At Access 2 Comfort our focus is on supporting employees through workplace adjustments. We provide assessments, observing people in their working environments and recommending equipment to enable them to fulfil their roles, whilst remaining safe and pain-free.
Our primary service is to employees whom are experiencing postural issues, or have existing medical conditions for which they need support at work.
The services we offer at Access 2 Comfort are just one aspect of what is becoming a more holistic approach to how companies provide wellness at work.
This is because wellness takes many different forms and recent research has shown the benefits to employers of investing in their employees’ health and wellbeing. It makes sense that if employees feel valued and are physically and mentally well, they will have a better attitude to their work and productivity will increase. The Global Wellness Institute (GTI) estimates that workforce unwellness (chronic disease, work-related injuries and illnesses, work-related stress, and employee disengagement) may cost the global economy 10-15% of economic output every year.
This has led to a huge growth in the ‘wellness at work’ industry, with lots of companies offering their services. In fact, the Global Wellness Institute projects 9.9% average annual growth, with the wellness economy reaching nearly $7.0 trillion by 2025.
The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development believe investing in employee wellbeing can lead to increased resilience, better employee engagement, reduced sickness absence and higher performance and productivity. Their latest survey found employee wellbeing continues to rise up the corporate agenda but there is still work to be done within companies to be more proactive, rather than reactive to employee needs. Wellness in work needs to become part of the culture of an organisation rather than an ‘add-on’ at the request of individual staff. Something HR leaders seem to be aware of with investment in employee wellbeing rated as more important than anything else. (Deloitte 2020).
The last two years have seen a shift in our working habits, with many more people home working, for most people this has had a positive impact on their wellbeing. No one is mourning the commute that adds hours to your day; being home for dinner and being able to do the school run now and again has enhanced family life and a sense of wellbeing for many. However, the downside to working from home can be the lack of interaction with others, feeling disconnected from work colleagues and the difficulty switching off from work, with home feeling like a permanent office space. This can be addressed by employers, through weekly Zoom get-togethers, sticking to contact within working hours and not expecting staff to be online outside of working hours.
Last month the NEC Birmingham hosted the annual Health and Wellbeing@Work show, which we were lucky enough to attend and this highlighted the wealth of resources available to companies in order to improve wellness at work for their employees. This ranged from Drinkaware at Work, which offers alcohol training courses to help employees gain a better understanding of the impact of alcohol and empower them to make better choices, to apps such as Zecure, which promotes a sense of wellness through safety when you are out and about and Microbreaks whose app can target the areas of health and wellbeing that are most important to the individual employee. The wellbeing challenge.uk offers an eight-week lifestyle transformation journey that all employees can complete together, which will help to build long-lasting habits and boost physical and mental health. Medigold Health offer their Perform service designed specifically to boost the well-being of employees and protect them from the impact of mental health issues. There were even companies offering wellbeing retreats.
The purpose of all these products and services, including ours at Access 2 Comfort is to reduce absenteeism, presenteeism and staff turnover and increase productivity within a happy, safe environment where staff feel like a highly regarded member of a good team.
If you think we can help your team please get in touch.