How Wellness Challenges strengthen team collaboration and increase productivity
Wellness Challenges can be a fun way to encourage teamwork but how can we do them?
Have you ever considered rebooting your work teams and, just like your laptop, a refresh to your work system? If you want to keep your business growing and developing, Wellness Programs work like a kick-start to boost your employees’ motivation and collaboration.
Teamwork productivity follows the simple rule of 1+1 = 3 (the rule of synergy): the stronger the collaboration and understanding among the team, the greater the productivity.
Early school education taught us the basic rule for success: “Unity is Strength.” Thus, to ensure maximum productivity and service quality with profitability, you must boost the teamwork of your work team.
Wellness challenges are fun-filled activities that are collaborated in your business’s Corporate Wellness program.
Why should we do Wellness Challenges?
According to the famous psychologist Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, humans long for belonging. Wellness programs can fulfill this basic human desire–as they bring your employees together and help them engage in healthy activities.
You can turn boring meetings and virtual workshops into engaging, fun, joyful, yet productive activities to revitalize your team. As part of your business’s development strategy, these programs/activities will not stress out your employees but rather involve every employee in creating a caring, thoughtful, and happy work environment.
This blog will help you how you can boost your team collaboration with some fun-filled yet innovative and productive activities.
Healthy eating makes a healthy environment
Studies by Grimani et al. (2019) show a significant relationship between healthy eating behaviors and production job performance by employees. Excessive fast food and unhealthy eating behaviors lead to increased weight gain, obesity, mental stress, and other weight-related diseases. This may include Cardiovascular diseases, hypertension, diabetes, or even depression and lethargy.
Suppose you want to cut the expense of productivity loss due to employee poor health, poor performance due to sickness, and absenteeism. In that case, you must read the following activities to promote a healthy work environment.
a) Eat-healthy challenge
You must organize a healthy eating challenge once a week or for the whole month. In this activity, every employee is asked to bring a nutritious lunch from home. Then, at lunchtime, the table will be set with all the lunch meals, and the best healthy meal will get the reward. You could even extend it further by asking them to explain their choices and benefits. Sharing will empower the employee and the education shared will bond the team.
b) Fruit day
Like in our school days, let’s relive that fun. Arrange a fruit day once every week, ask the employees to bring fruits of a specific color and also that day wear clothes of that specific color. For example, for Apple Day, red-colored dresses and fruits will be the challenge. Make it a competition of teams or departments!
c) No Fast-food day
This can also work as a training program to quit fast-food eating habits and to control weight. Challenge avoiding fast food, that means no one will be allowed to eat fast-food on that day, maybe three times every week. The employee winning this challenge for the whole month will win a reward. Set up accountability partners for team building or confidential weigh ins with a winner each month.
A healthy mind nurtures a healthy body
Physical activities and challenges are the most interesting ones, filled with fun and joy. They are healthy competition that enhances a physically active lifestyle.
a) Sports week
Do you still remember the fun-filled sports week at college? It’s still not too late to play sports. Design your office sports teams and organize a sports challenge among them in a sports week or gala. You could arrange one every 3 months or 6 months to encourage self-care and fun work activities.
This will enhance team building, collaboration, coordination, physical health, and mental health of all employees.
b) Gym in the office
Promote a 30-minute exercise daily by designing an office gym. You can also organize classes like aerobics, yoga, or other fitness training classes. The one employee following a good exercise routine will get a good reward. If onsite isn’t an option, offer partial payments to those checking into their local gym with your benefit programs.
c) Fitness contests are Wellness Challenges!
You can boost employee participation in sports teams and exercise programs by organizing a fitness contest among the employees. It will create a healthy competitive environment. Offer a way to help them track progress. Maybe your company could sponsor an employee team for softball or other type of game?
d) Walking meetings
You can arrange one-on-one meetings not in the old boring way but also in a new walking way. If there is a park near your office, you can have a walking meeting in the park, which has a quieter, more refreshing environment than the old meeting room. It will encourage and manifest creativity with the movement as well.
e) Take the stairs challenge
It is an exciting and competitive challenge. Organize a challenge to avoid using elevators or lifts and take the stairs to the office. This can promote healthy behavior, walking patterns, and time management among employees. Integrating this into work breaks to help those sitting behind a computer or desk for long periods will do wonders! Having an alternative such as a walking path for those unable to do stairs can encourage all to participate.
Mental well-being Wellness Challenges
Along with physical health, mental health is of equal importance. Increased work stress can cause mental challenges. These mental issues can lead to decreased productivity and a less friendly or engaged environment among the team members. You can improve the mental health and encourage a cheerful, friendly culture among the employees by implementing the following activities:
a) Select a park and make it your office meeting place
If you have a project or issue to discuss with your employees, you can still have that meeting in a less stressful environment. Arrange an Office-at-park, take your meeting team members to a park or somewhere open near your office, and have a sitting discussion and meeting there.
b) Office games
Stressful work-life? Missing your fun childhood? Let’s relive childhood.
Organize gaming competitions like word-game, scrabble, “guess the Movie”, truth or dare, “Never Have I Ever”, and many other trending competition games. Give each member turns throughout the day with a winner. The token award could be the office champion belt or traveling trophy.
These games will impart an understanding of behavior and collaborative team bonding among the employees. This can make the environment more light hearted and fun to come to work.
c) Outdoor picnics
Take your team on an outdoor picnic trip, either for one day or several days each month if possible. Divide them into teams and ask them to arrange and order the picnic. Include time for picnic games among the teams, like corn hole, hiking competitions, treasure hunts, even gathering wood for a fire. Ask each team to organize it and facilitate it for some quick fun.
d) Do you know your colleagues?
Organize a game by choosing a pair of employees or random drawing of names to pair employees. Ask each to tell two truths and lie about the other. This will increase their bonding and emotional attachment while supplying laughter. It’s a great way for them to get to know each other on a personal level to foster a family type of workplace. You could do this for 5 minutes at the end of each meeting to end on a fun note.
e) Laugh together for overall wellness
Continuously working in the same environment can be dull and exhausting. To counter this, you can arrange some quality time to spend with your team. This could be a simple meet up for dinner or post work activity.
Other ideas may be to meet for a good movie or a comedy show. Simply crack some jokes with the employees; just have a good time laughing with them. Challenge each team member to come with 3 jokes for your after hour meet up or arrange an activity like bowling. If they have a set monthly date, it will be easier to get more to come. This will create a strong relationship and a good bonding of emotions among the team members.
f) Theme day to have fun wellness challenges
Organize different themed dress-up days every month to reboot the employees from the same boring office dress. This will create a positive vibe of positivity and connectivity that will have a direct effect on your team collaboration. Have each team go with a theme to make it more interesting and get pictures to share on bulletin boards, newsletters, and social media. Everyone wants to work in a fun environment.
g) Themed office decoration challenges
Do you remember decorating your classrooms to win the best-decorated class award? Repeat this challenge among your employees. Divide the employees into teams and assign them to decorate the offices according to a specific theme, such as Thanksgiving, Halloween, Christmas, Easter, etc. You can also encourage employees celebrating Ramadan, Yom Kippur, Diwali, Holi, Hajj, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, etc. to celebrate and help to educate the team on their culture.
Hair Analysis and Wellness Challenges for team-building
These fun-filled activities and healthy challenges can have a positive impact on the physical and mental health of employees. They also induce a positive environment of working together, laughing together, and spending quality time together. This enhances team collaboration and an inclusive feeling of teamwork.
Thus, a well-connected team is a highly productive team. You can implement these tips to help your workforce come together. I can work with you and them individually to help them to get healthy with their diet and lifestyle. When each member is healthy and happy it will just amplify your company as am unstoppable force!
If you need help and want a strong team or to enhance productivity, LET’S CHAT.
Relevant and further studies:
Ireland, James & Deloney, Linda & Renfroe, Shyann & Jambhekar, Kedar. (2017). Use of Team Building Activities to Build a Better Resident. Current Problems in Diagnostic Radiology. 46. 10.1067/j.cpradiol.2017.02.005.
Fapohunda, Tinuke. (2013). Towards Effective Team Building in the Workplace.
Grimani, Katerina (Aikaterini) & Aboagye, Emmanuel & Kwak, Lydia. (2019). The effectiveness of workplace nutrition and physical activity interventions in improving productivity, work performance and workability: a systematic review. BMC Public Health. 19. 1676. 10.1186/s12889-019-8033-1.
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