Workplace wellness is at the forefront of many companies around the world. The benefits to implementing wellbeing strategies have been highlighted in a plethora of examples over the last couple of years.
However, whilst creating awareness of the results is crucial, companies have to not only talk the talk but walk the walk. Here’s a few pointers to get your ball rolling.
Rethink what’s working.
The big corporates aren’t the only ones that should jump at the opportunity to have a gym or wellness studio and look after their employees.
Whilst it may seem that space is more limited in many SME offices, an expertly designed layout will enable effective use of unused and wasted floor space.
Ask yourself the hard but needed questions in order to maximise the opportunity your floor plan offers. How often is that space that’s dedicated to the table tennis, pool table or office bar actually used? Do you use that boardroom or have your Town Hall meetings migrated to the breakout zone?
Whilst there are always good intentions and benefits to amenities such as these, the novelty can soon where off and they quickly become a ‘vanity metric’ or an unused ‘status symbol’.
Physical exercise is habitual and engrained into many of our employees lifestyles.
So, it makes sense that your team have a functional, considered space that compliments their lifestyle before during or after work which will ultimately aid in their performance.
Credit: Technogym
Kitting out the space.
Whilst we love an aesthetically pleasing studio, form always needs to follow function.
The type of equipment that will be needed in your workplace gym will always be determined by who is using it. Start by asking your team simple but effective questions such as;
What type of training do you do? What type of exercise do you enjoy the most? What main pieces of equipment could we have here that is lacking in your current gym that you are using? Do you prefer exercising alone or with a partner/group?
The underpinning motivator of these questions is to understand how you could create a gym that your team truly enjoys using that will continue to provide value throughout their career. The answers to the above questions will significantly help provide more insight into how to kit out the space effectively. Don’t just cram the space with cheap equipment that won’t be used.
Credit: Love That Design
Making it yours, makes it theirs.
Last year, Gympass published a report where they stated that ‘IPSOS found thar 70% of consumers across 25 markets reported they tend to spend money with brands whose values reflect their own’. Where people spend their money and where people earn it may come down to this very thing.
People truly excel in a company when they resonate with the values, culture and what the company stands for. Truly high-performing employees are created when their work is an extension of them and their personality. If the environment of your workplace gym and wellness studio can harness this through how it looks, makes them feel and inspires them then well… you’ll thank us later.
The only real problem you’ll then have is getting them to leave the office!
