Posts from — September 2008

When an employee is sick or injured, many times it has a direct affect on an employer’s cost of health care, disability, worker’s compensation, increased absenteeism, lower productivity, reduced safety and morale.The object of an employee incentive wellness program is to improve the health of a company’s workers and to improve its productivity. This type of program helps ensure consistency with an employer’s long-term strategy on health care management. It aids in forming the framework for effective wellness, health improvement and care management programs.

Wellness incentive programs need close coordination by a company’s human resource department; otherwise these programs are less effective. If there is no coordination or follow-up, it is difficult to measure outcomes and performance. The best incentive programs work on a collaborative approach between the health management company and the employer. The goal is to find cost-effective solutions to meet budget needs and reinforce them by performance-based service guarantees. The bottom line is the employer wants to see reduced health care spending and show a return on the health management investment, as well as improvement in the health of employees.

Investing in a corporate workplace wellness program is a good way to improve overall employee morale as well as reduce employee turnover and overall health care costs. By initiating a workplace wellness program in your organization you create a positive, energetic and productive workplace that provides meaningful gains for your business.

Components of a wellness incentive program include preventive health screenings, health fairs, health risk assessments, wellness programs (weight reduction and exercise), Education, newsletters, employee wellness surveys, incentive strategies and employee communications.

Incentive Programs provides detailed information on Incentive Programs, Employee Incentive Programs, Corporate Incentive Programs, Safety Incentive Programs and more. Incentive Programs is affiliated with Pay Per Click Affiliate Programs.

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25% Jump in Employer Interest in Employee Health and Wellness

Worksite wellness for their employees, employers are discovering, is good for the health of their businesses as well. Health and wellness programs help to cut the costs associated with poor employee health, which include absenteeism, loss of productivity and poor work quality.

A recent Hewitt Associates survey of over 500 US companies indicated a significant paradigm shift in how companies view health benefits for their employees. Of those surveyed this year, 88% are committed to instituting long-term health care assistance programs (over the next 3-5 years) for their employees, with the goal of boosting the health and productivity of their workforce. This represents a 25% increase in interest in worksite wellness programs over 2007.

A strong offering of health and wellness programs to meet the demand has resulted. Health assistance providers have broadened their programs with tools that address general lifestyle factors, physical, social and psychological health factors. Programs look to predict chronic disease in their employees and give them the tools and the information to prevent it. Companies also demand a way to measure the effectiveness of their healthcare spending.

“Self-care is our motive,” says Vic Lebouthillier, president of progressive health and wellness provider Exan Wellness.”We really believe giving employees tools to help them manage their own health, and promoting the benefits, while giving people resources to reach out for help is the key to successful lifestyle change. Corporations are also telling us they need a cost-effective way to deliver worksite wellness programs. The type of program we have developed over years delivers the highest health care return on investment.”

Combining worksite wellness promotions, online assessments and health trackers, online health information, telephone conferences and self-help groups, and access to a wide variety of health professionals, is behind the success of the Exan program. “Having online statistics about employees’ health also makes it easier to track the bottom line – ROI” says Vic Lebouthillier.

“Companies are moving beyond their traditional role as a provider of healthcare benefits to develop holistic programs that pinpoint the specific health needs of their employee populations, drive employee behavior change and eliminate barriers to healthcare,” says Jim Winkler, leader of Hewitt’s health management consulting practice.

However, in a separate survey of 30,000 employees, 74% said that, although they felt their company had an obligation to help them understand how to use their health benefits program, only 12% felt the company had any right to tell them how to be healthy. Based on these results, employers need to drive home the fact that improved health is better for their employees as well as the company. It’s a win-win situation.

Employers and employees did find common ground when it came to future healthcare. Both surveys indicate that 95% of employees understand that their taking care of their health today will impact future healthcare payments. A similar percentage also understand the important of early detection and prevention when it comes to saving on healthcare costs.

Cost is important for most companies as well. Over 80% of those surveyed made cost mitigation a priority for 2008, but those cuts did not involve shifting responsibility for healthcare onto employees. Although 64% of companies have shifted costs to their employees, only 17% plan to do so in the next 3-5 years. Similarly with health reimbursement accounts, 20% now offer these, but only about 5% plan to use them in 2008.

These survey results indicate companies are getting more proactive in helping their employees to change behaviors and take ownership of their own health futures. This is obviously good for the well-being of employees, but also for the well-being of the companies they work for. Almost half the companies surveyed were convinced that changing health behaviors was key to increased productivity and lower absentee rates. Over 60% plan to institute programs that help employees change and/or sustain a healthier lifestyle. Almost of these companies will also use data and measurements to ensure their healthcare strategies meet their healthcare objectives?

Exan Wellness, Inc. provides corporate employee health programs, stop employee diabetes programs, worksite wellness programs, fatigue management programs since 1991. Please visit official website http://www.exanwellness.com

Naturopathic association gets behind the source of stress

We spend a large part of our lives at work. We make friends, network with colleagues and plan our retirement years based on our active lives in the workplace. But for all the time we spend at work, how healthy is the work climate? The answer to this question has become the focus for a growing number of companies that provide employee assistance programs.

Everyone has experienced a cold or flu, which was “going around the office”, or had allergic reactions to cleaning fluids or strong perfumes in the workplace. Some jobs require physical endurance and may have a high risk of accidents. Regardless of our job descriptions, we cope with deadlines, routines that can be repetitive, and environments which we can’t control. The result can be a great deal of stress that can leave us vulnerable to whatever is “going around the office.”

Employers are now beginning to realize the interconnection between work and mental and physical health. How we juggle our family lives with work pressures, workplace stress and our ability to achieve excellence have become a focus of human resources professionals. The concept is not whether we are sick or well. It is the environment we work in and the impact of that environment on our lives, our attitudes at work and how we can cope with stress and job- or family-related pressures.

Employers are also beginning to connect this to productivity. Seventy-five per cent of employees would like to see holistic health as part of their working relationship and 85 per cent of those polled believe that holistic health reduces employee assistance costs.

One company that didn’t need an opinion poll to introduce this idea to its employees is Husky Injection Moldings. Husky employs 1,400 people at its plant in Bolton, Ontario. It has an employee assistance team of eight healthcare professionals, including both a medical and naturopathic doctor (ND). The employee assistance program includes consultations with the ND and health educational programs such as information fairs. The program manager calls the inclusion of naturopathic treatments the “Cadillac” of the program. Representatives of Husky say naturopathic doctors are the key to prevention and employee education. The Husky example is just one of the ways to address the myriad of workplace well-being issues.

Some issues in the workplace that negatively affect our health are easy to resolve. For example, many people spend most of their workday in front of a computer screen. More often than not, the screen we look at is higher or lower than our neck and head. This can cause us to adopt an awkward posture which, over long periods, can compromise health. By simply raising or lowering the screen we can help correct our posture.

How we handle stress in the workplace is much more complex. These stresses include coping with environmental sensitivities such as dust or mold (statistics show that multiple chemical sensitivity affects about 15 per cent of the population), air quality in sealed office buildings or industrial work sites, fluorescent lighting and the effects of seasonal affective disorder, and communication with coworkers, to name just a few.

The British Columbia Naturopathic Association (BCNA) recently created a profile of the working environment and strategies to deal with it. Their employee assistance strategy is seminars for staff and management, interactive workshops, and educational materials. The BCNA also offers seminars that include fitness testing, basic health check-ups, blood typing and other areas of health.

The Association conducted stress management workshops for staff at Canada Trust for the first time. This involved an interactive seminar with a ND who addressed the mind/body connection of stress, nutritional tips on helping our bodies naturally cope with stress, as well as simple exercises and activities that reduce stress. Canada Trust has also held natural health fairs and various workshops for its employees. Human Resources Manager Olivia McIvor notes that Canada Trust’s goal is to promote health and well-being in general.

Is a holistic attitude towards health too “new age” for some employee assistance plans? Sure–some people can’t see the connection between stress at home and anxiety in the office. Some people have never taken the time to stop, focus and address what they do, how they do it. They don’t look for ways and means to integrate mind, body and spirit in the workplace and in their private lives. But high profile companies, such as Royal Bank, KPMG, Aetna and others are taking the lead and offering their employees an opportunity to discover well being through a variety of complementary modalities.

Yet even if employers offer this type of employee assistance for their staff, is there any staff benefit? Absolutely. Canada Trust has seen a 17 per cent decline in stress among those enrolled in its 18-month-old program. Telus, another company making similar programs available to its staff, has shown a 28-per-cent lower absentee rate among employees. As McIvor notes, providing access to alternative practices can help staff strike a better mental, physical and emotional balance.

Companies such as Telus, the Royal Bank and Husky are achieving that balance, while at the same time seeing the “bottom line” improve. Employee assistance that monitors health improvements and cuts costs for business is crucial to this new emphasis on holistic health. Make sure your employee assistance program achieves a healthy balance, while at the same time giving employers a measure of success.

Exan Wellness, Inc. provides employee assistance wellness tracker programs, employee health programs, employee wellness programs, stop diabetes programs since 1991. Please visit official website http://www.exanwellness.com

“75% of health care spending pays for illnesses which are preventable”.- Centers for Disease Control

Four of the leading causes of death in the nation—heart disease, cancer, stroke, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease —are directly linked to unhealthy lifestyles and tobacco use. Encouraging individuals to adopt healthy habits and practices may reduce the burden of chronic disease in communities throughout the United States. Public and private efforts and programs are increasingly designed to promote these healthy behaviors and lifestyles. Employers are becoming more aware that obesity, lack of physical activity, and tobacco use are adversely affecting the health and productivity
of their employees and ultimately, the businesses’ bottom line. As a result, innovative employers are providing their employees with a variety of work-site-based health promotion and disease prevention programs using health coaches and the “trans- theoretical theory of change” approach to wellness. These programs have been shown to improve employee health, increase productivity and yield a significant return on investment for the employer.

What is a Health Coaching Program?

Health coaching programs help people make smart choices about health behaviors through education, motivation and reinforcement of healthy options. Taking the time to build a rapport, assess readiness to change, identify areas of need and to create an action plan, leads to a healthier outcome. Research proves that this personalized, collaborative approach is more effective than the cookie-cutter method that often leaves those most at risk far behind.

Health Coaches typically are licensed, degreed healthcare professionals that have made the choice to work one-on-one with their clients, outside of the typical “medical model”; empowering them to make long-term healthy changes by building solid skills that will last a lifetime.

Wellness Promotion

Employee wellness education is the starting point of prevention. It is about encouraging individuals who have demonstrated the behaviors of healthy living and providing them with the tools and support they need to stay fit, manage stress and continue to make good health decisions. Programs often include initiatives such as health risk assessments, on-site screenings, preventive care reminders, health club memberships, and financial incentives.

By promoting healthy behaviors, employers can reduce overall healthcare costs and absenteeism as well as support a “culture of health” and wellness.

Health Improvement Plans

Health improvement plans are about identifying high-risk factors, and preventing or slowing disease progression and encouraging individuals through education and one-on-one behavioral health coaching to begin altering their risky actions.

The types of behavioral-related high-risk factors addressed by health improvement programs include high blood pressure, high cholesterol, tobacco cessation, and weight management. Individuals with known or potential health conditions may be aware of elevated risks but have not found the motivation to change. They haven’t experienced any major hospitalization or serious complications – yet. However, without some form of intervention, their conditions will likely progress to a much higher-cost, productivity-limiting chronic disease.

Disease Management

The goal of disease management is to empower individuals to effectively manage disease and prevent complications through adherence to medication regimens, regular self-monitoring of vital signs and healthful diet, exercise and other lifestyle choices by education, support and encouragement of both the physician and the health coach.

For employers, the cost of chronic disease goes far beyond the direct costs of healthcare and medical expenses. Absenteeism due to lost wages amounts to $65 billion annually for American companies. This cost is compounded by the impact of lost productivity due to workers who are limited in the amount or kind of work they can do, which can be as high as 34% of the total workforce. Disease management programs have proven to not only control health benefit costs but also improve the overall health and productivity of workplace environments.

The founder of Monarch Health Promotions, Michelle L. Taylor has been in the healthcare industry for over 14 years in Tucson, Arizona.

After suffering from severe asthma throughout her life, she is especially committed to respiratory disease prevention and management services. She also believes that the psychological and social burdens of chronic illness can be minimized through patient, caregiver and community education.

Michelle is a registered respiratory therapist, a nationally certified asthma educator, and a certified tobacco cessation specialist, as well as a certified health coach. She has collaborated with The American Lung Association, The American Cancer Society, and The University of Arizona as a speaker, volunteer, and an educator in her chosen field.

Michelle has also worked in specialty pharmaceuticals for many years, educating area hospitals, pulmonologists, allergists, neurologists, anesthesiologists, and psychiatrists on the best pharmacological choices and treatment options available for their patients.

http://www.monarchhp.com

Employee benefits jumped to 44% of total 2006 payroll costs according to a recent survey of 400 U.S. companies released by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Another report suggested that almost 60% of all employees are not fully engaged in their positions. The question that you need to answer as a business owner or business executive is:

Are these continued increases in employee costs coupled with the decrease in individual performance part of your strategic plan?

Numerous reports during the last several years revealed that U.S. employees wasted time and lacked the necessary skills and knowledge to take their businesses to the next level. The bad news continues to flow from the U.S. Manufacturing Association’s report detailing how the U.S. public education system is contributing to the skills gap. In spite of continued increased educational funding, twelfth grade reading scores are at the lowest since 1992. Also, three quarters of seniors scored below the expected math proficiency level. (Source: The Nation’s Report Card: America’s High School Graduates)

With this dismal news, business owners need to run not walk back to their strategic plan and make the necessary course corrections. For example, medical related expenses rose almost 3% over the previous year. Possibly, now is the time to consider employee wellness as a potential critical success factor or critical goal category. Paid time and holiday time inched up .6%. With the push back on profit margins in almost all industries, any fixed cost increase is not good. Finally, employee engagement is another potential critical goal category with a specific goal to increase employee productivity.

Executable strategic plans include critical areas from which specific goals are committed to writing and monitored on a regular basis. Since the bottom line for any business is to increase revenues and decrease costs, ignoring this information is potentially fatal. With the Internet acting as viable resource to quickly capture important data, business owners can quickly analyze this information to make any necessary course corrections to their strategic plans.

Leanne Hoagland-Smith, M.S. is a business coach and executive coach with offices in Indianapolis and near Chicago. She writes, speaks and coaches people in businesses to quickly double or triple results through the creation of an executable strategic plan along with the necessary leadership skills “to pull it off.”

One quick question,if you could secure one new client or breakthrough that one roadblock holding you back from success, what would that mean to you? Then, take a risk and give me, Leanne, a call at 219.759.5601 to experience incredible results.

Visit http://www.processspecialist.com/ and explore everything from free articles to connecting with Leanne.

Individual Adverse Selection

Essentially this happens on your employee benefit plans when they are voluntary in nature (when they require an employee to pay portion of the premiums), and is caused from the rational purchasing of these benefits by employees. The theory is that employees will elect to pay an amount of money for benefits (say $100 per month) only if they expect to get more than $100 of value out of the plan. It is important to understand how this works when you are going through your benefit renewal process.

The 80 / 20 rule works well in helping to explain it. 80% of your employees are causing only 20% of the claims experience, while 20% are causing the other 80% – and thus they are responsible for 80% of your costs. Think about this as a continuum from the most healthy to the sickest person on your group (the healthy get the least amount of benefit, while the sick get significant amounts of benefit).

So here comes your renewal, and it is 20%+. To curb the expenses to the company, you decide to pass along part of the increase in the form of increase employee deductions. As this happens over time, you should expect to price your healthy people off of your plan. Take your single, healthy employee – you can charge him an amount that will make him stay away from your plan. On the other hand, consider your employee that has significant health issues – you cannot charge them enough to get them off of your plan.

The reason this can be detrimental is that if this model were to persist through time, eventually you would end up with only the sickest people on your plan. You would be offering a benefit to only 20% of your employee population & the cost would be 80% of what it was originally. This result would be catastrophic, and thus is the reason that it pays to respect the power of adverse selection.

Location Adverse Selection

Many larger employers and employers of certain types (who have grown over time due to acquisition) can experience a whole different type of adverse selection in their plans, called location specific adverse selection. Many business models will lend themselves to this additional risk possibility. This comes from the fact that not every entity/location participates in your benefit plan.

This is an example of how this comes about: let’s assume that a company is just starting up & you were taking over 5 locations. Their employee only medical rates per month were ($225, $250, $300, $375, $425). As you know, the reason that each of them are being charged different amounts is because of the claims risk in each group – the group paying $425 per month is paying that amount because they have medical claims which substantiate that high of a premium.

After underwriting, we have a carrier that comes to us with a rate that pulls all of these people together & it is a rate of $295 per month. The problem with this is that the people paying $225 & $250 per month are not going to want to participate, while the others will want to do so. If this is allowed, then you will be left with a plan priced at $295 when it should have been priced higher (since the $300, $375 & $425 were the ones who participated).

You probably guessed what will happen come renewal time – it will be a big one. Let’s assume it goes to $390 per month – now we will likely lose the $300 & $375 locations if we allow them to opt in & out. The end result is the same as that of individual adverse selection.

There are a myriad of ways to correct for this issue, but the main thing that any organization can do is to recognize the issue before it becomes a major problem.

Mark Combs (CLU, ChFC, CFP®, RHU, REBC, CFA®)

Mark is a Vice-President, part owner of Horne/Guest Employee Benefits http://www.horneguest.com – one of the largest employee benefit advisory firms in South Carolina. Horne/Guest is also a Charter Member of United Benefit Advisors, which is the 3rd largest employee benefit advisory firm in the US. You can learn more about UBA via Google. Mark is a graduate of Wofford College, with two undergraduate degrees (Bachelor of Arts in Political Economy and Philosophy & Bachelor of Science in Economics). He entered the individual financial services field directly out of college as a Certified Financial Planner® with John Hancock Financial, where he was selected as “Rookie of The Year” in 1998.

Mark began working in the employee benefits arena with Marsh & McLennan Companies, specializing in large employee groups. Mark holds 6 professional designations & was honored in 2003 with the Distinguished Educational Achievement Award from the American College.

As a veteran in the employee benefit industry, he brings tons of professional knowledge to the table. As a specialty, Mark creates processes that help employers save money while maximizing the value of their employer-employee relationships. His vast array of expertise allows him to automate processes, and system applications to make life easier for his clients and their employees.

Mark also has a tremendous amount of expertise in creating Employer Wellness Programs, and is the author of The PlanWELL Method Wellness System. Applying Wellness and Disease Management Tactics effectively promises to be the biggest trend in healthcare over the next 10 years. The PlanWELL Method teaches employers the fundamentals of a well functioning, data-driven corporate wellness program. These type of programs consistently render return on investment of 5 to 10+ times initial investment. For more information, you can visit http://www.planwellmethod.com

Who needs wellness programs? If you work in an office or a jobsite or are a member of an organization who spends a considerable amount of time at work, you will definitely benefit from a well-designed corporate wellness program. Employees spend a minimum of about 200 hours a month at work – a considerable amount of time.

Furthermore, distractions, stress, and the pressures of the job itself can take its toll on the worker, which makes it important that a wellness program is implemented. Today, all across America, Canada, Europe and Asia, top corporate wellness programs are being used to help improve employee conditions at work and reduce the cost of worker healthcare.

Some of the top wellness programs currently in use today include:

1. Health Risk Assessments or HRAs

Health Risk Assessment is a top corporate wellness program currently in use globally. Organizations that implement it determine the safety and health concerns of workers by assessing the appropriateness of the facilities and equipment against the needs of the employees.

It can, for example, guide the organization into determining how much air quality within an office room affects the users and then help the assessment team to come up with the measures necessary to correct the problem. An HRA can also evaluate the level of exposure workers have to certain hazardous or dangerous materials and practices.

2. Immunizations

This isn’t always practiced in every country since there are regions where government sponsored immunization shots are available. However, it has also become an important component of the top worker wellness programs in many organizations in North America.

Immunization shots, such as those used to combat flu, for example, are offered to workers for free.

3. Employee Assistance Programs or EAPs

Employee Assistance Programs consist of a wide variety of services. It can range from providing educational resources to employees regarding health issues to sponsoring health services and medical care. In many companies, medical and insurance have also become a staple part of their benefits system.

4. In-house diet and nutrition drives

This is another wellness program that organizations use, particularly those that offer in-house commissary or cafeteria services. Instead of serving richer, high-calorie fare, cafeterias offer options for a healthier diet, usually in the form of low-calorie foods and sugar substitutes.

5. In-house wellness newsletter and campaign drives

One of the top wellness programs that organizations can implement is a self-powered tool using a newsletter to promote wellness, coupled with a visible campaign. The campaign may be done periodically and focus on a specific topic, such as smoking hazards, cancer, stress, carpal tunnel syndrome, safety in the workplace, etc.

The newsletter in itself can be an effective means to deliver information to employees or members of an organization but it is far from perfect. Some employees, for example, may not read the newsletter entirely or even pay attention to it. If the issues outlined in the newsletter are promoted through an active and highly visible campaign, it will be easier to maximize positive results.

6. Exercise and physical activity drives

Another top wellness program for organizations is one that involves physical activities. Companies often sponsor exercise-related events such as marathons and company sports programs to encourage employees to remain fit or lose excess weight. In mid- to large-sized organizations, companies may even pay for gym memberships or in-house exercise facilities.

7. Incentive rewards

Some of the top wellness programs implemented by companies involve incentive rewards. This involves company-sponsored programs that reward employees for achieving specific wellness goals. Participation in health campaigns and signing up for wellness programs are two of the most commonly rewarded schemes. Rewards can range from special recognitions to points (for bigger rewards) to specific gifts. In a few cases, cash may also be used.

However, incentive systems have had mixed reactions and levels of success. But it continues to be one of the top choices among companies who are willing to modify it in order to fit their unique needs.

8. Peer Pressure

In many organizations, companies take advantage of peer pressure in order to encourage workers to participate in wellness programs. This is currently one of the favorite worker wellness programs currently in use today and growing in popularity. Peer pressure is often leveraged to help promote competitions referring to workplace wellness and to persuade employees to be active in company-sponsored health fairs.

Konstantin Koss runs the popular website RealRelaxation.net. Want to learn more about corporate wellness programs and stress in the workplace? Visit his website to find out more at RealRelaxation.net

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