A top motivation for utilizing wellness programs is to promote the health and wellness of employees. When starting to think about developing a workplace wellness program, keep in mind these guidelines outlined below.
Ask your employees a few simple questions to understand the current state of health at your company. This can be done through informal conversations, a call for ideas (suggestion box or bulletin board), or even an online survey.
Understanding the answers to these questions will not only help you develop a program unique to your business, but it will also begin to involve employees in the wellness program. Employee involvement is key to the long term success of your program.
There are many wonderful assessment tools readily available, including ones created by the CDC, our partner Wellable, and the WorkWell Missouri Toolkit, just to name a few.[i] A few common categories and questions often seen in assessments are shown below:
Now that you know the health needs of your organization, you can create a program that reflects those needs.
Establish your Champion. Start with identifying one point of contact for your organization. This person will be your “health champion” and will not only help design the program, but also be the one to rally employees to participate. Your champion should be able to communicate clearly and succinctly the program and its goals to other employees.
Create a Plan. Now that you have a champion, have him or her work with management to create a plan to implement the program. Some elements to that plan should include:
Keep in mind that workplace wellness programs do not have to cost significant amounts of money. There are many simple programs available that can be no or low-cost for small businesses.
An ideal program will have a mixture of health related programs and policies you can implement in your business. These should all be supplemental to health insurance, which is the biggest health benefit you could establish for your employees.
Some examples of programs you can establish:
Some examples of policies you can establish:
Other benefits could include discounts or subsidies for fitness facility memberships, creation of a supportive leadership structure and environmental measures such as control of dust, fumes and vapors, good lighting and well-designed work spaces.
Now that you have a program in mind, get it started!
It is important to assess how well your workplace health program can be sustained over time, how it is received by employees and management and its return on investment.
It is key to select an evaluation method that works for your business. There are many types of surveys to choose from, and the CDC Workplace Health Promotion toolkit provides a comprehensive overview of how to design, administer, and analyze your assessments, discusses pros and cons for each format, and provides links to example surveys.[iv] Whatever assessment your business chooses to utilize, stick with it over the course of your wellness program to effectively measure change over a period of time. Some of the more common survey formats include:
We recommend that your evaluation focus on questions that are relevant and useful to those who will use the findings. The goal of the evaluation shoud be to strengthen and improve existing wellness programs and activities, identify potential gaps or areas of improvement and describe the effectiveness of the program.[v]
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce provides some key insights into the type questions you should ask in the evaluation phase, which include the following:
[i] Centers for Disease Control (2016). Workplace Health Resources. https://www.cdc.gov/workplacehealthpromotion/tools-resources/workplace-h... University of Missouri Extention (2016). WorkWell Missouri Toolkit. http://extension.missouri.edu/hes/workwell/WorkWellToolkit.pdf; Wellable (2017). Resources. https://www.wellable.co/Resources
[ii] Centers for Disease Control (May 2016). Workplace Health Model. http://www.cdc.gov/workplacehealthpromotion/model/index.html
[iii] Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (September 2016). Develop a Policy. https://www.samhsa.gov/workplace/toolkit/develop-policy
[iv] Centers for Disease Control (2016). Workplace Health Promotion. https://www.cdc.gov/workplacehealthpromotion/index.html
[v] Centers for Disease Control (May 2016). Workplace Health Model. http://www.cdc.gov/workplacehealthpromotion/model/index.html