The Competitive Advantage Hiding in Your Employees’ Breath
Most workplaces run on pace. Deadlines, meetings, inboxes, pressure — repeat. But pace without pause comes at a cost: foggy thinking, poor sleep, reactive stress, and teams running on empty. Breath work offers something deceptively simple — a way to shift from constant doing to regulated, focused performance.
In November 2025, I delivered a five-week breath training programme for the Collaboration & Client Solutions team at Howden. Seven people signed up. No yoga mats. No wellness fluff. Just practical, science-backed breath practices designed to fit into real working days.
The aim wasn’t to slow people down — it was to help them think clearer, recover faster, and handle pressure better.
Why Breath work works in business
We all breathe. But how we breathe can either keep the nervous system stuck in high alert… or help it settle, reset, and perform.
Nose breathing, in particular, supports:
Calmer nervous system responses
Improved focus and clarity
Better sleep and recovery
More resilience under pressure
The challenge isn’t understanding this — it’s building a habit that actually sticks in busy schedules. So we kept it simple.
How it Worked
The course ran over five weeks and was built around short, regular touchpoints:
Live online drop-in sessions during the workday
A clear weekly structure and simple “homework”
Short videos and fact sheets
A shared WhatsApp group for reminders and resources
No long sessions. No pressure to be perfect. Just repetition, consistency, and permission to pause.
Interestingly, many participants said even having the sessions in their diary was enough to remind them to breathe differently throughout the day.
What People Used (and Kept Using)
Some techniques landed more strongly than others — and that’s the point. People found what worked for them.
The most popular practices included:
Box Breathing and Box Builds
Breath Hold Nods
Paced breathing for stress and focus
Humming breath for sleep
Every participant improved their BOLT score (a simple measure of breathing efficiency), and many began using the techniques instinctively — at work, at the gym, and before bed.
The Real Results
The biggest shift wasn’t dramatic transformation. It was something more subtle and sustainable.
People reported:
Feeling calmer and clearer during the day
Using breath to regulate stress in real moments
Improved sleep and evening wind-down
Greater awareness of their breathing patterns
One participant put it simply:
“I now think about my breathing — which I’d never have done before.”
Another shared how breathwork helped prevent stress spirals before they started:
“When I’m stressed or frustrated, nose breathing really helps me regulate rather than escalate.”
Why This Matters for Businesses
From a leadership perspective, the impact went beyond individual wellbeing.
Several participants commented on how the programme changed their perception of the company — seeing it as genuinely people-first, not just saying the words.
As one person said:
“It really shows the ‘People First’ concept is real. It feels like the company is truly invested in its employees.”
This is what breathwork does well in organisations:
it’s affordable and accessible
it supports whole teams, not just individuals
it integrates into existing workdays
and it gives people a tool they can use anytime, anywhere
No apps. No equipment. Just breath.
The Takeaway
You don’t need to add more to already full plates. You need better recovery between the moments that matter.
Breathwork doesn’t remove pressure — it helps people meet it with more clarity, calm, and control. And sometimes, the most effective performance strategy is learning how — and when — to pause.
The Breath Advantage
Most wellbeing programmes target leaders or those already struggling.
Breathwork works because it supports everyone.
It’s short, accessible, and easy to roll out across teams — no fitness level, no experience, no disruption to the workday.
For organisations, that means:
A scalable way to support focus, stress regulation, and recovery
Practical skills employees can use in real moments — meetings, deadlines, pressure
Improved performance without adding time, tools, or workload
A clear signal that wellbeing is built into how work happens
