Creating cultures of wellbeing in Sheffield businesses
Space to Breathe, a local Community Interest Company based on the Abbeydale Road are launching new training and resources aimed at helping local businesses create corporate cultures which look after their employee’s wellbeing. Next month they’ll be launching a new training programme called “Creating a Culture of Wellbeing in Your Workplace.”
Conversations about mental health and wellbeing are becoming increasingly urgent in politics and the media in recent months. Whether it be how to combat anxiety and depression, discussions about men and suicide or the increasing levels of stress put on our school and hospital staff, mental health is front page news.
In Sheffield, it is anticipated that stress and anxiety that resulted in sickness absence, lost productivity and worklessness cost the local economy £420million in 2018 (Health & Wealth Report, Sheffield Public Health 2019.)
Here at Space to Breathe we’ve been working hard to support people in the jobs which help our city be the place it is, but often result in stress or wellbeing challenges. We’ve worked with local teachers, clinicians in Sheffield hospitals, employees in some of our local businesses and with solo-workers and entrepreneurs starting businesses of the future.
However, we’ve become convinced that this work will only be effective if we also address issues of working culture which affect teams and businesses.
In recent years, major employers like Google have begun to study what makes teams and offices effective and have found that a culture of “psychological safety” is crucial (Edmondson 2019.) Google’s Project Aristotle looked at training, social life, interests and approaches to work but found nothing to be as effective as creating work environments where people could be honest in opinions, real about their lives and experiences and risk vulnerability without fear of adverse reactions.
We wanted to share the findings of this and other contemporary research and create a training programme which we believe will create radical improvements in workplace wellbeing across the city and the region.
“Creating a Culture of Wellbeing in Your Workplace” takes place for the first time at the Adelphi Room at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield on 24 June from 9am to 12.30pm. Tickets are priced at £200 and include not just the seminar but a one-to-one consultation with one of the Space to Breathe team and a set of useful and practical resources.
The seminar will seek to provide the following outcomes:
· You will leave with detailed foundations of good practice and resources to help you.
· You will be exposed to imaginative approaches to wellbeing and ways you can practically change the culture in your workplace.
· You will be given tools to both aid your own wellbeing and that of other people.
· You’ll explore real-life case studies of wellbeing culture both positive and negative.
· You’ll be given practical tools which can employed in any working environment.
We wholeheartedly believe that this seminar can result in radical and positive changes to working cultures across many different sectors.
Places are limited but we can create a waiting list for future events.
