At a basic level the system has been designed in a way that creates the need for a strategy just to survive the madness it produces. This is not transformation. It’s a band-aid on a wound that actually needs stitches without questioning the cause what made the wound.
It leaves really often the root cause untouched, allowing the system to keep producing new wounds. Well-being strategy stays as HR project.
Here are three root-level failures that usually sit underneath wellbeing initiatives:
1. A system built for permanent survival mode
Targets, pace and expectations are structured around constant urgency and fear. Fear of not meeting the results, money, relevance or job security.
No amount of yoga, mindfulness or resilience training can regulate a nervous system that is required to stay in survival mode 40 hours a week.
2. Leaders managing from an unregulated inner state
Unprocessed fear, need for approval and control issues don’t disappear at work, but rather scale end become more visible. Organizations don’t mirror strategies, but they mirror the inner state of those in power.
3. Loss of meaning that no one dares to name
People keep performing, but no longer know why. Values live on walls, not in bodies, minds or hearts. Burnout is an existential one. Wellbeing doesn’t fail because people don’t try hard enough. It fails because we normalize systems that hurt people and then call coping a strategy.
