Corporate brochure 1 Jan 2014 | Page 2

2 | Employee Wellbeing

Employee Wellbeing | 3

Employee Wellbeing:
An Essential Building Block for a High Performing Workforce
By Dan Henry Sr, Chief HR Officer, Bright Horizons, and
Lucy English, PhD, Senior Consultant, Horizons Workforce Consulting

Support a child’s
university
education

Get
exercise

Enabling Top Performances
Employers often ask, “What can we do to differentiate
and propel our organisation?” The reality is, the most
valuable and potential-rich resource is already on the
organisation’s payroll.
Employees are undoubtedly an organisation’s greatest
resource for growth. They are the pivotal factor
in whether an organisation’s initiatives succeed.
Progressive employers seeking a sustainable,
competitive advantage will find it not just in the
products and services they offer, but in the abilities of
the people who are delivering and supporting them.
The workforce, then, is the most critical reserve.

Cultivating this performance-driven environment
through employee wellbeing is in an employer’s
best interest. Doing so requires purposeful efforts.
Wellbeing thrives in supportive organisations
that recognise employees have priorities and
responsibilities both in and outside of the workplace.
Organisations have environments that are established
not by chance but by design. They are the result of
an organisation and leadership having a willingness
to look inward at the workforce, beyond traditional
surveys, to understand precisely what is challenging
their individual employee population, and then to
respond with targeted and relevant support strategies.

The key is to leverage its full potential.
Current research by Horizons Workforce Consulting
(HWC) illustrates that employee wellbeing
exponentially multiplies workforce potential. People
with high levels of wellbeing have a profound impact
on the success of their employers. They are energised,
perform at their peak, and, as a result, drive their
organisations forward. In addition to delivering top
performances, these employees possess optimism and
creativity — as well as the crucial quality of resilience
— that allows their productivity to be sustainable
even in the face of the inevitable disruptions that
occur either at work or outside of work.

Find
childcare

Save for
retirement

For employers willing to engage in such introspection
and action, the results can be transformative. The
net effect will be employees with high levels of
wellbeing and, as a result, the desire, the drive, and
the ability to consistently and sustainably deliver and
contribute to the organisation’s success.

Pay bills

Complete an
unfinished
qualification

What is Wellbeing?
Wellbeing refers to the sum total of things that make people feel grounded and capable of successfully
managing life; the elements that together make them feel fully capable of putting in their best performances.
Often mistakenly equated with the more narrowly oriented “wellness” (which refers only to physical factors),
wellbeing looks at people in a more holistic way.
It takes into account an individual’s disposition in all areas, from family to community to work to financial,
as well as physical and mental health. Depending on the particular pressure points of the employee, factors
affecting wellbeing might include caring for an elderly parent, saving for retirement, paying bills, supporting a
child’s university education, exercising, losing weight, career direction, getting those last credits to complete an
unfinished qualification, or having the time to be active in one’s community.

©2012, Bright Horizons Family Solutions LLC. All Rights Reserved.