How is the approach to taking care of employees' health changing in Poland?

Comprehensive approach to employees’ health has always been high on the agenda for HR directors. Attractive non-financial benefits in this area contribute to the increase of involvement, retention and, above all, to the increase of employees’ safety. These tasks are strongly linked to the business objectives of company management: to ensure business continuity and efficiency of operations. In order to even better understand business needs and their relation to employees’ health care, ICAN Research has conducted interviews with HR directors in over a dozen companies from various industries on behalf of Medicover.* What are the conclusions of the "Healthy Company" study and how can they change due to the coronavirus pandemic? Now, based on our research and knowledge, let us describe how these needs have changed.

In reality that has been defined by the pandemic, the needs of HR departments have moved in new directions. Nowadays, the most important challenges of these teams are:

  • A strong need to take care of employees' health in order to rebuild their commitment and effectiveness. The task is all the more difficult as it turns out to be necessary to adapt to completely new working and living conditions, and at the same time – the employees are overloaded with remote work, social isolation, and accompanied by fear for the future.
  • The need to develop resilience and good mental condition of employees as well as a safe and hygienic work environment and processes in the organisation.
  • Many companies are confronted with the difficult question: how to effectively carry out the transformation and adapt the organisation to the new situation in terms of its structures, the necessary competences, the leadership model, collective efficiency, and labour costs.
  • Due to the economic situation, it is necessary to reduce personnel costs, including headcount, salary levels and scope of non-financial benefits.

Employee health care strategies for 2019-2020

Caring for employees, their health and safety at work was chiefly part of the strategy of large global organisations. This approach is particularly valuable in the current situation.  In the case of smaller businesses, it was key to provide basic non-financial benefits. Currently, these benefits are strongly linked to the company’s financial situation.

The strategy of taking care of employees' health takes different forms, depending on various business sectors. In non-manufacturing companies, employees are often covered by a broad well-being programme, which assumes multidimensional care for good health and safety of employees. In a more advanced version, these programmes included definitions of physical, emotional and "life balance" areas. This approach has now been complemented by the creation of a safe workplace that minimises the risk of illness and by the support in the area of mental health – psychological helplines or more consultations with specialists.

For manufacturers, safety has always been the watchword in caring for their employees. The safety department is responsible for it, and it works in liaison with HR. Many initiatives in this case combine safety and health.

Currently, it is necessary to adapt organisations to the required sanitary regime and the guidelines of the Ministry of Health and the Chief Sanitary Inspectorate.

The strategy of taking care of employees' health was based both on planned basic activities as well as the development of ad-hoc initiatives. First of all. the companies focused on choosing the products they wanted to offer their employees (medical care, sports package) and on organising or enabling participation in cyclical events and initiatives. Other activities (e.g. preventive, health-related, volunteering) were developed according to ideas and needs as they arose. Today, medical care and access to physical activity are vital – however, a safe remote model of these services is becoming increasingly important. Prevention is also important and can be adapted to the current situation and carried out through webinars, e-books, or telephone advice.

HR challenges in the organisation of pro-health activities in 2019-2020

The "Healthy Company" study shows that the biggest challenges related to taking care of employees' health are:

  • matching the offer to the needs within the limits of the budget,
  • reaching out with information to employees (especially in dispersed structures),
  • motivating employees to take part in the programmes,
  • providing resources for organisation of large events,
  • access to the best coaches or the best suppliers of training programmes,
  • in smaller organisations, their budgets can be a barrier to the development of the health offer,
  • changing health habits, as it is not only crisis response actions that matter.

These challenges are still relevant (and even more conspicuous) in connection with the coronavirus pandemic. This is mainly due to the frequent budget limitations, the functioning of the remote working model, and the organisation of a safe return to work.

What affects the health, safety and efficiency of workers in 2019-2020

As the most important area in building a healthy company, the interviewed HR directors indicated medical care. The representatives of the companies whose health offer is more extensive also mentioned prevention, physical activity and mental health.

  • Medical care is still treated as a basic benefit that every company has to provide its employees with. The main motivation for HR to use the medical care element is to match the market standard and to care for employees. Currently, it is also important in terms of strengthening immunity, as well as remote, fast and safe access to doctors.
  • The activities in the area of mental health in the surveyed companies are focused on supporting employees at work and in their private lives. Mental health has a large impact on involvement and motivation to work. The increasing level of stress at work is influenced by, for instance, anxiety about maintaining employment, improper sleep, addictions, remote working, feeling of isolation and uncertainty, interpersonal conflicts, demotivation or professional burnout. These issues affect many employees and their family members, disturbing their level of commitment, energy and efficiency.
  • The aim of prevention is to build awareness and strengthen healthy lifestyle habits and prevent the development of diseases. The change of habits perpetuates a healthy way of functioning and building immunity, especially in the current sanitation regime. It covers many aspects: from mental hygiene and regular physical activity through proper nutrition, sleep and social relationships to beneficial leisure activities. During an epidemic, company activities that build awareness and help strengthen immunity and safety in the workplace are particularly important. These activities include diagnostic tests for employees, education in hygiene and responsibility for their own and others' health. Remote work used to be a strong part of the "work-life balance" trend – now, its effectiveness and relevant healthy habits are fundamental to ensuring business continuity of many companies and employee groups.
  • Physical activity and healthy leisure activities are still very pressing needs. Companies want to support their employees in development of their passions because in this way the best employees stay at the company, and the employer presents its positive image. For the participants of the "Healthy Company" survey, sport is the most important in building any organisational culture – it allows to shape teamwork culture, cooperation, pursuit of goals and fighting spirit. Currently, sport and physical activity are particularly important because they help to develop immunity – both of the mind and of the body. After the temporary closure of fitness clubs and swimming pools, new types of activity have enjoyed popularity: online home training (both live and recorded to be played at any time), webinars with experts, training tips and advice from dieticians on healthy eating.
  • Personalisation of the health offer, i.e. moving away from standard service packages to cafeteria systems with independent selection of benefits by employees. Currently, the most popular are offers such as access to streaming platforms, books, board games, home and outdoor sports equipment. It is increasingly common for health benefits to be tailored to the specific needs of different groups of employees (e.g. production, office, remote, direct customer service, mobile, decision makers). This is related to the diversity of expectations and health risks in the workplace at different positions.

How Medicover responds to the changing needs of companies in 2020

The conclusions of the study encouraged Medicover to implement a new approach in the area of healthcare for companies. As part of our new "Healthy Company" model we build solutions for organisations with regard to different groups of employees (production, office, mobile, remote, decision-making or sales and customer service). We focus on meeting these three main HR needs:

  1. How to build commitment, immunity, mental and physical condition as well as energy of employees?
  2. How to create safe working conditions, including new safety standards and requirements for the workplace and work processes?
  3. How to make sure that employees get benefits when personnel costs (e.g. headcount or wages) are reduced?

Both our and our customers' approach to health strategy is consistent with the WHO definition of health: Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. Therefore, based on our competence centres and in cooperation with our partners, we dynamically develop and provide innovative solutions, both standard and tailor-made in all areas of employee health. We focus on being an HR partner in building safety, health and employee engagement.

  1. Medical care – thanks to our flexibility, substantial knowledge and many years of experience, we can offer modern solutions tailored to each budget, which will help to keep employees healthy and build a sense of "taking care" in them, which translates into their effectiveness - even when they work from home.
  2. Mental health – we offer solutions that respond to the need of providing psychological care without having to leave home and arrange meetings for employee groups. The employer can select from the offer of webinars, telephone consultations with specialists and crisis interventions that work well in extraordinary situations when employees have recently been exposed to strong stress, e.g. restructuring or changing their workplace.
  3. Prevention and safety at work – we will select solutions to match the current epidemiological situation, and then set up online prevention activities for employees – without the need to leave home.
  4. Physical activity – due to openness in creating modern solutions, we could create a platform that allows employees to work out online. The platform offers live exercises – and the participants can interact and feel almost like at a regular fitness class.
  5. Healthy eating – we offer educational solutions. We have moved lectures and meetings with employees to virtual space. We offer telephone consultations with dietitians, and an option to receive a traditional and vegetarian version of the menu that the employees can manage online.
  6. Healthy leisure – we make it possible to choose attractive non-financial benefits available at comfortable Medicover Benefits one-stop platform, where you can find various shopping vouchers, e.g. for books, toys, for online stores (e.g. Allegro), discounts for children to various playrooms, discounts for adults (e.g. salt caves, dance studios) or the possibility to support charities.

 

We would like to become the HR partner in ensuring safety, health and involvement of employees
zdrowafirma.medicover.pl

By: Piotr Dreszer - Marketing Director (Medicover) and Małgorzata Nowak – Marketing Offer Development Manager (Medicover)

* Survey “Healthy Company” by ICAN Research; commissioned by Medicover Polska, December 2019