68 HEALTH AND WELLBEING
DOING THE RIGHT THING
The important role health and wellbeing can play in retention and recruitment is now widely recognised across business and industry. Companies and organisations across Lancashire are working hard to cultivate a happy workforce and create an open culture. Our panel shared their approaches to supporting their workers’ wellbeing and promoting a healthy environment.
Steve Brennan is co-founder and chief executive of digital agency Bespoke
Health and wellbeing have always been a strategic priority but it’s only in the
last four or five years that I feel like we have understood it.
We’ve always been a business that has tried to do the right thing. The lockdowns were a motivator for a deep dive into this.
You could see everyone on a Zoom screen in their squares. I looked and thought that these are actually individuals with different backgrounds and stories.
We tried to do what we thought were the right things for everybody but once we realised that we looked at it differently. This is a set of people rather than a set of employees.
We all go into the office on Tuesdays and Thursdays and it’s joyful to see each other. We all have lunch together as a group.
It’s time to catch up and have a natter, there’s no hierarchy at that lunch. When you have that level playing field you can speak about what the issues are.
Emma Garner is strategic lead at Shelter Lancashire
We help around 15,000 people every year with complex needs, drug and
alcohol issues, poor mental health.
Four or five years ago we started looking at staff health and wellbeing. They’re helping so many people and we needed to look after them.
We started doing different things, simple things like a birthday club where you put in a pound and get a card and present. We organised lunches with each other so we could chat and ‘exercise at your desk’ sessions to help people look after themselves.
DJ Fridays started in lockdown where people could pick music. What came out of that was people sharing as they picked songs based on something relevant to them.
We then created wellbeing champions to talk to staff and come up with different ideas. We’ve implemented a whole list of things. Having good training and good learning pathways are also important.
Kate Quinn is executive director of people and culture at East Lancashire Hospital Trust
Years ago, it was always ‘staff welfare’ as opposed
to HR. Then we moved into driving productivity and performance-managing people. We’ve now gone full circle.
Whether it is having lunch together or creating opportunities for people with health issues affecting their ability to work, we recognise we have to meet these needs.
We have a raft of interventions. We have a staff gym, we have a ‘well team’ as part of our occupational health service. They go out and engage in conversations with people, directing them to the right support.
Over the past two and a half years Covid has had a massive impact on staff. We have focused on mental health, financial wellbeing and physical health and wellbeing.
Coming out of Covid there is a need for us to really encourage people to look after each other.
We have to accept some of our staff are going to be affected by poor health determinants
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