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The Wellbeing Paradox challenges the assumptions underpinning today’s workplace wellbeing efforts. Despite increasing investment, burnout and stress continue to rise. This book explores why that is, and what it takes to create genuine, lasting change.
Rather than treating wellbeing as a programme to implement or a metric to manage, it reframes it as a living quality that emerges from relationships, meaning and energy within organizations. Drawing on systems thinking, philosophy and real-world practice, it shows how many well-intended initiatives fail by addressing symptoms rather than the deeper dynamics of how work is designed and experienced.
Written for HR, OD and workplace wellbeing leads navigating complex and demanding environments, The Wellbeing Paradox offers a different path - one grounded in participation, dialogue and collective learning. It positions workplace wellbeing as a complex adaptive challenge, requiring ongoing inquiry rather than fixed solutions.
The Five Shifts model provides a practical yet flexible framework for moving from fragmented initiatives to coherent, co-created cultures of thriving. It helps leaders move beyond surface-level interventions to cultivate the conditions where wellbeing can emerge and evolve.
Compassionate and thought-provoking, this is both a guide and a companion for those seeking to lead more human, adaptive and energizing ways of working amid constant change, competing demands and the pressures of modern organizational life.
Sarah Taylor, founder of ThriveWise, is a wellbeing expert with a PhD in health and wellbeing, combining academic insight with practical experience as an accredited health and executive coach, trainer and speaker. She works with purpose-driven leaders and organizations to develop strategic wellbeing solutions that address systemic, team and individual needs to prevent burnout and create healthy, sustainable performance.
Introduction
Part 1: The Way We Are Thinking About Working Place Wellbeing Isn’t Working
Chapter 1: The Real State of Workplace Wellbeing
Chapter 2: It’s Complex - Reframing Workplace Wellbeing as a Wicked Problem
Chapter 3: Embracing Tensions - The Power of Paradox Thinking
Part 2: Exploring A New Perspective of Common Workplace Wellbeing Paradoxes for Your People, Their Managers and….You!
Chapter 4: Another Box to Tick: When Wellness Feels Like Work
Chapter 5: Leading on Fumes: The Burned-Out Boss’s Burden to ‘Be Well’
Chapter 6: Whose Wellbeing Is It Anyway? When More Support Means Less Ownership
Part 3: A Wiser Way of Navigating Workplace Wellbeing Paradoxes
Chapter 7: Beyond Rigid Routines: Finding Your Flexible Wellbeing Flow
Chapter 8: Making Room for Real Conversations about Wellbeing
Chapter 9: Measuring the Unmeasurable: Tracking Wellbeing’s Conflicting Signals
Conclusion: The Future of Wellbeing