Financial Advantage to Employee Wellness Schemes
Is there a financial gain to having a wellness programme in your business or is it just more cost? It’s a valid question.
Employee Assistance Programmes & Health & Wellness Programmes were not even around in the 1990s, but now even relatively small companies are considering them. Why … because they work!
Workplace Wellness is the buzz. The physical aspect of adding health and fitness related benefits to an employee’s package is obvious, but what about the return on the investment for the employer?
Evidence-based studies have been conducted and are showing that the financial gain to the employer is definitely apparent. Fewer sick days are observed, focus and productivity are both significantly improved with nutrition and fitness improvements – in turn increasing employee engagement and attitude.
Also apparent is that employees are beginning to consider non pay-related benefits as having increasing value, and are likely to stay longer where a wellness programme improves their working life. Diabetes sufferers, smokers and over-stressed people benefit hugely from the interest and investment in their health and wellness – and become more productive, more committed and longer term employees as a result.
Employee Wellness Programmes that are successful generally include a number of aspects as follows:
- Physical fitness programmes, such as subsidised gym memberships, yoga classes or other fitness related pursuit.
- Smoking cessation programmes – when in a company subsidised or funded programme, smokers are more likely to be successful in cessation, especially if there is more than one employee in the programme (note – you cannot make this a condition of employment, selection of the programme must be voluntary).
- Enrolment in a nutrition or weight loss programme – those not actively working in the nutrition field will not appreciate how much diet and movement contributes to productivity, quality of sleep and general state of mind. Positive changes in nutrition is key to focus and work output.
- Stress management programmes such as meditation, hypnosis or massage therapy – reducing stress levels to increase focus and quality of work output.
Some programmes include the use of, or contribution to, the cost of fitness measurement devices like Fitbits, and team challenges are commonly used to engage employees and boost overall team morale.
It’s a good idea to take measurements of key lifestyle factors at the outset of a programme to monitor progress, such as blood pressure, blood glucose levels, resting heart rate etc in order to measure physical gains – while also monitoring work outputs to monitor and measure work output changes.
There is no doubt that employees who feel valued will stay longer and remain increasingly engaged. Adding fitness and taking a genuine interest in their progress (and in your own), will only make this stronger.
Join the Wellness Trend, and look after your team (and yourself).