Social Wellness: A Determining Factor For Employee Wellness At Work

Human civilization has thrived through social interactions. It does not do too well when in isolation. As a social animal, achieving and nurturing social wellness is crucial to humankind's wellbeing. Let us then understand about social wellness in detail.

What is Social Wellness?

Social wellness or social wellbeing refers to the development of positive relationships with other people. Our social health is often indicative of our emotional and physical wellbeing. It is a factor of friendship boost and strong social connection whether professional or personal.

One of the hallmarks of social wellness is being inclusive, not exclusive, with our friendship.
- Laurie Buchanan, PhD.

Thus, social interaction is essential for our overall health, so much so that the quality of our social relationships directly impacts our behavioral health, physical health, emotional health, and mortality risk.

These relationships can be friendships, romantic partners, platonic relationships, mentor-student relationships, acquaintances, relationships with neighbors, professional associations, etc.

Read our blog: 7 Ways to Overcome Social Challenges affecting Behavioral Health in the Workplace

Importance of Social Wellness in the Workplace and a factor to Employee Wellness

Now, you might wonder: what is social wellness at the workplace?

It's simply the relationships you have with your co-workers, supervisors, or employees. Apart from this, social wellness at work inculcates the sense of social engagement as a part of positive employee benefits.

Employees' social relationships and social networks impact our overall wellness in the workplace.

Let us understand how.

Photo by Brooke Cagle / Unsplash

When our connections get stronger with time, our stress levels reduce drastically. Our responses to stressful situations improve. With reduced stress and anxiety, our immune system gets strengthened, our endocrine system is healthier, and our heart health improves tremendously.

According to Ashlee Bost, a marriage and family therapist associate at Covenant Health, "...people who do have healthy relationships and good support systems have better overall mood, deal better with stress and actually have increased self-esteem."

Conversely, people who are socially isolated have a higher chance of developing chronic diseases and illnesses.

Poor social wellness may lead to:

• Weak immune system
• Heart diseases
• High blood pressure
• Poor mental health
• Anxiety and depression
• Raised stress hormones

Workplace stress is one of the leading causes of stress among American adults. Workplaces are usually very stressful places but it can be turned into a place of comfort as well.

Hectic deadlines, working shifts, less pay, lack of communication among peers, supervisors, and managers are but a few reasons that might lead to more and more stress in the workplace. This may lead to poor performances and employee burnout.

To combat such situations, we need to have a solid and dependable social network from which we can seek guidance, support, and insight.

Social support from one's connections can be in one of the three ways:

1. Emotional:

In our everyday lives, especially when faced with a challenging situation, we depend on our social relationships to guide us with emotional support. In times of a crisis, emotional support is one of the three ways we gain social support from our social connections.

Read our blog on: Ways to Boost up Emotional Resilience in the Workplace

2. Instrumental:

It is usual and typical to depend on our social connections to help us with something tangible, like money and other resources. This is an instance of showing and providing social support instrumentally.

3. Informational:

The third way of providing and gaining social support from our social circle can be termed as 'informational' social support. Helping our social peers with information and knowledge of any sort falls under this category.

Different Ways to Improve Social Wellness in the Workplace to enhance Employee Engagement

In order to maintain your social wellness, you need to nurture and take care of your relationships in the workplace.

Cultivating social wellness involves engaging oneself in the following activities:

1. Developing and maintaining long-term relationships with employees and co-workers.
2. Having mutual trust and respect for each other.
3. Actively listen to each others' concerns and providing empathetic suggestions when necessary.
4. Supporting your employees and colleagues in times of any crisis.
5. Appreciate your employees and colleagues for a job well done: give them credit where credit is due.
6. Be honest and considerate in your critique of their work.
7. Fight any feelings of envy, and be genuinely happy for your co-workers' successes.
8. Participate in different activities together, e.g., lunch and learn sessions at work, office wellness challenges, being a member of an exercise group, etc.
9. Create healthy boundaries in all your relationships.
10. Healthy employees feel a sense of belonging to the workplace and they leave a positive impact on others as well.

Related: 21 Positive Thinking Ideas For A Workplace To Encourage

Facts and Stats on Social Wellness

Here are some fascinating and important facts and statistics on social wellness:

• The death rate of socially isolated people is two or three times higher than those with healthy social relationships.
• Approximately 20 percent of Americans feel lonely in their free time.
• Close friendships lead to higher levels of immunoglobulin that helps fight respiratory infections and cavities.
• Touching, hugging, and laughing improves health.
• The Harvard Study of Adult Development found that the quality of social relationships mattered more than the quantity.
• According to Mayo Clinic, "Adults with strong social support have a reduced risk of many significant health problems, including depression, high blood pressure and an unhealthy body mass index (BMI)."
• Research by Shawn Achor found that having social connections is a helpful predictor of reduced stress.

Related: 81 Positive Quotes To Improve Your Day At Work

Wrapping Up

"The secret to getting ahead is getting started."

How you feel and perform at your workplace depends significantly on your social wellness. Your social wellness, in turn, depends on the relationships and social connections that you form at work.

Thus, take your time to build a solid social support network that contributes to your emotional wellbeing. A little extra effort in building these relationships will ensure that you have a trusted group of people who look out for you in success as well as in failure.

With the presence of positive relationships that reciprocate your respect, trust, and admiration, your overall wellness, mood, and self-esteem, will witness a significant peak.