Studies suggest that spending time outdoors can relieve stress and boost feelings of happiness and improve overall wellbeing, so if your workplace is located near a public park or green space, you should consider this a blessing. Such spaces can be used for pre and post work exercise, as well as perhaps lunchtime physical activities providing a simple way to boost employee wellbeing.
If staff are concerned about fitting in a lunchtime workout, make them aware of HIIT exercises sessions which last between 15 and 20 minutes. A business could provide an instructor to help run the sessions, but staff may be happy to form their own exercise groups. It helps if your workplace has shower facilities but if not, a brisk walk at lunch and the intake of fresh air has – like exercise – been proven to increase productivity.
Outdoor meetings and one-to-ones
Additionally use the space for meetings and one to ones. Walking meetings are growing in popularity while a catch up with a colleague on a bench outside can make a refreshing change to a bland meeting room. The different environment may inspire new ideas and more creative thinking, while there’s less likelihood of distractions.
In an era where businesses are searching for marginal gains to improve performance, productivity and efficiency, one cost-effective solution could be just around the corner – your local park!
Convert unused space into exercise areas
If you’re not near a green space or offering money towards physical activities is too costly for your business right now, and you have adequate space to do so, allow staff to use spare rooms for exercise in their break or lunchtimes. With the rising popularity of the aforementioned HIIT workouts and an abundance of smartphone exercise apps and videos available on YouTube, staff only require a small space to exercise – a meeting room can suffice for a handful of staff.
One of our clients ‘converted’ its unused basement storeroom area into an exercise space which staff now use for weekly yoga sessions and workouts! This simple change helped boost employee wellbeing. See here for how we helped them with this.