What strategies improve the ROI of a worksite wellness program?
The Wellness Council of America (WELCOA) suggests the following five strategies:
- Learn how your insurance company may be willing to pay for wellness. Many insurance companies provide preventive health benefits for their enrollees. These benefits pay for age and gender appropriate disease and cancer screenings. Also often included are annual physical examinations and routine immunizations. These benefits are a part of the health plan, so there is no or very little cost associated for you and your employees.
- Provide a benefit plan design so wellness can be cost neutral. When determining an employee’s contribution to his or her health plan, a wellness program component should be included when calculating the total costs. The extra dollars per employee should become your wellness budget for the year. Also, communicate your wellness program incentives, including reimbursement of a certain amount or percentage to participating employees at the end of the year. This incentive can come in the form of cash, premium reductions or rewards.
- Put into practice wellness policies that support healthy living. Change policies and worksite environments that discourage healthy behaviors and habits. Be sure that employees sign off on these policy changes.
- Create a wellness message that increases employee participation, morale and engagement. The way in which a wellness program is communicated to employees will greatly determine its level of success. Wellness programs have two primary goals: to positively change lives by improving health and to positively impact a business’s bottom line. Because of this dual outcome, employers need to be cautious of how they communicate. Employers should think like employees, by not telling them how much the company will save but rather what’s in it for them.
- Take advantage of your free community resources. There are many great community resources that you can use to complement your wellness program, such as WELCOA, the American Cancer Society and the CDC.
After a wellness program is put in place, when will health improvements be seen?
Of course, each company is different, but employers with effective worksite wellness programs can expect the following. When it comes to measurable results, often first on the list, which is rather immediate, is a decrease in employee absenteeism. Companies that are able to measure productivity will begin to notice improvement in six to 12 months. On the flip side, reductions in health plan premium increases may not take place until two or three years after the program begins. This is a direct result of a decline in health care claims. Obtaining these results requires that the programming be upheld and regularly examined for effectiveness. If the program is not maintained or there is lack of employee participation, negative and potentially harmful wellness behaviors may ensue.
Patty Starr is the senior director of health insurance and benefits for the Council of Smaller Enterprises (COSE), one of Ohio’s largest small business support organizations. Reach her at [email protected] or (216) 592-2269. Composed of more than 17,000 members, COSE strives to help small businesses grow and maintain their independence. COSE has a long history of fighting for the rights of all small business owners, whether it’s through group purchasing programs for health care powered by Medical Mutual of Ohio, workers’ compensation or energy, advocating for specific changes in legislation or regulation, or providing a forum and resource for small businesses to connect with and learn from one another.
