Incentivizing your Employee Wellness Program (The Guardian : 13/02/2018)

The overall goal of any wellness program is to help employees adopt and maintain healthy behaviors. It is best when employees are internally motivated to be healthy. But sometimes employees get stuck in unhealthy habits and they need help in adopting and maintaining healthy behaviors. Unless motivated, most employees will have a hard time beginning and maintaining a healthy lifestyle. Behavior change is one of the most difficult things we do as humans. The best way to get around this is to provide small incentives to randomly selected employees who successfully complete different aspects of a corporate wellbeing program. The following checklist will help design your employee wellbeing incentives program.

1. Design incentive programs that align with company goals and overall objectives of your wellness program. Remember that incentive programs can draw attention and gain initial engagement, but sustaining healthy behavior change requires increasing intrinsic motivation.

2. Offer incentives for achievable goals. Incentives that are unachievable can be demotivating, and unachievable targets are unlikely to change behavior and are likely to cause dissatisfaction.

3. Remember the importance of non-financial incentives. People place a high value on public recognition, and we find employees appreciate praise even more than modest financial incentives. Plaques, special designations and the opportunity to lead teams can all motivate employees to improve health behavior.

4. Consider incentives to promote group activity. Incentives to participate in group activities can help build a sense of team and promote a culture of health. These activities can be fitness related, with reasonable alternatives for those with disabilities.

5. Deliver incentives to maximize their effectiveness. Incentives are most effective when they are available immediately and the delivery method of incentives is important. The most effective incentives are kept separate from other payments.

6. Align incentive programs – incentives should align with your company’s broader strategic goals and be consistent with its culture.

7. Measure program results – Incentives often perform differently than their architects expect; rigorous measurement allows you to refresh programs to help obtain better future results.

The monetary amount of incentives should be large enough to motivate employees, but not so much that it creates an entitlement mentality among program participants. In many instances, employers can achieve sustained behavioral change and a healthier workforce from better-targeted incentives that cost less. They can also earn more employee loyalty with a thoughtfully designed program.

When combined with simple, short-term prizes, benefits based incentives will provide employees with enough motivation to get the wellness ball rolling until they begin to feel the internal benefits of healthy lifestyle.

 

Reply back to bhakti@impactafya.com or call +255 754 694 643 with your feedback. We welcome your suggestions for corporate wellness tips you’d like to see covered in our future columns.

Bhakti Shah, MPH is the Founder and Managing Director of ImpactAfya Ltd, collaborating with Workplace Options and Mayo Clinic, USA to provide Corporate Wellness and EAP Solutions in East Africa. Bhakti is also the Advisor for the Africa Business Portal and the Past President of the American Chamber of Commerce in Tanzania.

 

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