Health Programs to Promote In The Workplace

Employee health is a growing concern for many businesses because of the cost that their employees are having on their health insurance premiums as well as the loss of income from reduced productivity and paying for sick leave. Focusing on improving your employee's health is important to help reduce costs but to have a workforce that is able to work effectively and will be able to increase the productivity for the company. One of the other benefits you will see with employee health promotion is the impact it has on the employee morale. When a company invests money into their staff it is easier for their employees to become loyal to the company and to feel appreciated by the company.

Focusing on health promotion in the workplace will also give your employees responsibility and control over their jobs. You are making each employee personally responsible for something within the company and they will find that it is easier for them to focus on certain aspects of their job. There are several different areas of employee health and promotion that you can focus on and designate your employees to be in charge of. Here are some of the areas to consider:
- Smoking Cessation
- Healthy Eating
- Heart Health
- Alcohol Awareness
- Fitness
- Workplace Safety
- Office Ergonomics
- Disease Awareness and Management
- Mental Health

Employees are always learning from one another and when you have them each in charge of different areas of teaching health promotion; it can make it much easier for them to focus on improving their jobs and relationships with their co-workers. The great thing about implementing a health program in the office is that your employees will be able to take home the information they learn. Your company can end up inspiring an entire family to focus on health and wellness and it can really end up giving you reduced health insurance premiums because you are having everyone on the policy getting healthy.

Take surveys of your staff to find out which areas of health that they really would like information on. You might find that there are certain areas that need more attention like learning about mental health versus areas like proper office ergonomics. Mental health concerns are growing and growing and this is a huge expense on companies. It is something that you really need to consider talking about with your staff and brining in some counselors to help your employees understand treatment options. One of the reasons why you might have mental health issues in the office is because of the workload you are placing on your employees. Your employees need to have a balance of stress in their life. Too much stress can lead to very serious mental health problems and it is important that you implement methods to help your employees manage their workloads in order to reduce stress in their life.

One other area you really need to offer training on is employee safety. Too many companies rush through the training programs and they do not take the time to properly train their staff and to ensure they really know how to do their jobs. Accidents commonly happen as a result of poor training. If you lose an employee to an injury it can really cause issues for your organization. You not only need to worry about replacing the injured employee but you will have a decrease in productivity and a huge increase in health insurance premiums as well as dealing with Worker's Compensation and potential lawsuits. If you have not held a training session in awhile, now is the time to do so. This is the best way to find out what issues you have and to ensure you are doing all that you can in order to improve the safety among your staff.