Wellness programs help make employees healthier and more efficient.
Employee wellness programs are nothing new, but they are gaining popularity. Businesses have learned they can help slow their health insurance rate increases, increase productivity and promote happier, healthier employees with an effective wellness program.
But where do you start? From anywhere in the nation you can participate in an employee wellness conference on-line May 15th & 16th. There are a variety of presentations over the 2 day period. A great introduction on employee wellness programs will be led by Cathy Rasmusson, first item below. The second event will be held in Sacramento May 23, Maximizing the Value of Wellness Programs, again presented by Cathy and hosted by the Sacramento Area Human Resource Association.
Don’t feel intimidated if you are not a Human Resources professional. These presentations are geared for risk managers, managers, HR administrators, finance officers, and business owners. Office managers that also handle the health insurance and would like to get a wellness program started would also benefit from the presentations.
Wise choices – wise spending – getting the most from your wellness dollars
Date: May 15, 2012 at 3:00 – 4:00 PM ET
Employee Wellness Virtual Conference Link
Presenters: Cathy Rasmusson, Principal Consultant (Healthy Business Designs)
Without knowing it, employers are often spending money on wellness activities that do not get the desired results or worse yet, they don’t know what they did or didn’t get!
1. Wise choices begin with “doing the homework” of assessing what is: already in place, already paid for, driving health-related costs up, and staff resources. Presenter will describe the assessment process and provide a worksite wellness scoresheet.
2. Wise spending begins with only spending money on: what you don’t already have, taking advantage of what’s available for free, prioritizing, careful budgeting, making sure you “get what you paid for!”. Presenter will provide a resource checklist to identify what the organization already has such as safety staff, insurance broker, space for indoor and/or outdoor workouts, discounts, potential co-op situations, parks, local farmer’s market, etc.). Attendees will also be provided with list of free resources available through not-for-profit organizations government, free worksite wellness kits and wellness collaborative.
3. Prioritizing can be by high impact, low cost, program rollout timeline, and/or “low hanging fruit”. Close examination of assessment will identify these options. Presentation will include samples of each of these considerations.
4. Budgeting will take into consideration what is really necessary to achieve the desired outcome. Using best practices employers can determine expected return on investment relative to the wellness initiatives put in place and considerations. Presentation will include a grid of program activities & the related expected return on investment.
5. Specific measureable goals, objectives, data collection and evaluation tell the story of “getting what you paid for.” Presentation will include sample goals, objectives, data collection methods and evaluation process.
6. Samples of low-cost and effective programs in a variety of businesses. Presenter will share experiences with what other businesses have done.
Maximizing the Value of Wellness Programs
Presented by Cathy Rasmusson, MHA
Monthly Meeting: Sacramento Area Human Resource Association
May 23, 2012 Woodlake Hotel, Sacramento
Do you have an employee wellness program that you’d like to save from the budget chopping block? Or would you like to start one but are challenged to find the dollars to do so?
If so, you won’t want to miss this seminar with wellness expert Cathy Rasmusson. Cathy’s seminar will address:
- Research-based keys to designing successful wellness programs
- Options for wellness program components for your organization
- How to make a compelling business case to senior management to start – or save – a wellness program
- Low-cost and no-cost resources available to you
- The best approaches to measuring results that demonstrate value
By the end of this seminar, you will learn:
- Elements of a successful employee wellness program
- How to make a successful business case to management
- Ways to measure wellness program outcomes
Cathy Rassmusson of Healthy Business Designs
Cathy Rasmusson, MHA, has more than 15 years of experience in the field of health promotion and employee wellness. She is currently a Principal Consultant with Healthy Business Designs, LLC. Her experience encompasses full-spectrum employee wellness program design serving small-to-large organizations, to include needs assessment, strategic planning, design of lifestyle and disease management programs, development of health curricula and training on a variety of wellness topics. In addition, she presented at the National Wellness Institute and Institute for Human Resources. Cathy’s professional experience includes the roles of National Healthy Worksite Program Director, Wellness Program Manager at Blue Shield of California, Health Promotion Specialist at the University of California – San Francisco, Assistant Director of the California Diabetes Control Program, and Corporate Wellness Coordinator for the American Heart Association.
Cathy’s consulting clients have spanned the public and private sectors, including organizations such as Cal-PERS, Blue Shield of California, Viridian Health Management, the City of West Sacramento, Health Net, Kaiser Permanente, Sutter Health, and Western Health Advantage.
Cathy serves on the California Task Force for Youth and Worksite Wellness and is Past President of the California Wellness Information Network. She earned her Master’s in Health Administration at Chapman University and Bachelor of Science degree in Health Sciences at California State University Chico.
