Wellbeing by design: Moving beyond tick-box initiatives

Katie Austin

Minutes
9th October 2025
Wellbeing
Employee Engagement
Employee Experience
This Friday, 10th October, is World Mental Health Day — a moment that always sparks conversations about how organisations support their people. But while many companies will mark the day with initiatives like webinars, wellbeing weeks, or resilience toolkits, too often those efforts don’t deliver the impact we hope for.

That’s because most workplace wellbeing activity still follows the same pattern: a series of standalone actions aimed at raising awareness or offering support. And while these can be helpful, they rarely change how people actually experience work.

If we want to create workplaces where people truly thrive — not just cope — we need to shift our thinking. Wellbeing isn’t a campaign. It’s not a benefit. It’s not a one-off event. It’s a core part of the employee experience — and that means it needs to be designed as one.

Why wellbeing fails to stick

Even the most well-intentioned wellbeing initiatives can fall flat if they’re built in isolation. Common challenges include:

  • One-size-fits-all approaches. 
    What supports a frontline worker might be completely different from what a hybrid knowledge worker needs — yet many organisations offer the same solutions to everyone.
  • Focusing on surface-level fixes.
    Meditation apps and lunchtime walks can help individuals, but they don’t address deeper causes of poor wellbeing like workload, culture, or leadership behaviours.
  • Treating wellbeing as a bolt-on. 
    When wellbeing sits outside the core employee experience — instead of being woven through policies, leadership, and day-to-day work — it struggles to make a lasting difference.

To move beyond these limitations, we need to stop thinking about wellbeing as a programme and start thinking about it as a designed experience.

Wellbeing by design: a new approach

Designing wellbeing means applying the principles of employee experience (EX) design — using empathy, co-creation, experimentation, and iteration to create solutions that work in the real world. It’s not about launching more initiatives. It’s about creating the conditions that help people flourish.

Here’s how to get started:

1. Understand what really matters

It’s easy to assume we know what employees need to support their wellbeing — but assumptions are often wrong. Instead, gather real insights by listening deeply: interviews, journey mapping, focus groups, and empathy-based research can help you uncover what shapes people’s wellbeing at each stage of their work experience.

Look beyond generic questions like “Are you stressed?” to explore root causes: Where does stress come from? What helps people recover? What changes would make the biggest difference?

2. Co-design solutions with your people

Wellbeing initiatives are far more effective when employees are involved in shaping them. Co-design workshops and collaborative idea sessions not only generate better solutions — they also build ownership and trust. People are more likely to engage with something they helped create.

3. Embed wellbeing into everyday experience

Wellbeing shouldn’t be something employees access in addition to their work — it should be part of how work happens. That means designing policies, leadership behaviours, workflows, and environments that support wellbeing from the ground up.

Think about:

  • How leaders role-model healthy habits.
  • How work is structured to avoid burnout.
  • How psychological safety is built into team culture.
  • How recognition, autonomy, and purpose are woven into the employee journey.

4. Prototype, test, and evolve

Design isn’t a one-and-done process. What works today might need adapting tomorrow. Use prototypes to test new approaches at a small scale, gather feedback, and iterate. This agile, design-led approach keeps your wellbeing strategy relevant and impactful.

Building the skills to make it happen

Designing wellbeing is a skill — and it’s one every EX, HR, and engagement professional can build. Our EX Designer course gives you the tools, frameworks, and practical guidance you need to design employee experiences — including wellbeing — that truly work.

And if you’re looking for something shorter to support your efforts right now, our Wellbeing Bitesize course offers practical tips and techniques to help you boost wellbeing today, while you design for tomorrow.

This World Mental Health Day: Design for change

Awareness days like World Mental Health Day are valuable moments to talk about mental health — but they’re also a chance to reflect on how we design the experience of work itself. Because lasting change doesn’t come from one-off events. It comes from intentionally shaping the culture, systems, and everyday moments that impact how people feel.

Wellbeing by design is how we get there. It’s how we move from reactive support to proactive strategy. From quick fixes to lasting impact. And from good intentions to great experiences.

If you’re ready to build that capability and create wellbeing experiences that truly work, explore the EX Designer course and start designing a better future for your people today.