Wellness initiatives encourage staff members to lead healthy lifestyles, which lowers their risk of illness and saves money on healthcare. They also increase productivity and reduce sick days and workers’ compensation claims.
Almost all wellness programs are voluntary, but many employers offer incentives to prompt participation. Some even impose financial penalties for non-participation.
Personalized Coaching
A high-touch element in many wellness programs is a personalized coaching program. Unlike group meetings or one-on-one mentoring, these coaching sessions focus on an employee’s unique circumstances and needs. They also connect personally to the employee’s health and well-being, building rapport and trust. These programs can help employees overcome obstacles, change damaging behaviors, and adopt new positive habits.
The resulting increase in employee health and productivity reduces costs in several ways. A healthier workforce can decrease absenteeism (and the accompanying requirement for paid sick leave) and presenteeism (when employees come to work but aren’t functioning at their best). It can also lower employee expenses by reducing the need for prescription medications and other treatments and lowering deductibles and co-pays.
Creating a culture of health requires passionate and persistent leadership. A comprehensive program is a complex undertaking that takes significant time and resources. Teams of HR and other staff must be involved to ensure success. They should be responsible for collecting, analyzing, and strategizing data to drive the program’s goals and create a strong sense of ownership among employees.
Several reputable studies have shown that workplace wellness programs can mitigate elevated employee healthcare costs. However, companies must understand that most of these savings come from disease management programs rather than lifestyle management. Lifestyle management mitigates long-term health risks, whereas disease management eliminates immediate healthcare costs.
Web-Based Solutions
Many of the most effective employee wellness solutions are web-based and leverage a variety of modules. Each module has its purpose, but they all work together to improve the overall effectiveness of your program.
Health risk assessments and biometric screenings are typically used to identify health issues. These assessments provide the foundation for disease management programs that help employees cope with chronic illnesses or manage their condition.
These programs focus on helping employees adopt and follow healthy habits such as regular exercise, eating healthfully, better sleep, and tobacco or responsible alcohol use. Successful implementation of these programs has the potential to increase productivity and reduce healthcare costs.
Incentives are among the biggest motivators for employees to participate in a company wellness program. Some popular incentives include reductions in health insurance premiums, cash or gift cards, and extra contributions to employee health savings accounts. Many employers have also found success with a tiered incentive structure where higher performers earn more significant rewards.
Another popular type of incentive is a “reasonable alternative standard,” where employees are offered an alternative method to meet a wellness program goal in case it’s medically unwise or impossible for them to meet the original requirement. These alternative standards may be a modified points system or an individual coaching program. A wellness platform provides all the tools and resources you need to deliver an effective and scalable program.
Targeted Education
Participating in wellness initiatives makes employees healthier, which lowers healthcare expenses. While some factors, such as heredity and age, cannot be changed, focused education and personal discipline can change others, like smoking, obesity, high blood pressure, and sedentary habits that contribute to chronic diseases. A wellness program should address all of these issues in addition to mental health.
Employee health risk assessments are valuable tools to help employees understand their risks and take action, but they must be designed to engage participants. The most effective assessments are designed to help employees track their health progress. They also provide a range of incentives to encourage participation. Popular options include cash, reductions in the cost of health insurance premiums, and contributions to flexible spending accounts.
Wellness programs also reduce healthcare costs through lower costs for medications, therapies, and hospital stays. Employee absence due to medical problems results in higher paid sick leave and reduced productivity (presenteeism). Wellness programs can decrease absenteeism and improve productivity by encouraging better health practices.
Data-Driven Reporting
As a manager, you understand that the health of your workforce is both crucial and a threat. A healthy team means greater productivity and a positive company culture, but an unhealthy team can quickly increase costs.
A growing body of research shows that wellness programs increase the exercise employees engage in, lowering the risks of obesity and other metabolic disorders. In turn, this lowers absenteeism and improves mental health. This, in turn, reduces healthcare costs for the employer and limits the impact of sick leave on productivity.
In addition, some wellness programs offer tools to help employees track and manage their health data, which leads to a more self-sufficient approach to health and well-being.
A good wellness program creates a feedback loop between high engagement and improved health, leading to better morale. In turn, this can lead to a decrease in absenteeism and turnover within the organization.