When it comes to building a culture of health and well-being, employees take their cues from the messages they see, the behaviors leaders model and the workplace norms that are reinforced every day. Communications teams play an important role in shaping those experiences, from spotlighting healthy behaviors to creating opportunities for connection and open dialogue.
The right internal communications strategy can help turn well-being from an initiative into a lasting part of company culture. Here, Forbes Communications Council members share specific initiatives your team can spearhead to foster health, well-being and self-care across your organization.
1. Implement ‘Work Buddy Circles’
One initiative I love is creating “work buddy circles” across departments, which are groups of three to five employees who intentionally spend time together outside of just meetings and deadlines. Something as simple as rotating lunch groups or coffee walks once every couple of weeks can have a surprisingly powerful impact on well-being. A lot of workplace stress comes from people only interacting transactionally. – Amrita Hemdev, Green Bay Remodeling
2. Make Well-Being Part Of Internal Storytelling
Communications teams have a rare combination of organizational reach and storytelling capability. When those assets are pointed at employee well-being with consistency and intention, the cultural impact compounds in ways a standalone program never could. Start by making well-being a consistent fixture in internal storytelling—not as a standalone campaign, but an enduring commitment. – Johanna Herrmann, Merck
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3. Lead By Example
Keep your leadership proactively engaged to ensure a well-being program succeeds. The “Lead by Example” initiative, where internal champions share real success stories, can be a game changer. Formulate a well-being internal policy. Get leadership commitment to promote well-being through behavior. Set up a monthly meetup to share real stories. Track participation and collect feedback to ensure impact. – Eleonora Liapina, Netwrix Corporation
4. Help Employees Take Time Off Confidently
I don’t believe in a one‑size‑fits‑all idea of work‑life balance. Everyone’s needs look different. One meaningful way comms can support well-being is by helping people take time off confidently—through clear messaging, leaders modeling it and reinforcing that rest isn’t a perk but essential. – Regina Key, Destination Concepts inc
5. Encourage Values-Based Self-Reflection
Self-talk is an important part of how we relate to the world around us, and values are what direct our actions and shape how we interact with others. I encourage a writing exercise where employees of all levels write down and share their values. They also create a mantra to go with it. That way, each person has a tangible tool for positive self-talk and can express what’s important to them to others. – Rachel Kule, Pursuit PR
6. Acknowledge Employees’ Emotional Load
Comms should acknowledge the emotional burden people carry, especially in fast-moving environments and this era of constant change. When you can make explicit what the company offers and how employees will be held accountable with an employee value prop, work can become a two-sided commitment that allows people to do their best work. – Paula Mantle, Branch
7. Create An ‘Internal Well-Being Champions’ Program
Create an “Internal Well-Being Champions” program that trains a cross-functional group to model and promote health, well-being and self-care through micro-content, check-ins and employee stories. Steps: 1. Define goals and baseline measures; 2. recruit diverse champions by department; 3. onboard with a concise playbook. – Kal Gajraj, Ph.D., CAN Community Health
8. Launch A ‘Manager Moments’ Program
Launch a “Manager Moments” program that normalizes well-being through leadership behavior. Equip managers with simple check-in prompts, run monthly themes like rest or focus and share real employee stories. Add small actions like meeting-free blocks. Track participation and sentiment, and adjust based on what actually changes behavior. – Maria Alonso, Fortune 206
9. Promote Existing Well-Being Resources More Effectively
Partner closely with HR to consistently spotlight the well-being benefits and resources already available to employees. Many companies invest heavily in these programs, but adoption stays low because employees either forget they exist or don’t fully understand them. Embedding reminders into meetings, leadership messaging and internal communications keeps well-being visible and culturally supported. – Emily Burroughs, EB Connection
10. Treat Stress As A Business Issue
Stress is the single most important predictor of employee well-being, yet most wellness initiatives ignore it entirely. Comms teams can drive the cultural and leadership shift that addresses it directly. Until organizations treat stress as a business problem, wellness programs are just noise. – Bisera Lakinska, M42 -Abu Dhabi Health Data Services
11. Establish Norms, Not Perks
Launch a “Norms, Not Perks” initiative: Comms publishes and models the unwritten rules that actually shape well-being, no after-hours pings, real meeting-free blocks, visible use of leave. Steps: Get leaders to go first publicly (a VP posting “offline till Monday”), bake the norms into onboarding and manager training, then measure with pulse surveys on whether people feel safe using them. Impact comes from changing behavior at the top, not adding another app nobody opens. – Anshuman Dutta, Cognizant
12. Create A Channel For Honest Employee Stories
Own a recurring internal channel where employees share real workload experiences. Not curated wellness tips, but honest narratives. Comms’ job is to make those stories visible to leadership and tie them to actual decisions. Impact only lands when people see their honesty change something, not just get acknowledged. – Laiba Tariq, InnReg
13. Launch A Permission-To-Pause Campaign
Create a “Permission To Pause” campaign led by executives, not HR slogans. Comms can equip leaders to model specific behaviors: no-meeting blocks, visible recovery time and clear escalation norms. Measure impact through uptake, sentiment and workload signals. Well-being only sticks when employees see it protected in how work actually gets done. – Hope Frank, Gathid
14. Reimagine The Internal Newsletter
An engaging internal newsletter can be a powerful culture-building tool. Organizations often invest heavily in external messaging while internal communications become overly transactional with memos and message boards. Applying some creativity internally by sharing wellness resources, events, initiatives and practical tips can help employees feel more connected, informed and engaged. – Victoria Zelefsky, Anne Arundel Economic Development Corporation
15. Build Recovery Time Into Success Metrics
Comms can support well-being by reframing rest as part of performance, not a break from it. Move beyond generic encouragement and lead an initiative that treats “recovery blocks” as a project deliverable after major milestones. By highlighting these periods in internal communications, you turn well-being from an HR suggestion into a built-in part of how success is measured. – Lauren Parr Banks, RepuGen
16. Create A Work-Life Operating Manual
The most effective move is for comms to spearhead a “Work-Life Operating Manual” that codifies internal boundaries as official company policy. To ensure impact, comms must move from promoting yoga apps to standardizing the “Right to Disconnect”—this involves creating a tiered comms hierarchy that explicitly bans non-emergency Slack or email after hours and requires “deep work” blocks to be respected. – Patrick Ward, NanoGlobals
17. Build Psychological Safety Into Communication
A high-impact initiative is building psychological safety as the foundation for well-being. Comms can create structured spaces like regular check-ins, open Q&As or retros where employees can speak openly about workload, stress and boundaries. It works because well-being isn’t driven by perks, but by whether people feel safe to speak up, ask for support and be heard. – Jonas Barck, Mentimeter
18. Normalize Disconnecting After Work Hours
Most companies say they value well-being, but their internal communication patterns contradict that constantly—Teams messages at 10 p.m., emails flagged urgent on weekends and leaders casually mentioning they worked through evenings, late nights or the long weekend. All messages or comms should stop at 5 p.m. and be scheduled to send during regular working hours. – Shirin Ali, CMiC
19. Change What’s Sayable At The Top
Stop the wellness newsletter. Comms owns narrative—use it where it matters. Get one senior leader to publicly say, “I disconnected and came back sharper.” Then make it a recurring format. Most well-being programs fail because they target employees while leadership behavior stays unchanged. Comms can’t fix culture, but it can change what’s sayable at the top. – Leeron Walter, Teramind
20. Normalize Recovery, Not Just Productivity
One effective initiative is making well-being part of everyday internal communication by reinforcing healthy work habits, realistic expectations and leadership behavior. Culture changes when the message is consistently modeled, not just announced. – Jessica Wong, Valux Digital
