Umbrella Health Conducts Employee Wellbeing Assessment, Finds Relationship Between Wellbeing and Productivity

Umbrella Health, New Zealand’s leaders in resilience training and corporate wellbeing services, has released their first wave of data from the Umbrella Wellbeing Assessment, revealing a relationship between employee wellbeing and productivity. 

The Umbrella Wellbeing Assessment was conducted to collect accurate data on employee wellbeing, providing a comprehensive picture of participant’s wellbeing and mental health, and of relevant work dimensions, including organisational climate, work challenges, rating of job performance and satisfaction with work-life balance. Non-work stressors, personal resilience and health behaviours were also surveyed.

The Umbrella assessment received 1,180 completed assessments from a range of organisations. With a response rate from 70 to 91%, this reflects a high level of interest people have in receiving feedback about their wellbeing.

Participant wellbeing was measured according to the participants’ responses to established, internationally-recognised measures. People were then categorised into one of four categories based on their responses: Thriving, Managing Well, Struggling and Finding it Tough.

One of the most relevant findings for organisations is how this classification of wellbeing relates to self-reported productivity – self-rated job performance over the past 6 months decreases across the wellbeing groups. Respondents revealed feeling that they perform less well in their job when they have poorer wellbeing.

While there is a risk of same source bias, (a positive state of mind contributes to higher ratings) respondents who report higher wellbeing also report better performance in their jobs.

In summary, the Umbrella Wellbeing Assessment proved popular with employees, as evidenced by the high response rates. Organisations have also found the depth of information contained in the organisation reports informative for better understanding drivers of wellbeing and for planning more targeted employee support.

Umbrella believes that organisations should have a clear understanding of the wellbeing and mental health of their workforce before designing programmes and support for employees. Collecting data also ensures that pressure points are accurately pinpointed, provides a baseline measure for monitoring change in wellbeing over time, highlights employees’ main challenges, enables effective intervention planning, and measures employee capacity to handle stress.

To learn more about Umbrella Health’s Wellbeing Assessment and their range of corporate wellbeing services, visit the Umbrella Health website at https://umbrella.org.nz/ today.