Posted by Worksite Wellness | Posted in worksite wellness programs | Posted on 29-05-2009
The Worksite Wellness Program Committee ought to set out a plan for the entire year that outlines accomplishing goals and objectives,
as well as supports details for marketing and evaluating the program. The plan is the detailed map of what types of programs will be
provided, when and where they will be scheduled, how they will be marketed and evaluated, and what the budget is. It is important to
plan your wellness activities based on your goals and objectives, as well as the budget since different strategies will yield different
outcomes. For example, if your intention is to increase awareness on a topic, then distributing handouts or scheduling a one-time
education session may be appropriate. Nevertheless, if your objective is to change behavior, then different strategies may be
necessary, such as ongoing weekly meetings and support groups. Click here to link to Program Design Options for additional ideas.
Worksite Wellness Program Marketing
This is the time to coordinate your marketing strategies! How can you market the wellness program and ongoing activities? No matter
how you decide to, market often, keep it fresh, and remind workers repeatedly! Consider having an overall kickoff activity to inform
everyone of the wellness program. Senior Management ought to support the introduction or invitation so that all workers are alert to
their support and leadership in the program.
Possible marketing methods:
- Distributing email messages, including reminders
- Develop bulletins
- Hanging bulletin board postings
- Composing articles
- Sending letters or
- Distributing special invitations
Other Worksite Wellness Program Considerations:
- Is the Worksite Wellness Program promoted to all workers or to a specific group?
- Do you have a Worksite Wellness Program champion (someone who is coupled with different groups in the organization,and well respected) who can help in your promotion efforts?
- If your marketing efforts aren’t working, do you have a way to revisit and adjust your strategy?
- How will you determine performance and evaluate your program? And how will you collect the information needed toevaluate your program?
Topics most often included in Worksite Wellness :
- Nutrition
- Physical Activity/Exercise
- Tobacco Use Cessation
- Bone Health
- Heart Health
- The Spine
- Stress Reduction
- Chronic Disease Awareness & Prevention
- Self-care; Wise Medical Care Consumer
- Screening Services (BMI, Blood Pressure, bone density, cholesterol, glucose, posture, vision, and other…)
- Ergonomic Assessments
- Health Fairs
- Kids/family Events
- Others subject matters that workers have interest in
The subject matters and type of Worksite Wellness Program planned hinge upon the needs and interest, central objective and
resources available. Program Design Options include awareness programs such as handouts and/or education sessions, behavior
change programs such as tobacco cessation and weight loss classes, and environmental or company support such as no smoking
policies or healthy selections in vending machines.
The programs planned also hinge upon the demographics of your workforce. If you have a young, healthy workforce, you may want to
focus the wellness attention on keeping workers healthy and not need to screen for disease. Instead you might want to focus on
healthy lifestyle behavior such as exercise and good diet to prevent the start of disease. Click here for more information on strategies
for keeping workers well, identifying disease early, or returning workers to work who already have a chronic conditions.
It is also important to consider, and plan how you will evaluate the performance of your wellness program. The system needs to be
shown for tracking certain data and recording events depending on the program goals and objectives. Step 7 discusses program
evaluation in more detail. And Step 6 will launch your program!