The alarm goes off at 5am, reminding you that you’re booked into a circuit training class at the gym before heading off to work. You reach over for your phone, switch off the alarm and open up Instagram. Despite all your efforts to cultivate a cool, minimalist persona on your grid you have 67 followers but follow 782 accounts. As you scroll through endless images of beautiful bodies taking candids on #boraborabeach you can’t help but compare your life to theirs. Who are these people? What are they doing with their lives that means they get to have such wonderful experiences? No wonder no one follows you – the most exciting thing that happened in the last month was finally getting 10 stamps on your coffee card.
When you eventually stop scrolling the clock reads 5.37am. You’ve missed your gym class so you roll over and go back to sleep.
Sound familiar? Whether you are one of the lucky half of Brits planning to holiday abroad in the next year, or you’re making the most of the heatwave, comparing our lives to those of those we follow online, whether they are strangers or friends, celebrities or co-workers, has a strong impact on our wellbeing. Social media is how many of us spend not only our leisure time, but our work time. Since 2013 the percentage of people who are required to use social media for work has increased from 27% to 37%. Having digital skills is a basic requirement for many careers now, and this includes social media and other technological advances such as augmented reality, artificial intelligence and human-like robots. Along with these digital skills it is essential that employees know how to be safe, and how to look after their own mental health and wellbeing in an increasingly digital workplace.
Digital Bricks Learning spoke about Digital Wellbeing this month at the Edinburgh College Working Well Conference. They’ve created a course that identifies the risks facing employees who engage in high levels of digital use – both as part of their job and in their personal lives – ranging from tech addiction and cognitive overload to the physical impacts that tech use can have on our bodies, such as poor posture and eye strain. The course discusses practical solutions, such as the time management strategies, how to communicate with your team effectively when working remotely, and how to encourage employees to build resilience so that they are better equipped to face the challenges of a technological workplace.
When used effectively, technology brings huge benefits to a workplace; it can make your business more competitive, increase efficiency and enhance communication. However, a report carried out by CIPD found that 50% of employees feel they need more skills and knowledge to carry out their role due to the adoption of technology. In addition to our Digital Wellbeing course, we also offer training in Digital Skills and Digital Communication, so that your team can learn how to adopt technology effectively. By understanding how to implement a positive digital environment in the workplace, you can improve employee productivity and wellbeing.
To find out more about our Digital Skills & Wellbeing training, please get in touch via hello@digitalbrickslearning.com
