Wellness/Wellbeing Program Start Up Blog #5


Doing Worksite Wellness and Wellbeing Right!


Over the years, I have seen far too many worksite wellness programs flounder or even fail because of poor design or poor implementation. Far too often, the boss approaches someone in HR and says: “I want to start a worksite wellness program. Congratulations, you are our new wellness program coordinator.” 

This blog will focus on starting up an effective and successful worksite wellness/wellbeing program. It will focus on helping brand new worksite wellness program practitioners (that’s you) get your first program started off on the right foot. Current worksite wellness program practitioners who feel stuck at their current level will also benefit from this blog.

I hope you will find benefit and value in this blog post and the others to follow.

6 Essentials When Starting A Worksite Wellness Program

Addressing these six critical elements is necessary when starting any worksite wellness program today. The six serve as a solid foundation for creating an effective, successful program. The six critical elements include purpose, support, participation, assessment, comprehensive and evaluation.

Purpose

Having clarity of purpose is the starting point for building a worksite wellness program. Clarity of purpose is your fundamental why. Why are you establishing the worksite wellness program? What is the purpose you wish to accomplish? It is crucial that senior leaders be involved in and actually take the lead in forming the program’s purpose. Having a program purpose sets the stage for everything else that follows in the program development process.

Support

Having an effective, successful program requires the support of employees, operational level leaders and senior leaders. Obviously, having a clear sense of the program’s purpose is crucial to garnering the needed support. Support for the wellness program requires employees, operational leaders and senior leaders to all have a clear understanding of WIIFM – What’s In It For Me. Obviously, the nature of their support will vary by each of the three different groups.

Participation

Participation is closely related to support. It is well established that employees are more likely to support and participate in what they have a hand in creating. Since not all employees are created equal, employees will be more likely to participate in programming and interventions most closely associated with their pain points and life issues at the moment. Employees should also be given the opportunity to participate as a wellness program champion or as a member of the wellness team, wellness committee or the safety – wellness committee.

Assessment

With the program’s purpose clearly identified and articulated, the next step is to identify the available resources that can be applied to achieving the program’s purpose, goals and objectives. In addition to the available resources, conducting an assessment will also identify what new or additional resources are needed by the program.

An analysis of the data and information gathered through the assessment process should yield gaps that need to be addressed. These gaps are best addressed through the creation and execution of either strategic and annual operation type plans, or a combined plan. The completion of an assessment assures the foundation for the wellness program is built upon data and actual experiences, rather than being just the implementation of a series of random activities. 

Comprehensive

Since each employee is unique and at a different point in life’s trajectory, in order to meet the employee where they are at, the worksite wellness program needs to be comprehensive in nature. In order to offer something for everyone, a comprehensive program approach means addressing awareness building, knowledge and skill set enhancement, lifestyle management, organization health, along with program evaluation.

Since the health of an organization impacts employee health and wellbeing just as much as the health and wellbeing of employees impacts the health of the organization, a worksite wellness program must focus on the health of the organization just as much as its focuses on the health and wellbeing of the employees. The two are inseparable. To focus worksite wellness program efforts on only the employees is really doing only half of the job that needs to be done.

Evaluation

Continuous quality improvement is a critical element of any worksite wellness program today. You can better manage and improve upon what you measure. Evaluating your efforts allows you to clearly demonstrate that you are, in fact, making a difference for both the employer and the employees.

Hopefully you now see why each of these is an essential part of the foundation of your effective, successful worksite wellness program. Ignore them at your program’s peril.

Resource Box:

As an independent consulting, coaching and training contractor, Bill McPeck is a worksite wellness and wellbeing program thought leader, strategist, practitioner and mentor. With more than 15 years of worksite wellness experience and study, 

Bill is dedicated to helping wellness program coordinators (both new and current) create successful, sustainable worksite wellness and wellbeing programs. Bill has experience working in both large and small employer settings. Email Bill at: williammcpeck@gmail.com