With your deskless employees on the move, they are often the last to reap benefits that are often readily accessible to your other team members. From wellness programs to training courses, it may require some flexibility and creativity to get your workplace initiatives in front of your deskless team members. Failure to do so can lead to low levels of engagement, high turnover rates and decreased levels of employee satisfaction.
In fact, a recent Gallup poll shows that less than 50% of US employees believe their employers are interested in their well-being at all.
Here are some tips for laying that statistic to rest and helping your deskless employees get more out of your employee wellness programs.
What are the benefits of implementing a workplace wellness program?
Wellness doesn’t only refer to your employees' mental and physical health. It also applies to their financial, social and workplace well-being. When each need is taken care of, they’re more likely to feel at their best and produce their best work, and that’s just the beginning.
Improved employee morale and retention
If you want content employees who’ll stay with your business, you’ll need to embed wellness initiatives into the fabric of your workplace culture. A wellness program should equip them with the tools, resources and support they need to feel their best. Employees are more likely to engage and remain loyal to your business when they do.
Consider building some or all of the following wellness initiatives to improve employee morale:
- Offer a gym or local health club membership they can use during their lunch break or after hours.
- Reimbursement or vouchers for wellness and group exercise classes.
- Access to mindfulness tips to reduce stress.
Reduced stress levels
Consider the role of each of your deskless employees. Are they medical staff on the front lines of life-saving emergencies? Or are they servers who are trying to keep your customers satisfied so they return again and again? Stress has many faces, and your deskless employees all experience their fair share. Case in point, 88% of deskless workers say they battle stress daily, according to QSR Magazine.
You can reduce stress levels by creating a customized employee wellness program tailored to their unique needs. Regardless of your industry or sector, consider the following simple yet effective stress-reducing measures:
- Encourage deskless employees to take regular breaks.
- Practice open communication.
- Seek their feedback about what they might need or what you could do to reduce their stress levels.
- Ensure their workload mirrors their responsibilities (and doesn’t exceed them).
Lower rates of absenteeism
Absenteeism means more than just calling out sick or missing a few work days. It can also refer to tardy employees, employees who leave early or even those who check out mentally during their shifts. It’s also a clear sign of disengagement.
According to a recent study, one of the top benefits of a workplace wellness program is that it can reduce your absenteeism rate by over 25%. The key is to provide access to resources that address some of the root causes of absenteeism.
Take a look at some of the most common types of resources you can incorporate into your wellness program:
- Offer advice on healthy living and nutrition.
- Commit to regular employee recognition and rewards.
- Create time for team-building activities to instill community and accountability.
Getting your non-desked employees to participate in wellness initiatives
You can invest in every popular wellness initiative on the market, but that doesn’t mean your deskless employees will take advantage of them. A significant aspect of meeting your employees’ wellness needs is providing access to resources in a way that works for them. Because of their on-the-go workstyle, they don’t have the time or capacity to review long emails or lengthy wellness pamphlets.
UPshow SHIFT is a digital signage solution and employee engagement platform designed to bring your deskless employees the tools and resources they need to perform at their peak.
Providing information in consumable chunks
Your deskless employees don’t spend eight hours at a desk or a chunk of their day answering emails. How you present your wellness initiatives is as vital as what you’ve included in them. For your deskless workforce, that means making the information accessible and easily digestible while they’re on the move.
With UPshow’s in-app Canva integration, you can use industry-relevant templates to create catchy announcements and display resources with royalty-free photos, videos and audio that will grab their attention.
You can also take advantage of the fixed panel and multipanel displays to keep essential updates, such as training announcements, on your screens for as long as necessary while also changing the content on other parts of your screens (on a screen-by-screen basis) as you see fit.
Make information available on the go
Since deskless workers are on the move, they may not have time to review and reflect on the wellness information you’ve made available on your displays.
By using UPshow’s QR Code campaign creator, you can create a QR code that links to a resource right from an employee’s mobile device. By posting the QR code on the screen, they can scan it with their devices, making wellness content and other resources accessible whenever and wherever they want to read them.
Incentivize, celebrate and track success
While logging in thousands of steps each week or consuming the recommended water intake are admirable outcomes, only some employees will reach the wellness goals they set.
And that’s more than okay.
When employees dedicate themselves to a wellness program, their commitment is worth celebrating. And if they hit their goals, that’s just a bonus. You can use UPshow’s insights and real-time analytics to track their participation and success by:
- Monitoring QR-code and mobile engagement so that you can acknowledge their task or training completion.
- Offering an incentive for employees to download and use your wellness app.
- Celebrating and rewarding both setting and achieving individual and collective goals.
- Encouraging employee feedback so that you can continue optimizing your wellness program offerings.
Make wellness a priority for your deskless workers
Your employees’ wellness doesn’t begin or end the second they punch in or out. Maintaining their well-being takes continuous effort with all hands on deck. Opt for an employee wellness program that can address their needs in a way that works for them.
With UPshow SHIFT, you’ll deliver the wellness content they need on your screens. With the help of QR code technology, communicating with your deskless employees and making wellness and other resources available has never been more convenient.
Sign-up for a risk-free demo and discover how easy it is to prioritize and commit to the health and well-being of your deskless workforce.
