Stepping Up for Men’s Health: Real PM’s November Steps Challenge

Over 4 million steps in 26 days, how Real PM walked the walk to support mental health

For their final wellbeing initiative of the year the Wellbeing Committee organised a team Steps Challenge for the month of November in support of Men’s Health Month and Movember. 16 team members took part in the challenge and they managed to walk an incredible combined total of four million, one thousand, four hundred and forty-four steps in just 26 days! That’s 2,000 miles…if AI’s auto calculation can be trusted.

Suicide is the single leading cause of death for men under 50 with men 3x more likely than women to die by suicide. Our aim with this challenge is not only to get people out walking but also out talking and taking some time to check in with each other. Research from BUPA found that only around ¼ of men who have struggled with mental health say they would talk to their friends about their struggles. Whilst our steps challenge was only from the 1st to 26th November, we hope that it helped to breakdown some of these barriers and support healthier habits.

Now, whilst we knew that our team are all pretty active and the lunch-time walks that the Wellbeing Committee have put on this year have seen great turnouts, we knew that we couldn’t announce a challenge without also announcing some prizes too! Even if the competitive nature of the group really didn’t need any extra motivation, we’re looking at you, Raman Sharma, Project Manager (you did insist on everyone sending screenshots of their step count so there would be recorded proof!). But the prizes made for a fun extra bonus, so without further ado, here are your winners!

Highest Total Step Count

With a whopping 465,825 steps Leigh Rogers takes the crown by a mile, or in fact, by 46.9 miles!

Most Walks With A Colleague/Friend

Raman Sharma and Chris Burns took the prize as a pair for all their many lunch-time trips together to Waitrose to pick up varying meal deals!

Most Improved

Lisa Bergin, Office & Accounts Manager, took home the prize for Most Improved, levelling up her steps week to week by more than threefold!

Awards aside for a moment, though, this challenge really was such a delight to experience. Not only did it see an uptick in team members getting out and walking on their own, be that walking to a site visit or client office rather than taking the tube, or walking on the weekend more than they usually would have in a cold and dark November, we also saw more team members going on walks with colleagues at luch time which made for some fun new Kings Cross christmassy memories.

After all, it’s important to remember why we decided to do this challenge for Men’s Health Month and suicide prevention. Getting away from your desk or simply getting outside from wherever you are is a surefire way to boost your mental health even just a little. Boosting your step count can help you to remember to take a breath and focus on yourself for a while.

It may sound simple, but we hope that this challenge has helped not only our team members but also those who are reading this Insight to feel a bit better in what can be a really trying month. Let’s practice some mindfulness now, why don’t we, deep breath in, deep breath out.