Most of my clients here in Singapore work in an office for 8-9 hours 5 days a week, and sometimes they even work for 10 to 12 hours. As a seasoned personal trainer, I’ve noticed that a lot of people develop bad posture as a result of spending many years hunched over their computer keyboards.
Here are some types of exercises for office workers with bad posture. If you want to try them, you’ll need a foam roller, which in my opinion, is really a good investment.
- Lying down chin tuck. With the keyboard and the monitor in front of them all the time, office workers tend to keep their heads forward. This not only looks bad but it also stresses the spine when it tries to support an 8-pound head with the support of the shoulders.
So I always ask my clients who have this kind of posture problem to perform the lying down chin tuck. My client will first need to lie on his back with no pillow or anything else behind his head. The feet should be flat on the ground. From this starting position, he will tuck his chin towards his chest while his head never leaves the floor. He stays in this position for 5 seconds, and my client will do 2 sets of 10 reps each.
To help reinforce the importance of this posture correction, I always remind my clients to sit up and stand up straight during every session. And I also tell them to sleep with just one pillow under their head to keep their heads and necks in better alignment.
- Shoulder exercises. For a client who has a problem with his shoulders, for example, his shoulders may look rounded and hunched over making it look smaller smaller and narrower, there are several exercises that can help correct this problem:
- Snow angels. My client will do 15 reps of this exercise every day. It will help him regain the mobility of his shoulders.
- Hug stretch. This stretch is just like hugging someone, except that my client will need to cross both his arms so the hands are on the opposite shoulders. Then he will raise the elbows slightly and hold that position.
- 90/90 shoulder stretch. If you want to learn how to do this, here’s a video to guide you. This position should be held for 90 seconds, and this will help reset your shoulders to their proper place.
- Hip exercises. Are you constantly suffering from back pain? I’ve found that often the cause of this is poor hip mobility and weak glutes. Here are some exercises I recommend for the hips:
- Hip flexor stretch. In this exercise my client takes a kneeling position with one knee up. Then he rocks forward 5 times and hold a forward position for 10 seconds. Then he’ll do it with one arm (the one on the same side as the knee which is on the ground) raised. Afterwards he’ll do it with the other knee raised. This helps to loosen the hips.
- Hamstring stretch. While lying down, my client raises one leg up high pointing to the ceiling. Then he pulls in his knee towards his chest and then pushes up the leg again using a resistance band.
- Bodyweight hip extension, with single leg variation. In this exercise, my client lies down with his back on the floor and feet flat on the ground. Then he thrusts his hips upward and hold this position while one leg is stretched straight.
As a personal trainer Singapore workers often come to me for help not because they want to lose weight or gain muscle. Sometimes they just want relief from the pain in their shoulders, hips, or back.
If you work in an office all day, the exercises I’ve listed here should be part of your warm up before working out. And on the days you aren’t working out, I strongly encourage you to do these stretching exercises. With these routines, you’ll have better workouts, your posture will improve and you’ll experience fewer body pains over time.