Health and wellbeing at work

Now in its 23rd year, the CIPD’s Health and wellbeing at work survey, supported by Simplyhealth, provides readers with benchmarking data, information and analysis on current and emerging health and wellbeing practices.

While these findings are based on UK data, the broader trends and implications should be of interest wherever you are based.

Health and wellbeing at work 2023

Watch Rachel Suff, Senior Policy Adviser at the CIPD, discuss the key findings and recommendations of this year's report

This year the research reveals that:

Employee sickness absence is at the highest level we've reported for over a decade

• The average rate of employee absence (7.8 days per employee or 3.4% of working time lost, per year) has risen considerably since we last reported this from data collected before the pandemic in Oct/Nov 2019 (5.8 days per employee).
• Average absence levels remain considerably higher in the public sector (10.6 days per employee) than in other sectors, particularly private sector services (5.8 days), although the upsurge in average levels of absence is observed across all sectors.

Mental ill health and musculoskeletal injuries are two of the top causes of both short-term and long-term absence

• The causes of absence are similar to previous years. Minor illness is most commonly responsible for short-term absence while mental ill health, musculoskeletal injuries, acute medical conditions and stress are the most common causes of long-term absence.
• COVID-19 continues to impact sickness absence – it's the fourth main course of short-term absence and 50% report their organisation has employees who have experienced, or are experiencing, long COVID in the last 12 months.

Stress and mental health require continued focus

Presenteeism and leaveism remain widespread

Line managers need more training and support as more than half of organisations say they take primary responsibility for managing absence

Over half of organisations are now approaching health and wellbeing through a stand-alone strategy

There’s variable support for wellbeing issues through the employee lifecycle

Evaluating the impact of health and wellbeing activity helps to improve outcomes

Explore our case studies on health and wellbeing at work

Employee views on health and wellbeing

This year we have also examined what employees think about health and wellbeing at work using our Good Work Index data.

How employees feel about health and wellbeing at work

• In 2023, employees generally feel positively about their mental and physical health, with over half reporting this to be good or very good.
• Nevertheless, staff feel much more mixed on how work affects both their mental health, with over a quarter reporting a negative impact.
• These negative effects are especially notable for public sector workers, whose experiences at work are more likely to contribute to lower wellbeing than private sector employees.
• Specifically, public sector workers are more likely to feel exhausted and under excessive pressure at work.
• Employees tend not to discuss their health issues with their boss or employer. Only in cases of an injury due to an accident at work, COVID-19 and heart problems have over half of workers done so.
• Despite this, staff feel mildly positive about the climate of wellbeing in their organisations. There is more agreement than disagreement on whether or not they are encouraged to speak about their mental health (51% agree or strongly agree) and are supported when they do so (57% agree or strongly agree).
• Line managers are perceived very positively with regards to their support and treatment of their staff around mental health. This is in contrast with the findings from the survey of people professionals, where a ‘lack of line manager skills and confidence’ is rated as the top challenge for health and wellbeing over the next year (43% of respondents).
• Many employees find their workload to be about right, but more than 31% feel they have too much to do in a normal week.
• Over half of employees (53%) have done their job in the last three months despite not feeling well, up from 46% in 2022.
• Pressure to work despite not feeling well often comes from within (93%), with employees feeling less pressure from their manager or their colleagues.

Health and wellbeing at work 2023 – Views of employees

Simplyhealth is a leading healthcare company, committed to providing affordable healthcare, to support everybody’s everyday healthcare needs. Through our health and dental plans, we look after over two million customers. We aim to support and protect the NHS through the provision of outpatient support to help people live their best lives.

We don’t have shareholders and since 1872 we’ve been led by our purpose of improving access to healthcare, for all in the UK. We are changing the game, investing £60 million in new businesses to accelerate the development of predictive and preventative healthcare services.

At Simplyhealth we know that workplace health and wellbeing services support people to stay healthy while at work and can get them back to work quicker if they are ill. Employers have a vital role to play in supporting the health and wellbeing of their employees and provide access to services through healthcare plans as part of a wider benefits package.

We offer two types of preventive health plan:

• Optimise – health and wellbeing: Our corporate health plan, covering a range of treatments including physio fees, dental check-ups, eye tests, and more. Our online portal provides access to a 24/7 employee assistance programme (EAP) and a 24/7 GP helpline. There are also other benefits that support overall health, like discounts on gym memberships.
• Denplan – dental healthcare: Our dental plans help patients avoid dental problems before they start. They enable patients to easily spread the cost of routine treatments and benefit from check-ups, hygiene visits, restorative treatment, and accidents and emergencies.

PDFs to previous reports can be found below. CIPD members can access earlier reports via the HR and L&D archive database.

Health and wellbeing at work 2022

• Survey report
• Practitioner guide
• Case studies
• The view from employees

Health and wellbeing at work 2021

• Survey report
• How the findings varied by sector: Summary
• Guide: Implications and recommendations for practitioners
• Case studies

Health and wellbeing at work 2020

• Survey report
• Private sector summary
• Public sector summary
• Infographic

Health and wellbeing at work 2019

• Survey report
• Private sector summary
• Public sector summary
• Infographic

Health and wellbeing at work 2018

• Survey report
• Private sector summary
• Public sector summary