Many aspects of modern working environments can be stressful.
As such, offering opportunities to de-stress in the workplace, ranging from corporate yoga classes to mental health days, is becoming increasingly popular as companies focus more on supporting employee mental health and wellness. Mindfulness carries a lot of weight when it comes to encouraging greater employee productivity, preventing burnout and creating a higher quality work product.
Not all mindfulness methods and corporate mental health offerings are created equal. Knowing what your employees need to maintain healthy mental states and a certain level of workplace mindfulness can be difficult. To help, we asked 11 members of Forbes Human Resources Council to share their best recommendations for incorporating mindfulness training or other health initiatives into the workplace.
Forbes Human Resources Council experts share their best advice for integrating mindfulness training into the workplace.
1. Start Where You Are
You don’t have to go from offering anything to offering some elaborate mindfulness program. Start small by partnering with a wellness company. Then, plan for the next few years and how you can incorporate more initiatives such as flexible schedules, increased or unlimited PTO, sabbaticals or robust stress management programs. – Lotus Buckner, NCH
2. Incentivise It
My best recommendation for implementing mindfulness initiatives into the workplace is by incentivizing them. To gain employee buy-in for the program, employers can offer idea bonuses or other non-monetary suggestion initiatives to generate buzz and engagement across the workforce. From there, companies should continue to incentivize participation via specific behaviours or desired program outcomes. – Dr Timothy J. Giardino, Cantata Health & Meta Healthcare IT Solutions
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3. Understand Your Culture
The best recommendation for incorporating mindfulness training and/or initiatives into the workplace is to first understand the culture of your organisation. Leaders of the organization need to model the behaviours for health and wellness initiatives for adoption with employees. Mindfulness training needs constant practice, sharing and modelling. Also, consider health and wellness ambassadors. – Sherry Martin, OmniTRAXGet
4. Employee Buy-In Before Implementation
While mindfulness training can be useful in improving employee focus and relieving stress, a mindfulness training program is useless if employees don’t take advantage of it. Companies should gauge employee interest through an email survey to determine what kind of training or initiatives employees would take advantage of before implementing a program that may or may not succeed. – John Feldmann, Insperity
5. Make Mindfulness Its Own Category
Most companies offer a wellness program for employees. Employees may think of wellness as only healthy eating and exercise. Incorporating mindfulness into the overall wellness program can be an excellent way for employees to focus on this area. Encouraging employees to volunteer in the community, practice gratitude, read books, reduce stress or practice yoga and meditation can all be part of this movement. – Debi Bliazis, Champions School of Real Estate
6. Schedule In Time
It’s crucial that leadership support mindfulness and make it a priority. Give mindfulness a proper introduction by having a speaker or role model onsite to explain its advantages with demonstrative training. Schedule a weekly time for practising mindfulness and meditation at work together or alone. Agree on rules: What is the intention, what’s expected from mindfulness, when is it OK to meditate? – Anne Iversen, TimeXtender
7. Foster A Culture Of Purpose-Driven Work
Mindfulness creates a positive, in‑the‑moment work environment that enables employees to develop their own purpose, always being aware of how their role affects others. By fostering a culture of purpose‑driven work, managers can use mindfulness to help their teams set department and individual goals that can increase productivity. When goals are achieved, celebrate them, then create new ones. – Genine Wilson, Kelly Services
8. Offer Experiential Management Training
If you want to maximize the benefits of mindfulness to improve employee retention and your bottom line, you need to have experiential management training that simulates real situations and utilize mindfulness tools to address those situations. If people physically interact with mindfulness and emotionally experience the outcomes, they are more likely to retain and deploy the practices. – Jeff Buenrostro, Metric Theory
9. Use Research To Support Your Offerings
There will always be sceptics. When you offer programs such as yoga, meditation, mindfulness or even emotional intelligence, share the research to support your offerings. Help employees and leaders understand the potential benefits and become champions of your programs. – Michele Markey, SkillPath
10. Start With Meditation Techniques
The main practice of mindfulness is how to be in the present, which can be learned through meditation. Your organization can practice mindfulness through meditation techniques during team building sessions. Individuals should focus on the now and not be consumed by their thoughts. The results will reduce stress and boost productivity in your organization. – Tiffany Jensen, Pure Grips
11. Create Multiple Programs To Choose From
Some employees would want to do yoga, while some would want to play tennis. Others might want to work on their stress levels and apply ideas that will help them away from work as well. Look at different speakers who can come and inspire your team. Have them come multiple times to work one on one with a few members who need it. This is taking wellness to the next level by offering a coach. – Abhijeet Narvekar, The FerVID Group
From: Forbes
