Wellbeing Designers Newsletter

Designing a wellbeing culture via Strategic Wellbeing Education for Human-Centric Organisations and Leaders

Hi Wellbeing Designers,

How has your summer been? Hopefully you all had fun and some energizing time in the past month.

"Ah, I sometimes wish that I was a hair dresser. Then at least people would immediately understand what I do for a living. Not like now when I say that I work in organisational wellbeing." - I had a call today morning (Switzerland time) with two awesome people from New Zealand (evening time for them) who run a wellbeing business over there. I was truly enjoying the conversation as we connected quickly having similar challenges like the "hairdresser challenge" and working on the same mission.

In my eyes New Zealand and Australia are frontrunners in wellbeing. Still, these two colleagues were sharing very similar insights and challenges that I got during my recent conversations here in Europe: big part of the work is to talk to business leaders, CEOs and make them aware of the benefits of putting employee wellbeing on the top of their agenda. Luckily we have some convincing data thanks to all the research that has been done in the past years. 

Building awareness in leaders seems to be the most urgent work, priority number one before any other wellbeing offerings for employees. 

One wellbeing leader working in a large organisation recently told me how much they appreciated my podcast interview with Josh Bersin where he said that "CEOs and CFOs need to understand that growth is dependent on (employee) wellbeing". They almost sent the interview link to their CEO. Then they thought it would be too progressive for them so at the end they did not share it with them.

Recent research issued by Deloitte (see the link below at the end of this newsletter) provides an interesting insight on the Perception Gap: "76% of C-suite leaders believe their workforce’s health has improved, but most employees disagree, feeling their health has worsened or remained the same." 

We are listening to these stories and trying to think about the best ways we can work with you.

It would be great to hear more stories from you as well so please feel free to send me an answer email and share your experiences! 

In the meantime keep on doing the amazing work that you all do in your roles and fields to make wellbeing a priority in the world of work. And... remember to enjoy this work!

Wishing you a good day,
Reka
Founder of Wellbeing Designers

The Podcast - Wellbeing Designers

When is the next episode of the Wellbeing Designers Podcast coming out? Who are the guests? - I hear these questions a lot. 

Keep calm! The podcast is back from its summer vacation soon! We already recorded the first episode with Jonathan Fischer, MD. He is not only a Wellbeing Leader in his organisation but he is also a full time doctor, a cardiologist. His insights on his personal wellbeing journey, the intersection between the Western medicine and wellbeing are truly inspiring. Jonathan is about to launch his book "Just One Heart - A Cardiologist's Guide to Healing, Health, and Happiness" - The episode will be launch probably in two weeks, keep an eye on your emails!

In Season 2 you will listen to Heads of Wellbeing as well as some other inspiring professionals who are working on creating a systemic change in wellbeing and created their own movements, events around the topic. Can't wait to introduce them to all of you! 

Insights into our work

As we are having conversations with several business and wellbeing leaders, we are refining our ways how we can support people and their organisations in the wellbeing movement to make employee wellbeing a priority. 

  1. INSPIRE & RAISE AWARENESS FOR BUSINESS LEADERS & EMPLOYEES: keynotes and inspirational workshops on the topic of wellbeing. 

  2. ENABLE WELLBEING LEADERS: a 6 week learning journey specifically for wellbeing professionals or anyone who would like to take responsibility for this topic in their organisation. Fill in this form if you are interested and would like to be amongst the first ones to get information about this upcoming course. 

  3. ENABLE & SUPPORT EMPLOYEES: either by workshops like the Wellbeing Culture Sprint or by the Wellbeing Academy, a strategic education journey at scale.

Welcome dr. Ani Hovhannisyan to the team of Wellbeing Designers! As anticipated in the previous newsletter, Ani joined the team as a Scientific and Education Advisor. 
Beginning of August Ani & Reka had an extraordinary meeting in the mountains. Instead of meeting in an office they decided to go outdoors to walk the talk in all ways! They discussed about personal and business goals in a picturesque setting. 

Where to meet us

Amsterdam here we come! November 14-15 2023 Reka will moderate a panel discussion between three wellbeing leaders during the Horizon Summit which is the CHRO and HR Leaders Summit Reimagining Human Capability. Our panel will be about "Creating an Empathetic Exchange: Enhancing people Well-being through Creating Inclusive Workplaces as Cornerstone for Psychological Safety" with panelist from Standard Chartered Bank and Majorel.

There is another event to be confirmed for October where Reka will deliver a keynote on the Wellbeing Index  in a Wellbeing Culture - how to measure wellbeing in organisations.

Wellbeing insights on our reading and listening list this month