There’s doughnut, there’s waffle, there’s apple, there’s a horde of free snacks in your office pantry. But what else do you do in terms of employee health?
Yes, free snacks is not only solution to promoting employee happiness and health!
Unfortunately, employee health is one of the most critical yet ignored aspects that many businesses fail to realise. Small things that matter are mostly overlooked that contribute in degrading the health of employees.
There are various tell-tale signs, which are usually not discussed openly, as they are often deemed as least important by the management.
Is your staff sick and tired of being sick and tired at work? If yes, then it’s high time to review your office environment and get things in order. Below mentioned are few pointers that the management should not overlook:
1. Unhygienic pantry: Every office has a pantry or at least a corner that boasts of a coffee machine, fridge and oven. Many companies do not have bigger pantries due to space constraints however, if a large company has a small pantry, this is where the problems begin. To start with, the pantry is cleaned mostly once or twice in a day due to the frequent visits of employees. Confined space and lack of regular cleaning leads to infestation hence, putting the lives of employees in danger. Make sure that the pantry area is spacious to house the employees and is cleaned regularly.
2. Smaller or congested working space: Often, smaller working spaces are the reason behind deteriorating employee health. Despite of this, we find offices not investing in bigger spaces, cramping more seats where only few can sit not providing good chairs and not providing separate washrooms. Here, the HR should first conduct a survey to learn about the changes employees want and then proceed to address the ones that are harmful to employee health. It would be great if you could also read online about good office structures and spaces, so that you can convince your management to change the infrastructure if required.
3. Bad chairs: An employee sits in office for straight 9 to 10 hours with limited breaks and what makes matter worse for the health is the chair. Many of us do not know that specific way to sit or the definition of a good chair and this is what causes discomfort and extreme health hazards such as backache, eyestrain and migraines. A good chair is supposed to support the spine and make sure that the person sitting on it does not slouch much. Here, it is the duty of the HR to conduct workshop on proper sitting postures. There are ergonomic chairs available designed for this specific reason.
4. Regular pest control: Pest control simply doesn’t mean applying some random mosquito repellent in every cubicle, since it goes a lot beyond that. Proper sanitization and pest control methods should be undertaken to make sure that there are no insects and pests lurking around. Employees should also be discouraged to eat food at their place or to preserve eatables at their workstation for a very long time. HR and admin should pay heed to any complaints about infection among employees and get the workplace sanitized regularly.
5. Lack of canteen: As mentioned above, eating at your desk is not advisable, since you would be leaving food crumbs all around, which acts as the breeding ground for harmful bacteria and germs. To make sure this does not happen, the HR can promote the use of canteen for everyone and the canteen management should keep the area clean and sanitized. Another benefit of having a canteen is that employees will walk to it and at least spend some time away from their desks.
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