Why is workplace wellbeing worse than ever?
On 27th February 2025, Fruitful Insights and The Chalfont Project hosted a seminar at the prestigious London Mathematical Society, for senior professionals from the Wellbeing / Occupational Health / Culture & Development worlds, to discuss the challenges associated with deteriorating workplace wellbeing.
We covered a lot of ground, so here’s a recap:
First things first, our speakers, Mike Tyler, Chairman and Co-Founder of Fruitful Insights, and Dr Leandro Herrero, Chief Organisational Architect & Founder of The Chalfont Project. They couldn’t be more different! But at the same time aligned.
Our rationale for coming together? For workplace wellbeing to get better, we need to have a deeper understanding of what’s causing the problems in order to make meaningful changes.
Key takeaways:
Mike: “Absence is at an all-time high and productivity remains flatlined. Wellbeing strategy should not be about fixing defects, then putting people back into the environment that created the problem in the first place.”
It’s widely understood – and evidenced – that happy employees are more productive employees. But this is all too often based on subjective measures (satisfaction and engagement scores), with little to no understanding of the underlying drivers.
“The key reason wellbeing is getting worse is that business leaders don’t understand the organisational issues that are impacting the wellbeing of their employees,” commented Mike.
Far too many organisations still insist on looking sideways at what their competitors are offering in terms of benefits, instead of really understanding the issues and behaviours in the business that need to be addressed in order to improve wellbeing.
Attendees at the event were offered a complimentary Wellbeing Maturity Index (WMI) report, bespoke to their organisation. This was developed by Fruitful Insights to help quantify the impact of wellbeing on workforce productivity. Importantly, it helps organisations consider the strategic drivers of wellbeing including; strategic intent and leadership commitment, wellbeing services and engagement etc.
“The results of the WMI often indicate that leaders lack strategic intent with respect to workplace wellbeing. The data suggests they’re just throwing things at people in the hope that they solve the wellbeing problem. But as we all know, you can’t out-yoga a bad manager!” added Mike.
Leandro: “Imagine 300 people in your organisation this afternoon asking: ‘can I help you?’ What kind of culture is that? And would you like to be a part of it?”
Leandro challenged us to consider what a “culture of wellbeing” means to us; what would we like that to look and feel like in our organisations. A seemingly simple question but, as became quickly evident, not one that is easy to answer.
Responses ranged from “collaborative” and “allowing people to be their authentic selves” to “feeling able to speak up”. All sensible responses. And all things that arguably cut across everything ‘people’ related in organisations – employee experience and engagement, DEI, reward and benefits, health & safety, occupational health. And, of course, wellbeing. Everything is considered – and ‘fixed’ – in isolation. Consequently, no large-scale improvement is ever seen.
“The first question should be, how do we build a culture of wellbeing? As opposed to how do we fix the problems,” said Leandro. “In the process of building, we have to fix things. But the worry is that you do all the fixing without thinking big picture – what are you aiming for? Everyone’s too busy just restocking the supermarket shelves to think about building something new.
“Culture is volume. Culture is scale. A pile of quick wins is important, but it’s not culture change. Behaviours are the only scalable currency in organisations – not communication, training or coaching.
“Behaviours, spread peer-to-peer, are twice as powerful as the leadership at the top when it comes to creation of culture.”
More about The Chalfont Project:
Dr. Leandro Herrero is a psychiatrist, author, and organizational architect leading The Chalfont Project, an international team of consultants transforming organizations worldwide.
Known for pioneering Viral Change™, he bridges behavioural science with hands-on strategies to create lasting, real-world impact.
Dr. Herrero has authored several influential books on mobilizing change, including Viral Change™, Homo Imitans, and The Flipping Point.
His work has consistently shaped the landscape of leadership and organizational dynamics across sectors.
https://thechalfontproject.com
More about Fruitful Insights:
Fruitful Insights was established in 2022 by employee benefits industry veteran and key opinion leader Mike Tyler, together with digital health specialist June Dawson.
Feeling he had “unfinished business” with workplace wellbeing, Mike completed the MSc in Workplace Health at University of Nottingham and is continuing his doctoral research.
Fruitful Insights’ platform and algorithms were designed by Mike and June, to help empower business leaders to better understand the drivers of impaired wellbeing and productivity within their organisations. And the factors that underpin those losses.
Crucially, they utilise data from both the individual organisation – in terms of absence, presenteeism and attrition – and from its employees, who receive their own personal wellbeing assessment and report.