Every year, large consulting and brokerage firms conduct surveys on what companies are doing to mitigate the impact of rising health care costs.
Often, these companies cite lack of time, money or resources for their failure to even consider such plans. Some even make vague and defensive statements such as, "We have no interest in wellness programs," or "Wellness programs just don't work for us."
It's certainly true that a large percentage of companies have failed to make
Get off the sidelines
However, companies no longer can afford to sit on the sidelines and play the reluctant spectator. Health care costs won't ever magically decrease.
Well-planned and well-managed health promotion efforts have a proven return on investment that ranges anywhere from a $2 return for each $1 invested to more than a $6 return for $1 spent. In some cases, companies have cited $10 returned on medical expenses alone for each dollar invested.
If professionals do their homework and commit to helping employees to manage their health more effectively, their companies can expect to get at least a 200% return on their investment.
Considering that a large percentage of businesses operate on a less than 10% profit margin, that 200% return on investment is an excellent way of increasing net profits.
Nevertheless, some companies still treat wellness plans like poisonous snakes - keeping them at a distance with the proverbial 10-foot pole.
Could it be that such erroneous business decisions are made because not all facts are considered and wellness is seen only as a tool to manage health care cost? Health improvement among the workforce has a much broader impact.
By not accounting for these secondary benefits, one can easily dismiss
At that point, naysaers further substantiate their point by referring to the many anecdotal reports - reports that usually leave out critical facts that would invalidate them - from companies that have failed to demonstrate a positive return on investment.
Although, a comprehensive and fully integrated wellness program can have a significant impact on future medical claims, the financial impact generated through the secondary benefits is in actuality multiple times greater than the cost savings generated through lower medical claims.
Research over the last 10 years has repeatedly confirmed that productivity gains outweigh health care cost savings of as little as two- and as much as four-fold.
In case you are still hanging on to the old and outdated methods of managing health care cost, let me be very clear on this: absenteeism and presenteeism numbers are only positively affected if the overall health of the employee improves.
The kind of synergy effects necessary to truly take your company to the next level and protect it from health care costs cannot be achieved through any other cost cutting strategy (such as shifting cost, reducing benefits or eliminating access.)
Only when you make the required paradigm shift and invest in the health of your employees will you experience changes in productivity.
Once you combine the impact a health promotion program has on health care cost and productivity (as well as other cost drivers such as workers' compensation, short-term and long-term disability, accident rates and even overtime and training costs) it becomes a no-brainer and perhaps even a mandatory business pursuit.
There are absolutely no reasons left not to make health promotion a top focus. Business leaders who still opt not to implement a health promotion program are knowingly putting their companies and their employees in harm's way.
Based on what we know today, there are absolutely no reasons left not to make health promotion a top focus. Business leaders who still opt not to implement a health promotion program are knowingly putting their companies and their employees in harm's way. -M.P.
Contributing Editor Michael Puck, SPHR, is the benefits innovation leader for a global defense, security and aerospace company, author of "The High Road - Total Health Care Transformation Program" and founder of www.8020wellness.com. He can be reached at
