Keeping fit at the office

By Adam Gifford

Yoga at lunchtime. A gym session before work starts. A quick dip in the pool at the end of a long afternoon.

A small number of New Zealand workers are able to break the mental or mechanical drudgery of work with a quick physical workout in the office gym or pool.

It has become an increasingly common trend overseas, particularly in the IT sector, but New Zealand employers have been slow to catch on.

Baby photo empire, Anne Geddes Photography, introduced lunchtime yoga at its Parnell offices earlier this year. Personal assistant Sue Massey says about half the company's 20 staff take part in the weekly lesson, or work out in their own time in the office gym.

"It's a lot easier to work exercise into your day," she says.

"Otherwise it's a matter of getting home, getting changed and back into your car to go to a gym. It gives me extra time, to have the gym here, when I finish work."

Another company with its own gym is internet service provider IHug.

Director Tim Wood says IHug expanded the gym it found installed in the basement of the Newton Rd offices it took over from former Olympian Murray Thom's Personalised Plates company.

A quarter of its 160 Auckland staff have signed up to use the gym and services of personal trainer Danny Watson, a martial arts instructor and entertainer.

The nominal fee was imposed "to create an environment where people have a commitment to themselves. If you don't place a value people get slack and don't go."

Mr Wood says people enjoy getting fit rather than just sitting at their keyboards all day answering phones.

"It's a great idea. It stimulates the mind as well as the body. I'm seeing a lot of smiles around the office.

"If you get fit you're more likely to enjoy your surroundings rather than just sit around drinking two-litre bottles of coke and chips, which is the standard geek diet," Mr Wood says.

Mike Ward, an Engineers' Union national health and safety officer, says office gyms are relatively uncommon.

"Some companies got into them and then out again because of concern that injuries happening in the gym would be regarded as workrelated. Some companies work out corporate deals with commercial gyms instead."

Some industrial sites like plyboard mills also have swimming pools staff can use, even though they are ostensibly part of the fire-safety programme.

Mr Ward says other employers are taking an interest in the wider health needs of their staff, such as sponsoring smoking cessation programmes.

The Forest Owners Association has prepared a pack on the importance of eating and drinking properly.

"They found a big source of accidents was people going in without enough food and water to last the day and getting dehydrated, or drinking until late and then going onto the job."