Yet worksites are doing more disease prevention and wellness than any other entity in society today. They are more consistent about it and they are more effective than anybody else. And they do all this because they enjoy the benefits that come from having an active healthy workforce.
Worksites all across the world are implementing employee wellness programs because they like the benefits of wellness. Think of the different benefits employers typically offer. These could include a retirement or pension plan, healthcare, paid time off, or maternity leave. These are designed to help your organization recruit and maintain qualified employees. We do them because we believe they are important.
These things are actually very hard to study and we have a feeling or sense that they do make a difference in our ability to attract good workers. But, there is no science to back any of this up. Now consider your wellness program. Unlike all the other benefits your worksite offers, wellness programs have been studied for decades.
There are hundreds and hundreds of rigorous scientific evaluations of the impact of wellness programs which provides a great outlook on reasons to have a wellness program. There is more research on the impact of wellness programs than anything else your company does. The research is not perfect—there is no such thing as a perfect study. But after decades of scientists evaluating programs, we have an enormous amount of very solid data that show the benefits of having a wellness program.
We now have the benefit of years of published research on the impact of worksite wellness programs. It is this information that be used to back up the 7 most popular reasons to have a wellness program. The core of every good wellness program is behavior change. Wellness programs are good at helping people adopt and maintain healthy behaviors. This is perhaps the biggest benefit of having or reasons to have a wellness program.
Healthy behaviors lead to lower health risks, and lower health risks lead to less chronic disease. With less chronic disease employees have fewer health care costs. It looks like this:. Many studies have evaluated the ability of wellness programs to improve health behaviors. Not every wellness program is able to show positive results.
The ones that are well-organized and follow effective behavior change models show the best results. Here are the results of a recently published evaluation. The 1, employees at this worksite reported their health behaviors at baseline, one year, and two years after the program began.
Source: Population Health Management article. Just about anybody can have healthy behaviors for a few days or weeks. The key is to maintain healthy behaviors for years. As soon as you stop having healthy behaviors you stop getting the benefits. I like studies that go out for two years because the results are pretty conclusive by that time. If you can get your employees to participate in a good wellness program chances are they will adopt and maintain healthy behaviors for years to come.
Most wellness studies show the employees have better health behaviors. Wellness programs can also help alleviate depression and the symptoms of depression as well as improve life satisfaction. Even the American Heart Association has completed an extensive review of the ability of wellness programs to improve health and reduce cardiovascular risk. Others have evaluated all of the research and reported that wellness programs, do in fact, have the ability to improve employee health.
In researchers completed one of the most rigorous and comprehensive reviews of wellness programs. This study is called the Rand Report. Here is what the authors concluded:. We find that workplace wellness programs can help contain the current epidemic of lifestyle-related diseases, the main driver of premature morbidity and mortality as well as health care cost in the United States. The foundation of any good wellness program must be focused on helping employees adopt healthy behaviors.
Elevated blood glucose, high blood cholesterol, and high blood pressure are almost all caused by unhealthy diets and lack of physical activity. Eating and exercising are behaviors. A randomized clinical trial was designed to help people improve their nutrition and physical activity. When researchers looked at the results, they were stunned to learn that in as little as six weeks health risks could improve dramatically. Those who maintained healthy behaviors experience lower health risks for six weeks, six months, 12 months, and even out to 18 months after this program began.
When you change your diet, get active, and avoid tobacco, really good things happen. Boise School District is a WellSteps client and not long ago we published the results of their changes in health risks.
After one year, a lot of employees who had elevated health risks at baseline, had reached healthy risk levels. Source: JOEM. Reductions in elevated health risks are important. Low health risks are the foundation of good health, and wellness programs are a great way to help employees and their spouses avoid elevated health risks.
There are hundreds of research papers that evaluated the ability of wellness programs to reduce elevated health risks. One particular study looking at almost , wellness participants and showed that 5 0f 7 health risks improved after one year. Another researcher looked at all of the published studies to get a consensus. This review showed that comprehensive wellness programs will have a significant impact on elevated health risks.
There is one weakness that almost all wellness programs have. After 30 years of evaluating dozens and dozens of programs it has become clear that it is difficult to impossible to get large groups of employees to reach and maintain a healthy body weight.
The obesity epidemic is caused by a variety of cultural factors and helping employees lose weight has proven to be exceptionally difficult. While the research suggests that helping people improve blood cholesterol, blood pressure, and blood glucose is possible, helping people lose weight and keep the weight off has proven to be hard to do.
Just take a look at the body mass index BMI data in the table above. Those who are obese do lose some weight after a few years but not very much. There is some hope. Recently, the RAND study showed some promising results:. And as we mentioned in benefit 9, the social interaction and positive reinforcement associated with group participation in wellness programs can offer valuable, if unintended, benefits.
Implementing an employee wellness program will get people working together toward the same goal—outside of their usual work responsibilities. This would definitely improve company communication, and it would support good health at the same time.
The evidence: Develop an employee wellness program focused on mindfulness, and you could notice a major reduction in workplace stress. According to a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association , meditation might help improve anxiety, stress, and depression. If you have a light budget, you might be able to implement an employee wellness program using just one quiet conference room and some free guided mindfulness meditations.
Make your case: A majority of workers in a diverse array of jobs report facing lots of work-related stress. We could improve multiple aspects of our company performance by offering a wellness program aimed at reducing workplace stress. Are you ready to make your pitch? We hope this list provided all the benefits and validation you need to fight for the employee wellness program you want to implement for your company.
Be sure to have a ballpark budget that outlines the different costs associated with your proposed program. Leaders will likely bring up workflow as well. Mitigate their fears by offering a detailed breakdown of how the work will get done and who will do it. An estimate of the weekly hours it might take would be a major bonus.
Did we leave out any key benefits of employee wellness programs? SnackNation is a healthy office snack delivery service that makes healthy snacking fun, life more productive, and workplaces awesome. We provide a monthly, curated selection of healthy snacks from the hottest, most innovative natural food brands in the industry, giving our members a hassle-free experience and delivering joy to their offices.
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Close Search. About SnackNation SnackNation is a healthy office snack delivery service that makes healthy snacking fun, life more productive, and workplaces awesome. Ashley Bell November 12, Connor Garrett November 10, Ashley Bell November 10, Call or e-mail mc gertsburglaw. Newer or smaller companies will want to take advantage of CoverMySix for Small Companies and Startups complete legal documentation portfolio. Check out covermysix.
President Trump tweets a controversial message, launching a key employee into an unbridled rage. The person returns fire on social media with a barrage of emotionally charged remarks. In the process, the tirade is played out before a select audience that includes your most valued customers, partners and prospects. The social platform the employee used as a political megaphone was personal and technically private.
What do you do? What can you do? This can include subjects such as political and religious views that might be considered offensive. The NFL this year surprised many people when it took a similar stance by prohibiting players from protesting during the National Anthem. The decision made headlines, but it fell in line with how many employers now view personal conduct, regardless of place or time. Their conduct, words and actions are expected to uphold the values of the organization.
This includes details about the logo and messaging, down to specific colors, design styles and imagery. It can include post frequency, relevance and objectives. The policy should be clear about who has authority to make posts, comment and respond, especially to controversial remarks.
When United Airlines discovers a negative tweet about its brand, the company has very specific protocols about how a complaint is managed. When a customer complains online, the first step should be to take the conversation offline and resolve the issue away from a large viewing audience. Then, handle the customer as if they called. The policy should prohibit employees who are not involved with this process to abstain from any engagement, so the professionals can handle it.
Many consumers today have become empowered through social media to expose businesses for their bad behavior. In many ways, the new environment has forced companies to improve their service, while some consumers have found ways to take unfair advantage. The policy should address how social media is managed during a crisis, who is in charge and how the social managers interact with communications teams and senior management. No company policy is ironclad in the eyes of the law, but many can prevent mistakes and clear confusion among employees.
Attorneys and public relations firms can help draft social media policies to fit your organizational needs. When a policy is finalized, it should be presented effectively throughout the entire organization. A strong brand can take decades to build, but even the best brands can come undone in a single day. He is focused on intellectual property with a specialty on domestic and foreign patent and trademark preparation, prosecution, procurement and litigation. Read on for a list of things you should know before you take your company beyond U.
Working with outside suppliers, sales agents, joint venture partners and subsidiaries can serve to expand and grow your business but, when working internationally, they might also expose your organization to civil or criminal violations. When doing business globally, it is important to know your business partners and put processes in place to avoid running afoul of certain U.
The U. Given the changing geopolitical environment, the list of sanctioned countries, organizations and individuals is constantly changing. The federal government also regulates the export of certain products and services that have a military use or may be used for military purposes. Businesses that operate internationally and that have products or services that are regulated must have controls in place to assure compliance with these trade regulations.
These laws and regulations are challenging and the repercussions of non-compliance could result in civil or criminal sanctions. Ignorance of the law is no legal defense—a business or individual does not have to plan or intend to violate these requirements to be held liable. A business must understand how it delivers its products and services to market, how it gets paid and with whom it does business.
Failing to know your business partners might expose a legitimate and reputable business to accusations of doing business with terrorist organizations, sanctioned countries or human traffickers. Cassidy Law has experience helping clients avoid these common pitfalls. Maragret Cassidy is principal at Cassidy Law. Here are 10 things you should do or stop doing to stay on the good side of your coworkers.
Workplace etiquette is defined by dictionary. Read on below for the 10 things you should do or start doing to avoid raising the ire of your colleagues and show that you do have some common sense as it relates to workplace etiquette.
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