Part 3: The Three C’s

Finding the right wellness vendor is crucial to implementing a successful wellness program, but a vendor can only do so much.  Successful wellness programs require building a culture of health and wellness, which means more than just finding the right vendor or partner – there are “other things” that employers must do.

This is the third post in a series that addresses the “other things” that are crucial to fostering a culture of health and wellness.

Part 3: The Three C’s

Does your company promote the three C’s of wellness: committee, champion, and captains?  The three C’s are crucial to building a culture of wellness.  Let’s examine each a little more closely:

Committee

A wellness committee is a group of employees who are involved in assessing a company’s wellness needs, evaluating wellness vendors, determining a wellness strategy, and helping to execute on that strategy.  A wellness committee should consist of a diverse group of employees.  The committee should draw from members of various departments, a broad range of ages, and even multiple office locations.  Be careful… it’s easy for a committee to be taken over by fitness fanatics.  A group of fitness fanatics and health nuts is likely not an accurate representation of your employee population.  Leverage this group for key wellness decisions.  Developing wellness through group consensus will lead to a more successful program, better alignment with your employees’ preferences, and higher engagement.

Champion

Your wellness program needs a champion. The wellness champion is the person who is going to internally advocate for wellness.  This person believes that wellness is essential for the company culture and is personally willing to devote time and effort to make the wellness program successful.  The wellness champion is a culture carrier, someone who embodies the culture of your organization.  Culture carriers can be found at every level of the organization, not just the senior leadership.  Every organization has someone who believes in the importance of wellness and is motivated to help promote a culture of health and wellness.  Leverage his or her passion, enthusiasm, and leadership to build a contagious culture of wellness.  This internal wellness evangelist can be your wellness champion.  The champion role often falls, sometimes reluctantly, on a human resources manager.  The human resources manager may be responsible for overseeing wellness programing and wellness strategy, but the role of internal champion doesn’t need to be restricted to the human resources department.  The right wellness champion will promote wellness out of pure passion and not because it’s a job responsibility.

Captains

Team wellness competitions are a great way to drive participation in wellness programs and build connections and camaraderie amongst employees.  To optimize engagement, every team needs captains. The role of the captain is to motivate, organize, support, and remind their team to engage in healthy activity.  Since wellness programs can get lost amongst other competing work priorities, the captain is there to provide some additional organization and the occasional friendly reminders to participate in the program.  Sometimes the captain will take the lead in planning a walking meeting or other healthy activity for the team.  The team captains should be passionate about wellness and interested in taking a leadership role.  Unlike the wellness champion, the team captain’s time commitment is minimal and most organizations will have no trouble finding volunteer captains for each team.

Does your company use the three C’s?  If not, consider how you can use a committee, a champion, and captains to help achieve your company’s wellness goals.