
Do Workplace Wellness Programs Save Employers Money? - spindritf
http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs/RB9744.html
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malandrew
There's a very obvious solution that doesn't require any special programs,
give employees time and incentive to get exercise and make sure your office is
right next to a gym or other place to get exercise.

The biggest predictor I've found to getting regular exercise once you have a
gym membership is how far you live from a gym. When someone tells me they go
to the gym regularly I ask how far they live from the gym and it is typical
that the gym is extremely convenient for them (usually within a few blocks in
a city or a few minutes drive in the suburbs).

I started asking this when I noticed the impact of convencient on my exercise
habits. I myself was in the best shape of my life when I lived two blocks from
a gym. It made going to the gym an "impulse" option for which I didn't have to
set aside time in my schedule. I went practically everyday, but not at a set
time in the day. It's easy to maintain a daily habit that you can do at any
time during the day. It's much harder to maintain a habit that you only have
one or two slots of time available in the day to do, since every other concern
that can't wait and need to be done during your exercise slots threatens
making exercise a habit.

For example, I think both Asana and Heroku have it right by making wellness
accessible. Both have yoga rooms and classes daily. I would be much more
likely to participate if a wellness activity like yoga were made that
accessible.

If the gym or other physical activity isn't convenient and there isn't time
set aside for it, it usually won't happen.

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aaron695
> give employees time and incentive to get exercise

Isn't this specifically what they are talking about? Giving all employees time
/ subsiding gyms doesn't pay off.

Plus this concept, if it was easier suddenly I'd do yoga or gym more probably
isn't true. It's an excuse employees use, but make it easier then they'd find
another excuse.

And Gym/Yoga isn't for everyone. Many offices / organisations have gyms and
wellness programs with yoga and very little of the staff use them. And those
that do are as the article points out probably people who don't need the help
as much anyway.

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shenoybr
Correct me if I'm wrong, but takes a very narrow view when it says ROI on
Health Care costs. I think they overlooked the possibility that healthier
employees (and employee's family) could help provide an ROI in terms of
productivity?

~~~
b2themax
Exactly. Some things aren't just about money.

~~~
colechristensen
ROI based on employee productivity is very much about money.

But you're right, a great employer does care about more things than just
money-above-all.

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whiddershins
I think the reason wellness programs aren't as effective is because most
health claims aren't scientifically validated. Therefore much effort is spent
trying to convince people to change behavior which may not have positive
impact on health. In fact, many of these behaviors may cause more harm than
good.

I also think people subconsciously suspect much of the advice is of dubious
validity, which may be why the public at large is relatively unaffected by
health recommendations. There is a trend in public health to move away from
educating the populace and towards regulation, especially food distribution
and composition. Regulating industry can affect food consumption much more
dramatically than attempting to get people to change their behavior
voluntarily.

But I don't think enough people are examining the recommendations themselves,
and demanding very good science to back up the advice. Luckily for all of us,
food manufacturers have an economic incentive to fight against dubious science
... often maligned for fighting regulation, I think in this case they have a
point, and without that economic incentive I might be prevented from buying
potato chips.

And what kind of world would this be without potato chips?

~~~
Retric
Only looking at direct healthcare spending not indirect costs such as sick
days. _the overall ROI was $1.50 — that is, a return of $1.50 for every dollar
that the employer invested in the program._

They add that wellness programs do reduce time off which would further
increase savings, but ignore the fact that healthy people are more productive
and employees view perks as additional pay which aids retention. Which
suggests wellness programs are vary cost effective.

PS: RAND is a political organisation that looks for facts supporting there
conclusions rather that doing actual research.

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gress
Nor surprising, given that the strongest predictor of occupation on health is
_autonomy_.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitehall_Study](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitehall_Study)

~~~
Retric
Whitehall was not looking at overall heath. It studied cardiovascular disease
prevalence and mortality rates of British male civil servants aged 35 to 55
and as such is hardly representative over overall heath for the total
population. Whitehall II was slightly broader in scope but was not looking at
overall heath.

 _The primary health risks under investigation in the Whitehall studies
include cardiovascular function, smoking, car ownership, angina, leisure and
hobbies, ECG measurements, and diabetes._

Also, _A Finnish study conducted a cohort study similar to Whitehall, but with
greater analysis of the worker 's stress. The study determined that decision
autonomy was not a significant contributing factor to coronary heart disease,
but that lack of predictability in the workplace was a significant factor. In
the Finnish study, "predictability" was defined as high stability of work and
lack of unexpected changes, and was found to correlate closely to employment
grade._

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GabrielF00
> The recently published RAND Wellness Programs Study, which included almost
> 600,000 employees at seven employers, showed that wellness programs are
> having little if any immediate effects on the amount employers spend on
> health care. This has been further confirmed by our new analysis of 10 years
> of data from a Fortune 100 employer.

They're looking at seven enormous employers. Can their findings really be
applied to all employers? There's a lot of variance between employers (average
salary, average age of employees, region where employees are based). I'm not
sure that you could reasonably compare employees at, say, WalMart, with
employees at Goldman Sachs or Google. There's also presumably a lot of
variance between these different programs. Is it possible that some programs
are just badly executed?

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emn13
These conclusions sound utterly meaningless - as in; useless from a policy
perspective. Their core claim is that lifestyle management programs don't
reduce health care costs - but so what? Are they measuring productivity?
Motivation? Impact on other employees by example? Employee loyalty? Sick leave
of participating employees and/or others they come in contact with?
Stress+burnout?

And when it comes to costs, did they consider management distraction - as in,
if you're doing this, what _isn 't_ the organization (management) focusing on?

This is a pointless article.

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herf
But - costs from disease are not the only cost of being unhealthy!

For instance, healthy sleep makes people perform better at problem solving
tasks and avoid depression. These effects are realized extremely quickly.
Exercise has similar benefits.

How fast people can solve problems? Do they pick fights with their colleagues?
These things hit the employer's bottom line too, whether or not you measure
them.

You get what you measure. RAND needs to measure ROI better.

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bluedino
The Wellness program at my job is ridiculous (Kersh Wellness). They mandate
that we cannot having vending machines with snacks (chips, candy, etc) but
they are perfectly fine with us having 2 giant vending machines full of
240-calorie soft drinks.

How does that make any damn sense? A Snickers and a cup of water are going
give me more energy, and more of a 'full' feeling than a bottle of Pepsi.

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ams6110
_launching educational campaigns to use the stairs_

Sounds great until you compare accidental injury statistics from falls on
stairs vs. elevators.

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jessriedel
Luckily there's a fix for that too. Behold, Los Alamos National Lab's infamous
music video to encourage people to use handrails when they're on the stairs:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDsTc2oWGSI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDsTc2oWGSI)

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clumsysmurf
I wonder if benefits obtained by many of the behavior changes prescribed are
simply wiped out by sitting too much. It seems sitting wipes out benefits of
even strenuous exercise.

But how many employers will pay for treadmill desks?

