These days, companies measure almost everything. Sales, margins, staff turnover, productivity, customer acquisition cost, average customer lifetime, time-to-hire and a long list of others. Every last euro seems destined to become a metric. It is the far-from-romantic dictatorship of the KPI.
However, the picture changes considerably when it comes to understanding employees’ health and wellbeing with any precision.
Workplace wellbeing: what we know about what happens before sick leave
We know how many people are on sick leave, how long an absence lasts, how the workplace climate is evolving or how much absenteeism eats into the bottom line. But the clues about what happens beforehand tend to be scarcer: when stress begins, which musculoskeletal problems recur day after day, which habits are failing, which resources staff actually use to ease each problem, or which programmes serve a purpose and which end up gathering digital dust.
The EU-OSHA’s ESENER 2024 European survey places prolonged sitting, repetitive movements and psychosocial risks among the relevant issues for safety and health at work. These are conditions worth understanding and addressing before discomfort gets worse.
The most visible data tends to arrive once the problem already has consequences. And that is where technology can help broaden the view.
What is Health Intelligence?
From the company’s perspective, it is about detecting patterns in aggregated data, identifying needs, understanding which services are used and checking whether the measures proposed achieve anything more than padding out a company’s employee benefits catalogue. All while preserving the privacy and confidentiality of individual care.
And from the employee’s perspective, data is essential to help them make good decisions about the health and wellbeing services available to them. Knowing what to use and how to use it can make the difference between making the most of those resources and only scratching the surface.
This is what we at openhealth by opensalud call Health Intelligence: helping both users and companies to have better data in order to make better decisions.
For example, if aggregated data shows a recurring need for support with back pain, the company can review workstation ergonomics and make physiotherapy easier to access. That way, the measures respond to an identified need and their usefulness can be assessed afterwards.
Do corporate wellbeing programmes work?
For years, corporate wellbeing has largely consisted of offering services that are not always connected to the workforce’s needs: psychological support, nutrition programmes, physiotherapy, exercise, mindfulness, assorted workshops, fruit in the office…
All of them can add value, but an uncomfortable question remains: to what extent are they really improving employees’ health and wellbeing?
To answer it, we need to know which resources are used, whether they are easy to access, how useful people find them and what changes can be seen over time.
We also need to interpret that information. An increase in the use of a service may reflect a greater need, but also improved access or greater confidence in asking for help.
From offering services to making better decisions
That is where the real qualitative shift lies. It is about collecting and analysing data with enough precision to guide the company’s actions and help each employee find the support they need.
That information should also be used to review working conditions. The WHO guidelines on mental health at work include organisational interventions to identify and reduce psychosocial risks. If workload prevents people from taking breaks or makes it hard to rest, that circumstance also needs attention.
The goal is for health and wellbeing policies to become concrete, sustained and measurable improvements. For services to respond to real needs, and for data to help decide what to keep, what to strengthen and what to change.
Because the value of information lies in what we are able to do with it.
Would you like to find out how to apply Health Intelligence in your company? Talk to the opensalud team.