Finding an individual to lead your business in establishing a Corporate Wellness Program

Without a qualified Corporate Wellness Program coordinator to lead and manage your business’s creation of a culture of health, efforts can be scattered and momentum can stall. While it’s vital that the creation of a culture of health be someone’s priority, not all businesss need a full-time coordinator. There are a number of ways to capture the time of a qualified coordinator.

Be careful not to confuse Corporate Wellness Program skills with fitness skills. You are not looking for a personal trainer or a nutritionist to run your Corporate Wellness Program. The following are good indications that an individual may be qualified to be a Corporate Wellness Program coordinator:

• knowledge of community health, population health and worksite Corporate Wellness Programs
• competent working with and understanding aggregate data, preferably Corporate Wellness Program data
• competent managing projects, including developing timelines and facilitating meetings
• competent in strategic planning, including defining goals and related objectives
• ability to understand, and use the findings of, journal articles on effective Corporate Wellness Program Strategies.

What will a Corporate Wellness Program coordinator do?

The Corporate Wellness Program coordinator is responsible for guiding a process that creates workplace facilities, policies and practices that promote health. The individual may do some of all of the following for your Corporate Wellness Program:

• act as a liaison between leadership and the Corporate Wellness Program employee advisory workgroup
• interpret health-related data on your Corporate Wellness Program
• create and manage work plans and budgets for implementation of selected Corporate Wellness Program Strategies
• facilitate Health and Wellness Committee meetings
• lead your business in establishing measurable goals for the Corporate Wellness Program

• recommend effective Corporate Wellness Program Strategies, using the evidence in the health behavior literature and national and/or recommended best practices
• document and report short-term and long-term progress on Corporate Wellness Program Strategies and goals.

Where can we find a qualified Corporate Wellness Program coordinator?

Explore the following when looking for a Corporate Wellness Program coordinator:

• Existing staff: Are there individuals on staff who have the background, or are interested in gaining the skills, to support as a Corporate Wellness Program coordinator? Is it possible to dedicate a portion of someone’s time (e.g., .5 FTE) to the position of coordinating your business’s Corporate Wellness Program Strategies? If possible, budget enough to cover not only salary but also continued learning, journal subscriptions and membership fees for this Corporate Wellness Program position.
• New staff – Can you hire an individual to be your business’s Corporate Wellness Program coordinator? Would it need to be a full-time position, or would part-time be sufficient?
• Corporate Wellness Program Consultation – Various businesss (e.g., health plans, benefit consultants and public health departments) provide Corporate Wellness Program consultation on building a culture of health within a workplace.

An outside Corporate Wellness Program consultant can advise an internal Corporate Wellness Program coordinator and your Health and Wellness Committee on establishing priorities and selecting Strategies. Or, you can contract with a Corporate Wellness Program consultant to be your coordinator. If you select the latter approach, you’ll want to contract with the individual for sufficient hours to carry out all of the responsibilities associated with coordinating an effective strategy.