"Most people think we’re doing OK. I think."

If 'you can’t change what you don’t measure', but you don’t know how to measure something, will it ever change?

Without a clear definition of what something is (and what it isn’t), metrics that are correctly administered and that provide reliable and valid results, the best you can hope for is, “most people think we’re doing OK. I think.”

There are lots of times where you don’t need quantifiable, objective data, where qualitative feedback is enough. For example, I’ve never completed a survey before, during or after riding a roller-coaster, but any employee at the exit gate could tell by the smile on my face how much I loved it.

When applied to the workplace, though, here's what happens when you attempt a wellbeing initiative without any quantitative measurement:

• leaders realize that staff who are engaged, included, and respected are more productive in their work

• it’s agreed that they should “do wellbeing”

• someone with lots of energy but no training is tasked with “doing the wellbeing”

• three months later, leadership asks, “did the wellbeing stuff work?”

• the previously-energetic-but-now-exhausted staff member says, “most people think we’re doing OK. I think.”

Measuring wellbeing is tricky but doable. It all comes down to your definition and your metrics. In the well at work (w@w) model, wellbeing at work is when your workplace experience is positive, and you have the desire, ability, and support to attain your goals and thrive in your career. Wellbeing is a cumulative result of high levels on the following five components:

• Health

• Finance

• Career

• Connection

• Purpose

At w@w, the questions used to measure each of these five components are based on a combination of published research, best practices, and personal experience of developing and implementing wellbeing metrics in organizations of all sizes and sectors.

The report generated by these metrics doesn’t only allow leaders to establish a baseline for future comparisons, identify exactly where staff are excelling or need support, or inform future engagement and wellbeing strategies – it empowers leaders to use a response other than, “most people think we’re doing OK. I think.”