The mental wellbeing of the employees in your office should be far from merely a cursory consideration. Research has shown that there are various facets of a healthy workplace – including the employees’ work-life balance, health, safety and opportunities for growth and recognition. Boosting your employee morale makes for a more productive workplace.

Fortunately, today’s employers have probably never had a more in-depth and accurate insight into the factors affecting their workers’ morale. In 2016 and 2017, the mental health charity exhaustively investigated the subject, assessing how numerous organisations looked after workers’ wellbeing.

Ultimately, the research revealed how organisations can create an environment conducive to improved health and wellbeing in their staff. Through adhering to numerous strategies, the companies can demonstrably also improve workers’ job satisfaction and productivity levels.

Here are examples of simple ways in which employers can boost employee morale in an office.

Rejig the office’s layout

The mood into which your recruits fall as they first walk into your office could be the shape of things to come as far as their workplace wellbeing is concerned. That’s because even the physical design of a building has been revealed to influence the mental health and happiness of people who use it.

Nonetheless, the precise effects are not always clear-cut due to a big lack of research on the subject. A great bulk of research has been limited to highly traditional office environments and focused primarily on measuring productivity rather than mental health, one of its underlying influences.

While we continue to await specific ideas of how architectural concerns can feed into employee morale ideas, you could still expect some benefit from tinkering with your office’s layout. Even just repositioning a few desks could work well, especially if those desks are moved closer to windows…

Increase employees’ exposure to natural sunlight

In 2017, Soma Analytics conducted a study – the Mind Wellbeing Index – looking into FTSE 100 companies’ practices affecting employee engagement and wellbeing. More than three-quarters of the organisations under study reported staff receiving exposure to natural daylight.

This is a positive sign, as it can spur employee wellbeing. However, as workers at nearly a quarter of the studied organisations lack workplace access to an outside green space, it appears that these people could be unnecessarily hindered in their brain function and productivity.

Insufficient lighting has been shown to adversely affect workers in these ways. Several other conditions – including headaches, tiredness and eye strain – have also been attributed to poor lighting. Failing to prevent these conditions risks inducing anxiety and depression in your staff.

Keep the workplace clean and hygienic

If the office often looks strangely dark and murky during working hours, the windows might be part of the problem. After all, as the glass of those windows accumulates dirt, this situation could affect the amount of natural light that gets through to your personnel.

Fortunately, we can remove dirt from those windows – both internally and externally – through our provision of cleaning services. Our fully trained team is also capable of ensuring a clean work environment in many other respects, such as by treating your floor – even if it is carpeted.

Another incentive to preserve cleanliness of a high standard in the office is that, otherwise, illnesses could spread. The resulting probable effects on employee morale would be obvious – and don’t forget to extend a diligent cleaning regime to the office toilets.

Add an on-site pantry service and gym

Another part of the office which should obviously be kept hygienic for the sake of your employees is the on-site pantry… if, of course, your office has one. If your business occupies a co-working or managed office space, you could benefit from introducing a pantry service there.

This service would, after all, ease employee habits of snacking healthily during lunch breaks rather than heading outside to roadside shops, where the stocked food could be disconcertingly unhealthy.

The ready availability of such food could be especially worrying considering the lengthy periods of time during which your staff might continuously sit. Such sedate behaviour risks increased instances of obesity, cancer, obesity and cardiovascular diseases which an office gym could help to prevent.

Inject your office with the right kind of colour

Neurological and psychological research has indicated how colour can affect our brains and hormones – and, consequently, our mood and behaviour. According to colour psychology, surrounding ourselves with green can improve our mood and very effectively bust stress.

That’s a very good reason to add plants to the workplace decor and so help in keeping stress triggers at bay. Windows allowing broad views of nature can also calm your employees – and remember that we have the expertise to keep your commercial premises’ garden area looking nice in itself. We can mow the lawn, clear weeds, leaves and litter and do much more besides.