Employee wellness programs are essential to build a better company culture and improve the health and productivity of employees. This is usually done with the help of a proper program that can help reduce the overall healthcare cost spent by the employees.
Apart from keeping employees healthy and focused on the office, these employee wellness programs also help save money for businesses. But only cutting the overall healthcare cost should never be the goal when trying to invest in such programs. Always prioritize the wellbeing of the employee first, the rest should follow along.
In this article, we share four common mistakes that businesses make with their employee wellbeing programs. Avoiding these mistakes will help your business achieve a healthier workplace and an improved business culture.
Imposing Goals
One of the most common issues with any program that is ever introduced in a business is imposing the rules on the employees. Although these rules inside the workplace are built to be followed; that does not mean they should be forced on any employee. This will only irritate and lower their motivation to participate in the program.
Instead of imposing these goals, the management should focus on empowering employees to build their own goals. Having a strategy like this can help build an effective wellness program that actually works the way you want to be.
Further, within an office, each employee is different, with different needs and issues as well. If a strategy works on one employee, it might not be much help to the other employees. Hence, letting employees build their own goals on their own is more effective and will motivate them to put more efforts in the program.
Offering Goals Without a Guide
Most of the people already know what they need to do, especially when it comes to their own health. But the reason they cannot do it is that they often have no idea about the “how” aspect of the process. And that is the main issue employees face with wellness objectives.
As a lot of businesses offer employees these programs and goals to achieve, but they don’t provide any strategies or guidance along with it. And that is why most wellness programs usually fail.
There is no point in offering incentives to employees if they do not know how to achieve them. Hence, try to offer proper guidance or coaching, when offering goals to your employees with these programs.
No Feedback from Employees
Employee wellness programs can help build a healthier workplace. Hence It is essential that you understand how your employees feel about the program since the feedback can help you improve the program. But more often than not, businesses do not take enough employee feedback.
Not taking feedback will only tell how it’s being used instead of how effective the program is. Understanding the effectiveness will help you improve the program even further. Hence, try to implement continuous feedback methods every once in a while to understand how the employees feel, and if there are any changes they are expecting you to make.
Punishing Employees
Having a wellness program that punishes employees for not being fit according to the program’s guidelines, is another common mistake. The goal should be to help improve employee health and well being; not punish them for being unfit.
As mentioned before, forcing anything on employees when they are not comfortable, will only lead to reduced participation and low morale in the office. Instead, focus on supporting them with different employee wellness plans. Encourage them and help them understand the benefits of improving their well being inside the workplace.