency can be to self undermine. This can show up in a number of ways. People can become cynical, self critical, display poor behaviours and gravitate toward counter productive lifestyle behaviours. Examples such as eating unhealthy food, consuming alcohol, disconnecting from family and friends, not switching off and resting/sleeping properly, putting on Netflix rather than the joggers. These behaviours can lead to a downward spiral where fatigue and burnout can take hold. People eventually shut off. Performance and wellbeing suffers.

Leaders can be influential when self-undermining is at play.

An empathetic and mindful recognition of work demands and resources challenges can build trust and respect. It’s an opportunity to start a conversation about how individuals and teams can support themselves and each other to buffer against excessive demands. The leadership skill here is in bringing the conversation back to what is within the control and influence of individuals and the team.

This leads us to a second leading wellbeing approach. Identifying actions leaders can control and influence. Here are some tips.

2. Practical actions you can control & influence as a leader

• Be mindful of the team's 'hindrance demands’. Discuss them openly. Can any be removed, even temporarily?
• Strive for improved collaboration with other teams and resources
• Promote hydration. Simple mantras such as 2 litres before 2pm is a great way to mitigate fatigue
• Integrate movement into the work day. Walking meetings, ‘10 squats as a team’ during a meeting, promote stretching routines. You could even get whacky and throw in a dance break!
• Get employees away from their desks to connect with other people
• Integrate simple breathing exercises to get everyone present before launching into meetings. Even for 1 minute!
• Be clear on what available resources your employees can tap into. Typically organisations have access to resources and support such as EAP. Promote them on a regular basis. Even when things are going well

3. Leader role modelling

Do not underestimate just how much employees notice leaders actions and behaviours. They can even look up to leaders as role models. Something within the control of a leader is role modelling positive wellbeing habits, behaviours and routines.

Here are some simple yet effective ways leaders can practice being role models:

• If leaders are working long hours, practice micro breaks visible to the team
• Try not to be the first to work and the last to leave
• Display healthy eating and movement behaviours
• Leaders need to be mindful of how they respond to stress. Practice positive counterbalancing responses. Remember people are watching!
• Leaders can have open dialogue about how positive and negative wellbeing behaviours can play out. Keep promoting the positive

If leaders can influence how people fuel and energise themselves - how they rest, recover and recharge - the payback is incredible. It’s well worth the investment. If people are feeling good outside of work, this promotes vitality. The result is employees showing up to work energised as opposed to running on empty. Energised employees are more productive, creative, can respond to stress more effectively, communicate and behave better and in general are likely to be more engaged at work! Talk about win-win.

Whilst there can be some immediate payback in wellbeing investment, we need to respect the long game. Cultural evolution, where wellbeing is integrated into the fabric of the organisation, can take three to five years. Guiding principles, policy, learning and development frameworks, wellbeing integration in the employee experience from induction to exit is critical.

Magic happens at the intersection of organisations, leaders, and employees committing consistently to what’s most important. When organisations invest in employee wellbeing, leaders commit to leading wellbeing, and people are ready to take action, everybody wins. This is what we call a ‘winning on all levels’ mindset.

Benny Button provides leadership development experiences making wellbeing commitment and leadership easier and more effective. Contact us at hello@bennybutton.com

If you are looking for a strategic way to track employee wellbeing and performance, we are launching very soon - Checkpoint, a way for leaders, for the first time, the means to gain continuous insights into the employee experience and work-life dynamics that play out in people’s lives. Helping leaders support their people to focus and take action.

Signup to Checkpoint's launch here.