6 Design Leaders Explore Ways To Boost Company Wellness

“By scheduling a calendar of weekly and monthly events, mixing social and professional subjects, to rediscover how we can connect and learn from each other. The pandemic has made us all autonomous and efficient in some ways, but as a group we go farther distances.” —Stéphane Bernier, Aedifica 

“We encourage wellness through feeding our employees’ creativity and supporting their passions. We have a granting system, $1,000 per employee, and staff may use it in any way as long as it’s contributing to their professional betterment and, by proxy, the betterment of the studio.” —Drew Stuart, INC Architecture & Design

“Taking a cue from some of our clients, we’ve started to provide lunch for the staff each Wednesday. With our team being in the office only three days a week, we use it as a good opportunity to say hello and put work aside. We’ve also put a  ‘direct support’—rather than ‘direct report’—system in place. This is for oversight but also a buddy system, where one can express concerns or frustrations to a more senior member, who can then hopefully address the issue in a more holistic way. It’s been helpful not just in workflow charting but also in assigning teams to work together.” —Dan Mazzarini, BHDM Design 

“Our approach revolves around fostering a culture of collaboration and support. We conduct weekly in-person and virtual team-building meetings and activities, including lunch-and-learns with vendors. They are designed for brainstorming and to help resolve challenges to maintain our team’s connectivity, whether we’re working remotely or in person.” —Marion Philpotts-Miller, Philpotts Interiors 

“We have one specific day per week where everyone is in the office together, to allow the personal and social connections to occur.” —Janet Morra, Margulies Perruzzi 

“We lead design dialogues and utilize tools such as Miro to bridge the hybrid divide.” —Sim Nabors, RATIO Design