Confession: I don’t move enough while I work. And it seems I’m not alone – even the two notoriously active and energetic managing directors I interview for this article believe they’re guilty of being a little too sedentary on some of their working days.
Who tends to be glued to their seats more – senior or junior staff? What can help managers and all staff to be more active in their workplaces? I investigate good and bad working habits in honour of the Posturite Move More in ’24 healthy working campaign.
“When I work from home, I don't have far to go to brew up.”
Jo Ritzema’s busy role as Managing Director of Cumbria-based WCF Ltd means managing their 12 different businesses with 400 employees within retail, distribution and leisure at nearly 40 different UK locations.
Is Jo (above) sedentary in the office? “No, I tend to be on my feet and moving around the various different departments and chatting to people. We’re very sociable at WCF! I’m up and down the stairs to find colleagues, look at products and get a drink.” There’s no shortage of movement when Jo is on the road every week visiting WCF’s businesses either.
It’s the homeworking environment which she says prompts less movement. Jo doesn’t work from home very often; “I'm only working from home when I absolutely need to get my head down”. But she says she can go three or even four hours without moving from sitting at her desk when she’s absorbed in a task. Yikes, the recommendation is to move every 30-60 minutes while working!
Jo is up with the larks, walking in the countryside before and after work, and enjoying super-active weekends out and about, but it could benefit her health and wellbeing to also try to change her postures and sit a little less when working from home.
“I use the Pomodoro technique”
Chris Jones, Managing Director of Posturite (pictured below centre), finds that the Pomodoro technique works really effectively for him, “both from a productivity point of view and to ‘force’ the brakes on” to encourage taking healthy microbreaks from his tasks.
“So you split your day into 25 minute blocks with a 5 or a 10 minute break in between each block. You change your posture and move. The principle behind it is that most people can't really concentrate on a task for more than about 25 minutes solid before their productivity dips.” Interesting. Some people literally use an alarm to carry out the Pomodoro technique (tomato-shaped Pomodoro alarms are available!) or an app, or a simple online tracker with notifications.
Why worry about how much you move when you work anyway?
A key reason to move while you work is to help prevent back pain and other work-related musculoskeletal issues. And as the Move More In ’24 campaign points out, sedentary working can bring lower concentration, reduced productivity, lack of morale and more absenteeism.
Are senior staff worse or better at moving during the working day than junior staff?
“I have to say, probably worse” Jo Ritzema tells me.
“As a senior leader, your diary sometimes isn't your own because obviously you've got to react to what other people need from you. You can end up with back-to-back meetings and so on.”
Posturite ergonomist Katharine Metters is certainly not a fan of back-to-back meetings either – but does want to make a case for having the confidence to move during meetings too! Try not to be shy about stretching, rolling your shoulders or standing up next time you’re on a video call.
“I tend to stand at my electric sit-stand desk if I've got a series of back-to-back Teams meetings” Chris Jones adds. “This allows me to stay focused and engaged. When you're sitting for too long and just talking, that's when fatigue can set in.”
On the plus side, Jo’s senior team are great at holding walking meetings. “We lead from the front on that and we talk about them on our intranet to try and encourage more people to try walking meetings. It’s possible that staff not in the senior team are more self-conscious about saying ‘Right, we're off on a walk to put the world to rights!’ during work hours.”
“I think the flow of ideas is much better in a walking meeting” Jo says. “Also it's obviously great if you need to chat confidentially. Walking side by side is brilliant for difficult conversations, because otherwise being sat across the desk is quite confrontational. And best of all, you find out things about your colleague’s personal life in a walking meeting that you wouldn’t have inside an office. So I think there's an intimacy to them.”
Chris doesn’t think you can generalise about whether it’s senior or junior staff who are worse at not moving. “At Posturite, we all know the importance of moving for wellbeing and it's not just because we've seen the science and the evidence, it's what we're about. So I think active working is something that we do more and encourage more than other organisations. But nobody is perfect!”
“At 5.45am, I head out to the shed and start work”
There’s no one else awake in his household of seven people when Chris Jones starts work. “It’s peaceful and at that early hour you can actually do stuff that you know is not going to come back to you!”
In contrast to Jo, Chris reckons that he moves more when he’s working from home. “I probably do move a fair amount at home. It's my own space and so getting up and moving is perhaps more natural.”
Chris then walks his dog at about 7:30am for an hour, does some more work and then likes to arrive at Posturite’s Sussex HQ mid-morning. As a very sociable guy, he’s not wanting to stay isolated and the office environment is very important to him for connecting with colleagues.
Bringing people into the office
“We’re currently redesigning our offices at Posturite and I've been looking at different ways of not just giving people the opportunity for movement and health and wellbeing activities, but also trying to look at what those incentives are for bringing people into the office. Because the office is a very important workspace” says Chris Jones. The free Pilates classes for staff in the current office have been outstandingly popular.
The new office design will encourage collaboration, movement and social interaction which will be good for the people and good for business. Every floor will have both private and open plan collaboration spaces, so there will be the opportunity to break out very easily. Posturite is also introducing ‘no lunch at desks’ so that people move to the social eating area.
Inspiring work teams to get physically active for fun and fitness
Anyone fancy cycling 785km from Northumberland to Sussex? Chris is fresh from the triumph of his amazing Pedal For Stroke with four Posturite colleagues in aid of the Stroke Association and loves how sport and exercise can bring work teams together. He’s taking #MoveMoreIn24 to the extreme! If you’re looking for ways to enhance employee health and wellbeing, a charity challenge is perfect. Make it inclusive by involving people in different ways to suit fitness levels, disabilities, ages and locations – and have fun.
Jo from WCF Ltd agrees and is currently getting stuck into a Virtual Coast to Coast 172 mile walk, run or swim in aid of the Cumbria Community Foundation.
“I have discovered in the last week just how competitive my senior colleagues are - it's absolutely hilarious! We are logging our miles and competing on the leaderboard to get ahead.” She drove about 350 miles for work yesterday and still managed to do five miles walking because she arrived early to a meeting. “Usually I would have just sat in the car and done emails – but because of this challenge I took the opportunity to go for a walk and felt much better for it.”
Each of the WCF businesses has a ‘Better Health At Work’ Champion and they encourage staff to get moving. They did a skipping challenge with lots of funny videos of staff skipping in various places - at home, in the warehouse, on their campsites. And a Strava lunchtime stroll group has been created with team members posting photos on the intranet of where they’ve been - in all weathers.
What do you think are your best and worst working habits?
Take into account that Chris Jones (above) plays hockey, goes to the gym and competes in HYROX – as well as all that crazy cycling – when you read his evaluation of any small failings in looking after his health:
“I think I can get absorbed and not look after myself quite easily. I do get stuck into something and I know that I need to stop and go and get a drink or go to the bathroom - but then an hour can go by quite easily and I haven’t done it. It's like when you're on the bike, once you've become thirsty or hungry, it's actually often too late and so you need to drink before you're thirsty.”
Does he ever get back pain?
“Yes, and it’s most commonly caused by doing even ten minutes’ work on a train or a plane on a laptop, without a proper ergonomic setup!”
Talking of back pain, on my recommendation Jo is going to try a laptop stand (like the one pictured below) because she thinks her occasional back ache is caused by her posture working on her laptop at home without something to raise the screen up.
I asked Jo what she’s proud of doing for her wellbeing?
“I'm pretty good at stress management and separating my home and work lives. I've had lots of good training around compartmentalising and I feel very strongly that you've got to be your best to give your best self.
We have this joke in our company that nobody is allowed to give me any bad news on a Friday! I try to protect my weekends. Whereas I'm never not on call because for many of our businesses, the weekend is their busiest time, but psychologically I switch off from the things that I need to do at a weekend.
My weekends are about fresh air and exercise bursts. It's good for the soul, I just love being outdoors.”
Move More in ‘24
Chris Jones is excited about the opportunity of Move More In ’24 to reach ‘more’ people with the concept of active working. If you want to use ergonomic kit to enhance active working – great – but the movement itself is the key:
- You might have a sit-stand desk, but you need to stand at it.
- You might have a nice chair, but you do need to move in it.
- You might be working, but you need to have breaks and change your postures.
As these dynamic Managing Directors Jo and Chris bound off into the distance, surreptitiously checking their step counts, I’d like to thank them for sharing their approaches to good wellbeing at work, and their honesty in sharing aspects which could still be improved.
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