We all have a moment where we realize that we do not drink enough water. Maybe it is because of the fact that we haven’t refilled our water bottle in two days or realized you are drinking your third cup of coffee. There are numerous benefits to staying hydrated. According to Harvard School of Public Health, “Drinking enough water each day is crucial for many reasons: to regulate body temperature, keep joints lubricated, prevent infections, deliver nutrients to cells, and keep organs functioning properly. Being well-hydrated also improves sleep quality, cognition, and mood.”
How can we engage ourselves and employees to drink more water? Rather than simply telling someone to buy a motivational water bottle, what can be done to ensure there will be an increase in water intake? You can add this to your ongoing list of health and wellness activities in the workplace. Here are some great employee water challenge ideas to bring into your workplace!
1. Business Day Water Challenge
If you do not work weekends, doing a 7 day challenge can be difficult to keep up with. Starting with a 5 day water challenge can be beneficial for staying close to your coworkers and keeping accountability with one another. You can keep a whiteboard with a list of employees with the goal of drinking eight glasses of water per day. They can add the remaining amount of water they drank from the previous day at home. Whoever drinks the most water wins a gift card to a place of their choice and second place wins a water bottle with the company name!
2. Habit Challenge
Healthline reported: “It can take anywhere from 18 to 254 days for a person to form a new habit and an average of 66 days for a new behavior to become automatic.” With that being said, this would be a long term challenge. Maybe try it for each season! You can find an abundance of habit trackers online or you can do it in a bullet journal. Set up weekly accountability check-ins to ensure that people are still on track. You can either offer some sort of employee incentive like an extra day of paid time off or a gift card like the last challenge idea. Truly, what matters is that employees improve their overall water intake and form healthy habits—even if it takes some time.
3. Make It Fun
There are so many ways to make this extra competitive! Whether you have a whiteboard or have an app like Slack where you communicate with your coworkers, you can show who is in the lead. You can add extra challenges like no caffeine or sugary drinks for 24 hours or no fast food. This would be a great opportunity for bonus points! Another great idea would be to set up a water bar in the break room with fruits, fresh herbs, and offer infusible water bottles to encourage their water intake. So get together with your team and start a water challenge today!
