Healthy, Productive and Profitable
When businesses hire a contract cleaning service, often they are imagining the aesthetic benefits that they will enjoy. We at 4M Building Solutions love the look of a clean, shiny office space, as well, but the benefits are more than just superficial. Over time, businesses learn that they can save money while increasing productivity by fostering a sanitary and healthy office environment.
HLW International, LLP, studied the productivity levels of 400 managers and employees and found that there was a direct relationship between productivity and cleanliness of the office in which they work. When maintaining a sanitary office space, they learned that those businesses realized a 5% productivity gain ($125,000) in a 100-employee office (average salary was $25k).
Additionally, the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) determined that when cleaners effectively removed dust from surfaces, the workplace realized both health and comfort benefits. Mild symptoms of distress or discomfort, including dry, itchy or watery eyes; lethargy; headaches; and chest tightness, accompanied a loss in performance from 3-8% depending on the symptoms. Even more, dust reservoirs like old carpeting can decrease typing skills, arithmetic, logical reasoning, memory and creative thinking skills by 2-6%
According to a 10-month survey of more than 25,000 individuals, off-task workers cost $250 billion per year, or approximately $2,000 per worker. One contributing factor was reduced engagement and decreased performance due to illness.
To further emphasize the impact that poor health can have on a workplace, the Journal of Occupational Environmental medicine determined, in a 2003 study, that health-related lost productive time cost employers $225.8 billion per year, or $1,685 per employee. When factoring in 14 years of inflation on those numbers, the results are even more impactful.
While workers can avoid touching certain surfaces or keep a bottle of hand sanitizer at their desks, it is far more difficult to avoid airborne germs. And as we prepare to enter cold and flu season, there may be far more in the air other than the normal dust and allergens that we already would like to avoid.
In order to ensure that 4M Building Solutions does the most effective job possible maintaining a clean, healthy office environment for our clients, we combine our meticulously engineered cleaning plans with products that are certified to be effective and safe. With Greenguard certification, we rest assured knowing that the products we use have met the world’s most rigorous and comprehensive standards for low emissions of volatile organic compounds into indoor air while being sustainable and environmentally responsible.
Because indoor air quality is so closely tied to health, it is important to know exactly what is going into it. Having a partner like Greenguard means our products are credited by more than 400 green building codes, standards, guidelines, procurement policies and rating systems, making them widely adopted as a trusted standard.
A healthy workplace is invaluable to businesses for a variety of reasons. It goes beyond just keeping employees happy. Through an investment in maintaining a clean environment using sustainable products, a company can realize financial benefits and a more productive workplace, not to mention the satisfaction of knowing they are minimizing their carbon footprint.
