The holidays can be stressful. Expectations are high, time is short and financial strain is real. Good leaders see this season as a moment to pave a pathway for employees to embrace the joys of the season without sacrificing personal wellness. Here are three strategies for promoting a healthy, positive workplace through the holidays and well into the new year.

Get to Know Your Employees

The holidays tend to exacerbate whatever stresses employees are facing. So, get to know each human on your team, and find out where they’re stuck. Whether learning and development (L&D) leaders use pulse surveys, town halls, in-depth assessments or other feedback mechanisms, tracking holiday-hued workplace morale is vital to identifying areas for improvement. Once you know if your team is feeling overwhelmed, lethargic, financially strapped, stuck on their devices too much, over-scheduled or otherwise off-kilter, you can administer learning strategies in an effective and targeted way. In other words, by knowing the specifics, leadership can come up with thoughtful training initiatives to help employees overcome those obstacles.

Of course, it doesn’t hurt to have informal check ins as well. Making connections with employees and showing that leadership genuinely cares is an important first step to relieving holiday stress.

Devise a Wellness Plan

Once you know what struggles are upping the holiday stress for your team, figure out where leadership can make the biggest impact and start there. That holiday window is intense but short, so find a focus or two — and keep it fun.

Nurture healthy holidays.

If all the holiday runaround and festive indulgences are causing employees to stress out about health and well-being, consider scheduling a series of wellness inspired, lunch and learns. By bringing nutrition, fitness, meditation or even financial experts into the workplace, L&D leaders can help team members develop holistic, stress-reducing wellness. An added bonus, mandatory lunch breaks also give everyone important time to pause and step away from their desks. By training employees on methods to reduce stress and promote wellness while at work, they can feel prepared to go into the new year with a new mind and a newfound motivation.

Alleviate time constraints.

The oh-so-busy holidays can often cause employees to feel overwhelmed. Given that L&D leaders are instrumental in finding ways to nurture time management skills skills year-round, the festive season can make this more challenging. Beyond training and incentives, consider countering stress by implementing flexible work schedule options over the holidays. Employees could buckle down for four, ten hour days, rather than the traditional nine-to-five, five day, work week. Or make a hybrid schedule an option. Or get creative with offering remote training opportunities. Work with your team to devise the most efficient schedule that allows for time with family and friends — and doesn’t sacrifice productivity.  

Think outside the office walls.

Get innovative with your wellness enhancing tactics. Learning opportunities can be particularly impactful when they come from a respected, knowledgeable outsider. For example, coaches are great sounding boards and advisors for employees.  Look to small businesses near you for potential speaking candidates — as well as experts from afar. Invite a yoga instructor into the office for some pointers on easy, at-the-desk stretches and breathing exercises. Or enlist a coach to deliver bite-sized tips on anything from goal setting to time management. In other words, make wellness approachable.

Ease financial stress.

Inflation isn’t making the holidays any less expensive this year. If financial strain is the root cause for stress, offer budget training and learning opportunities on gaining financial freedom. Consider financial wellness as a discussion topic for lunch-and-learn speakers.

Inspire a Positive Mindset

Wellness starts with a great mindset, and everything else stems from there. The season of gratitude and giving is a perfect opportunity to instill a genuine sense of care in the workplace — whether via wise words from lunch-and-learn speakers or simply leading by example. By putting employees first and modeling a spirit of caring, L&D leaders can create the first step on a wellness path. At the end of the day, inspiring an attitude adjustment far outweighs any single wellness tool or strategy.

Promoting wellness in the workplace during the holidays — or any time of year — comes down to three key components: create a culture where care for employees is genuine; deliver tools to employees that are tailored to helping them overcome their biggest sources of stress; and nurture a positive attitude through it all.