Corporate Wellness Programs: Five Key Pitfalls to Avoid
The evidence is irrefutable that implementing a successful corporate wellness program can enhance employee well-being, productivity, and overall organizational health. However, there are some key mistakes that can significantly hinder the effectiveness of your wellness program. Here are five that are easy to avoid once you’re aware of them—all you need is a leadership team that genuinely cares about your people.
1. Lack of Management Support and Involvement
A critical factor for the success of a corporate wellness program—and one where we see many organizations fall short—is the support and active involvement of management. Regardless of how busy the organization’s leadership is, this is vital. When leaders actively support and participate in wellness initiatives, it sends a powerful message to employees about how much the organization values their people’s wellbeing. When leaders don’t get involved, it sends just the opposite message—that they either don’t believe in the program, don’t care about their people, or have a hidden agenda of some sort.
In our view, management involvement in your wellness program is a sound business investment that can optimize workforce adoption and engagement by:
- Setting an example: When employees see their leaders participating in wellness activities, they are more likely to join in.
- Building trust: Leadership participation in wellness activities facilitates interaction, helps break down organizational barriers, and allows management and staff to get to know each other on a “human” level.
- Mentoring and motivating: Wellness programs provide an excellent forum for motivating employees through recognition and encouragement—and optionally with incentives too, if you have the budget for it.
- Identifying resource needs: Hands-on participation allows management to learn what drives your people and where to allocate resources—not just at the wellness program level, but at the organizational level too.
2. Misalignment with Workforce Needs and Interests
To be effective, your wellness program needs to resonate with the specific needs and interests of your workforce. This may seem obvious, but a 2020 Aetna™ study revealed otherwise. Although 70% of employers believed they provided good access to health and wellness benefits, only 23% of their employees thought so—an enormous disconnect. The truth is that generic “one size fits all” programs thrown at employees without considering their unique characteristics are not only a recipe for low participation and engagement—they may even result in alienation. A good example is the annoying weight management offer I keep getting month after month from my national health plan … even though I’m not overweight, eat very healthy mostly, and am extremely active! To avoid this pitfall:
- Conduct surveys and assessments: Understand the health concerns, preferences, and interests of your employees. Your wellness portal may come with user-friendly surveys and functionalities specifically for this purpose.
- Offer diverse options: Provide a variety of wellness activities and resources that cater to different needs, interests, personality types, and levels of health.
- Regularly review and adjust: Continuously evaluate the program’s components to ensure they remain relevant and appealing. More about that later.
3. Ineffective or Infrequent Communication
Effective communication is vital for the success of any wellness program. Employees need to be informed about the program’s goals, activities, and benefits clearly and accurately. Accuracy is especially important if you offer incentives—there’s no quicker way to demotivate an employee than for them to put forth the effort to earn a reward, only to find out that they didn’t qualify because the rules were confusing or not communicated correctly. Your communications also need to strike the right tone—the program needs to be perceived as inviting and beneficial (for them!), rather than burdensome or intimidating. To avoid the pitfall of poor communication:
- Leverage multiple channels: Utilize emails, newsletters, intranet, and social media to reach employees—and perhaps flyers in the lunchroom etc. Depending on your organization’s size, also consider enlisting wellness program ambassadors to help beat the drum.
- Communicate regularly and often: Something we see with all our clients, regardless of program specifics, is that wellness program activity spikes every time a well-worded communication goes out.
- Use a warm, inviting tone: Impart your message in a way that lets your people know you care about them. Remember, you want to let your people know you’re doing wellness “for” them, not “to” them.
- Personalize your messages: When appropriate, tailor communication to address individual needs and preferences. If your wellness portal’s messaging functionality offers filtering options, put in the effort to target groups of members based on their specific activities and needs. You will vault participation and engagement to a whole new level.
- Provide timely updates: Keep employees informed about upcoming events, changes, and especially successes. Don’t forget that inspiring someone to achieve better health can literally change their life!
4. Lack of Objective Measurement of Results
It is impossible to determine the effectiveness of your employee wellness program without objective measurement. Metrics and data are essential to evaluate progress, make informed decisions, and make the adjustments needed to optimize wellness program engagement and outcomes. To avoid this pitfall:
- Set clear goals: Define specific, measurable objectives—not only for the overall program, but for each activity within it. If you’re working with a wellness vendor, consider asking them to help you establish realistic benchmarks based on information from their other clients.
- Track results: As a rule of thumb, measuring the following will provide you with the information you need: participation rate, completion rate, satisfaction and—when applicable—health outcomes. Quality wellness platforms often include a robust set of standard reports designed especially for this purpose.
- Analyze the data: Use the collected data to identify trends, successes, and areas for improvement. Be self-disciplined about performing data analysis regularly—generally, we recommend once a month. What you learn can be invaluable.
5. Inflexibility and Resistance to Change
A successful wellness program must be adaptable and responsive to feedback—both from your members and from the data you measure. Sticking rigidly to components that are not working does more than just waste resources and reduce program efficacy: it can also negatively impact overall employee wellness engagement.
- Encourage feedback: Create channels for employees to share their thoughts and suggestions. Surveys, well-publicized inboxes (or anonymous onsite suggestion boxes), and informal chats with wellness ambassadors are good examples.
- Be willing to pivot: If certain aspects of the program are not effective, be open to making changes. Wellness program success is a journey, not a destination, so be willing to make changes when the data indicates it.
- Stay updated: by keeping abreast of new wellness trends and best practices to continuously improve the program. If your wellness vendor sends out regular communications, be sure to subscribe so you can leverage their knowledge and experience. Depending on your organization’s size and structure, you may also want to set up a wellness committee to review and discuss program performance and feedback regularly.
Closing Thoughts
Avoiding these 5 key pitfalls will go a long way towards having a successful corporate wellness program; one that truly enhances employee well-being and drives positive outcomes not only for the workforce but also for your organization. I hope you’ve found this article helpful; for more like it, I invite you to check out our Resources Hub.
FAQs
Although different studies produce different results based on a number of factors, some indicated that every dollar spent could net you $1.50 to $3.00 in savings. The biggest drivers of these savings are healthcare cost reduction, enhanced productivity, and reduced absenteeism.
Yes they absolutely do, with the caveat that they need to be well designed and optimized. What works for a tech startup might not work for a car dealership. For further help read How to Evaluate and Energize Your Corporate Wellness Program
One of the most effective ways to increase engagement is with well thought out team challenges. Regular and effective communications, use of gamification, and employee feedback that is incorporated into the offering also help.
