Worksite Wellness ProgramsWorksite Wellness Programs

1. Senior management involvement in the Worksite Wellness Program- Evidence of enthusiastic commitment and involvement of senior management helps workers understand their businesses’ serious commitment to health. Employees need to perceive that their senior management, supervisors, and coworkers have positive attitudes toward health since these factors have all been associated with improved employee health status. Management-related factors have been shown to contribute more to success than the content of the intervention.

2. Participatory planning – A Worksite Wellness Program should be undertaken in partnership with the workforce. Employees from all levels of staff should be actively engaged in the health and management aspects of the project as well as all on-going processes of any Worksite Wellness Program. Planning must also include processes for maintaining communication with all staff and building their commitment to the process. Beginning Worksite Wellness Program steering committees to guide interventions during the planning and delivery of worksite health promotion programming improves worker awareness, participation, and satisfaction. Staff Member committees can identify perceived worker interests regarding educational programming, determine work site-specific characteristics that may affect the intervention or influence participation, and suggest the best methods for promotion and delivery of Worksite Wellness Programs and activities. Ways to maximize worker input and involvement might include interest surveys, focus groups, and peer counsellors.

3. Primary focus on workers’ needs – A Worksite Wellness Program should meet the needs of all workers, regardless of their current level of health and recognize the needs, preferences, and attitudes of different groups of participants. Program designers should consider the major health risks in the target population, the specific risks within the particular group of workers, and the company’s needs. In other words, interventions should be tailor-made to the characteristics and needs of the recipients. This means that different programs must be offered at different levels. Participation and commitment can be increased if a group of workers has the opportunity to address a specific modifiable risk factor of their choice.

4. Optimal use of on-site resources – Planning and implementation of Worksite Wellness Programs should optimize use of on-site personnel, physical resources, and organizational capabilities. For example, whenever possible, initiatives should use on-site health and safety, management, work organization, communication, HR, and other specialists. Well-qualified external leadership may be introduced when in-house expertise is lacking.

5. Integration – An overall worksite health policy should be developed. The policies governing employee health must align with the corporate mission, vision, and values, supporting both short- and long-term goals. These consistent policies must affirm the value of worker health and a commitment to engage workers in health enhancement. Worksite Wellness Program Procedures should be integrated into a company’s regular management practices and eventually should be formally incorporated into the company’s corporate plan with adequate resources attached to them.

6. Recognition that a person’s health is determined by an interdependent set of factors – Any Worksite Wellness Program must address multiple components of an individual’s life:
• the worksite physical and psychosocial environment;
• their personal resources such as social support, sense of empowerment, etc.; and
• their lifestyle practices influencing health.

7. Tailoring to the special features of each worksite environment – Worksite Wellness Programs must be responsive to the unique needs of each worksite’s procedures, organization and culture. Integrating health behaviors and program participation into the existing corporate culture will normalize program participation.

8. Worksite Wellness Program Assessment – Project management should flow through needs analysis, establishing priorities, planning, implementation, continuous monitoring, and evaluation. Assessment must include a clearly-defined range of process measures and outcomes as well as mechanisms for monitoring the impact of non-intervention worksite changes such as plant closure, major worksite re-organization, and new technology on staff health.

9. Long-term commitment – To sustain the benefits of the Worksite Wellness Program, the worksite must continue the initiative over time, reinforcing risk-reduction behaviours and adapting the programs to ongoing personal, social, economic, and worksite changes.