Industry Research Summary: The State of Employee Health and Well-being 2021

Boost employee well-being in an age of uncertainty

The Covid-19 pandemic has had a dramatic impact on work over the last year, with most HR professionals agreeing that it has significantly reduced employee well-being. Although this period has included some major shifts in how organizations address employee well-being, it has also helped justify approaches that were established well before the pandemic and that will continue after it is over.

Today, the concept of well-being encompasses not only physical and mental well-being but also social, financial and environmental well-being. Employee wellness programs have been expanded to reflect this more holistic idea of well-being. Employee well-being is increasingly linked with employee experience, which is another more expansive concept that has grown more important in recent years.

To help gain a deeper understanding of the impact on the current state of employee well-being and how organizations have tried to influence and safeguard well-being in recent times, HR.com conducted a survey-based research study. Here are highlights from the survey:  

Key Findings

• Programs related to workplace well-being are common, with a majority of HR professionals saying their organization strives to enhance at last one type of employee well-being through a specific initiative.
• Many take a wide-ranging view of well-being. 
• Covid-19 had an undeniable impact on the workplace, with a majority of HR professionals saying the pandemic has significantly reduced the overall well-being of their workforce.
• Mental health has become a top priority for many organizations. 
• Stress remains a serious hindrance to workforce well-being. 

The Pandemic’s Impact on Well-being

There can be no doubt that the Covid-19 pandemic has been a defining moment for today’s businesses, especially in hard hit nations such as the United States. As this report goes to press, the U.S. has endured over 28 million documented cases of Covid-19 and has suffered more than 5010,000 deaths.¹ Globally, there have been more than 110 million cases and over 2,450,000 deaths so far.2

Sixty-four percent of all employers agree that the Covid-19 pandemic significantly reduced the overall well-being of their workforce, with 13% strongly agreeing and 51% agreeing. 
 

Employer Response to the Pandemic

The majority of HR professionals, 84%, believe their organizations have done a good job of safeguarding their employees’ well-being since the coronavirus appeared early in 2020. It is possible there is some bias in these findings since HR professionals themselves are often integral to running the programs designed to keep employees safe, and employees themselves may take a different view. Nonetheless, the findings indicate that HR professionals have been working hard to help keep employees safe and may feel some pride in their accomplishments.

Soon after the pandemic began, infectious disease experts agreed that certain measures could mitigate Covid-19’s spread and enhance the safety of enclosed spaces such as restaurants, warehouses and retail stores. Our survey shows the majority of employers implemented many of these measures.
   

The Effectiveness of Well-being Programs

Among organizations with some kind of well-being program, nearly half (46%) of HR professionals say those initiatives are either highly (31%) or very highly (15%) effective. Roughly half of all businesses see their efforts as moderately effective and only 11% see their efforts as only being effective to a low or very low degree.

Methods for Promoting Physical Well-being and Workplace Safety

A little more than three-quarters (76%) of employers that provide well-being programs offer healthcare benefits, making it by far the most common way that employers promote physical well-being. Of course, there are many other ways of promoting physical well-being, with the next most common ones being providing resource materials (53%), telemedicine/virtual healthcare (51%), and lifestyle or wellness coaching (48%).

Looking to the Near Future

When we asked HR professionals about which well-being-related initiatives will be utilized over the next two years, the most common answers were “work remotely” (61%) and “offer flexible work schedules” (54%). Nearly half also predicted they would use:
 

• telemedicine/virtual care arrangements
• provide health-related information resources
• monitor workplace wellness/employee satisfaction

We can boil these responses down to greater flexibility, greater access to healthcare services and information, and greater monitoring of employee well-being.
 

¹ The New York Times. (2021, February 9). Coronavirus in the U.S.: latest map and case count. Retrieved from here.
² Johns Hopkins University University of Medicine (2021, February 9). Coronavirus Resource Center. Retrieved from https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html