Your staff need a COVID-19 recovery plan, too With lockdown restrictions easing, a big question is looming. How are your employees going to feel coming back to work and what can we do to ensure their physical and mental health are being cared for? Robert Lyon explains.
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et’s not forget the reason why companies and businesses succeed – a motivated and engaged employee base that are all pushing in the same direction. A lot of service-based industries found their bookings evaporate overnight and their staff go into ‘hibernation’, but now that we see a graduated return to the workplace there are some key wellness factors that we need to be aware of, both for the practitioner and business owner alike:
1. The Physical and Mental health of staff have declined. Months of time off work away from your passion and working within a vibrant, customer focused industry can take its 28 | SPA+CLINIC
toll. Your health can decline in many ways from a lack of physical exercise, poor nutrition, altered sleep habits and a general sense of laziness and lack of focus and drive. Some will have taken this enforced lockdown as ‘alive time’ – a chance to take care of their own body and mind, educate, upskill and prepare for a new future, whilst others have chosen the ‘dead time path’ littered with a lack of action, poor health choices and a sense of waiting around for things to get better. We all need to re-engage our own health and wellness through regular exercise, good nutrition through a whole food-based diet and the avoidance of junk food, plenty of water and high-quality sleep habits.
2. A skills lag will be seen as staff will need re-training and time to get back into the groove. The wellness industry thrives on contact and repetition. Skills are developed through hours and hours of performing tasks and procedures, and like anything else – a lack of repetition leads to a sense of feeling rusty and out of practice. You won’t be able to have everyone or everything operating at 100% efficiency at first, and to think that is the case is a recipe for disaster. Give yourself and your business a break! Manage the expectations by operating at a slower pace with bookings, treatments and turnarounds at first until staff find their feet. 80% is a smarter approach long term for