There has been a massive increase in digital technology and wearable devices over the last decade and many of us are striving to reach that daily ten thousand step goal, even if this means doing laps around our bedroom just before bedtime. The buzz of acknowledgement when we reach our target goal is like getting a pat on the back from our very own 24/7 personal trainer and the sense of pride we feel before we rest up for the night is indeed very satisfying.

These little prompts and notifications really do help us to stay motivated and these days these same technologies can really help us set and achieve goals across a wide range of areas and activities, helping us more easily monitor our healthy behaviours over time.

This digital health technology boom now includes apps and online platforms providing interactive tools and information on wellbeing guidance, mood tracking and practical advice across a multitude of wellbeing areas including Life Satisfaction, Physical Health, Emotional Wellbeing and Social Support. POWR is one of these innovate platforms, leading the way and contributing to the wellbeing needs of employees across Europe, the US, Australia and the UK.

Over the last 3 years, Wrkit, the company behind digital wellbeing platform, have been developing POWR which has grown and evolved in response to the ever-changing landscape of wellbeing. The wellbeing of employees, ease of access to information, and effectiveness of online self-help tools are at the forefront of everything that POWR strives to provide. The user-friendly and interactive nature of the platform ensures that support is available at the click of a button and provides instant advice and access to hundreds of behaviour change plans, that have been created by a team of psychologists and health experts to specifically meet the needs of each employee, in a personalised way. These plans help improve wellbeing based on Self Awareness, Goal-Setting and ongoing Self-Monitoring and gives individuals the chance to take an active part in improving their overall health and wellbeing. Designed to recreate a professional health consultation experience, with a variety of ongoing supports.

Companies have always faced the challenge of effectively supporting employees to improve their levels of health and wellbeing and these challenges have increased significantly in recent times, considering the amount of employees now working from home. Research shows that the promotion of employee wellbeing in the workplace has many long-term benefits, not only for employees but also for the overall health of the organisation. From an employer’s point of view, it can be hard to monitor the mood of staff and to check in with team members who are away from the office, as they don’t have the same opportunities for casual chats or to notice visual signs of how colleagues are. The pandemic has certainly highlighted the need to be proactively supporting employee health and companies know that it is not easy to motivate their staff to engage in daily self-care and invest in on their wellbeing at work, however recent engagement statistics for POWR are showing that this can be achieved!

Within POWR employees are given the opportunity to not only track their mood every day but are encouraged to engage in the behaviour change plans which are specifically created to improve mood and wellbeing. These plans provide people with the skills to ‘Understand Worry’, to manage ‘Feeling Overwhelmed’ and ways to overcome being ‘Stuck in a Rut’, common stressors seen in the everyday lives of many employees during the pandemic.

The ‘Breathe’ and ‘Listen’ exercises within the POWR platform are particularly popular among employees across the globe according to our engagement statistics. Medical research shows that taking just a few minutes out of your busy work day to focus on your breathing, activates the parasympathetic nervous system which has been proven to significantly reduce stress levels! Employees can then go back and log their wellbeing after the completion of these exercises or having completed a plan and figure out which coping strategies and skills work best for them. POWR also provides short informative blogs and videos which include feel-good, educational pieces on a wide range of health and wellbeing topics, providing employees with the opportunity to learn useful ongoing health strategies.

Employee wellbeing is of the utmost importance during the ongoing challenges of a pandemic and as we spend one third of our adult life at work, POWR is an effective tool to help make it somewhere employees can thrive.