Promoting wellbeing with little budget

If you’re looking to give your workforce a boost without breaking the bank, then have no fear, Citation’s here!

We’ve come up with six of cost-effective hacks you can use to implement a value-adding culture of wellbeing into your business’ workforce.

Before we dive right in, if you’re not already sold on giving something back to your employees, here are just a few reasons you might want to reconsider:

• Happy staff worker harder
• Valued staff stay longer
• Positive company cultures attract employees

So, let’s get stuck in…

1. Free fruit Friday (or any day, for that matter)

Something as simple as a free bowl of fruit (or chocolate if you’re feeling naughty!) can make a big difference. It shows your employees that you’re thinking of them and actively going out of your way to provide a nice little extra. It’s true what they say, it’s the thought that counts!

2. End of month drinks (including soft drinks, of course!)

This option offers a great way to build bonds within individual departments, and the business as a whole too (providing everyone’s invited, of course). It’s not often colleagues get the chance to let their hair down and natter about all things non-work related, so setting up a platform for just that is a great enabler. Better yet, it’s free for you to organise.

3. Get active

In case you’ve missed it, the nation’s in a bit of a fitness frenzy. To help your employees meet their fitness goals and have fun while they’re doing it, you could set up sports clubs before or after work, or even during lunch breaks.

You’d need forthcoming employees to essentially ‘lead’ the sessions and ideally a shower on the premises, but after that the job’s a good’un.

4. Feed that Friday feeling

It’s hard to avoid that ‘Friday feeling’. After a week of hard graft, why not reward your employees with an early finish. We’re not saying you need to go wild and start dishing out half days, but leaving half an hour early can make all the difference.

Don’t worry, we’re not forgetting those industries that require employees to be in the building until a set time – customer service advice lines, for example. For those that can’t leave early because of the nature of their role, you could make a point of creating a more relaxed environment so that work feels less like work.

5. Employee of the month

If alarm bells are ringing for fear of a costly prize, stop right there. You don’t have to splash the cash for employee of the month awards to have an effect – the recognition itself is enough to give employees a real sense of pride and achievement

If you want to attach a little something to the honour, you could consider a bottle of wine, box of chocolates or shopping voucher, for example.

6. Local partnerships

For a mutually beneficial relationship, see if you can team up with any local businesses to get a discount for your staff. They’ll (hopefully!) benefit from more customers, and you’ll benefit from an appreciative workforce who’ll hopefully be saving some pennies. And you? Well, you don’t even need to reach for the plastic for this one!