Plus

Promoting healthy
lifestyles is essential —
an employer obligation,
really — and certainly not
a waste of time.
Changing the culture and environment
to affect organizational
health is a notion that’s gained
a lot of traction in recent years,
with some even suggesting it’s a
waste of time and money to target
individual risk until you get culture
right. What’s your view?
Promoting healthy lifestyles is essential
— an employer obligation, really
— and certainly not a waste of time.
But even the best wellness programs
have limited prospects for success
when conducted in environments
that impede healthy behaviors, where
employees’ work and lives outside of
work aren’t honored. Culture, environment,
wellness, safety, employee
engagement, and productivity all go
hand-in-hand.
You have a full-time+ job managing
a program for more than
12,000 employees, write insightful
blog articles, are a regular speaker
at national and regional conferences
and webinars — how are
you managing your own stress?
Writing and public speaking motivate
me to grow and to learn from
others, which I find restorative. For
day-to-day stress, exercise remains
an instant remedy for me, so I run a
lot, bicycle on backroads, and dabble
in mind/body methods. I take vacations,
and enjoy spending time with
family — I’m fortunate to work for
an organization that encourages
employees to take care of ourselves
and each other.
What’s a book you’ve recently read
that’s influenced how you think
about work and health?
I’m tempted to say Homer’s The
Odyssey. The real answer is Triangle:
The Fire That Changed America,
which weaves the true, heart-rending
story of the Triangle Factory fire and
the workers who perished in it. The
book transformed the way I look at
our obligation to worker well-being
and how it runs deeper than anything
measured in healthcare costs
or by HRAs.
Let’s pretend workplace wellness
hasn’t existed for the last 40
years and you have a chance to be
king of the world tomorrow… and
get it right. What’s the first thing
you’d do?
If I were a vindictive king, I’d banish
those jesters who speak of ROI,
biometric screening, or incentives as
mainstays of wellness. Our industry
can be proud of many accomplishments
in the last 40 years, but the
persisting belief that wellness programs
exist to reduce short-term
healthcare cost lies at the root of
most of our missteps. I would keep
the focus on employee wellness as
an essential ingredient to a healthier,
happier, and more productive society.
If money were no object, what
well-being project would you
implement at your workplace in
the next 2 years?
Funding is not the limiting factor
for most wellness programs, but
if you’re offering me a grant… I
accept! Confident that we are progressing
satisfactorily in the realm
of organizational health, I would
convene our national network of
wellness champions to recognize
their extraordinary dedication and
contributions to coworker wellbeing.
I’d implement irresistible
campaigns to engage employees in
shared onsite vegetable gardens.
I’d hire the marketing experts that
fast-food chains use and have them
teach us how to market nutritious
food to employees and how to market
appealing, culturally sensitive,
wholesome food to impoverished
communities. I’d make a treadmill
workstation available to any
employee committed to using one.
Various organizations have come
out with sets of guidelines they
label “best practice” in wellness
or health promotion. What’s at the
top of your list?
My number one best practice is to
think critically, especially about
best practices.
Got any wellness industry pet
peeves you’d like to get off
your chest?
Here’s one: Our zeal for global wellness
is 1-dimensional. If we insist on
exporting our McWellness solutions
overseas, let’s also import some of
the smarter wellness strategies from
our counterparts in other economically
advanced countries.
Another: If it sounds medical, we
should stop doing it. When was the
last time you heard an employee say,
“I wish my boss would help me with
my metabolic syndrome”?
The future of wellness: Are you an
optimist or pessimist?
I’m totally optimistic! The march
toward so-called “outcomes-based
wellness” will be turned back soon
enough, and we’ll recommit to the
real work of supporting employees in
a manner that aligns with business
objectives. There are so many good
and talented people in our industry.
Honesty and intelligence are destined
to prevail.
What challenges lie ahead for
our industry?
We hear a lot about the “shared
economy” or “1099 economy,” in
which growing numbers of workers
use their own resources and set
their own schedules for ride-sharing,
delivery, manual labor, and other
services. What’s the role of conventional
wellness for these workers?
And what psychosocial risks are
inherent to this type of work, which
health researchers classify as “precarious”?
These are the types of
issues we need to get busy with.
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