Boost Office Health and Morale with Employee Wellness Challenge

By: Kandi Lannen

If not, they should.

Research shows that employees who are engaged in their health and wellbeing are less likely to be absent from work and even more productive while they are at work. In fact, American Journal of Health Promotion reported that wellness programs contribute to 25 percent lower absenteeism, and lower health plan, workers’ compensation and disability insurance costs.

Research shows that employees who are engaged in their health and wellbeing are less likely to be absent from work

Employee fitness challenges are an excellent, economical way to infuse health and wellness into a workplace. Many of your employees will know where they could use a little improvement, whether it’s nutrition, physical activity, stress reduction, sleep, financial peace or weight management. The hardest part is knowing where to start.

An employee fitness challenge that’s relevant to their specific target area can help inspire and encourage them to make the change. Find out your employees desired areas of improvement by conducting an employee interest survey. If employees feel like they are heard, they will be more likely to engage in a program. We spend the majority of our waking hours at work, so the support and motivation of a group effort, coupled with the competitive spirit, can lead to significant progress.

Challenges can vary in length – one week, one month, 6 weeks or as long as 12 weeks. The length should be based on how long it will take for the individuals involved to feel a difference and that they’re making progress. Keep in mind: it takes 21 days to form a habit. And the focus should be on the areas most relevant to your employee base. For example, if your business is a high stress environment, challenges should focus on ways to reduce stress. Or, if you have a lot of employees who spend most of their day sitting at a desk, then a physical activity challenges might be in order.

Physical Activity Challenges:

• Counting steps: Encourage employees to wear a pedometer or device that tracks steps (If it’s in the budget, providing the pedometer is a nice gesture). Set a minimum number of steps to reach each week. Provide walking maps for employees to use during the day around the office or outside your building.
• Be active: Have employees track their activities such as a 60 minute Zumba class or a 30 minute cycling class. Set a physical activity minutes goal each week.
• Stair climbing: Count the stairs climbed each day to reach an established goal. Find out how many stairs are in your buildings ahead of time to make it easy for employees to track. Mount Everest is 58,070 steps – see how long it takes your employees to ‘reach the top.’

Nutrition Challenges:

• Daily fruit and vegetable servings: Come up with a minimum goal employees need to reach every day. Experts recommend five to nine servings a day.
  

• Water challenge: Encourage employees to consume more ounces of water each day. It may cause them to cut back on the soda and other
  sugary drinks. Consider providing a standardized water bottle to all employees to make measurement easy, i.e. the goal is to finish three bottles while at work.
• Shake the sugar: Employees can cut back on the amount of processed sugars they consume each day/week by tracking their sugar intake at work. If your employees
  are participating in this challenge, be cognizant of the food you bring in for work meetings – no doughnuts.
• Meal planning/sharing: Employees can earn points for preparing healthy meals and sharing healthy recipes. You can even put together a company healthy cookbook or start a lunch time potluck where everyone brings a healthy meal to pass.
• Breakfast Club: Points will be awarded for eating a healthy breakfast. For many people, the first step to a healthy breakfast is even eating in the first place. A healthy breakfast can fuel you throughout the whole day.

Stress Management Challenges:

• Laughter challenge: Laughter can be the best medicine, especially when having a stressful day. Have employees take a moment each day to exchange jokes, stories or videos.
• Learning challenge: Have everyone commit to trying a new activity or class. Whether it’s taking an education or exercise class, trying new recipes or joining a new group, getting out of comfort zones can be exhilarating and rewarding.

• Compassion challenge: Encourage employees to volunteer at a local charity or community event. It feels good to give our time for a worthy cause. Better yet, organize a charitable company outing.
  
• Stress busters: Provide employees with 10 free minutes a day to relax, meditate, deep breathe or just close their eyes. Each healthy stress buster can earn them points toward rewards.

Incentives play a big role in the success of employee wellness challenges. You could consider having everyone pay $5 to participate and divide the winnings among the employees who are able to maintain the healthy habit throughout the healthy challenge. You could throw a (healthy) party for those who complete their challenge. It doesn’t have be financially-driven, recognition alone can go a long way.

Challenges contribute to a happier, healthier and more vibrant workplace. Get started today!

About the Author: Kandi is the director of wellness for Priority Health and is responsible for helping the organization earn Wellness and Health Promotion (WHP) accreditation with performance reporting from the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA), which recognizes organizations whose plans demonstrate the ability to improve workforce health and reduce absenteeism. Priority Health is the only plan in Michigan — and one of only 5 plans nationwide – to earn this accreditation.