Defining workplace wellness is the first step in understanding wellness programs and their importance. After establishing these fundamentals, you can better recognize how these programs can support your organization. But you should also consider how these programs influence your employees and what resources are available to pursue workplace wellness programs. Givhero can help you delve into these insights and mine them for all their benefits.
What is the Goal of an Employee Wellness Program?
An employer’s wellness program should promote employee well-being through access to organized health and wellness opportunities. An organization arranges and markets these programs to encourage its staff to improve their wellness through initiatives. Such initiatives support the elements of well-being, including mental wellness, physical wellness, emotional wellness, and social wellness.
To promote engagement, wellness program organizers can designate objectives, such as improving specific areas of employee health and contributing to social causes. In striving toward common goals, employees feel motivated to join and participate.
Although employees must take initiative to reap the benefits of corporate wellness programs, employers help motivate involvement by designing and implementing compelling programs. By doing so, they demonstrate a level of understanding with their employees. Furthermore, they send the message that they care about employees beyond their workplace involvement.
How Do Wellness Programs Help Employees?
Wellness programs provide an avenue for employees to take control of their wellness in a supportive environment. Well-designed programs include motivational techniques like goal setting, aspirational encouragement, friendly competition, and intrinsic motivators. These motivators—including social causes—incentivize positive behavior with social wellness rewards.
Wellness program benefits include the creation of a support structure for employees. Effective programming creates comradery and a sense of unity among participants. Employees can get acquainted, offer encouragement, and keep each other accountable for staying committed to the program. As a result, the program creates workplace solidarity.
What Does a Wellness Program Include?
Wellness programs must include clearly defined objectives, resources for carrying out objectives, and incentives. We also recommend offering participants access to health and wellness industry providers, including:
- Benefits advisors and brokers
- Wellness companies
- Health insurance providers
- Health systems
Finally, incorporate any necessary resources for carrying out the program, such as facilities, equipment, or passes to outsourced services. Giving employees the things they need to succeed is crucial for an effective wellness program.
Engaging wellness programs offer more than generic incentives like swag or monetary rewards. They involve customizable goal incentives, like unlocking donations to charities that participants support.
Workplace wellness programs reach their greatest potential when they include access to diversified opportunities. Engaging employees’ total well-being calls for programs that exercise more than physical wellness, as we mentioned earlier.
Finally, successful programs adapt to employee ability. Difficulty levels should adjust based on each employee’s potential and circumstances.
What are Examples of Wellness Activities?
Wellness programs at work can encompass several activities, but the most popular ideas include:
- Healthy Pot Lucks
- Races
- ‘Walk and Talk’ Meetings
- Animal Sanctuary Volunteering
- Meditation Work Breaks
- Big Brothers Big Sisters Meetings
- Yoga Classes
- Walking Club
- Competitive Team Sports
- Localized Volunteering
The activities that a workplace chooses will reflect its overarching goals for employees. Thus, some activities may be ongoing while others occur as a standalone event. Also, they may act as cornerstones for dynamic initiatives like competitions, logging time, or participation events.
How Do You Make an Office Fitness Challenge?
To organize an office fitness challenge, begin by identifying a goal. What objective do you intend your employees to achieve? You can further define your goal by considering which component of wellness it falls under.
Next, have your workplace wellness committee determine the specific initiatives employees would like to focus on. They may consider conducting annual or bi-annual polls to understand what employees would like to accomplish through the wellness program.
Then, brainstorm office fitness challenge ideas that will support the goal. Challenges may include the cessation of fast food or coffee intake, 30 minutes of daily exercise, or logging miles for cardio activities.
Finally, create measurable increments for employees to work towards throughout the challenge, as well as other timeframes or guidelines you believe necessary for participating. For instance, you could set a target number of steps for your company’s step challenge, or a set amount of donations for individuals.
What is an Employee Wellness App?
An employee wellness app is the user interface component of corporate wellness software. It allows employees to access wellness initiative information including challenges and leaderboards.
These apps can integrate with fitness trackers and health devices, input data, track goal progress, and connect users with social causes that they support. Givhero’s resourceful employee wellness app allows employees to schedule wellness activities and communicate with their coworkers.
Modern workplaces can benefit from the Givhero app’s customizable features for workplace wellness. Employees can select any number of goals your organization creates while measuring their progress in multiple metrics.
Givhero makes it easy for employers to onboard new employees and validate their wellness data without spreadsheets or manual entry. Additionally, employers can keep employees updated and motivated with push notifications and digital coupons. The app is fully automated, which relieves administrative workload by up to 80%. It also offers custom reporting for employees and management.
Integrate Your Workplace with a Resourceful Wellness Program & Adaptive Software
A successful workplace wellness program requires a good deal of effort and organization. Givhero alleviates these concerns with a dynamic platform that offers adaptable features. Your organization can better design and integrate wellness initiatives that are uniquely suited to your employees. Empower your employees as they unite in pursuit of well-being with the Givhero app. Contact us at (240) 801-5927 or schedule a call with us!
