Comprehensive worksite health also addresses presenteeism??

Presenteeism represents the employees that are feeling "under the weather" but are valiantly trying to hang in there and be productive at work.  But despite their best efforts they are not as productive as they normally would be.  They are not easily identifiable, because they didn't call in SICK so absenteeism and sick days are not available to count. 

While most researchers agree that presenteeism measurement needs further exploration, several experts (Published in Harvard Business review) are making the distinct connection of presenteeism to other easily identifiable health conditions:  seasonal allergies, asthma, migraines and other kinds of headaches, back pain, arthritis, colds and the flu, gastrointestinal disorders, and depression.  

However researchers at Stanford University have a tool that can be administered to help capture and identify the potential impact of presenteeism on your organization's productivity.  Such an assessment is part of a baseline assessment for a COMPREHENSIVE healthy worksite program.  

Comprehensive Worksite Health...is it in my future??

The workshop on Healthy Worksites was held on October 18 at the annual Food and Nutrition Expo and Conference.  Jason Lang, co-presenter,  and a colleague from CDC attended and shared their extensive resources publicly available at the CDC website.  One of the attendees mentioned her AHA moment as she "didn't realize that CDC had so many tools available!" and they were "amazed at the depth of CDC worksite health program resources".  Others listed their key learnings from the workshop as:

• Great resources, suggestions for how to incorporate programming in a variety of ways to keep it fresh
• Realization that I "really can do comprehensive worksite health program"
• Best training in years!!  Realized the importance of approaching it from the employers perspective
• Tremendous opportunity for connections and growth
• Focusing on the 3-5 year timeframe for financial returns; building a champion team with term limits
• Importance of leveraging current organizational culture versus trying to change the entire culture
• Importance of getting out in the community to talk about wellness to get attention of leaders

We look forward to seeing the accomplishments of those who joined us for the workshop!!