Developing a Wellness Program

There is a lot of focus on wellness in the workplace. Healthcare costs are increasing. Organizations are realizing that they need to put more emphasis on mental health issues along with the focus on physical health and financial challenges. Workplace stress is rising.

Corporate wellness programs are popular as leaders focus on the costs associated with absenteeism and healthcare premiums.

As with any new initiative, getting the support of top management is critical—especially when money is involved. If you want to start or expand a current wellness program, here are some tips to get you going:

Get leadership buy in. Some of the benefits of a wellness program are:

• Reduction in turnover

• Reduction in absenteeism

• Increase in productivity

• Decrease in healthcare costs

• Increase in employee satisfaction scores

Be sure to gather data for your organization regarding the above benefits to convince your leaders that a wellness program will financially benefit your organization.

Consider Employee Surveys. Whether or not you already conduct them, consider conducting one and include questions on wellness. Then, use that information to make the case for a wellness program. (You can find some tips in The Big Book of HR about developing a survey along with information about wellness programs.)

Determine the focus. Do you want reduce absenteeism, or reduce turnover, or increase employee satisfaction? The answer will determine the elements to include in your wellness program. Possibilities include health education, lifestyle coaching, onsite exercise programs—don’t overlook virtual wellness programs, yoga, massages, and lots more.

Don’t do this alone. Find organizations to partner with who provide services to support the program, and you’re likely paying for some of these services with current providers, so promote them to your employees.

• You can partner with a local health club for discounted access to their facilities.

• Your medical plan provider may offer classes in nutrition and other health related topics or can provide you with professionally researched information to share with employees and their families.

• Don’t overlook the resources available from your Employee Assistance Program. Most offer no cost to the employee for help with financial counseling, mental health assistance, and other valuable services and information.

Once you have the approval to start a wellness program, consider putting a committee together of employees and managers to help sell the program to the organization and serve as champions to gather enthusiasm for what the program offers. Encourage the committee to help design a kickoff to the program to promote interest.

As with any new program, build in an assessment process so that you measure the effectiveness of the program. Use the assessment data to make any needed adjustment so that your program improves over time.

Happy and healthy employees are productive employees so consider what you are doing to enhance the well-being of your staff members.