Moorhouse

Moorhouse shows that size doesn't matter when it comes to staff health and wellbeing

“At Moorhouse we wanted to seek out best practice and demonstrate our commitment to a healthy and happy workplace and to the ongoing health and wellbeing of our staff. We felt the London Healthy Workplace Charter provided us with the right framework to work with to improve our organisation. Moorhouse is now the proud owner of a Commitment-level award!

The London Healthy Workplace Charter is an accreditation endorsed by the Mayor of London that provides businesses with a framework to benchmark health and wellbeing against, with ascending levels of award to aim for.

Below are a couple of the key initiatives we have implemented that supported our successful application.

Mental Health Framework and First Aiders

Mental Health is an integral part of wellbeing as it is such a prominent part of today’s working world.  We set up a Mental Health team and worked with Mental Health First Aid England  (MHFAE), which has significantly increased mental health awareness within Moorhouse. Clear support and escalation routes were put in place via a four-step framework devised by staff. The four key steps are; ‘Awareness’, ‘Prevention’, ‘Intervention’ and ‘Protection’. This framework acts as a guide to staff and signposts them to the right sources should they encounter mental illness in themselves or others. In addition, a number of staff across our ranks have attended MHFA training, providing staff with an internal point of contact if they want to reach out to talk through any issues.

Wellbeing Escape

Moorhouse facilitates quarterly all staff conferences known as ‘Escapes’. These take place over two days and provide staff with a chance to hear business updates, engage with each other, socialise and relax. The most recent Autumn Escape was fully dedicated to wellbeing, and explored topical issues such as mental health and resilience. Staff heard from guest speakers in the health sector and in some cases their colleagues, who opted to share their personal experiences of mental health with the whole firm.  In addition, Moorhouse had its own Sports Day, bake sale and desk yoga session.  The Health and Wellbeing Escape was an important step in our company approach to encouraging Wellbeing, ensuring time was dedicated to this important subject and embedded as an integral part of our culture.

What Next?

For continued improvement, Moorhouse will be aiming for the next level of the London Healthy Workplace Charter in 2018. Senior leadership commitment to improving wellbeing is a key enabler of this journey. To ensure we are on the right track, we have developed a Wellbeing Action Plan based on the feedback we received in Commitment level. We will also be working closely with our assigned buddy to ensure alignment.”

The City of London Corporation provides support to local businesses looking to take part in the London Healthy Workplace Charter. E-mail our London Healthy Workplace Charter lead here.