Ipswich employees take part in ‘Live Well’ healthy lifestyles awareness week

Employees at a call centre in Ipswich donned their best Lycra on Wednesday as they took part in their own ‘Wear Your Sports Gear to Work Day’.

The event at Call Connection was part of the organisation’s ‘Live Well Week’, where they encouraged their staff members to make a healthy lifestyle change for a period of at least 30 days. ‘Wear Your Sports Gear to Work Day’ saw employees take part in sports-based competitions and have a go on gym equipment on the office floor.

As part of the awareness drive, Community Health Coaches from Live Well Suffolk were on hand throughout the week, delivering sessions on various healthy lifestyle topics to the Call Connection staff. Topics included stop smoking, alcohol awareness, physical activity, energy drinks/drinking more water and healthy eating.

Caroline Woodward is one of Live Well Suffolk’s health coaches who supported Call Connection’s Live Well week. She said: “We love the idea of a healthy lifestyles week – encouraging a healthy workforce will improve their general wellbeing which will in turn increase productivity. Even before we started eight of the Call Connection employees pledged to give up smoking and we’ll be going in every week for eight weeks to support them on their quit journey.”

Graeme Kalbraier, Managing Director of Call Connection, added: “We wanted to do something to motivate our call centre agents and because it’s January, lots of our staff are talking about wanting to improve their health. We decided that our first event would focus on healthy lifestyles where we will encourage staff to commit to a 30 day challenge to stop smoking, give up alcohol, eat healthier or do more physical activity. Whatever we do at Call Connection we like to make it fun too.”

Live Well Suffolk will be revisiting the Call Connection staff next month to see how they get on with their 30 day challenges. They are also encouraging other employers in the county to arrange similar awareness events aimed at improving the health and wellbeing of their workforce.

As the healthy lifestyles service for the county, Live Well Suffolk is available to support local employers and can offer practical support and advice on stopping smoking, being more active and healthy eating. Call them on 01473 229292 to see how they could encourage your staff to make some healthy lifestyle changes.