Build flexibility into your Workplace Health Promotion Program.
Think ahead: what unexpected challenges might come up as you implement your Workplace Health Promotion Program? How could you adapt and change the Workplace Health Promotion Program to meet those challenges?
• Consider the “what if’s?”
• What if your classroom space is suddenly no longer available?
• What if you can’t hold the Health and Wellness in the usual place?
• Have a ‘Plan B’ (or even Plan C or Plan D) in mind for when the “what if’s” happen.
• Build a team that can help with the Workplace Health Promotion Program
• Who else could teach the health education class if the regular instructor cancels at the last minute?
• Know what areas of expertise your staff has besides their ‘main’ job. By way of example, find out who has fitness instructor credentials besides just the physical therapist.
• Don’t wait for a crisis before you build a network of employees that you can call on.
• Be ready to roll your sleeves up
• Jump in to fill a gap if you need to.
• YOU may have to help restock the milk case in the dining center when the Dairy Month ‘Milk Mustache’ contest results in increased sales during lunch.
• Be willing (and ready) to respond to feedback about the Workplace Health Promotion Program
• Get participant feedback while the Workplace Health Promotion Program is ongoing. Then be ready to adapt to those suggestions.
• By way of example, if kids in a pediatric obesity Workplace Health Promotion Program fight the idea of completing exercise logs, then get a verbal summary of their activity for the week instead.
• Simplify Workplace Health Promotion Program
• If part of your Workplace Health Promotion Program is not working, try making that part less complicated.
• By way of example, if getting follow-up information is not going the way you planned, then make the process to get information easier OR decrease the number of pieces of information that you collect.
• Use lemons to make lemonade
• What do you do when the Workplace Health Promotion Program doesn’t turn out exactly as you planned? Look for what did turn out. Often, the ‘unexpected outcomes’ produce positive results.
• By way of example, one installation’s database to collect sick call data was made obsolete by a regional system. However, the installation database was able to be used in a different way to track vaccination information that improved delivery of care to Employees.
• At another installation, world events halted a new physical training program. Instead, Workplace Health Promotion Program materials were made into a fitness guide.
