Wellbeing is a really popular word at the moment, and rightly so. It’s always been important and no more so than in the last eighteen months of this world pandemic we found ourselves in.

There are many learnings we can take from the experience of going through a pandemic and looking after our own wellbeing should be at the top of everyone’s list.

For the third year running, World Wellbeing Week starts on the 21st June, which has actually been extended this year to ten days and runs to the end of June. We wanted to share with you all the things we do with our staff to ensure we keep wellbeing forefront of our minds and hope that this may resonate with you and help share ideas on how we can look after each other, as we all know that people are the heart of any business and it’s important to look after them.

It’s been important to stay connected as a team and where we have all been working remotely this has been one of the ways we have stayed together.  It gives us an extra reason to communicate and helps us lift others when we can see they may need it.

We’ve made a point of asking how people are feeling and have captured this in conversations and regular check in’s and also via survey’s where we encourage our team to be open and honest and tell us what’s going on for them.  We have a number of mental health champions in Focus7 so people have more choice of who they want to speak to and we can provide them with support whenever they need it.  We were also delighted to launch our Employee Assistance Program, which is available for all our staff and their families and offers access to confidential advice line, 24/7 support, counselling and support and access to amazing webinars and health checks.

We do some short weekly yoga sessions to encourage a break and a reset, have issued a list of things “It’s ok to do” whilst working from home, have sessions where we openly talk about mental health and continue to reinforce the message that it really is ok not to be ok.  We do walking meetings, work from the garden on sunny days and make sure everyone is reminded to take breaks and take time for lunch.

These seem simple things but so easily we can all fall into bad habits that affect our wellbeing and we all need these reminders.  So my advice is to make sure wellbeing is integrated into the culture of your business.  Remind people that they are important and valued and that there is always help and support available.

Hopefully by the time you read this the roadmap will soon unlock more restrictions and we can start bringing our team back together in the office.  This will be another change to get used to, don’t forget we’ve not commuted for months now so the excitement of being back will be balanced out with the challenges of settling into a new routine so keep an eye out for each other and make sure it’s not too much, too soon for some.  Particularly the introverts among us who may need a bit of time to get used to the noise of a busy office once again, which is why we have planned a blended, flexible and agile approach to returning to the office.

We’ll be continuing with our activities and this month we are growing sunflowers.  Sunflowers symbolise loyalty and longevity and are known as “Happy” flowers and that’s what we want for each and every one of our team.

Feel free to use one of our Focus7 Wellbeing ideas and let us know how you get on.