Wearable technology can be a useful tool for employers to promote a healthier lifestyle with employees. Especially items such as fitness trackers, smart watches, wearable glasses and sport watches. Healthy employees take fewer sick days and are more productive! Investing in physical activity in the workplace can also mean fewer accidents, improved morale and people maintaining a healthy body weight.
Employee Wellbeing Research highlighted there has been a 37% growth in the last 12 months in proportion of employers offering access to wearable devices. If you are thinking of investing in workplace wearable technology, here is how it can be beneficial:
Encourages employees to exercise
Sickness absence costs UK businesses an estimated £29 billion each year and Irish businesses an estimated €490 million a year. A lack of physical activity, and failure to take care of your health can lead to employees having sickness related absences. Placing health and wellbeing at the heart of an organisation can help to minimise absenteeism. Therefore, implementing programmes to support this can be beneficial to companies. Supporting employees with fitness trackers can encourage an uptake in physical activity and be a motivating factor to workout. People will be held accountable for their fitness progress and will be able to monitor how they are doing.
More inclusive workplace
Fitness trackers are a fantastic way to get fit with colleagues whilst also creating a little bit of healthy competition. By syncing fitness devices together, you can set challenges and encourage each other along the way, thus making exercising fun! It can make for a more inclusive workplace and get staff talking to each other by giving them some common ground.
Boosting staff wellness
Wearable technology has the ability to continuously measure and analyse the health data from a person’s every day life. Therefore allowing people to have an in-depth look into their wellbeing and health giving them a greater sense of awareness. Fitness trackers can monitor your heart rate and from that you can track anything that would be of concern.
Increases workplace safety
Wearable technology can help address safety issues in the workplace such as fatigue and stress monitoring! Fitness trackers can monitor stress levels by tracking your heart rate and also regulate your sleep pattern. Viewing real life data will give employees the opportunity to tackle the issues head on.
Enhance efficiency at work
The hands-free nature of wearable technology can make employees more efficient as they can have information readily available on their devices without needing to refer to their computer. They can provide real-time navigation. Thus is beneficial for employees who are constantly on the go and need GPS tracking devices within their job.
