Simon Kent asks HR professionals what they would prioritise for the wellness of their workforce.
As the New Year gets underway there are many who will be making resolutions in the hope of a better life. Better health, physically and mentally, a better financial situation and even a better social life.
Each of these pillars of wellbeing can be strongly influenced by employers. But given the current stresses and challenges faced by many employees, together with the challenges that face organisations (there maybe some signs of green shoots, but markets remain challenging and uncertain) HR can find itself with some difficult choices. With the budget that it does have, where is expenditure best used to have maximum impact on the wellbeing of everyone?
According to The State of Financial Wellbeing 2025 report, published by Stream (formally Wagestream) and behavioural scientists CogCo, the financial wellbeing of people across the UK declined for the first time last year. The FinWell Index, which informs the annual report, tracks the state of the nation’s financial wellbeing and unpacks the role employers play in that experience. This year, that index has fallen, revealing the growing financial pressure on households and widening inequalities across gender and age.
The implications for employers cannot be avoided – as Peter Briffett, CEO and co-founder of Stream, pointes out: “When people are financially secure, they’re less stressed, more engaged, and more productive – outcomes that benefit both employees and employers.”
Tom Pearson, Director of People at fintech company Twenty7tec certainly thinks the financial side of things will play an important part in employee satisfaction this year: “When an employee is under financial strain, it creates a burden that leads to stress, impacts physical health through poor sleep or nutrition, and impacts social interaction,” he says. Unfortunately, as he notes, employers are not in a position to simply make more cash available. The stress of the cost of living must be set against new costs from meeting the National Minimum Wage and new legislation – he cites flexible working changes and the new preventative duty for worker protection as examples.
“These changes are positive and necessary,” he says, “but they require investment in administration, training, and infrastructure.”
Pearson recommends making sure any financial support comes with added value: “This means utilising salary sacrifice schemes – like pension, cycle-to-work, or EV schemes – which provide savings for employees at little to no cost to the business,” he says. “In addition, we must provide high-quality financial education to help employees navigate the current economy and manage their existing income more effectively.”
Pearson is essentially making sure employees appreciate and maximise the value of what they already have.
This attitude can be applied to other areas of employee provision. Brad Batesole, Founding Partner at Madecraft notes that learning and development provision can deliver significant positive impacts on many different areas of an employee’s life: “When budgets are squeezed, everyone’s looking for the biggest impact,” he says. “L&D is the one investment that amplifies all wellbeing initiatives and has the potential to make your workforce more engaged and more productive.”
Nothing damages confidence like feeling stuck or left behind.
Batesole gives the example of physical wellbeing: “When employees can access bite-sized learning during their usual workday instead of staying late for training sessions or to catch up on work, you immediately reduce stress and burnout.
The mental health benefits don’t stop there: “Nothing damages confidence like feeling stuck or left behind,” says Batesole, “but personalised learning that adapts to individual pace shows employees a clear growth path whilst nurturing the softer skills that protect against workplace stress and disengagement.”
Learning can even impact on the social side of life: “When people learn together, they connect through natural opportunities for collaboration and relationship building that extend far beyond training sessions,” he adds.
The biggest drag on productivity isn’t people being off sick, it’s people turning up for work but running on empty.
Taking a holistic view on wellbeing leads HR to consider the employee experience and how this can be improved and supported generally, rather than simply looking for specific hits in any single area. And according to Katie Winstanley – HR Director, Morson Group this can address issues such as absenteeism as well: “In reality, the biggest drag on productivity isn’t people being off sick, it’s people turning up for work but running on empty,” she says. “Burnout, constant pressure, decision fatigue and low-level anxiety quietly erode performance long before absence shows up in the data. When people are mentally stretched, gym memberships don’t get used, financial benefits get ignored, and social initiatives feel like window dressing because people just don’t have the bandwidth to take part. And if people don’t have mental headroom, nothing else really works.”
For this reason Winstanley says that with strictly limited resources she wouldn’t spend out on perks or bolt-on support that are only relevant if someone is struggling, but would put it into doing the basics right: sensible workload design, managers who can lead rather than just manage, setting clear expectations, trying to create psychological safety, and allowing flexibility where it genuinely helps people perform. “These are not expensive interventions,” she says, “but they make a disproportionate difference to engagement, resilience and output. They are considered ‘the basics’ but not everyone does the basics well.”
In uncertain and challenging times people need clarity, trust, and good leadership.
Karen Rider, Head of People at ICS-digital agrees that the priority should lie in creating better working processes for employees. This impacts on the all round experience of the worker, rather than providing something that just off-sets the difficulties: “In uncertain and challenging times people need clarity, trust, and good leadership,” she says. “If you get that right, the rest should follow. For these reasons I’d prioritise manager capability and continuing to build an inclusive culture, over any other single or specific wellbeing initiative or spend.”
This is not to suggest that initiatives which address physical, mental, financial and social wellbeing are not important – but, as Rider suggests, the biggest determinant of employee engagement, productivity and wellbeing remains the quality of their day-to-day experience at work and that is something which is shaped most by their line manager.
“Prioritising continued investment in the ongoing coaching and development of people managers – equipping them to have good conversations, set clear expectations, give feedback and recognition, manage workload and performance fairly and create an environment of trust and psychological safety – should all form the foundation of where limited wellbeing investment is focused, as it delivers the greatest and most sustainable impact on both performance and the employee experience,” Rider concludes.
There is no doubt that delivering initiatives which help employees with their financial, physical, mental and social wellbeing is crucial for a workforce to feel appreciated and supported. Moreover, enabling employees to select support from each of these areas as and when they require it can return dividends as the recipients experience greater value around things that have a direct impact on them. But at the end of the day, HR must ensure the background experience of the employee is a positive one from the start if they are to have a firm foundation on which to build great working lives.
