Feature Article: Workplace Wellness Programs: A Winning Idea in Which Employees Acquire Better Health
While Employers Receive Higher Productivity... and Perhaps Both See Lower Healthcare Bills
Special Feature: Save Money, Help the Environment, and Increase Your Health by Biking to Work
Bonus Feature: Just Do It! Six Reasons to Ride a Bike or Walk to Work
Extra feature: Walking to Work to Save Money, Help the Environment, and Increase Your Health
Book Excerpt: Swim in a Smaller Pond, from Escape from Corporate America
Quintessential Reading: QuintZine's Review of Career Books
Quintessential Site: Featured Career Web Site of this Issue
Latest Additions: What's New on Quintessential Careers
Q TIPS: Quick and Quintessential Tips to Guide Your Job Search
Notes from the Editor: About this Issue...
Greetings from the St. Louis, MO, area, the second stop on our QuintCareers Fall 2008 Tour.
It's always exciting to explore a topic in QuintZine that we've never covered before.
Welcome to our first Workplace and Worker Wellness issue.
The very healthy Dr. Randall Hansen -- who definitely promotes wellness in the QuintCareers workplace -- has
outdone himself with four terrific articles on workplace and worker wellness.
Sometimes wellness means getting OUT of your workplace -- whether temporarily or for good. In this issue we spotlight
resources from Time Off Tactics for taking time off from your job, along with an
excerpt from Pamela Skillings' book Escape from Corporate America,
about getting out of the rat-race of the big corporation and into a smaller pond.
--Katharine Hansen, Ph.D., Master Resume Writer, Credentialed Career Master,
Certified Electronic Career Coach, and editor at
kathy@quintcareers.com
Feature Article: Workplace Wellness Programs
Workplace Wellness Programs: A Winning Idea in Which Employees Acquire Better Health While Employers Receive Higher
Productivity... and Perhaps Both See Lower Healthcare Bills
by Randall S. Hansen, Ph.D.
With shrinking paychecks and rising healthcare costs, both employers and workers appear stuck in a battle of diminishing returns. There is
no question as open-enrollment meetings begin that employees will see further erosion in their paychecks from rising healthcare costs
that many employers will pass on.
While not much can be done by individuals (or even employers) until the government and the rest of the country build momentum
to tackle the mess that is the U.S. healthcare system, there is ONE thing that workers and employers can explore together to reduce
the burden of ever-increasing healthcare costs.
That one thing is a workplace wellness program. A workplace wellness program encourages employees to take steps to prevent
the onset or worsening of a health condition, eliminate unhealthy behaviors and habits, and promote the adoption of healthy lifestyles.
There are two types of wellness programs. First, there are insurance-based programs (that lower premiums if employees
agree to certain lifestyle changes). Second, there are employer-based programs (in which the employer is truly trying to change the lives of its
employees for the better). This article focuses solely on the employer-based programs because of the greater benefits
they offer to both employers and workers.
According to recent statistics, the vast majority of larger companies have some sort of wellness program, while more than half of all
employers provide some minimum amount of encouragement to their employees to take responsibility for their health.
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Save Money, Help the Environment, and Increase Your Health by Biking to Work
by Randall S. Hansen, Ph.D.
While the recent increase in gas prices has caused people to look at alternative methods for commuting to work, riding
a bicycle at least a few days a week offers many more benefits besides having a bit more money in your pocket. Assuming your
commute is not unreasonable (under 10 miles), riding a bike to work is a great way to increase your physical and mental health
while also reducing your carbon footprint.
When you decide to bike to work, you'll join the thousands of other cyclists who have put aside concerns that biking to work
is too complicated, too impractible, too physical, or too unsafe. Studies show that about one of every 200 people bike to work
-- and those numbers are rising.
Just Do It! Six Reasons to Ride a Bike or Walk to Work
by Randall S. Hansen, Ph.D.
As an avid walker and bike-rider, I have to admit that I am biased in my views about biking or walking to work -- but I
am also an excellent case-study of someone who has become much healthier since taking up biking and walking several
years ago. I also spent the last year biking to and from my job at a local university.
Walking to Work to Save Money, Help the Environment, and Increase Your Health
by Randall S. Hansen, Ph.D.
The recent increases in gas prices have caused people to look at alternative methods for commuting to work, and
while many are looking into car-pooling, public transportation, or biking, there is one other option for those of us who live fairly
close to our work: walking.
Even though we all do some amount of walking as part of our daily routines, before you consider something as strenuous
as walking to work, consult with your doctor to be sure you are physically up to the challenge. Once you get the OK,
start slowly, adding a few miles each couple of days until you build up the stamina and muscles for the full commute
distance. Walking is said to be one of the best forms of exercise because of the many benefits received.
Learn more in our full article.
If the bureaucracy and rules at a big corporation make you crazy, your best escape route may be to a small company
or start-up. Employee satisfaction is often higher at small companies because people have more autonomy and feel
as if their contributions matter. While you may be a "human resource" at a large firm, you are always a key member
of the team at a small business.
The most appealing aspect of Pamela Skillings' Escape from Corporate
America -- and the one that gives it the most credibility --
is the fact that she interviewed more than 200 people who successfully
escaped from jobs in big corporations that no longer suited them.
Not only does Skillings tell the stories of many of these escapees, but
she also lists them in the back of the book. The vast majority have Web sites,
thus providing the opportunity to learn more about these folks or perhaps
even contact them.
Escape is quite comprehensive, covering the full gamut of escape routes --
changing jobs into corporations that are known for being employee-friendly, cutting back to
part-time/flex-time, telecommuting, taking time off (such as a sabbatical), joining
a smaller company; working as a solopreneur; starting a business that's more
then a solo enterprise, working to make a difference in a job or
organization dedicated to the greater good, and following creative passions
in such areas as music, acting, writing, filmmaking, and art.
Skillings also spends a good chunk of the book helping the reader determine
if he or she truly needs and is ready for an escape from corporate life.
She even offers a quiz to help readers determine if it's time to get out.
The book is full of reader-friendly tidbits, quotes, lists, resources, and
stories in sidebars. A Timeline of Corporate Malaise (beginning in 1298
with the founding of the world's oldest surviving business corporation -- Sweden's Stora
Kopperberg) is revealing. The author's Financial Planning Worksheets for Career
Changers seem quite comprehensive and are bound to be more than helpful
to the reader considering transcending the rat race.
Skillings also injects the volume copiously with humor,
such as including music playlists for miserable cubicle dwellers ("Back on the
Chain Gang," for example) and those fantasizing about leaving ("Take This Job
and Shove It," naturally).
What would it take for you to experience a sense of well-bring about your job?
Taking Fridays off? Going part-time? Extra weeks of vacation? A sabbatical leave?
If any of those sound like heaven to you, Time Off Tactics is your resource. Founder
Pat Katepoo offers all kinds of articles, scripts, templates -- some at no cost, and
some for a fee -- for proposing to your boss various flexible work arrangements and time-off options.
She offers scripts for trading a pay raise for part-time, a guide to extra vacation leave, sabbatical tools (including
idea for cultural travel and volunteer vacations), and resources for just about any flexible-work
or time-off contingency.
Canada Job Directory
-- a great starting point for job-seekers searching for jobs in Canada. This site provides
links to all the major Canadian job boards, with links (by category) to general job boards,
specialized (industry) job boards, geographic-specific job boards, and governmental job boards.
No cost to visitors.
CaribbeanJobs.com -- a
a top job site for the Caribbean region (including the Bahamas, Bermuda, Cayman Islands,
Jamaica, and Trinidad and Tobago Jobs, among others), where job-seekers can browse or search job
postings (by job category, location, keywords), post your CV, and find lots of helpful resources.
No cost to job-seekers.
The Comfortable Life --
an interesting site, with a plethora of articles for making life more comfortable, with
topics such as work and family life balance, career development, creativity, home business development,
personal finances, and much more. No cost to job-seekers.
MinorityMBAs.com --
a job site dedicated to connecting leading minority MBA students and professionals with top companies
committed to workplace diversity. Job-seekers can search through thousands of job and internship
listings (by keywords, job type, job function, industry, and location), as well as post an
anonymous MBA profile (resume), register for job alerts, and find career resources.
No cost to job-seekers.
Find even more career and job site additions to Quintessential Careers by visiting our
Latest Additions section.
Q TIPS:
Quick and Quintessential Tips to Guide Your Job Search and Work Life
Would six weeks off to refresh, rejuvenate, and recharge improve your workplace wellness? Pat Katepoo of the Websites
Work Options and our Site of the Issue,
Time Off Tactics,
is offering a product called Six Weeks Off: A Sabbatical Proposal
Template. It's a no-cost, short PDF document that gives you
the ready-made language to make your sabbatical request to
your employer. Katepoo advises that before you plow into the
proposal, prepare yourself with these topics:
Not only do wellness programs boost employee health, but participants in such programs also are more engaged
employees, according to a recent study.
Employees who participate once a week in a wellness program took significantly less sick time than those who
never do so. Even workers who participated sporadically had better attendance records than those with zero participation.
That may be because of a perception among participants that their employer cares about their well-being, theorizes
Mindy McGrath, vice president of strategy for Maritz's health-care sector.
The Maritz survey, conducted in February 2008 with 2,379
full-time workers, found that:
When offered a reward or incentive, 23 percent participated in a wellness program once a week
When no incentive is offered, participation drops from 23 percent to 16 percent
Non-participation declines slightly from 36 percent to 21 percent when an incentive is offered
Prevention and workplace wellness practices such as vaccines, exercise programs, and cutting-edge drugs
were the highest ranked health priorities, according to the 11th annual Sanofi-Aventis Healthcare Survey
conducted in December 2007.
Related 2008 report: An aging population, sedentary lifestyles, overburdened facilities, and increased levels of many chronic diseases
are shifting the emphasis toward prevention as a longer-term solution to minimizing or avoiding cost and illnesses.
[Source: SHRM news article, August 21, 2008]
On the flip side, the growing popularity of employer-sponsored wellness programs is starting to raise questions about how far
employers can go in their efforts to change employee behaviors.
Many employers are offering incentives, often in the form of lower health-insurance premiums, to employees who enroll in these programs.
For example, some employers are subjecting employees who smoke to a higher health-insurance premium unless these employees quit
smoking or agree to enroll in a smoking-cessation program.
Trouble started in April 2008, when Whirlpool suspended 39 workers for smoking on company premises after they had
signed statements saying that they did not smoke and received a reduced, nonsmoker's health insurance premium. Even though
the disciplinary move was linked to the fact that employees had lied in a signed statement, the case captured international media attention
and put the spotlight squarely on the employers' wellness efforts. [Source: SHRM Compensation & Benefits Library article, June 2008]
Quintessential Careers Press Announces Our Latest Book: The Quintessential Guide to
Finding and Maximizing Internships.
The Quintessential Guide to Finding and Maximizing Internships,
by Katharine Hansen, Ph.D., and Randall S. Hansen, Ph.D., provides eight chapters that
will help you decide what you need in your internship experience, tell you how to find one,
give you the tools to secure one, teach you how to make the most of your internship experience,
show you how to turn an internship into a job, and provide internship resources.
QuintCareers Network of Empowering Blogs
What are QuintCareers empowering blogs?
The Career Doctor Blog:
Especially for those who miss our former regular feature, Ask the Career Doctor, this blog each day features a question and answer from The
Career Doctor, Randall S. Hansen, PhD.
If your school, organization, business or other
entity has a Web site, we welcome you to link to Quintessential Careers.
If you already have a link from your site, we want you to know we
appreciate it. If you don't have a link to us, please
send a request to your site's Webmaster to establish a
link to Quintessential Careers. Thanks so much!
For more details (including sample HTML copy), see our
Link to Us page.
Need a career expert for a story or article you're working on? Searching for college,
career, and job news? Interested in learning more about Quintessential Careers?
Our Press Room
is your one-stop location for getting the information and resources you need.
QuintZine: Topics in Upcoming Issues
WATCH FOR feature articles on these topics in upcoming issues of QuintZine:
* Credit Reports and Job-Search
* 10 Critical Interviewing Tips
* 3 Generations of Workers: Y, X, Boomers
* College Financing
* Scholarship Do's and Don'ts
* The Academic Job Search
* Perks of Working in Higher Ed
* Signs Your Job is in Jeopardy
* Blogging Way to New Job or Holiday Job-Hunting
* Office Politics
* Maternity Leave
* Jobs on the Cutting Edge
* Job Search IQ Quiz
* Resume Bullet Points: Before and After
* GLBT Job-search Issues
* The Value of Internships Abroad and Study Abroad
* Top 10 Fears of Job-seekers
* For Job-hunting Success, Develop a Detailed Job-Search Plan
* Keep Your Career Dreams Alive
* MBA Career Portfolios
* Pre-Hire Background/Credit Checks
* Financial Aid/Scholarship Timetable
* Build Confidence and Avoid Insecurity in Job Interviews
* Empty Nest Job-seekers
* Lifelong Networking
* Networking for the Shy
* Working Night Shifts/Odd Hours
* Quintessential Career Profiles of YOU, our readers
* Q&As with well-known career experts
* Book reviews
. . . and much, much more...
