Workplace sports and social clubs are a popular feature of many employers’ extra-curricular activities, and an important aspect of their reward package.
- Sports and social clubs help build employee engagement and motivation.
- Clubs can help employers support employees’ emotional and physical wellbeing.
- Clubs are typically created and run by employees, but often funded by employers.
Clubs are typically initiated and run by employees, but they are owned and often funded by employers. Their focus varies greatly between employers, from social clubs including choirs to sports clubs.
Work-life balance
A great appeal of workplace clubs is that they give staff the opportunity to take part in activities they might not otherwise have considered, or have found the time to take up. Ben Willmott, head of public policy at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, says: One of the challenges that a lot of [employees] have, particularly if they are working long hours or have a long commute, is to find ways to balance their work and non-work life. So these types of activities can enable people to, for example, find time to exercise, either at lunch or after work with colleagues who are into the same sports or activities. It is really important to offer [employees] activities during the working week as a stress release, and also for them to have access to creativity and ways of unwinding. Employees are often expected to work outside of office hours and are on call on email and Skype, blurring the divide between work life and home life. If they can fit their hobby into the working week, it leaves more time for family or friends at the weekend.
Engage and motivate
Employers that are apprehensive about the potential impact of social activities on employees’ timekeeping and productivity should consider the fact that sports and social clubs can be used to foster employer-employee relationships. For example, employers can demonstrate support for employees, and consequently engage them, by providing the facilities they require for their clubs, as well as by developing a communications strategy to promote the clubs throughout the organisation. Clubs can also be an effective motivational tool. As well as reducing employees’ stress levels and boosting their overall health and wellbeing, club membership gives staff an opportunity to interact with their peers and feel a valued member of a supportive organisation. It also gives them an extra reason to go in to work, reducing employee absence levels. From an engagement perspective, [clubs can give] the feeling that an employer is interested in an employee’s wellbeing, not just interested in them as a machine that comes to work and goes home again; it is interested in the employee as a whole. Ultimately, the interest, enthusiasm and engagement has to come from the workforce. I think HR can play a role in supporting and occasionally nudging [employees] to decide to run these things.
Duty of care
Employers have a duty of care to ensure staff carry out any necessary risk assessments when setting up a new club and embarking on any associated activities. Clubs for example, are run by staff volunteers who are clear about the rules. Daniel Barnard, HR benefits analyst Manager : We actually make the volunteers work quite hard to ensure that if they’re going abroad, or even for anything in the UK, that they have done the necessary risk assessments, spoken to the right people and that there is a level of insurance and cover.
A published in June 2013 into how to boost productivity found that 52% of HR professionals felt that allowing employees to take gym or exercise breaks during work hours, along with providing healthy food, could make for happier, healthier and ultimately more productive employees. As much as sport, exercise and other social activities are about improving the satisfaction and general happiness of individual employees, they are also about fostering teamwork. At its best, sport is one of the most unifying activities there is; you only have to witness a stadium full of people joining together to cheer on their team to experience it. Similarly, sport and other social activities can be used to cultivate a sense of camaraderie and team spirit, which can be brought back to the workplace, helping to boost morale, productivity and results.