There are many people who are for corporate wellness programmes, or the promotion of workplace health. According to a recent article in the American Journal of Health Promotion by Michael O’Donnell, comprehensive programmes are extremely beneficial to employees’ wellbeing, providing education, engagement strategies, skill building as well as social and environmental support. However, Wolf Kirsten, the Founder and President of International Health Consulting and President of the International Association for Worksite Health Promotion (IAWHP), argues, ‘While these elements no doubt play a role in the success of programmes; a distinctive blueprint does not yet exist, and most programmes in place are not able to produce the desired outcomes. Therefore, more focus should be given to the “how” of workplace health promotion.’
Kirsten details, ‘The rise of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) is a global phenomenon…63% of all deaths worldwide currently stem from non-communicable diseases (NCDs), approximately 500 million people are obese and more than one in seven are overweight. Coupled with the global ageing trend, the need for enhanced prevention and health promotion has become a priority. The workplace has been established as one of the priority settings for health promotion in the 21st century, including by the World Health Organization (WHO). The majority of adults spend most of their waking hours at the workplace, often as a captive audience, and thus the workplace provides a huge opportunity to inform and help workers to improve their health.’
Thanks to the increased awareness of the workplace as a viable setting for wellness practises, there are more corporate wellness programmes than ever before. The results of the Global Survey on Health Promotion and Workplace Wellness Strategies have shown that, since 2007, there has been a steady increase with regards to employers recognising their role in employee health and wellbeing. But why should you, as an employer, implement a corporate wellness programme in your workplace? Promoting workplace health not only improves the morale of your workforce, the 2012 Global Survey shows that it also makes your employees more productive, and reduces absenteeism.
Kirsten notes, ‘The issue of workforce morale and work engagement coupled with rising work-related mental illness has become a major challenge for enterprises worldwide and many programmes are addressing this gap. Employees feel constantly overstressed, pressured, worried about their job security and often display a lack of motivation thus affecting productivity and customer service. Other big drivers for employers are corporate image as well as recruitment and retention. The main health issues driving health promotion and wellness strategies are strikingly similar across the globe: stress (a key contributing factor to mental illness), physical activity, nutrition, work-life issues and chronic disease.’
So what works for corporate wellness programmes, and what doesn’t? Kirsten points out, ‘A notable global initiative is the Global Healthy Workplace Awards programme, which has set the ambitious goal to gather and disseminate better practices globally for the creation of healthy workplaces based on the World Health Organization (WHO) Healthy Workplace framework. The WHO model provides guidance for a comprehensive and systematic approach on a global scale.’ The four main areas of influence WHO identifies are physical work environment, psychosocial work environment, personal health resources and enterprise-community involvement.
Kirsten adds, ‘The Healthy Workplace model also follows a continual improvement process, such as highlighting the need for evaluation, and places leadership engagement and worker involvement as central priorities. Perhaps most importantly, the very centre of the model exemplifies that promoting health at the workplace is both the right thing (ethical) and the smart thing (adds value) to do…Based on the existing evidence in the US, and elsewhere, it is much more likely for a corporate wellness programme to work if it follows the eight-step process outlined in the WHO model.’
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