One of the biggest threats to any company is low employee morale, happiness, and productivity. Consider, according to statistics from Good.co, 70% of American workers are unhappy with and disengaged from their jobs. Disengaged employees cost American companies as much as $550 billion every year in lost productivity. Further, since unhappy employees are much more likely to leave their companies, businesses with unhappy workers see incredible turnover costs. Clearly, making sure your employees are engaged and happy can have incredibly beneficial effects on your company. Using office catering, you can gain the happiness advantage in your office and turn things around.
What is the Happiness Advantage?
The happiness advantage is a concept pioneered by Shawn Achor, an expert in human behavior who has spent time teaching and researching this concept at Harvard University. As he explains it for an article for Psychology Today, happier people make for more productive employees. In fact, according to statistics from Forbes, happy employees are 37% more productive than their unhappy counterparts. They also outperform their disengaged counterparts by 30% as far as the costs of healthcare, energy levels, and turnover rates are concerned.
Can Office Catering Companies Actually Improve Happiness?
One of the best ways to improve office morale and gain the happiness advantage is with food. As studies from MindFlash.com and statistics from Business Insider show, eating certain types of food, such as those offered by corporate catering services, leads to higher sleep quality, energy levels, happiness, and productivity. Here are just three of the most common types of food food catering services offer to help improve their clients’ happiness and productivity.
- Nuts and Dark Chocolate
- Fresh Fruits
- Eggs Prepared with Healthy Fats
Nuts and dark chocolate-rich foods are excellent sources of vitamin E and flavonols, both of which are known to be powerful antioxidants. These blood-purifying vitamins are known to protect cognitive function and improve the amount of oxygen that reaches the brain. In other words, they improve the way we process information and make us more productive in turn. Chocolate also causes the release of serotonin, a neurotransmitter known for causing feelings of relaxation and happiness.
Fresh fruits, whether it’s citrus, berries, or bananas, are well-known for their ability to give us a well needed boost of energy and productivity. Fresh berries, for example, are chock-full of antioxidants that improve memory and motor coordination. Bananas are known to contain 25 grams of sugar, the perfect amount for promoting high-end brain function.
Eggs have long been touted as a powerful food for energy and productivity. Containing a B vitamin called choline, eggs can enhance both our memory and reaction time. However, if made with so-called “heavy fats,” like butter, the effects can be canceled out. Cooking with heart-healthy fats, like olive oil, can improve the benefits gained from eggs.
Office catering services offer their clients these high-quality foods and many others that improve energy and provide invigorating vitamins that go a long way in improving employee happiness and productivity. If you’re tired of your business suffering from a disengagement crisis, give your employees a delicious way to be happier and more productive. Helpful links.