Employee Appreciation: Wellness-ing Beats Perking & Gitfing Any Day
In 2020, Employee Appreciation Day in the US is observed on Friday, March 6. This unofficial holiday aims to bolster the employer-employee bond with gratitude and appreciation at the helm.
A quick look at the literature, scientific and not, reveals why perks and well-meaning gifts-from-the-past are no longer cutting it. From the combative, yet genuinely revealing stance —“We all like to receive a thank-you, and likely won’t turn down free cakes, boxes of chocolates, or an early-finish. However, ‘moments’ like these do nothing to improve employment conditions. They are often nothing more than hollow gestures, designed to show the outside world how great an employer is rather than demonstrate true appreciation.”— to the common-sense follow-up —“Very rarely will you hear someone say “I left my company because they didn’t give me free gym memberships”, “not enough paid sick days” or “we didn’t have enough free meals”. While these are great to have, they should be the icing on the cake instead of key reasons for employees to stay.”
This last assertion ties up with the issue of company culture, employee appreciation as revealing a component as training or agency. Reduced employee engagement, or active disengagement, comes at a high price, costing anywhere from $450 to $550 billion per year. Sense of belonging, purpose, a healthy and engaging corporate culture… are cornerstones of talent retention and nurture.
A whooping 95% of company actors consider corporate wellness a key factor. The 2020 State of Corporate Wellness Report is delivered top scores for Increased Awareness for Personal Health (76 percent), Promoting Productivity(73 percent), and Enhanced Culture (68 percent), providing a holistic wheel of interdependent factors for employee and company success.
At De Natura® Wellness, we believe that investing in individual employee health with carefully selected wellness programs and incentives actually catapult job performance and productivity. Heck, in the long run, it actually saves you both time and money through talent retention, while integrally benefitting wellbeing!
This is our wellness gift shortlist, hoping that this initial token of appreciation convinces you of the convenience of a year-long fixture.
Massage Therapy
Clinically proven to reduce the “stress hormone” cortisol by 30%, increase “happy hormones” serotonin and dopamine by 28% and 30% respectively.
A 1.5-hour massage, such as Thai, for outstanding staff. 2 hours for gold-medal employees.
Fitness: HiiT, Zumba, Body rolling…
Move, breathe, tone, help weight loss, increase coordination, destress, build team spirit and have a laugh are all proven benefits.
1 collective Class: 10 participants / 50 minutes.
Yoga
A Chair Yoga & Stretching solo session uses chairs as props to lengthen tissue, breathe deeply, and elicit relaxationresponse in the nervous system. Very useful in-house, allowing you to keep professional demeanor and attire. The group Mat Yoga class combats bad posture through guided breathing, movement, and visualization.
Acupuncture
From a boardroom acupuncture session, to the wonders of auriculotherapy ear seeds, to applied B-12 and Lipotropic injections… our range of services is perfect to get creative and specific.
Weight Challenge
Curated 6-activity weight wellness event with end-of-day prize.
- 7-Value weigh-in and volume measurements
- Dietary Guidelines
- Healthy Recipes
- Lipotropic Injections for fat metabolization
- Auriculo-therapy for appetite
- Ear Seeds for anxiety and appetite
*** All activities feature in our Signature Wellness Programming, often sought out by our clients as the perfect monthly program to track mid-to-long-term results and complement our a stand-alone Wellness Day.
Sources:
https://www.paycom.com/media/resources-content/whitepaper/Discover_What_Employees_Want.pdf
https://b2b.kununu.com/blog/employee-retention-strategies-start-with-company-culture
https://www.gallup.com/workplace/237368/culture-wins-attracting-top-candidates.aspx
https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-perks-no-longer-cut-it-for-workers-1543846157?mod=e2fb
https://workplaceinsight.net/national-employee-appreciation-day-what-a-joke/