2022 Was the Tops for Advancing People-First Places
Over the course of 2022, we’ve seen incredible growth in our global movement to transform health and well-being across our buildings, organizations and communities. Today, WELL is being used in 125 countries, more than 100 of the Fortune 500 and across more than 4.5 billion square feet of space. In celebration of all those who have joined with us on this journey, we’re excited to share some of the top moments of the year – the stories, community gatherings and policy moments. We are so grateful to all of you across our global community for fueling our momentum and helping make 2022 the tops.
TOP MOMENTS WITH OUR GLOBAL COMMUNITY
The WELL Summit Breaks the Event Mold, Convening Group of Global Leaders in Arizona
The WELL Summit, hosted in April of 2022, brought together WELL power users and the next wave of leaders committed to anchoring their organizational strategies in health. The event – interactive and immersive, and held outside – provided a deep dive into WELL strategies, showcased best practices for implementation and featured powerful keynotes and executive roundtables focused on delivering well-being at the enterprise scale.
Event at NASDAQ’s MarketSite Shines a Light on the Importance of Health in ESG
Last February, IWBI and Humanity 2.0 co-hosted a seminal event on ‘Putting the H in ESG,’ held live from the Nasdaq MarketSite. The event, focused on exploring how humanity and health fit into the environmental, social and governance (ESG) framework, featured an action-packed day of virtual programming. The sessions explored the full arc of the ESG landscape – how companies develop and navigate their own ESG strategies, to tools and frameworks that support human and social capital reporting, to the latest developments in sustainable finance, regulatory compliance and stakeholder demand. You can still catch the programming here.
Launching Connecting on Purpose, A WELL Salon Series
In 2022, IWBI launched Connecting on Purpose: A WELL Salon Series, designed to remind us that meaningful connection is essential to our humanity and to celebrate those bonds with a series of intimate dinners with a specific conversational topic. We started by hosting these Jeffersonian-style dinners outside with IWBI team members, discussing major topics ranging from the future of places to the art of storytelling and reimagining healthcare. At our WELL Summit, we asked our special keynote speaker to help us replicate our internal salons and lead what turned out to be a vigorous and thought-provoking discussion among key leaders from our global community. Check out our WELL Salon Playbook, everything you need to host a salon within your own organization or community.
WELL Enterprise Provider Summit Series
This fall, IWBI convened WELL power users—our WELL Enterprise Providers (EPs)— in a series of one-day events in locations around the world, including Sydney, New York, London, Amsterdam, Singapore and Chicago. The series of events provided a deep dive into WELL strategies and key initiatives, like Investing for health, showcased best practices for delivering WELL at scale, and offered moments to connect and network with regional stakeholders and IWBI leaders.
TOP MOMENTS IN HEALTHY BUILDING POLICY
Miami Goes for WELL, First in the Country
Thanks to the leadership of Mayor Francis Suarez, Miami became the first city in the nation to achieve the WELL Health-Safety Rating across a large municipal building portfolio. “Today, by embracing WELL for our public buildings, we are stepping up — we’re walking the walk,” said Mayor Suarez. “I’m proud that this portfolio of city buildings, including our City Hall, is being recognized by IWBI, the world’s leading authority on healthy buildings. I hope other cities will replicate what Miami is doing to advance WELL buildings, so we can deliver the benefits of healthy buildings to communities everywhere.”
The Healthy Workplaces Coalition Launches on Capitol Hill, Grows to 60+ Members
In May, IWBI led the launch of the Healthy Workplaces Coalition, a new coalition of more than 60 national organizations, industry leaders and trade associations collaborating to support and advance federal policy aimed at helping businesses and organizations better afford and implement health and safety improvements in workplaces and across the built environment — to benefit the health and well-being of employees, customers and the public. Learn more here, and if your organization is interested in joining, please reach out to us.
White House Hosts First-Ever Summit on Indoor Air Quality
For the first time ever, the White House hosted a summit on indoor air quality. Held this past October, the event convened a group of leading national experts and called for collective action to chart a path to bring the benefits of clean indoor air to everyone. Read IWBI’s recap titled, “Biden Administration Shines a Light on Healthy Buildings."
President Signs Legislation to Invest Nearly $400 billion in Health and Sustainability Solutions
In August, President Biden signed into law the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, which includes a huge $369 billion investment to combat climate change. Widely lauded by climate advocates and heralded rightly as historic climate legislation, the bill aims to set the country on the path to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent by 2030. The legislation, which will help rewrite America’s climate future, also creates massive new opportunities for healthy buildings, equity and resilience. Read more here.
TOP HEALTHY BUILDING STORIES
From The Times, After Covid, offices must focus on employee health
“We’re seeing occupiers rethink how they measure the value of real estate in their business. This was once about efficiency and cost, but now they’re assessing a range of metrics, including the overall workplace experience as a differentiator in the jobs market,” explains Lewis Beck, head of workplace for EMEA at commercial real estate firm CBRE.
From GlobeSt.com: “WELL Certification Brings Multiple, Powerful Worker Benefits”
[WELL’s] people-first approach, supports wide-ranging benefits for occupants and organizations alike, creating significant improvements in all-important areas of occupant satisfaction and health, well-being and productivity,” Rachel Hodgdon, President and CEO, International WELL Building Institute (IWBI), the creators of the WELL Building Standard, said.
From Bisnow, Health And Safety Ratings Spread Far And Wide, Easing Fears Among Tenants About Returning To Work
The [WELL] certification has been adopted by thousands of property owners in many sectors of commercial real estate, including office, industrial, retail and healthcare.
From Axios, How healthy is your home?
How healthy is that new home you’re eyeing? The International WELL Building Institute (IWBI) is developing a new rating system to help answer that question.
Why it matters: Air and water quality, light levels, building materials and similar factors can have a big impact on home occupants’ health.
From The Fifth Estate, Healthy, green and attractive – LEED and WELL play doubles
Approximately 25 per cent of all commercial office space in Australia is engaged in the WELL program, with a fourfold global increase seen over the past 18 months and 371.6 million square metres of space now WELL Certified globally.
From Build Australia, New IWBI rating to create more equitable places
The International WELL Building Institute (IWBI) has launched of the WELL Equity Rating, a new rating designed to help organisations act on their diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility goals, and improve company culture and employee health.
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