For Wellness Program Success, Don’t Do This

February 06, 2012

  by Dean Witherspoon     

It happens every year around this time. A client will tell us of a service they’ve been providing for 12 months or more that’s not working or an activity that uses up resources but produces no real benefit. They say something like “not getting as much participation as we should” or “nothing ever seems to happen as a result of…” When we ask why they keep doing it, the answer is often “because it’s in the plan” or “that’s the way we’ve always done it” or “so-and-so wants it.”

To all of the above and more, we say… STOP! There’s never a good reason to waste time and resources. You know what causes this for your program, but here are a few we’ve experienced in our work with others…

• Excessive meetings. Some meetings are vital, but minimize, focus, and streamline them so you can actually get some work done.
• Long reports. If nothing ever happens as a result of creating the report, skip it. And try to get them down to a single page if you really want someone to pay attention.
• Dormant services. If you can’t repackage and resurrect them, bury them and start over. Why keep doing something for only the same dozen people?
• Proving the obvious. Healthy people cost less, are more productive, have fewer absences. It’s all in the literature. For you to prove it again for your population makes no sense. What you really should prove is that your program is effective at getting people to adopt healthy habits.
• Overdone, inappropriate data collection. If you find yourself saying “isn’t that interesting” when reviewing your quarterly data but never doing anything with it, you’re wasting everyone’s time. Don’t collect information you’re not prepared to act on, and be prepared to act on anything you collect.

The cost of an ineffective, nonproductive activity or wellness service goes beyond the actual dollars spent on salaries, materials, and overhead. There’s also the opportunity lost by not investing those resources in effective, productive areas — to actually help people improve health.

Take some time this month to see what makes sense to stop doing… then invest those resources in things you know will work or new services with greater potential.