The Five Ways to Wellbeing have been scientifically proven to help us store enough resilience and wellbeing to help us get through the Januarys of life, and enjoy the Augusts.

We can help ourselves to not feel overwhelmed and embedded in survival mode. Instead, they can help us to thrive and flourish and be at our most productive, innovative, collaborative and connected with our colleagues. Here’s a short video about the concept, and how the Vista team look after their wellbeing at work.

The Five Ways to Wellbeing have been adopted by many organisations from different sectors, including the NHS, Universities and Local Authorities. Here we put the Vista perspective on how you can help your managers translate the Five Ways to Wellbeing into great management practice.

The Five Ways to Wellbeing

Connect with other people

Do remind managers of the importance of making their team a priority. How? have regular, in the diary 121s, give constructive feedback and Team Meetings with planned agendas, actions to follow up and accountabilities.

Don’t rely on rushed conversations in the corridor to communicate key message and objectives. And definitely ensure they don’t remain in entrenched in old ways of communication and management styles – refresh self-awareness, people skills and new ways of thinking about effective management styles.

Be physically active

Do communicate clearly and regularly to managers so that they are clued up about the employee benefits that your organisation has on offer. Encourage them to have regular reminders and check ins about take up in their teams. For example, discounted gym memberships and bike loans.

Encourage light physical activity throughout the day, taking break from screens, taking proper breaks and use these to maximise movement throughout the day. A walk at lunchtime, getting up from our desks at regular intervals.

Modelling those behaviours yourself is one of the most powerful and effective messages that you can send to your team.

Don’t encourage thinking that physical activity is only effective if we are running half marathons or pumping iron at the gym! Small, incremental physical activity is incredibly beneficial.

And don’t be defeatist – we can build in physical activity into our day whether we work at home or the gym.

Learn new skills

Do think about personal development in its broadest sense: it is not just about technical skills but also people skills to help us connect with our colleagues, engage and be effective communicators and negotiators.

What hidden skills might your team members have that they can share with their colleagues?

Don’t restrict feedback; PDRs and conversations relating to personal development should never be restricted to annual meetings but should be part of a regular flow of dialogue.

Don’t think that all training must end with a qualification or accreditation.

Take notice

Do raise awareness about the benefits of mindfulness; organise a training session.

Do model and encourage teams to practice gratitude: none of us work in a perfect environment – lets learn together to make the best of the resources that we have.

Do ensure that your managers are providing genuine and regular acts and words of recognition for the work, initiatives and going the extra mile that the individuals in your team achieve. Here’s our tips for giving great quality feedback.

Don’t think this is some new age guru nonsense! There is a substantial amount of scientific evidence to demonstrate the tangible benefits of taking notice. If you are building your business case for positive mental health and wellbeing training, stay tuned to our resource hub, we’ll have more help coming on that topic soon.

Give

Do help managers to be able to give their time, thanks, smile to their team members.

Do encourage any opportunity to volunteer in a charity partnership or encourage managers to join employee resource groups/networks within your organisation. Ask your managers and team members to share their experience of any volunteering outside work, in their team meetings.

Reduce or avoid the thinking that giving is only beneficial in financial terms or in big, heroic sweeping acts. We come together and connect more often than not through the little acts of kindness that we practise regularly in our teams.

Vista are proud to be pioneering a new approach to mental health and wellbeing training, coupling this with our employee relations expertise and leadership development in one go. This means that delegates can align and connect these three areas, translating into more effective employee relations practice and leadership behaviours. If positive mental health and wellbeing is on your 2024 agenda, take a look at our programme of training here, but please keep in mind we can tailor each of these for your organisations needs.