Employee Wellness Program

An employee wellness program is an effective method to promote health and wellness amongst the members of your staff. Programs will encourage awareness of health related issues, improve morale, and often times reduce cost of healthcare throughout the corporation.

One important aspect of an employee wellness program is that the program is voluntary. It is rare for 100% of all employees to be interested in participating in an employee wellness program, and those without interest cannot be coerced into doing so.

To find out how many employees would be interested and would participate in the employee wellness program, you may conduct a survey or have every employee fill out a prepared questionnaire.

This would give you a fairly good estimate regarding how many employees are likely to take part in the employee wellness program and whether it was worthwhile implementing it.

For the employee wellness program to run smoothly one person should be elected who will be responsible for coordinating the program. This person may be anyone who is motivated and committed to leading a healthy lifestyle. Moreover this person should be interested in promoting the employee wellness program and speaking to other colleagues and staff about the program.

The goals of the employee wellness program should be well defined. These goals should include any combination of the following:

Improve general health and well-being
Improve productivity
Improve the sense of being a team
Improve morale & attitude
Decrease absenteeism
Reduce turnover rate
Decrease injuries

For the employee wellness program to be successful, a Wellness Committee could be appointed, depending on the size of your organization. Forming a Wellness Committee spreads the responsibility of the employee wellness program among a number of representatives.

Committee members may have various responsibilities including booking external health care professionals, ensuring the availability of healthy snacks and organizing various health-based events. The Committee members should coordinate their efforts and meet on a regular basis to keep each other updated on the progress of the employee wellness program.

Meeting regularly will also allow the committee to make the necessary improvements to keep the program interesting, applicable, and effective. Rewarding committee members for their efforts will ensure a firm commitment from them and encourage them to continue their work to enhance the employee wellness program.

It is important for an employee wellness program to address the specific needs of the staff members within the company. Identifying topics of interest and concern may occur by conducting a survey among the employees.

It is important to find out what aspects of the program the employees are most interested in. Is it on site healthcare, first aid courses, healthy snacking program, health resources or RSI prevention software? You can incorporate the necessary elements into the employee wellness program based on this survey.

Employee wellness programs are effective tools that benefit both the employee and employer within a corporation. Implementing these programs correctly will bring about significant positive change within your organization.