Is your wellness program generating a return on investment (ROI)? If not, it could be due to token offerings with limited benefits and little senior management support, which signals to employees that your organization is not committed to employee health and corporate wellness. Or it could be that the program provides many quality benefits but does not do enough to engage employees. Another reason for lackluster ROI is a wellness program that only focuses on one aspect of employee health – leaving many employees without true wellness management.
With approximately 80 percent of employers now offering some form of corporate wellness, developing a program with a significant ROI is the goal of many employers. There are four major elements critical to creating and implementing a wellness program that will realize savings and increase ROI:
Screen for Risk: An estimated 87 percent of employees participate in lifestyle management programs and 13 percent participate in disease management. But according to the Rand Institute, 87 percent of employers’ healthcare cost savings is linked to disease management and 13 percent is associated with lifestyle modification. That’s why the better wellness programs offer both. When combined, they return a hearty ROI. For example, use biometric screenings to measure your population’s need for intervention and assess risk factors for medical conditions such as cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes and chronic kidney disease. Then, develop programs that target the risks prevalent in your workforce.
Offer Incentives and Be Accessible: The Lockton Benefit Group found that incentives need to be at least $100 to get 75 percent of employees to engage, while smaller rewards motivated only 30 to 50 percent of employees. More effective are outcomes-based incentives, where employers incentivize employees for reaching goals such as weight loss and lowered blood pressure. It’s also important to make your program convenient and accessible. Reach beyond the office to engage employees. For broader participation, offer testing to employees in a variety of settings whether the office, patient service centers, external events or at home.
Get Personal: Individuals are motivated by personal, not collective, wellness. With biometric screenings, results reporting for participants should be individualized for personal use and telehealth or coaching opportunities. Based on screening results, telehealth professionals or coaches can discuss testing results and develop tactics to help individuals reach personalized goals.
Facilitate Action and Intervention: For employees whose results suggest the need for medical treatment, the very best wellness programs introduce initiatives that can help build healthy habits and better health. Programs that are proactive and actionable help employees live healthier lifestyles and get results.
Collectively, these four elements provide the foundation for a comprehensive wellness program that will improve employee well-being and generate a healthy ROI for employers. Contact us to learn more about our programs and the results we have achieved for our clients.