Survey: 60% of companies in Romania have invested in employee well-being programs in recent years

In a context of significant changes on Romanian labor market, including the challenges related to the attraction and retention of talent and the hybrid way of working, 60% of companies have decided in recent years to allocate resources for the physical and emotional well-being of their teams.
Most well-being programs delivered on the local market include team building events, counseling and psychological support, as well as emotion and relationship management sessions. Regarding the allocated budget, for 41% of the companies this remained at the same level in the last two years, while for 38% of the companies the amounts increased. These are the most important conclusions of a survey carried out by EXEC-EDU, the leader of the executive education market, which has launched a division dedicated to well-being programs 9 years ago.

“The demand for well-being programs has increased after the pandemic and employees have started to value this type of workshops. More complex, integrated programs have beed developed, which are built based on the real needs of companies. On the other hand, the success of this type of initiatives also depends on the upper management involvement and support. They are the first who admite that they feel exhausted, overwhelmed and stressed, so they, in turn, need support. Also, they need the awareness that can stimulate them to encourage these initiatives among their subordinate colleagues”, declared Oana Scarlat, CEO EXEC-EDU. Thus, traditional team building events (72%) are still on first place in the list of well-being activities offered by companies, followed by counseling and psychological support sessions (43%), managing emotions and relationships sessions (41%), nutrition (36%), sports programs or sports spaces (34%), but also financial education seminars (34%). The top benefit mentioned by EXEC-EDU survey respondents as a result of these investments is higher employee engagement, a result that an overwhelming 72% of survey participants highlighted. An important benefit is also the employer brand awareness, which has as an immediate consequence a faster recruitment process, in 41% of cases, correlated with a lower staff turnover, indicated by 36% of companies. Also, 43% of respondents have seen an increase in team productivity and performance, while 13% indicated that the number of sick leaves has decreased significantly.

”Well-being programs have become an absolutely necessary basis for developing a constructive organizational culture and an environment where employees feel valued and appreciated. HR departments are making efforts to identify the right providers in this area, in order to maintain a high degree of engagement among employees. Our strategy is to focus on providing customized well-being solutions for leaders, because leaders are able to support the well-being of the entire organization. That is why we have already launched registrations for the Well-being 360 program, addressed to management in companies. It is a program that integrates all areas of well-being, from the relationship we have with our body, mind, emotions, to the spiritual, social, occupational and financial dimensions”, added Oana Scarlat, CEO EXEC-EDU.
Among the success factors of such a program are the employees engagement, the management involvement, the communication and the internal sale, but also how the programs are customized to the real needs of the employees. The main challenges faced by the companies that have introduced these courses are the high costs associated with them (41%), the lack of time to implement them (40%), the lack of interest of the employees (39%), and the reluctance of the company’s management (32%). Almost half of the companies that have not implemented well-being programs at all claim that they consider them in the future, considering them very important, while 38% of respondents say that lack of budget was the main obstacle. The EXEC-EDU survey, conducted in August, was answered by managers from industries such as retail, IT, oil and gas, education, FMCG, banking, agribusiness, courier, transport, consulting. 34% of the interviewees work in companies with between 100 and 500 employees, 30% work in companies with over 500 employees, 12% in companies with between 50 and 100 employees, and 22% in companies with smaller teams of 50 people.