Where to Start with Employee Wellness Plans
Ten Steps Toward Strategic Employee Wellness Plans
The Company Health and Wellness Program management world is evolving rapidly. Each month, there are new research findings that support the
premise that Employee Wellness Plans and disease management have a long-term impact on medical costs. Many large companies that started
Employee Wellness Plans three to five years ago are showing savings in health, disability, and workers compensation costs. Small to
mid-size companies are watching all this and wondering where to start with wellness.
Getting senior management support and budget approval is one of the challenges at the beginning of a Employee Wellness Program. This is the
case because Employee Wellness Plans can be expensive, averaging $150-300 per staff member per year in large companies. Most of the savings
are not realized for a number of years. This long-term investing is hard for companies on the move.
The key to success for Employee Wellness Plans is to take a strategic approach. Here are ten steps to consider when starting a Employee
Wellness Program.
1. Start with senior management. Without senior management support, a health promotion strategy can fall flat. Start with the health of
your executive team and discover your wellness champions at the top of the company.
2. Assess the problem. Look at your medical claims and analyze the trends. Which conditions are driving your medical, disability, and
workers’ compensation claims and which are modifiable? What’s worked and what hasn’t thus far? What is the long-term impact of doing
nothing?
3. Hold an initial wellness meeting. Invite your primary stakeholders both inside and outside the company. Ask your broker to facilitate
the meeting and invite primary health vendors including health, disability, Employee Assistance Program (EAP), fitness, and occupational
nursing. Review claims and utilization data and establish primary areas of concern. Look at current offerings and see how they can be
tailored to the needs of the population.
4. Look at both healthy and unhealthy staff members. Since 85 percent of claims are usually attributed to 15 percent of claimants, it is
essential to reach those with the most costly conditions while also reaching people who are at risk for developing preventable diseases in
the future. Voluntary Employee Wellness Plans such as lunch and learns wellness seminars miss many of the people who need them most. Look
at initiatives that are population-wide or target intact workgroups. Wellness incentives help but do not motivate everyone.
5. Establish short-term goals for the Employee Wellness Programs. Establish some realistic short-term goals based on your primary areas of
concern. Are there any plan design changes that could have an immediate impact on spending? Are there some programmatic actions that could
have immediate results?
6. Find out what staff members are thinking. Hold some focus groups to determine where people are with wellness. What’s working? What
isn’t? How much interest do people have in the Employee Wellness Programs? What obstacles and barriers are staff members experiencing when
they try to change behavior?
7. Ensure that you have a high-impact Employee Assistance Program (EAP). Your first wellness dollars should go into upgrading your Employee
Assistance Program (EAP). A highly utilized Employee Assistance Program (EAP) can provide a foundation for all of your future wellness
programs. A good Employee Assistance Program (EAP) is a trusted link to the hearts and minds of staff members. At no additional cost, the
Employee Assistance Program (EAP) can provide needed follow-up coaching and individual attention for staff members who are working on
modifiable health behaviors or involved in disease management initiatives. Nutritionists, fitness, pregnancy, and stress management
specialists are all part of a high-value Employee Assistance Program (EAP).
8. Establish three to five year goals for medical savings and measure them. Get help from your broker and insurance carrier help you on
long-term goals for your health, disability, and workers compensation plans. Start program metrics that will help you to measure ROI. Go
beyond participation rates, completion rates and program satisfaction. Measure changes in readiness, changes in behavior, and changes in
risk factors. Start rigorous methods to measure medical savings over the long term.
9. Establish goals for organizational health. Look at the more intangible benefits of a Employee Health and Wellness Program and quantify
them whenever possible. Include staff member turnover rates, cost of new hires, staff member morale, benefit satisfaction data, and
employer of choice issues in setting goals. Start ways to measure success in these areas.
10. Add specifics to your short and long-term plan. Include a Company Health and Wellness Program strategy, a communication strategy, and a
Company Health and Wellness Program incentive strategy that will fit with your company culture. Focus on integration of related components
along a health continuum with communications that are focused, simple, and human. Start a budget that includes primary components such as
consumer education, health promotion, Health Risk Assessments, and regular biometric screens.
January 28th, 2009 at 3:42 pm
I would also add one more thought to the list – recognize that you may need some incentive to motivate employees to participate in wellness programs and you may need a reward to acknowledge their efforts along the way. Too often, I have seen organizations build excellent wellness programs under the belief that just by offering these programs people will naturally participate. The reality is that more often than not, good health is not enough to change behaviors. Even when individuals want to change, it is difficult. A well structured wellness program recognizes that there is a “what’s in it for me factor” and tries to address it as part of a comprehensive program.