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A quick summary:
Team Heka hit the ground running this year with a month packed full of live events, exciting announcements, and new partnerships.
Keep reading for a full update on our highlights of the month and a sneak peek of what’s in store for February.
With the new year, came a new lockdown
The tightened restrictions understandably caused mixed feelings of anxiety and uncertainty amongst our employees.
To support our team through these challenging times we decided to put some additional wellbeing initiatives in place, including:
📲 Encouraging people to have meetings on the phone so they can have a break from staring at their screen whilst they stretch their legs and get some fresh air.
🌤️ Hosting Wellbeing Wednesdays - Every other week we finish work earlier on Wednesdays, allowing the team to take some time for their wellbeing. People have been taking this time to go for a walk while it's still light outside and to try new Heka classes.
📚 Giving people space once a month to socialise and discuss non-work related topics by hosting an optional book club.
We hosted a Live Webinar - Lifting the veil of silence on domestic abuse
Last week Heka's co-founder Steph was joined by Head of Wellbeing at Healingclouds Ashley Lourens and experienced therapist Kim Barden to address a huge social and mental health problem: domestic abuse.
The panel discussed how to recognise the signs of domestic abuse, how to keep safe (mentally & physically) in an abusive relationship, the steps to take if you are thinking of leaving an abusive relationship, and how to support someone you know going through domestic abuse.
The more we talk about issues such as domestic abuse, the more awareness we will build, and the less stigma we will experience, making it easier to take action to prevent harm to people suffering at the hands of this cruel behaviour.
If you need help or advice concerning this topic please visit: https://www.refuge.org.uk or ring their helpline: 0808 2000 247
We welcomed new customers
So far this year we’ve already been lucky enough to secure several new partnerships. Although these companies vary in size, industry and location, they're all nurturing human-focused cultures by prioritising their employees health and embracing the importance of maintaining a healthy work-life balance.
A few of these companies include:
🔍 Adzuna - The job search engine used by tens of millions of visitors per month
📝 Jameson Legal - Multi-award-winning legal recruitment company
💡 With - multi award-winning, international PR & marketing agency
🚲 Buzzbike - Urban cycle scheme & technology business
💻 Redsetter - PR & marketing agency
And new partners!
As well as new customers, we’ve continued to bring on exciting new experiences and products to the Heka platform for our users to enjoy, including:
🎶 On:song - On:song run virtual choirs and vocal workshops for businesses worldwide, on a mission to improve mental health and wellbeing and to increase cultural opportunity.
🍎 1-1 nutritional consultations with qualified personal trainer and MNU certified nutritionist and experienced personal trainer Hollie Louise.
👨🍳 Live cook-along classes with Michelin star chef Danilo Cortellini. Our users have the oppourtunity to join these intimate and interactive sessions to cook 2 of Danilo’s signature vegetarian recipes.
With new more members joining Heka every month, we’re working hard to further diversify our wellbeing offering by adding new providers to the platform which brings us to our next announcement…
Our team’s growing
This month we've welcomed Harry and Luke to our team of fitness-maniacs, pottery-lovers, environmental-warriors, creatives, perfectionists, brothers, daughters...humans.
Harry joined us at the start of the month as our new Provider Development Representative to help our amazing Provider Manager Ryan expand our Heka experiences portfolio for our users to enjoy, and yesterday we welcomed the wonderful Luke to the team as our new Head of Sales.
Starting a new job can be challenging at the best of times, let alone mid-pandemic whilst we’re all working remotely. A few things we do to support new employee's when they join include:
- Making sure they have all the equipment they need. We've sent everything out from monitors, to desks, to essential oils 🧘
- Setting up introduction calls for each department and asking everyone to attend. This gives team members the chance to introduce themselves, their role, and offer their support.
- Maintaining biweekly socials to keep the team connected and encourage non-work-related conversations.
We brought you 2 new episodes of our Wellness Warriors series
Continuing from last year, this month we have released 2 new episodes of our Wellness Warriors at Work series where we champion human-focused leaders and feature wellness warriors supporting inclusion, wellbeing, and employee empowerment at the workplace.
At the start of the month we had a chat with Healing Cloud’s CEO and Founder Asim Amin and their Head of Wellbeing Ashley Lourens about how Healing Clouds is making mental health more accessible and affordable.
Last week we also interviewed Jennifer Mowat, the Managing Director of public relations and communications agency Babel PR. After recently winning the Best Culture category of the European Agency Awards, we were keen to learn more about the practices Jenny and her team have put in place to create the ultimate human-focused culture.
Feel free to check out both of the interviews in full here.
Coming up…
Not sure which benefits your employees will enjoy this year? Need to boost morale and motivation ASAP but don't know how to? Struggling with nurturing workplace culture and making each of your employees feel valued?
We'll be discussing all of this and more in our upcoming digital roundtable event next week.
Designed for employers, entrepreneurs, HR managers, and anyone committed to creating a wellness-focused culture at the workplace, this roundtable will provide insights to adapt to the age of hybrid work.
Register for free here and join us on the 3rd of February at 8:30am.
