If You Are Looking to Start Your Own Corporate Wellness Program, Consider This
So your company is ready to start a corporate wellness program. It’s a smart investment. A study by the Harvard Business Review found that for every dollar invested in wellness, companies average a return of $2.71 by way of increased productivity, decreased absenteeism, and reduced healthcare cost. Looking to recruit? Then it will be interesting to know that according to Linchpin, “When looking for jobs, most employees tend to look if a company has a wellness program in place. 87% of employees look for employers who can support them achieve their work-life balance.” So having a strong employee wellness program can help your company recruit and retain valuable talent.
Whether you create and manage the program in-house or farm it out to a vendor is an initial consideration. The US Chamber of Commerce offers a useful brochure on how to design an employee wellness program. It’s worth a review to help guide your decision. If you don’t have the capacity to set up your in-house program, consider using a health and wellness vendor to address your employee wellness needs.
It will come as no surprise that stress and anxiety continue to top the list of employee wellness issues.The pandemic has exasperated what was already among the top health concerns of employees. Research conducted by Oracle and Workplace Intelligence found that 2020 was the most stressful year people have ever experienced in their working lives. Seventy-eight percent of the workers surveyed said that the pandemic has negatively affected their mental health, 76% indicated that companies should be doing more to protect workers’ mental health, and a staggering 85% said that newfound work-related stress is affecting their home lives although the majority of the workforce may never spend a full week in the office, companies are advised to consider these findings as they plan for the future of their workforces. In a recent blog, Employee Wellness in Times of Remote Working, I shared what employees are currently looking for and some innovative approaches to incorporate into new or existing wellness programs. Couple this information with my summary of The Top Wellness Trends of 2022 to help you to design your program.
Is it more cost effective for you to use a wellness vendor? Then consider the following issues when evaluating a potential vendor:
Will they support an organization of your size? Some have a minimum group size.
Are they able to tailor a program to meet your needs? Some companies just offer stock libraries of resources that may or may not meet the needs of your employees.
How will you be able to track your return on investment? Not all companies provide employee participation and performance tracking.
Can employees receive direct support from vendor? Personalized interactions can make the difference between a successful and a mediocre program.
Do they offer mobile platforms? Although you may not want your wellness program to be exclusively app based, consider the demographics of your employees and how easily you’ll be able to monitor performance and therefore your return on investment.
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