Health And Wellness In The WorkplaceHealth And Wellness In The Workplace

The program design options depend on the goals and objectives and desired outcomes of your program.  If your goal is to help employees change behavior, reduce risk factors, or save medical care money then your wellness program would be designed to accomplish those outcomes and a budget would be necessary to support that design.  

There are different wellness program design levels depending on desired outcomes and budgets.  Each level has advantages and disadvantages.  The intentions or results are quite different, are not interchangeable in terms of obtaining similar results, and therefore should not be confused.  For example, scheduling activities such as an employee wellness fair or lunchtime education sessions, or having brochures available do not usually result in behavior change, but may expand awareness on a topic.  If the objective is behavior change then a different design is required, such as Lifestyle/Behavior Change Programs and Business Support.  The outline below outlines the wellness design levels with a brief explanation.

Awareness Programs:  At this level a employer makes health information available and accessible to workers.  This type of program often includes handouts on a variety of issues, wellness articles in newsletters, bulletin board displays, e-mail health messages, etc.   Also, most health & wellness fairs are designed as awareness programs with vendors providing information and providing wellness screenings to workers.  

Awareness programs are inexpensive and do not require extensive employee or organization time commitments.  Still, these programs do not usually result in behavior change.  Growing awareness isn’t usually enough to generate lifestyle changes for most Americans, unless used to arouse workers to register for a program being available at the organization or neighborhood on the topic.  An example of this would be offering information on the deleterious effects of smoking and inviting workers who smoke to register for a tobacco cessation class.

Education Programs:  Educational programs frequently support more information on a topic and are able to also provide time for questions & answers, but are similar to awareness programs.  An example is lunch-n-learn sessions on a health related topic.  These cost the organization a bit more than awareness programs; however, they are still inexpensive and do not require a whole lot of time for planning or attending a session.  Again, expanding awareness and offering information may not yield the desired behavior modification unless ongoing reinforcement or incentives are also planned.

Lifestyle/Behavior Change Programs:  These programs are designed as 4 to 12 weekly sessions or workshops to support health & wellness education, address barriers and support opportunities to practice the desired skills.  Behavior change programs therefore require more business resources, cost more, and also require more employee responsibility, time and effort.  The results are often the desired positive lifestyle change, which if sustained can lead to potential cost savings.  

Examples are smoking cessation classes, weight loss and weight management meetings, or an ongoing physical activity program.

Environmental and Business Support:  Environmental reinforcement is frequently considered the highest and most valuable level to include when beginning your wellness program in order to support and maintain healthy behaviors.  These types of design options include policy changes such as:

• Creating a tobacco-free workplace
• Designating a walking path,
• Establishing onsite fitness centers,
• Ensuring healthy snack machines selections,
• Offering healthy diet choices in the cafeteria, and/or
• Establishing flex-time policies.  

Other examples include subsidizing healthy vending machines or cafeteria choices; reimbursing health club or weight loss and weight management program memberships; or providing insurance incentives for healthy lifestyles.

Ideally, the wellness program design would include some of each of these options.  The more integrated the approach, the more successful the results will be.  By way of example, a company can have tobacco cessation information available; can schedule a one hour awareness session on the harmful effects of smoking and how to quit; can enable an worksite tobacco cessation program, supply self quit smoking kits, or support workers to catch a area program; and/or on an environmental support level can establish a smoke-free workplace and grounds, offer lower healthcare insurance for non-smokers, or support pharmacological quit smoking aids for free.

Workplace Health Promotion Program: Components for Success

There are many key parts that have to be considered to see to the performance of your Company Health Promotion Program or Company Health Promotion Program.  These include:  

• Upper Management Support & Employee Participation
• Active Corporate Health Promotion Program Committee
• Program is Based on Employee Needs & Interests
• Goals and Objectives are Determined
• Detailed Action Plan Based upon Resources & Budget
• Program Implementation & Internal Marketing
• Evaluation of Outcomes and Program