Today is Diabetes Australia, Walk to Work Day – an annual event that helps employers and employees build regular walking into their daily routine for a healthier workplace. Celebrating their 21st year today (Friday 4 October 2019), the event raises money and awareness for Diabetes Australia.
To support and participate in Diabetes Australia Walk to Work Day and raise awareness about the benefits of health and wellness, Employsure dedicated the entire month of September to get their employees moving. The challenge was to get Employsure’s widely dispersed workforce across all states across Australia and New Zealand in offices and in the field, involved and motivated.
Employsure partnered with the Move Spring app to rollout the ‘Step Up September’ initiative to improve individual and collective wellbeing by promoting physical activity throughout the workday. The Move Spring multi-platform app is designed to make fitness fun with group activity tracking, step-challenges, fitness content, chats, leader boards, and more.
Talent Consultant at Employsure, Nicola Scott said the objective was to, “Boost confidence and self-esteem so our staff can continually run faster, climb higher and be stronger in their role. We also wanted to invite friendly competition in to the work environment, encouraging departments to interact more with one another, whilst providing them with the tools and resources to make their health a priority.”
According to Ms Scott, participation was encouraged through Employsure’s internal platform, Workplace powered by Facebook, to get employees sharing their experiences posting their progress throughout the challenge. In addition, prizes were awarded for the top steppers on the leader board. Incredibly, the top stepper did a whopping average of 41,000 steps per day. Collectively, over 200 employees achieved 41.5 million steps, averaging 9000 steps per day.
One participant said, “The challenge was the best thing I ever did for my physical and mental health – not only have I lost 5kg, I became more aware of my sitting habits throughout the day and made small changes to my lifestyle to incorporate more activity and movement, which has made a big impact on I think and feel.”
“The challenge was good fun because it made me more engaged with Employsure and its values. I also felt more connected to my peers, even if we worked across states, countries and departments,” said another.
With the help of Move Spring, Ms Scott says the pilot company-wide fitness challenge was a success: “The app was flexible enough to fit our business needs and seamlessly tracked steps for a user-friendly experience. It was also a great platform to promote health and wellness in the workplace as it was very customisable and accommodated a variety of activity levels.”
In the spirit of National Walk to Day, Ms Scott says, “All workplaces should be encouraging staff to get up and walk regularly not just to work, but during the working day. Now is a great time to put your feet first and step into your daily routine. Take employees outside for a walking meeting, encourage employees to get off the bus, train or tram a few stops earlier, to incorporate walking into the daily routine.”
For more information and how to get involved in Diabetes Australia Walk to Work Day, please visit walk.com.au and for more information about Move Spring visit movespring.com
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Media Enquires.
About Employsure.
Employsure is Australia and New Zealand’s leading outsourced HR solution for over 25,000 small and medium sized businesses; providing customised expert advice, documentation, and protection to manage their workplace with confidence. For more information on Employsure’s employment relations and health and safety solutions visit www.employsure.com.au
