Incentive : Increasing the Power of the Workplace Through Wellness Incentives

If your employees suddenly, miraculously lost weight, stopped smoking and whistled through their day with stress-free smiles, how much more productive would your company be and what kind of ROI might be gained?

The answer may be a no-brainer, but getting those results requires a corporate commitment to wellness and prevention initiatives that not only encourage active participation but also provide incentives to motivate long-term behavior change.

A wellness program purchaser is most interested in whether the program results in better health, increased productivity among those participating and lower
overall health care costs. Incentives provide employees with extrinsic motivation to get started on the path to better health, and to stay engaged. Subsequently, incentives must include tangible and intangible rewards beyond an employee’s paycheck.

In March, 2010, as part of his health care reform agenda, President Barack Obama signed into law numerous healthrelated provisions to take effect over a four-year period including providing incentives for businesses to offer health care benefits to their workforce. By 2014, employers can also increase incentives for their workforce for participating in wellness and population health programs from 20%-30% of the total premium. This is providing the impetus for more companies to create new or enhance existing wellness programs that engage their workforce through incentive offerings.

The passage of the PPACA actually increases the likelihood that employers will expand their use of incentives. “Since this health care reform legislation was enacted, health management companies have seen greatly heightened employer interest in introducing or refining incentive strategies,” according to Employee Benefit News (October 1, 2010). Free access to preventive services should make for healthier patients, but it’s not automatic, Goertz says. He advises people
to wrap up their doctor’s visits by asking a simple question: “What can I do to be healthier?”

“Being healthy in the long run allows you to be much more productive over your lifetime and lead a life that is much more satisfying,” he says. “But it will take time. It’s a cultural shift that will have to take place, and it won’t necessarily happen just because a law was passed.”

Maintaining Employee Motivation

It’s one thing for a company to establish a set of incentives. It’s quite another challenge for businesses to meet the challenge of maintaining employee motivation while demonstrating that these programs make strict business sense. These programs motivate employee participation in their health on a day-by-day, week-by-week, year-by-year basis, and reward them on the basis of ongoing engagement and outcomes.

Corporate America is growing increasingly sophisticated in using incentives to maintain or improve the physical and psychosocial well-being of individuals through costeffective and tailored health solutions. Still, the most serious challenge for health-management programs is maintaining employee motivation over time, and that requires flexibility.

The Care Continuum Alliance (CCA), which represents the wellness and health promotion industry, recently released its 5th Volume of its “Outcomes Guidelines Report” which examines specific guidelines on population health management programs. The report states that “…those who arrange and pay for health care benefits and services never have had more options for designing flexible programs to support prevention, healthful lifestyles and chronic care support.”

The CCA survey also finds that the top concern of employers is about improving rates of participation by those who can benefit from these programs. Motivating,
engaging and empowering individuals to become better stewards of their own health is what wellness programs are all about.

“We see a higher commitment to personal health where people have a continuous incentive to stay engaged,” says Jeffrey M. Davis, M.D., Avivia Health Chief Medical Officer.

Just as importantly, outcomes solutions are imperative in order for employers to see a healthy return on investment and stay committed. Lisa Zamosky with the Los AngelesTimes, provides a good example: “If last year you received a gift card or money for completing a health risk assessment (an evaluation of your health risks and the lifestyle activities that contribute to them), this year your employer may offer you incentives to join a program
(e.g., disease management). And, increasingly, employers will require you to achieve the outcomes intended by the programs.”

According to the Integrated Benefits Institute (IBI), much of the early employer focus is on employee participation rather than on behavior change or improved outcomes; easier to measure, less of a culture challenge and fewer regulatory restrictions.

“Employers need to be more aggressive and target outcomes to justify the investment in incentives that will drive savings to the bottom line,” says Thomas Parry, Ph.D, President and CEO of IBI.

References
AviviaHealth.com

Wellnessincentiveprograms.com