Mars Global Head of Health and Wellbeing, Monika Misra, will be talking at MAD World on 9th October in London about ‘Healthy high performance in an age of uncertainty’, one of the challenges cited most regularly by our Leaders Club members. As well as her day job, her expertise comes from co-writing the book ‘Healthy High Performance: unlocking business success through employee wellbeing’.
To find out more about MAD World, see the agenda and register, see here. You can also catch Monika on the MAD Leaders Podcast: employee health and wellbeing, workplace culture
We spoke to Monika for a heads up on her Keynote session on 9th October, and her advice for setting your strategy up for success….
Tell me more about your session at MAD World and what you plan to talk about?
We are talking about the importance of taking a comprehensive approach to your Health and Wellbeing strategy. We’ll be discussing how employers should think about it at all levels within an organisation, from engaging individuals to line managers to teams.
Additionally, we’ll be covering what is our messaging at the organisational level regarding Health and Wellbeing, and the importance of taking an evidence based, data informed approach.
Is there anything else you would say is most fundamental to the success of implementing a Health and Wellbeing strategy?
Measure impact and continuously review your strategy and interventions, ask yourself whether what you’re providing is addressing the most important needs of the organisation, and whether they are actually making a difference in supporting business success.
What would you say is most challenging about implementing a health and wellbeing strategy right now?
There is constant scrutiny around funding for all that we invest in, including Health and Wellbeing.
So, of course, we have to bear that in mind and ensure, whatever we do, we are spending in an effective and efficient way.
Whatever the size of your budget, you need to be asking yourself, how can I make the most of it?
And yes, naturally people may question the value of Health and Wellbeing, but as we know, there is plenty of evidence to show the impact of wellbeing, not only on health and wellbeing metrics, but also on business success.
What would be your top tip for engaging senior management. For example, what would be your elevator pitch?
Rather than a pitch, I would ask a question. I would ask “what are your biggest business challenges?”
It’s likely that the answer will include business continuity, business growth or business success. It may be presenteeism. It may be too many people off sick at our factories, and therefore production is impacted.
There may be an issue with engagement or culture or safety or quality incidents. Whatever the answer, we should be able to articulate that health and wellbeing is associated with whatever it is that senior management is struggling with.
What are you most looking forward to about Mad World?
For me, I’m really looking forward to learning from others about what they’re doing, what is actually having an impact (and what isn’t) and what are emerging trends in this space.
It’s also a networking opportunity, which I thoroughly enjoy, as well as an opportunity to understand where others are at. Employers are invariably at different levels of maturity with their health and wellbeing strategies, so there’s always something that we can learn from each other.
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