How To Encourage Healthy Habits At Your Small Business
A recent study out of Brigham Young University found that workers who maintain a nutritious and balanced diet are 25 percent more productive than those who do not. As such, small business owners operating in a hyper-competitive market like Los Angeles have significant incentive to influence their teams to eat healthy. Here are a few tips on how to make healthy eating habits a core value of your company's culture.
Bringing a Nutritionist to Discuss Healthy Eating Strategies
One effective way to improve eating habits in your company is to bring in a nutritionist to discuss healthy eating strategies with your team. More often than not, people don't eat poorly on purpose. They maintain carbohydrate-heavy diets that they established in their teenage years and now resist changing in fear of being trapped in a state of perpetual hunger A nutritionist could outline different kinds of lean protein and vegetable-based diets that will help your staff lose weight and maintain a consistent energy level while also satisfying their food cravings.
Make Healthy Snacks Available
Due to things like sagging energy, boredom and hunger, many of us search for a boost in the form of a midday snack. Unfortunately, the snacks workers have available to them are things like unhealthy foods like cookies, candy and pastries. While they may provide a temporary sugar rush, making junk food a dietary staple will increase your employees' risk factor for contracting productivity-killing and health insurance-premium raising illnesses like obesity, diabetes and hypertension. To address this problem, you should stock your breakroom with healthy snacks like fresh fruits and vegetables, low-fat yogurt, nuts and plenty of ice cold water. Your workers and your bottom line will thank you.
Lead Your Team in On-Site Exercises
Lastly, another great way to instill healthier eating habits in your staff is to lead them in doing some on-site exercises. Things as simple as starting the day with some simple yoga poses, organizing a lunch hour walk around the campus or turning an empty office into a workout space can have a meaningful impact on your workers' eating habits. The reason being, in many cases, people develop poor eating habits as a reaction to stress. When our bloodstream becomes inundated with stress hormones, we seek out fatty and sugary comfort foods. Adding regular exercise to your employees' daily schedule will help them better process their stress and help them move away from seeking unhealthy foods as a coping mechanism.
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For more tips and inspiration for small business owners,
visit CBS Small Business Pulse Los Angeles.
