5 Steps to Build a Stong Workplace Wellbeing Champions Programme

If you’re a workplace wellbeing leader, you’re almost certainly aware of Wellbeing Champions. You might even have a team of your own Champions (if so, great! But there’s still plenty to learn here.)

The reality, though, is that many UK workplaces either don’t have a Workplace Wellbeing Champions Programme, or if they do, it’s not properly realised.

So we’ve put together a blog outlining exactly what a Wellbeing Champions Programme should look like, how to put one together, and, most importantly, how to get the absolute most out of it to ensure you build a physically and mentally healthy workplace.

What is a Workplace Wellbeing Champion?

A Workplace Wellbeing Champion is a volunteer in your workplace, from any part of the business, who is dedicated to promoting physical and mental health and wellbeing amongst colleagues. They perform this role in addition to, or as part of, their existing role, usually dedicating a few hours a week to it.

What is the Role of a Workplace Wellbeing Champion?

Champions have a broad role, which can often be determined by how your business operates on a day-to-day basis. Fundamentally, though, they’re there to help put your wellbeing strategy into action. As part of their role, they might be responsible for helping:

• Bridge the gap between staff and wellbeing resources.
• Ensure staff know how to get help and support.
• Encourage open dialogue around wellbeing.
• Organising events and campaigns, as well as generating new ideas.

It’s important, however, to remember that Workplace Wellbeing Champions need proper structure and training to be effective, as they may be dealing with sensitive issues. This training should include:

• Physical and mental health awareness.
• Communication skills.
• Resource navigation.
• How to create and maintain appropriate boundaries.
• Maintaining professionalism.
• How to respond in a crisis.

We’ll cover more of the key aspects of training later in this blog.

What are the Key Characteristics needed in a Champion?

We’ll look at how to recruit Wellbeing Champions in more depth later on, but there are some key characteristics that all Champions should possess to some degree. These include:

• Empathy.
• Trustworthiness.
• Tolerance.
• Communication skills.
• Open-mindedness.
• Approachability.
• An enthusiasm for wellbeing.

While this isn’t an exhaustive list, it’s certainly a great starting point when looking for prospective Wellbeing Champions – but we’ll cover more on this later.

Why do Wellbeing Champions Matter?

Businesses and workplaces have existed for millennia without Workplace Wellbeing Champions Programmes, so you may wonder why they’re so necessary to modern workplaces. Well, times change, and as roles like Lamplighter and Knocker-Upper become obsolete, roles like the Workplace Wellbeing Champion become necessary.

Plus, as we’ll explore, having Wellbeing Champions makes great economic sense, too.

The Impact of Champions on Work Culture

Culture may seem like a buzzword in today’s corporate world, but it’s quickly become crucial in hiring and retaining top talent, especially in the wake of COVID-19.

Having a Workplace Wellbeing Champions Programme helps to build a strong and impactful culture of support in your business. Your Champions, if trained and utilised properly, will help to promote a range of positive initiatives around your workplace, including:

• Normalising conversations around mental health and wellbeing.
• Reducing stigma around health, particularly in relation to certain mental health conditions.
• Build a more inclusive workplace to ensure everyone feels supported.

Tangible Benefits of a Workplace Wellbeing Champions Programme

Importantly, you shouldn’t be measuring the success of your Wellbeing Champions based on vibes and good feelings (though these are important) – the benefits should be measurable. We’ll dive into how to do this later, but with a successful programme, you could expect to see:

• Increased employee engagement.
• Better uptake of wellbeing programmes.
• Reduced absenteeism.
• Improved staff morale.
• Increased staff retention.

These are all measurable benefits that will directly contribute towards the success of your business, and measuring the success of your Wellbeing Champions against these criteria is not as daunting as it may seem at first.

Economic Benefits of Wellbeing Champions

When it comes to pitching a Workplace Wellbeing Champions Programme, this is what everybody wants to know. Wellbeing Champions are expensive. How will they make us more money? You read that in your director’s voice, didn’t you?

And to answer their questions: no, they don’t have to be expensive. And yes, they will make you more money. Here’s how:

According to the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID), physical inactivity costs the UK economy £7.4 billion annually, almost £1 billion of which directly costs the NHS. Also included in these costs, though not an exact figure, will be the lost productivity of workers and businesses from conditions that increase in risk by being physically inactive, which can include:

• Cardiovascular diseases.
• Type-2 diabetes.
• Colon cancer.
• Breast cancer.
• Depression.
• MSK issues.
• Dementia.

Additionally, physical inactivity is associated with 1 in 6 deaths in the UK, which is alarming considering that around 1 in 3 men and 1 in 2 women in the UK are not physically active enough.

In terms of mental health, Deloitte highlights that mental health issues cost UK employers around £45 billion each year in lost productivity, presenteeism, and staff turnover. Additionally, having an established workplace wellbeing programme, including your Wellbeing Champions, can lead to a return of £5 for every £1 invested by improving productivity and reducing absenteeism.

How to Build a Wellbeing Champion Network

Now, let’s take a look at how you can build an effective network of Workplace Wellbeing Champions. We’ll start from scratch, but this guide can be used no matter what stage you’re at to help build and improve your Champions programme.

Step 1 – Define Objectives

You need to understand exactly why you are setting up a Champions programme before you get started, and what you want to get out of building a network of Champions. There are two key aspects you should consider:

• Your business objectives, such as financial targets, reducing absenteeism, improving corporate responsibility, attracting and retaining talent, etc.
• Your employees’ needs, looking at the four pillars of wellbeing – their physical, mental, social, and financial wellbeing.

Once you have these outlined, you can address the next step – taking it to leadership.

Step 2 – Secure Leadership Buy-In

As with most business initiatives, securing leadership buy-in can be one of the biggest obstacles to overcome. Most of the time, this will come down to cold, hard numbers (and usually with a pound sign in front of them.)

As we’ve already pointed out, there are clear economic benefits to building a Workplace Wellbeing Champions Programme on a wider scale, but try to put it in real terms, too.

For example, if stress is a significant cause of absence rates within the business, you could look at how many staff are currently using your EAP (if you have one), and highlight how a campaign led by Wellbeing Champions could increase this utilisation.

Step 3 – Recruit Workplace Wellbeing Champions

When recruiting your Wellbeing Champions, it’s important to be clear about expectations and intentional about who you recruit – in other words, don’t just say yes to fill up the numbers.

Clarity of the role is crucial, and Champions should understand how their responsibilities align with the organisation’s overall wellbeing strategy. Similarly, their personal qualities and values are important. We covered this early, but as a reminder, Wellbeing Champions should have:

• Empathy.
• Trustworthiness.
• Tolerance.
• Communication skills.
• Open-mindedness.
• Approachability.
• An enthusiasm for wellbeing.

In addition to any skills you deem necessary for your business. For example, if you have a large population of staff that doesn’t speak English as a first language, recruiting a Champion who shares their language will help to build inclusivity.

Similarly, your Wellbeing Champions should reflect the full diversity and culture of your workforce. When you have representatives of a variety of different backgrounds, this helps to develop acceptance and trust of wellbeing initiatives in your workplace.

If you ensure that you include these elements in your description of the role, you’ll help to attract a broad range of candidates who are committed to your strategy, as well as being qualified.

Step 4 – Provide Wellbeing Champions Training

We are very biased here, but this should be stressed – providing formal training to your Wellbeing Champions is not only essential to the success of your programme, but will pay dividends in the long run.

Champions who know how to communicate, set boundaries, and signpost effectively will be more successful in the long run, meaning you’re less likely to need to keep recruiting new Champions.

We’ll dive into how to train your Wellbeing Champions in the next section.

Step 5 – Launch and Sustain

It can be tempting to send your newly minted Wellbeing Champions forth, workplace wellbeing calendars in hand, ready to start hosting weekly events and check-ins. But this approach is most likely to come with several teething problems.

Instead, launch in a phased approach – start small and have regular check-ins with your Champions to see what’s working, what isn’t, and to reorganise your approach as needed.

We’ll cover more on evaluating the activity of your Wellbeing Champions later on.

What Should Wellbeing Champions Training Include?

There are several aspects to Champions Training that are crucial to the success of your programme. By all means, read the list we’ve put together below. But if you’ve already decided to invest in your Workplace Wellbeing Champions Programme, then getting accredited professional training is the way to go. Here at New Leaf Health, we’ve been training Workplace Wellbeing Champions for nearly 30 years, so we know exactly how to get the best out of your team. Click below to find out more, or keep reading about what training should look like.

Health Promotion

Firstly, Wellbeing Champions need comprehensive training on health promotion principles and ethics to help them responsibly advocate for employee wellbeing. This helps them understand the importance of using evidence-based practices when promoting health in the workplace.

Communication Skills

Effective communication skills are also vital. Wellbeing Champions should learn techniques for engaging colleagues in conversations about wellbeing, which will help them foster a supportive environment when staff feel comfortable discussing their health and wellbeing.

Planning and Collaboration

Planning and collaboration are also key parts of a Champion’s role. Your Wellbeing Champions should know how to work together to define clear objectives for a campaign (such as ‘increasing awareness of mental health resources’, for example), as well as how to tailor the campaign to be inclusive of the specific needs of staff.

Promotional Strategies

Effective communication strategies should also be covered in training, so that your Workplace Wellbeing Champions know how to craft impactful messages to influence healthy behaviour. This can take the form of various mediums, including:

• Creating email campaigns and newsletters.
• Designing and distributing posters or flyers.
• Hosting workshops or webinars to raise awareness.
• Utilising social media and the company intranet to share stories and resources.

Feedback Mechanisms

Your Champions should also know how to gather feedback and analyse it appropriately, to help influence and refine future initiatives. Mechanisms such as surveys and suggestion boxes, as well as anecdotal feedback, allow employees’ voices to be heard, helping you craft clearer and more effective campaigns.

Company Policies and Boundaries

Your training should also include a thorough understanding of company policies and the boundaries of their role. This can also include legal aspects of health in the workplace, such as safeguarding. This ensures that your Wellbeing Champions don’t overstep their roles, as well as making sure that they can set clear boundaries so that they can support colleagues, but without putting their own wellbeing at risk.

The Importance of Continuous Training

Training your Workplace Wellbeing Champions isn’t just a one-time thing. They will need to stay up-to-date on the latest wellbeing developments, research, and studies, to ensure that their campaigns are evidence-based and follow health-promotion best practices.

Additionally, continuous training will help your Champions feel secure and supported in their role, giving them confidence to carry it out to the best of their abilities. It will also signal to the wider business that you are fully invested in the wellbeing of your staff, which is a great way to help recruit and retain top talent.

How Many Wellbeing Champions Do You Need?

There’s no definitive answer to how many Wellbeing Champions a business needs – there are a lot of factors at play. You’ll need to consider the number of sites you have, the diversity of your staff and their roles in each department, and the specific needs of colleagues in those areas. Some areas may require more support than others, with demanding roles that create a lot of stress or lead to physical inactivity.

It’s also important to be realistic. If you decide that every department in your business should have a dedicated Wellbeing Champion, a team of five with one Champion versus a team of 50 will create a disparity. You Champions will be spending a few hours a week in their role, and not necessarily all in one go, so consider how many Champions you think are necessary to create a realistic workload for them. The last thing you want is to create a situation where your Champions are overstretched and overstressed – the complete opposite of their purpose!

If you absolutely can’t decide how many you need, why not start out with one Workplace Wellbeing Champion for every 20 people in your business, and adjust from there? If you’re following our advice (which you should be), then you’ll quickly find out during the phased launch approach if you need more Champions.

Importantly, it’s always better to start with fewer and grow your team, rather than to start with too many Champions and have ideas and campaigns flying around all over the place – your strategy will be difficult to implement, and it will lose all of its impact.

How Much Time Should a Wellbeing Champion Allocate to Their Role?

We touched on this in the last section, but it’s important to be realistic here. Typically, your Wellbeing Champions would spend about 1-2 hours per week in their role, as part of their existing job within the business. This time will include activities such as:

• Engaging with colleagues around wellbeing.
• Participating in training.
• Organising wellbeing activities.
• Providing feedback to wellbeing leaders.
• Plus any other activities that fit within their role.

This allocation can vary based on the size of the organisation, as well as the specific needs of staff.

During peak times of the year, Champions may need to increase their involvement in wellbeing activities. Key workplace wellbeing campaigns include the likes of:

• Dry January (January).
• Time To Talk Day (February).
• International Women’s Day (March).
• World Health Day (April).
• Mental Health Awareness Week (May).
• Know Your Numbers Week (September).
• World Mental Health Day (October).
• Movember (November).

These are just a few examples of the big wellbeing campaigns throughout the year, but your industry or workforce demographic may resonate with more specific campaigns throughout the year. To see a full range of workplace wellbeing campaigns, download our free Workplace Wellbeing Calendar.

What Support Do Wellbeing Champions Require?

Workplace Wellbeing Champions require robust and structured support to fulfil their roles effectively. Regular team-wide check-ins with wellbeing leaders are a must, giving your Champions a platform to share ideas, discuss challenges, and collaborate. Similarly, scheduling quick one-to-one sessions with your Champions will allow them to raise any concerns in private, especially if it relates to a sensitive issue like their own health and wellbeing.

Creating company-wide awareness of their position is also crucial. Your employees should know who their Champions are and how to access them. Otherwise, your Workplace Wellbeing Champions Programme will be ineffective, and your Champions will be left feeling frustrated and stressed.

You also need to ensure that there are clear lines of referral for a variety of wellbeing-related issues, allowing your Wellbeing Champions to quickly and easily signpost colleagues to appropriate resources when necessary. This will help alleviate an potential stress for both your Champions and colleagues.

Regular feedback is also an essential part of supporting your Champions. You can highlight the impact they are having, which will help boost morale and encourage them in their role. Likewise, if a member of the team is struggling, you can understand why and address this in an appropriate way.

How Do I Ensure My Wellbeing Champions Stay Within the Boundaries of the Role?

Boundaries are vital when establishing a Workplace Wellbeing Champions Programme. Your Champions aren’t therapists or doctors, and shouldn’t act as such. They’re there to help promote health and wellbeing, and to signpost colleagues to further help when required.

As such, boundaries should be consistently prioritised on the agenda. Regular discussions within the team and during one-to-ones can help reinforce their responsibilities and expectations, as well as clarifying any uncertainties that may arise.

You should establish clear guidelines and expectations regarding what is within their role. Likewise, you should also develop a set of escalation protocols to ensure a Champion knows what to do when a situation extends beyond their role.

For example, if a colleague mentions that they are struggling with mental health and would like to know what resources are available to them, a Champion could signpost them to your company’s EAP service. If the colleague then begins to open up about specific struggles, this is likely to extend beyond the role of the Champion and would require additional support from a qualified Mental Health First Aider. Make the escalation guidelines as unambiguous as possible.

Implementing a confidential feedback system for Champions also allows them to express any concerns they might have, or to seek clarification on issues without fear of judgment. For example, you could set up a Google Form to allow Champions to ask questions anonymously. You can then answer the question in a Q&A style format and allow all of your Champions to see, in a weekly internal Champions newsletter, for example.

How Do You Keep Wellbeing Champions Motivated?

Much like any workplace role, keeping your Champions motivated is an essential part of building your Workplace Wellbeing Champions Programme. The clearest way to do this is through regular rewards and recognition, celebrating achievements big and small, helping to foster a sense of pride and accomplishment.

We keep talking about training, but it’s absolutely crucial to establishing a successful network of Wellbeing Champions. As we discussed, training should be an ongoing exercise, which will help to enhance the capabilities of your team, giving them new skills and new opportunities in their role. Similarly, this display of investment can help invigorate a sense of passion for the role, too.

It’s also important to make sure you foster the team dynamics of your Champions on a regular basis, to make sure everyone is working well together and fully collaborating. Host some team bonding activities, such as quiz nights or days out. If you have a large network of champions, you could even consider hosting a summit event, especially if they work remotely or at sites around the country. If you want to know how to host an engaging corporate retreat, we’ve got a great guide on that, too.

How To Evaluate Wellbeing Champions’ Activity

Evaluating the success of your Champions is much like any other project – you need regular qualitative and quantitative assessments to get an idea of progress.

It’s usually a good idea to start with a baseline needs assessment. That is to say, ask your staff about their wellbeing before you start your Champions Programme. You can do this internally, using a simple form or survey tool, or you can outsource it to a workplace wellbeing provider like us. We’ll build and deliver the survey to your employees, as well as provide you with an anonymised report that tells you everything you need to know.

From this initial assessment, you can then decide on specific metrics to measure, such as participation rates in wellbeing initiatives, employee feedback, and overall engagement levels. Qualitative metrics could include surveys or focus groups to provide direct feedback on your wellbeing efforts, as well as the perceived effectiveness of your Workplace Wellbeing Champions.

You also need to ensure you are collecting this data consistently and often. This allows you to get the best sense of how your strategy is performing and how well your Champions are delivering it. You can then make gradual tweaks and changes as you progress, rather than feeling like you need to throw it all out and start again.

How To Quality Assure a Workplace Wellbeing Champions Programme

As well as measuring the effectiveness of the programme, it’s also important to quality assure your Workplace Wellbeing Champions. There are a few key actions you can take to make sure that your programme is successful in the long term, and if you’re following this guide, you’ll likely be doing them as you go along. It’s always a good idea to formalise the process, though, allowing you to evidence the quality of your Wellbeing Champions Programme.

• Annual Reviews and Audits: This should come naturally as you evaluate your Champions and the overall effectiveness of the programme through staff surveys and feedback. It’s important to accept constructive feedback and criticism not as a negative, but as an opportunity to continuously improve the quality of your programme.
• Benchmarking Against Best Practices: Consider this when you’re setting out your initial objectives for the programme. You’ll determine what counts as a ‘best practice’ for your business through a mix of the initial training, along with research and tweaking as you go along.
• Continuous Improvement Plans: You’ll likely do this as part of your feedback sessions with the team, as well as individual Champions. It’s a good idea to formalise it and create measurable targets to work towards. But don’t make it feel like a PIP, either.
• Consider External Accreditation: Again, if you’re following along, you’ll have chosen a reputable Wellbeing Champions training provider (like New Leaf Health!) who provides accredited training anyway. This is why it’s important to offer ongoing training opportunities to your Champions, though, as it gives you access to a range of different accredited courses that upskill your Workplace Wellbeing Champions.

Case Study: Wellbeing Champions in Action

We work with a wide range of businesses, from small to large, across all sectors, so we encounter numerous variations on Wellbeing Champions.

One of our favourite approaches, though, is that taken by Community Housing, a housing association based in Kidderminster. Their ethos is based around community, and they live that first and foremost with their colleagues.

Their Wellbeing Champions Programme is called the Colleague Voice Group. They have many different arms, spanning various aspects of wellbeing, including women’s health, men’s health, and LGBTQ+ support.

We regularly support Community Housing with wellbeing events and awareness workshops, and their Colleague Voice Group (their Wellbeing Champions) often form an integral part of these campaigns. Check out the video below to see a Health Fair that we ran at Community Housing, and how their Colleague Voice Group helped to support it.

Having a Workplace Wellbeing Champions Programme is more than just a trend or a nice-to-have – it’s a strategic investment in the future of your workforce and your business. Building a team of Wellbeing Champions – and equipping them with the right training – is an essential step in helping put your wellbeing strategy into action. It’s like a football team with no players – you can have the best manager and tactics in the world, but if you’ve got no one to help put them into action, the fans won’t be pleased!

By no means do you need to overhaul everything. If you’ve read this far (and we’re guessing you have), then you’ll know it’s all about small and manageable steps, monitoring successes, and gradually increasing performance.

Here at New Leaf Health, we’ve been training Wellbeing Champions for nearly 30 years. Whether you want us to implement the whole system for you or you’d just like to bounce some ideas off us, we’re here to help. Head over to our Training Centre to view all of the courses we have available, or fill out the form below to get in touch or ask a question.