European-wide studies have shown that overweight and obese employees are far more likely to be absent from work compared to their colleagues in a healthy weight range.
And this is just one piece of the picture.
Poor diet impacts so much more than weight. It can also mean low energy, immunity, and mood, as well as disrupted sleep, and poor concentration. All of which can really hurt employee wellbeing, productivity, and ultimately your business.
So how about creating a culture that breaks unhealthy habits? A culture that tackles skills shortages and boosts productivity. If you’re an employer considering how you can reduce sickness absence, then providing healthy food options and information around staff nutrition is a crucial area that you may be overlooking.
The impact of poor nutrition on workplace productivity
Meet Dave.
Dave is having a bad day.
He got to work on time with every intention of meeting his deadlines, but it’s not even lunchtime, and he’s already feeling sluggish. It doesn’t seem to matter what time Dave goes to bed these days, he always feels like he’s dragging himself through the day.
And his brain is so foggy, he finds it difficult to concentrate on anything long enough to make a dent in his workload.
Not to mention that Dave’s stomach is rumbling and it’s not even 10 am.
So Dave does what he always does at this point. He meanders over to the snack machine to find something to boost his energy and mood.
He stares through the glass and tries to find something vaguely healthy (his partner has been trying to nudge him to lose a bit of weight). He sees nothing but milky chocolates, salty crisps, and those awful sugary drinks pretending to be water.
Dave grabs what he can and goes back to his desk.
By the end of the day, he’s got hardly anything done, and now he feels anxious on top of everything else. The following day, he calls in sick, hoping that maybe some extra rest will help.
The thing is, it won’t help. Not really. Because Dave is missing the root of the problem.
The root cause
On average, UK businesses lose 49.7 working days per year, per employee to sickness (that’s almost one day per week per person). But the important thing to remember is that formal sickness absence only accounts for 6.1 of these days.
The remaining 43.6 lost days are where employees are at work but not being productive. So, while reducing sickness absence is one piece of the puzzle, it’s not enough on its own.
And when we take that overall number, poor diet makes up 14% of the lost time. This is because nutrition impacts everything. Our sleep, our energy levels, our immunity to illness, our cognitive function, our mood, and your bottom line.
So, improving staff nutrition really is a game changer.
How many Daves do you have in your workplace?
I’m going to bet that you have a Dave in your workplace. You very likely have several Daves. (You might even be feeling like Dave yourself, how have you been feeling lately?)
Modern living can be hard. With so many competing demands on our time, our health can easily fall to the bottom of the list. And there’s so much conflicting information out there about nutrition and health. The Mediterranean diet, the keto diet, the 5:2 fasting regime; ingredient lists that look more like the periodic table; and which ones are the so-called “good fats” again?
There’s so much conflicting information out there that it can feel really overwhelming even when we do try to make changes.
The good news is, as an employer, there are things you can do about it.
Let’s dig in, shall we?
Promoting Healthy Eating in the Workplace
1. Providing Healthy Food Options at Work
In your office or work site, do your employees have access to healthy meals and snacks throughout the day?
In the midst of a busy life, how many of us consistently have time to prepare and pack a healthy lunch before coming to work? By making sure your employees can access healthy food in-house, they’re far less likely to nip to the local shop at lunchtime and grab a high fat mayo-laden sandwich and a packet of salty crisps and a sugary chocolate bar.
Make it easy for your employees to make healthy food choices.
If you can go further and subsidise the healthier choices, it’ll pay you back in spades in the long run.
2. Healthy Eating Challenges
Make healthy eating a team-building activity!
This is a wonderful way to foster team spirit and build camaraderie while supporting staff to make healthy choices. Turning healthy staff nutrition into a team-building activity is inclusive and a sure way to boost engagement at work, while contributing to the creation of a healthy social norm.
It’s also more likely to be sustained over time because collective activities mean accountability.
3. Workplace Nutrition Education
Whatever you do, education is a crucial ingredient that should be a part of any employee wellness strategy. Education around staff nutrition will lay a solid foundation and significantly increase the likelihood of sustained change over time.
Sometimes, we want to make healthier choices, but we don’t know where to begin. And with all the misinformation out there about health and nutrition, it’s easy to lose faith before we’ve even started.
That’s why education is so important for informed food choice. When we are informed, ambiguity and overwhelm are reduced, and we clear a path to confidence and sustainable changes.
Add to this that if we’ve seen the evidence to support the benefits of making healthy choices, we are far more likely to keep making them.
As a Registered Dietitian, I can provide interative nutrition workshops for staff, to bring education to your workplace. They cut through the noise and give your employees the information they need to make healthy choices for better health in all areas of their lives.
And the more widely we apply this knowledge, the more the benefits will expand beyond reduced sickness absence.
Think of it this way. Dave might not even realise why he’s so weary and sluggish all the time.
Maybe his colleague, Reena, hasn’t made the link between her poor sleep and the caffeinated, sugary drinks she has in the evenings.
There’s help at hand.
A Registered Dietitian Consultant can work with you to develop a strategy for improving staff nutrition. From designing workplace wellness programmes to implementing nutrition programmes for employees, and delivering workshops. Employees can also benefit from education on healthy food choices via presentations and small group talks.
And the benefits don’t end there.
When your staff see you investing in their health and wellbeing, they’re more likely to feel valued and appreciated. It’ll raise morale while improving the health of your workforce, reducing sickness absence and presenteeism.
Nutrition underpins so much. It significantly impacts both our mental and physical wellbeing by influencing brain function, mood, and behaviour.
If you’re an HR professional, leader, or business owner, and you’d like to review your current wellbeing strategy through the lens of nutrition, I’d love to help.
Contact me here or give me a call.
We can do this together.
