At Workplace Options (WPO), our philosophy is built on three core tenants: reach, relevance, and results. We are committed to delivering consistent, high-quality, easily accessible, and global services—services that make a meaningful difference in employees’ lives, allowing them to contribute to their organisation’s success more completely and effectively.

Since 1982, our sole focus has been on providing wellbeing services. Today, Workplace Options is the world’s largest independent provider of wellbeing solutions. We serve 116,000 organisations and 70 million employees in over 200 countries and territories worldwide.

Every day we sit around the table with HR leaders, Total Rewards managers, Health & Safety experts and Board members, and, based on shared experience, discuss our vision for the future of work, and the role that wellbeing can and must play in it.

Although health ultimately is the responsibility of the employee, as an employer you can also take on a role by encouraging and facilitating employees about their own health for many reasons. Firstly, because you want to be an employer of choice. Secondly, investing in the wellbeing of your employees has positive effects on your business, like reducing absenteeism and increasing presenteeism, retention and engagement. Furthermore, it helps you to build trust and cooperation and stimulate diversity and inclusion. It allows you to facilitate change and create a psychologically safe environment.

“Health is by definition a holistic story: you cannot separate physical health from mental health.”

 

1. Anyone experiencing burnout?

Burnout is everywhere today. We all know someone who has experienced burnout. Has it become a catch-all term? In addition to the often complex human aspect, which deserves all of our attention, companies also endure the cost of these long-term absences, and their effect on the workplace, which today is exacerbated by the shortage in the labour market. When employees seek help on an individual basis, they do not immediately find the appropriate professional guidance, and they are faced with long wait times, not to mention the cost, which for many is an obstacle.

More and more companies are offering Return-to-Work programmes, mainly through their insurer, so that their employees can return to their active lives in a sustainable manner. We see that our holistic approach pays off, with a supervising team always consisting of at least a psychologist, a physical trainer and a job coach.

Is prevention always better than the cure? Absolutely. That is why burnout prevention is now high on the agenda for many business leaders because a well-considered and conscious approach to wellbeing and proactively addressing mental health is the right path to sustainable work. Prevention is better than cure – and less costly.

2. Mental wellbeing is paving its place in the workplace.

Physical wellbeing, and the importance of exercise and sports had been on the corporate agenda for some time. However, there was still a big taboo when it came to mental health. COVID-19 enabled many organisations to redefine wellbeing and bring mental health out in the open. Organisations made it happen by offering wellbeing programmes to support their employees. In Europe, including Belgium and the Netherlands, we are seeing a real movement of catching up that is causing a change in the discourse around mental health.

In a sustainable human capital strategy, mental health definitely has its place as an important strategic pillar.

3. Companies are looking at training differently

Organisations are realizing that continuous training is essential to give people the opportunity to continue to develop. We are not only talking about training with an immediate link to the job, but also training that provides skills that are useful outside the job. Through various training programmes, we teach, among other things, basic knowledge about mental wellbeing:

• From recognising signals, through practical support for a colleague, to ways of dealing more consciously with your own mental wellbeing.
• There are wellbeing ambassador trajectories and also programmes specifically for managers designed to help them lead in today’s continuously changing environment, with a particular focus on recognising stress and feelings of anxiety in employees and how to appropriately deal with them. Work is done around awareness, intervention strategies and options to increase resilience.

4. Wellbeing is no longer a topic reserved exclusively for HR members. And that is excellent news.

Over the past two years, the pandemic has helped HR members take a more prominent role in many organisations and become strategic stakeholders. Furthermore, the publication of the recent ISO 45003 standard will help to ensure that psychosocial workloads, which are responsible for half of all absenteeism, can now be dealt with in a systematic and structural manner globally, which will ensure greater safety in the workplace.

Additionally, we welcome the ISO 31030 standard, which makes Duty of Care and risk management concrete for organisations with business travellers, expatriates and international students. Mental health is explicitly part of these guidelines. When HSSE and HR join forces as allies, you increase the carrying capacity of any wellness initiative you set up as an organisation, whether it’s creating more awareness, setting up training, or promoting and effectively using an Employee Assistance Programme.

Conclusion

Implementing a holistic wellbeing strategy should not be just another item that needs to be checked off on a busy agenda. Rather, it needs to be a well-considered priority, because its effects impact many crucial areas: prevention, engagement, retention, motivation and an organisation’s bottom line. Caring for your employees is caring for your business. The future of work will be wellbeing. The future of work will be human-centred.