Welcome to the Evolve Workplace Wellbeing newsletter – September 2025
| New podcast on what makes work meaningful
In this edition of the Evolve Workplace Wellbeing Podcast, Professor Sara Connolly from the University of Leicester speaks with Professor Ying Zhou from the University of Surrey, where she is Director of the Future of Work Research Centre. Her research is focused on job quality, occupation and employee wellbeing and in this podcast she shares findings from her latest work on the Skills and Employment Survey, focusing on meaning and purpose at work. She explains that when people are able to use their skills at work, take initiative and count on supportive managers, they are far more likely to think their work is meaningful. Find the podcast on all major podcast sites by searching ‘Evolve Workplace Wellbeing Podcast’ or use the direct link to this podcast: Making work meaningful – simple ways to bring purpose to jobs |
| Meet members of the team out and about this autumn
After a quiet summer, the team will be travelling and speaking again this autumn. We’d love to see you! – Former KTP Associate and ongoing visiting researcher Dr Bryony Davies will be talking about Financial Wellbeing at the Norwich Business School / FIG collaboration on 11th Sept: NBS / FIG Business Breakfast registration form – Dr Helen Fitzhugh will be at the Norfolk Chambers B2B event – leading people through her ‘dialogue bingo’ activity: B2B Exhibition | 9th October 2025 – Norfolk Chambers of Commerce – Dr Helen Fitzhugh, Dr Ritchie Woodard and Prof Kevin Daniels will have a stand for Evolve at the CIPD annual conference – for the first time! Come and meet us at stand E48: Homepage – CIPD Annual Conference and Exhibition – Prof Kevin Daniels will be at the British Association for Supported Employment Annual Conference, 17th and 18th November at Wembley Stadium: The British Association of Supported Employment |
| Evolve Network Insight and Discussion sessions
The next session is 18th Sept 2025, 11:00 – 12:30 and is about AI. Dr Elizabeth Cotton is an Associate Professor of Responsible Business at Leicester University, coming from a practitioner background working at senior level in the extractive industries and then as a psychotherapist in the NHS. Elizabeth will talk about the future of work and wellbeing in the advent of digitalization and AI, from the perspective of users and providers of digital therapies and wellbeing interventions. Her book UberTherapy: The new business of mental health will be published by Bristol University Press in October 2025. Applications to join the Network are still open to practitioners who have direct wellbeing responsibilities in organisations (e.g. HR, OD, OH or wellbeing job titles). However, please bear in mind that in October 2025, we will review our Network format. Read more about joining the current format of the network here: The Evolve Workplace Wellbeing Network – evolveworkplacewellbeing.org |
| Email list review
As per our data protection agreement with our subscribers, we send out emails to check if you want to stay on our list after 3 years. We very much want to stay in conversation with you, so please reply to your subscription renewal email as soon as it arrives. Hitting reply with subject ‘Yes’ is all it takes to keep receiving the newsletter monthly, for free, for another three years (and to avoid the multiple follow-up emails we will send to check in with you before we prune the list!) |
| OTHER INTERESTING LINKS
In this section we compile other evidence-informed links to pieces on workplace wellbeing that we have found interesting. The following are not produced by the Evolve Workplace Wellbeing team. – Introducing a shorter working week in Scotland’s public sector – The Autonomy Institute |
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| We will return for newsletter #39 in October 2025
Feel free to pass this newsletter on to colleagues and ask them to sign up for the next one (box on the left side of this web page): https://evolveworkplacewellbeing.org/contact/ TO UNSUBSCRIBE – email workplace.wellbeing@uea.ac.uk with the word UNSUBSCRIBE as your subject title. Please see the website www.evolveworkplacewellbeing.org for our privacy policy and terms and conditions. If you have any data protection queries, please contact dataprotection@uea.ac.uk The Evolve Workplace Wellbeing Team Norwich Business School University of East Anglia, Norwich Research Park, Norwich, NR4 7TJ |