Thrive at Work overview

Workplace Wellbeing Award - the health and wellbeing commitment for employers

In partnership with the West Midlands Combined Authority, The Thrive workplace health and wellbeing awards are the West Midlands County standard of good practice and a quality mark for health and wellbeing in work.

The Thrive at Work commitment provides employers with a structured approach to workplace health and wellbeing. It’s a blend of organisational and individual wellbeing elements which are broken down into ‘modules’ such as policy and procedures, mental health, musculoskeletal and promoting healthy lifestyles. The programme is managed online with a bespoke dashboard to monitor progress and upload evidence against the listed criteria in order to gain accreditation of the Thrive Award. 

Organisations work at their own pace to implement the commitment criteria. The Commitment is awarded at different levels, Foundation, Bronze, Silver and Gold. It begins at the Foundation level, data gathering to understand where you’re currently at, progressing to Bronze and Silver, recognising activities and ensuring policies are in place that comply with legislation and address the key workplace risks to employee health and builds to Gold level. Gold level, demonstrating excellence and that the organisation is fully engaged in wellbeing with a range of interventions and support mechanisms in place. The framework recognises that smaller employers may find it challenging to achieve the same level of activity as larger organisations. For smaller organisations meeting the requirements of the Bronze level should not involve significant financial investment and demonstrates excellence for an SME sized business.

Thrive at Work provides an accreditation for organisations who are committed to improving health and wellbeing. Due to our unique funding structure available to all sectors and suitable to those that employ more than 8 employees. Best of all it's free! 

Investing in employee health and wellbeing - Growing healthier, happier workplaces

The awards support employers to improve the health and wellbeing of their staff, engage and communicate with employees more effectively, and help to achieve a range of business and organisational outcomes.

Your employees are your most important and valuable asset, there is a strong business incentive to better supporting your employee’s health and wellbeing needs. A healthier and happier workforce is much more likely to be a productive workforce. Staff who feel that their employers are proactively supporting their physical and mental health feel better valued within an organisation and will be more able to manage any existing conditions with their work. This will improve work rates and reduce absenteeism and presentism in your organisation. The National Institute of Clinical Excellence (NICE) estimates that implementing interventions to promote staff wellbeing could save employers between £130 and £5,020 per participating employee, by reducing absence or illness at work. The award framework helps employers to address issues such as reducing sickness absence costs, improving productivity and staff engagement.

Employers who take an active role in supporting staff by fostering a positive working environment through health and wellbeing initiatives, allows the organisation to thrive. Healthy employees will be more able to effectively engage in their work in a much more sustainable way and will be significantly less likely to need to take sick days.

Organisations that achieve accreditation of the Thrive at Work Commitment receive the Thrive at Work Wellbeing Award. This accreditation sets an organisation apart as an employer of choice when it comes to mental health and wellbeing, whilst also enjoying the benefits of a happier and healthier workforce.

Signing up and getting started

You will need to identify a member of staff from your workforce to become the Workplace Health and Well Lead and gain managerial support to commit to the aims and objectives of the Thrive Commitment. Their role will be to lead and co-ordinate Thrive at Work within the organisation. The Workplace Health and Wellbeing Lead needs to either be able to liaise with and be supported by a member of management or be part of the management structure. This is to ensure that the necessary changes within the organisation are possible.

Additionally, you can add extra users to the portal explained in the below video:

Thrive at Work is accessible to employers and employees via an interactive, mobile-friendly website. There are login areas for employers to create an account, access resources and update progress on the Thrive at Work Commitment.

Thrive at Work is designed in recognition that one size does not fit all and although it specifies criteria and guidelines, and supports and nudges organisations to implement change, it allows flexibility in the way that businesses implement the guidelines and decide how best to allocate resource to meeting the criteria.

The framework provides a clear and easy-to-follow guide, to steps of actions, which we believe all organisations can implement and investing in employee health and wellbeing

You will need to register your interest to the Thrive at Work commitment on the WMCA website.

Register now to join the Thrive at work programme