A Health and Wellness Program is an organized program to help workers in establishing healthier lifestyles.  This can include enhancing employee awareness on health topics, providing behavior change initiatives, and/or establishing business policies that support health-related goals.  Programs and policies that promote increased physical activity, tobacco use prevention and cessation, and healthy food selections are a few examples.

What are the Dimensions of Wellness?

Wellness means more than just being physical fit.  The Dimensions of Wellness may include:

• Spiritual Dimension of Wellness,
• Emotional Dimension of Wellness,
• Social Dimension of Wellness
• Intellectual Dimension of Wellness and
• Physical Dimension of Wellness.

The dimensions of wellness are sometimes shown as a “wellness wheel” with examples of wellness components that include physical fitness, nutrition life purpose, financial planning, support systems & social connections, stress management, mind-body health, career planning and continued learning.   The key to individual wellness is maintaining a balanced “wellness wheel”.  A comprehensive Wellness Program addresses most, if not all, of these dimensions of wellness.

Why Provide a Health and Wellness Program?

Workers spend a great deal of time working, and research show that our traditional work-week is getting longer.  In fact, the typical American now works almost 47 hours per week.  Plus, modern technology such as laptops, cell phones, email and voice have blurred the boundary between work-life and home-life.  These realities lower the amount of time that the average American is able to devote to health and wellness activities, and yet workers are expected to be at peak performance when on the job.

A study by the American Association of Occupational Health Nurses found that Workplace Health Promotion Programs are successful in helping workers make positive health changes due to several factors such as environmental support, convenience and social or co-worker acceptance.

What is the Connection between Health and Wellness and the Workplace?

Workplace Health Promotion Programs and Policies that promote healthy behaviors can make a significant impact on employee wellness AND have an impact on the company’s bottom line.  Research indicates that for every dollar invested by companies in health and wellness programs, there were savings ranging from $1.49 to $4.91 with the average wellness program ROI being $3.14*.

In businesses terms, that’s more than a 3:1 minimum wellness ROI – a number that is difficult to ignore, and a best practice that should garner serious consideration from companies.  In fact, a Health and Wellness Program literature review posted in Health Promotion Practitioner Journal found:

• 19 research studies found a 28.3% reduction in sick leave
• 16 research studies demonstrated a 5.6:1 return on investment
• 23 demonstrated a 26.1% reduction in health care costs
• 4 demonstrated a 30% reduction in direct health care and workers’ compensation claims

There is little doubt that a Health and Wellness Program targeted to meet a company’s specific needs can save money by decreasing absenteeism, decreasing medical costs, decreasing employee turnover, and enhancing productivity.

For help in starting a Health and Wellness Program or to get a free wellness proposal you can visit www.WellnessProposals.com or www.InfiniteWellnessSolutions.com

* US Department of Health & Human Services, 2003

• Healthcare provider-patient relationships
• An individual’s exposure to, search for, and use of Corporate Health and Wellness Program information
• Effective counseling and patient education for behavior change
• Content of public health messages and community campaigns

Effective health communication should have these attributes:

• Accuracy: content is valid and error-free
• Availability: delivered or placed where the intended audience can access the information
• Balance: content presents benefits and risks of potential actions
• Consistency: content is locally consistent over time and is also consistent with information from other reliable sources
• Evidence-based: content and methods of delivery are based on relevant scientific evidence
• Reach: content gets to or is available to as many workers as possible in the target population
• Reliability: content source is credible; content is kept up-to-date
• Repetition: delivery of/access to the content is continued over time, to reinforce the impact with the audience and to reach new members of the target population
• Timeliness: content is provided when the audience is most receptive to, or in need of, the specific information
• Understandability: reading, language levels, and format are appropriate for the specific audience (i.e., Employees, Family Members, Garrison leadership, etc.)

• What the research says about health communication
• Health communication best supports Wellness when multiple communication methods are used to reach specific audiences.
• Effective Wellness and communication initiatives should reflect an audiencecentered perspective, and reflect the preferred formats, contexts, and means of communication for the intended audience.

Material adapted from: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Healthy People 2010. 2nd ed. With Understanding and Improving Health and Objectives for Improving Health. 2 vols. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, November 2000.
http://www.healthypeople.gov/document/HTML/Volume1/11HealthCom.htm

The Corporate Health and Wellness Program Vision

A Corporate Health and Wellness Program vision statement is a concise statement that summarizes the purpose and objectives of your organization’s commitment to creating a Corporate Health and Wellness Program. Taking the time to clarify and describe your organization’s Corporate Health and Wellness Program vision can provide a focus and a consistent direction for your Strategies for years to come. The vision statement reminds leaders and workers of the link between worker health and the organization’s ability to achieve its overall mission.

Answer the following questions and you’ll have the components needed to build a simple and powerful Corporate Health and Wellness Program vision for your organization’s culture of wellness:

•         What do you want your Corporate Health and Wellness Program to accomplish?

•         How do you plan to accomplish it?

•         How does this Corporate Health and Wellness Program mission support or further the organization’s mission?

A sample Corporate Health and Wellness Program vision statement might be . . .

To have workers who perform at their best and who enable XYZ Corporation to be an industry leader in printing quality and customer service (organization’s mission), XYZ Corporation is committed to providing opportunities for healthy behaviors during the workday (how) in order to encourage workers not to smoke, to be active, and to eat healthfully (what).

The Corporate Health and Wellness Program Brand

In the same way that your organization’s name and brand image provide visibility for your business, your Strategies toward creating a Corporate Health and Wellness Program will benefit from being easily recognizable to workers:

•         A consistently used Corporate Health and Wellness Program brand on all communications conveys to workers that the commitment to a culture of wellness is here to stay.

•         A Corporate Health and Wellness Program brand institutionalizes the culture and makes it more likely to withstand changes in staff and budget.

Do what you can to engage workers in creating the identity (brand) for your organization’s Corporate Health and Wellness Program. Not only are they more likely to accept the name, it’s also a great way to announce to workers the organization’s Corporate Health and Wellness Program commitment. Here are two possible approaches to involving workers:

Option 1: Have a Corporate Health and Wellness Program contest

1. Announce the Corporate Health and Wellness Program contest guidelines and deadline.
2. Have the Wellness Committee review the ideas submitted, and choose a name.

If, for example, your business, Premier Building and Design, is in the commercial construction business, you might receive the following Corporate Health and Wellness Program ideas from workers:

•         Cornerstone: Feeling well is what it’s all about

•         Premier Elements: Building healthier workers

•         Custom Build: Building health builds wealth

•         Building Health: Designing better worker health

After reviewing the entries, your Wellness Committee determines that it likes the name “Premier Elements” and the subtitle “Building health builds wealth”. Your committee awards the “name the Corporate Health and Wellness Program contest” prize to the two workers, those who submitted the pieces of the name that represent the final product.

Premier Elements: Building health builds wealth

            3. Choose a Corporate Health and Wellness Program logo to go with the name.

The Corporate Health and Wellness Program logo is an important piece of the branding

•         Review any ideas submitted for Corporate Health and Wellness Program logos.

•         If you’re fortunate to have a graphic design professional at your business, enlist her or his help with developing the Corporate Health and Wellness Program logo!

•         As an alternative, choose a piece of clip-art that fits with the Corporate Health and Wellness Program name you’ve selected. For example, the business referenced above might look for a symbol that conveys building, health and wealth.

Option 2: Wellness Committee determines the name and brand

1.      Have your Wellness Committee brainstorm Corporate Health and Wellness Program names.

•         To get ideas flowing, ask members to write down all health-related words and words associated with your organization or industry.

•         Try clustering words together as in the construction business example above.

2.      Once your Wellness Committee has narrowed down the possibilities to about three ideas, have committee members vote to select a name for your culture of wellness.

3.      Choose a Corporate Health and Wellness Program logo to go with the winning name.

4.      Announce the organization’s Corporate Health and Wellness Program and the corresponding Corporate Health and Wellness Program name. Explain that workers on the advisory committee chose the name.