If you believe you have the resources to conduct wellness lifestyle behaviours throughout the workday, you will be more likely to actually participate in such behaviours. This is according to an April 2013 survey by The Ohio State University, who noted that thoughts of healthy behaviours shouldn’t stop when the workday starts, even though typical workday activities such as answering emails, attending meetings and completing administrative work aren’t necessarily conducive to your wellbeing.
In a similar survey, respondents from more than 90 universities and colleges indicated that they would feel more likely participating in on-campus wellness activities if they had ‘flexibility in work schedules, a culture that encourages wellness, good communication about available programs and activities, leaders/administrators being fully engaged and supporting wellness, convenient locations and improved access to wellness resources and incentives.’
According to Bernadette Melnyk, Ohio State’s chief wellness officer and dean of the College of Nursing, ‘You’ve got to build a culture and environment that makes it easy and fun for people to engage in wellness activities. So, building a culture and environment of wellness in addition to making wellness activities freely available throughout the system and working with individuals on behaviour change is super important.’
Melnyk added that general healthy behaviours can help to improve the corporate wellness of a company, as well as the individual: ‘Evidence from studies has shown that when people have higher levels of wellness, they are more happy, engaged and productive and have fewer chronic illnesses, which means they miss less work and cost less in terms of health care claims. There is an economic incentive to keep staff and faculty healthy, but it’s also simply the right thing to do as an employer.’
However, the survey results show that there are still obstacles to overcome, such as rigid work schedules and lack of leadership support. As a result, the administration at Ohio State has created the One University Health & Wellness Council to unify health initiatives across the university, in order to coordinate leadership. Melynk said that she receives a lot of correspondence from businesses and universities throughout the country asking her what they should do to implement their own healthy policies.
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