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A stellar panel of health industry and business leaders will judge the 69 entries received for the inaugural Southern Cross Health Insurance Wayfinder Awards.

The Wayfinder Awards were created by Southern Cross Health Insurance to inspire New Zealand businesses to find new ways of improving leadership through workplace wellbeing, and to celebrate those who do it well.

The judging panel for the Southern Cross Health Insurance Wayfinder Awards is: Dr Denise Quinlan, MAPP, PhD - Director of the NZ Institute of Wellbeing & Resilience Professor Grant Schofield, PhD - Professor of Public Health, Director, Human Potential Centre, Auckland University of Technology, and Chief Science Officer, PreKure Carolyn Luey - Chief Digital and Publishing Officer, NZME Victoria Young, Investigations Editor, BusinessDesk, NZME Shaun Robinson, Chief Executive, Mental Health Foundation of New Zealand Nick Astwick - Chief Executive, Southern Cross Health Society (Judging Convenor).

Southern Cross Health Society Chief Executive Nick Astwick said: “It’s an honour that this group of business and industry leaders, with such vast experience, have come on board to support these awards. Collectively they are incredibly well-versed in what constitutes true workplace wellbeing.

“Workplace wellness is vitally important for businesses in New Zealand, large or small, and in terms of employee wellbeing and productivity, and that’s why we’ve created the Southern Cross Health Insurance Wayfinder Awards,” said Astwick.

"Good wellbeing and good business go hand in hand. In addition to celebrating businesses which prioritise employee wellness, we look forward to inspiring more businesses in New Zealand by sharing the success stories and insights we gain through the awards.”

“Entrants have spent a great deal of time crafting their submissions to show how their business and leaders value their workforce by growing their collective health and wellbeing,” added Astwick.

“There are many inspiring stories of excellence and innovation in workplace health and wellbeing and the people and organisations who do it well need to be celebrated, we don’t see this done often enough. “The Southern Cross Health Insurance Wayfinder Awards aim to change this, and we hope more New Zealand businesses focus on helping their people to flourish.”

The awards were created after the Southern Cross Health Society’s 2022 Healthy Futures Business Edition research - which was conducted by Kantar from a survey of over 1,400 people – found 89 per cent of those surveyed agree that they, and the businesses they work for, would flourish if employers made workplace health and wellbeing a priority.

The research also showed the importance of business leaders ensuring workers “log off” after work hours along with other initiatives like wellbeing leave, employer provided flu vaccinations and the availability of healthy food options at work. All the finalists in the Southern Cross Health Insurance Wayfinder Awards are listed here and winners will be revealed on Tuesday 21 November.

For more information on the judges go to: https://www.southerncross.co.nz/society/business/wayfinder-awards/judges

For a copy of the Healthy Futures Report go to: https://www.southerncross.co.nz/society/healthy-futures-business