Summer is finally here and everyone is feeling the heat. Don’t sweat it! (pun intended) Taking breaks is essential and finding the right emotional and physical balance whilst working is important.
We’re all about helping employees adopt and maintain healthy behaviors, which nowadays seems to be at the core of every employee wellness program. Healthy behavior starts with education and awareness.
We’re so excited about this topic right now especially because of the rising heat, so we did some research which gave us some very interesting insight, for example: optimal health and wellness is achieved when we align our environment, body and spirit as one. On top of all that, Science clearly shows that being more physically active has many benefits to the heart, brain and overall well-being. So, Take advantage of all your opportunities to sit less and move more, especially whilst at work, but not exclusively, you can do some stretching whilst watching TV or in front of your laptop catching up on your favorite Netflix series, or even when scrolling through the hours of TikTok.. move around, wiggle, wiggle. Every minute you move adds up, so make it count!
It's crazy to imagine that back in the day everyone would constantly be staring out the window at beautiful sunny days and longing to head outside, whereas nowadays, all we do is fight with each other to adjust the temp on the A/C. However, that’s not uncommon, as after some research, we learnt that only 28 percent of office workers take breaks away from their desk — an unfortunate statistic, especially during the summer! We tested taking short breaks of even just 15-20 minutes which proved to help us sustain concentration and energy levels throughout the day — whereas on the days that we didn’t take breaks, it reduced our productivity and creativity. Besides, who doesn’t love a break every now and then?!
ACTIVITIES FOR A HEALTHY SUMMER
The Summer season is a great time to encourage healthy eating, outdoor activity, and take wellness up a notch. The days are longer, so take advantage of the warmer weather and go outdoors!
Here are some tips that we are going to try out this summer:
Once a week we will swap conference room meetings by taking a stroll outside with a walking meeting
Eat team lunches outside the office once a week
We are encouraging everyone in the team to take two 15-minute walking breaks whenever and wherever possible
We are going to start using shared standing desks just to shake things up a bit and give our spine a break
The goal is to get active and feel good about it. We’re going to get out of our comfort zone and make it a habit to take the stairs instead of the elevator, for at least a floor or two.
Once it gets easier, we’ll add another floor. We are going to schedule physical activity breaks and reminders on our work calendar — Making sure to treat these like any other important meeting.
And to our fellow employers, If you notice that your employees are feeling tired or fatigued at work during the summer months, which is not uncommon and which by the way could substantially reduce productivity levels. We highly recommend following our steps and implementing as well as maintaining a health and wellness program, which would certainly lead to higher satisfaction, retention and happiness rates.
FRESH AND NUTRITIONAL
Now let’s talk food! Who doesn’t love a slice of watermelon or a nice cold drink of refreshing lemonade during the summer heat? Summer is the best season to intake a variety of fresh fruits and veggies. Enjoy refreshing healthy meals and simultaneously boost your productivity, energy and immune system. Consume necessary vitamins, you can't escape the sun so that covers Vitamin D, and since you can't escape the sun, here comes Vitamin A to prevent your skin from being damaged by the sun. You can also have some Vitamin C to enjoy healthy skin, bones and joints especially if you are out in the sun for an active summer. Sounds like a no brainer to us at Sensate.
Some ways that we have incorporated healthy food at work:
We are adding fresh fruit, juices and veggies in the office kitchen and break rooms
We negotiated with our local markets to get employee discounts on organic produce
We are super excited to be hosting a healthy potluck, every employee is going to bring in their favourite summer dish an we’ll be sure to let you know which dish was a MUST TRY
Ultimately the activities as well as the nutritional diet work together hand in hand to benefit you for a healthier lifestyle with higher results of productivity and energy. So far we’re loving it. Make sure to read our next newsletter to find out if we have survived this experiment.
Written by Aakash Jaggi & Ben Safra