Walkingspree program gets Horizon Software staff moving
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Transcript of Walkingspree program gets Horizon Software staff moving
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by John Zappe on Feb 16, 2012, 8:18 AM | 0 Comments
With all due respect to The Proclaimers, the folks at Horizon
Software International have walked 11,102 miles and far from
falling down at anyone’s door (see the song lyrics) they’re
climbing stairs, shedding pounds, and talking as they’re walking.
That talking thing there is a big plus. It’s just what Julie Denmon
was hoping for when she pitched senior management on
WalkingSpree‘s fitness program. That was 48,940,815 steps
ago.
“Who knew,” she says, “that a walking program would coax
cubicle dwellers to get up and go talk with their team members,
instead of emailing across the office?” Just as she expected, people are losing weight, they’re much
less sedentary, and, as she hoped, there is “Definitely more team collaboration and more social
interactions. I personally witness every day at lunch, our employees walking the property.”
Sitting leads to earlier dying
“I’ve never had so many people come into my office,” says Denmon, who’s office manager for the
140 employee company that specializes in developing software for food service operations. “They
come in and tell me how many pounds they’ve lost. And they’re talking to each other.”
That’s a happy consequence of a program developed to improve the fitness of office workers. Study
after study shows that sedentary office workers are more likely to have health problems than active
workers. In the most extensive and authoritative study of office workers ever done, researchers
found that the longer workers sat, the more likely they were to die.
Of the 822 who told researchers in 1981 that they sat almost all the time, almost 20 percent were
dead by 1994. Of the 3,000 who said they “almost never” sat, just under 7 percent were dead.
Peter Katzmarzyk, one of the leading researchers in the field of exercise science and medicine and
lead author of the study published in 2009, said bluntly, “What we generally see is that people who
sit more during the day have a higher risk of dying from any cause, and in particular, mortality from
heart disease.”
Over the years, as the evidence in favor of exercise as a way to improve worker health mounted,
insurers took notice and began to offer incentives for employers to provide wellness programs. The
most visible benefits to an employer come from two places: savings on premiums as a company’s
claims decrease, and reduced sick time.
Health-focused benefits becoming more common
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Among Silicon Valley’s high tech firms it’s not at all unusual for companies to offer health club
memberships, on-site gyms, massage services, and yoga classes. Health-focused benefits are
becoming increasingly common everywhere. And
vendors have responded with programs as simple
as walking programs and health monitoring
websites, to include even office furniture. For $479
TrekDesk will sell you a standup desk to
wraparound your treadmill so you can burn calories
while burning the midnight oil.
American Financial Group considered subsidized
gym memberships, but after considering how easy
it is to join and never go, opted for WalkingSpree.
It’s program, launched in 2008, came up with an
ROI of $9 an employee. It’s a calculated ROI,
based on studies of lost productivity, workers
comp, and health care costs. However, at the end
of the first year the company’s employees (2,700
participated) had such improved medical results that AFG’s health premiums barely increased.
Denmon says it’s too early for Horizon to know it’s return on investment. She suspects, that like the
social interaction benefit, it will be positive. At a cost of only $99 for each of the 83 participating
employees (plus a few more dollars for incentive prizes), it isn’t an expensive program.
Getting a ninefold return on the investment would be a happy result, but that wasn’t her first thought
when she happened upon the program last year. She was scouting locations for the company’s
annual user conference when she asked the rep showing her around about the pedometer on his
belt and discovered WalkingSpree.
“I was very intrigued to say the least,” explains Denmon, who said it wasn’t hard selling senior
management on the program. In fact, she says, Randy Eckel, Horizon’s president, is one of the
company’s Top Walkers and lately he’s been averaging 19,000 steps a day, an impressive 9 miles.
An easy to implement program
WalkingSpree is easy to implement. The technical parts are all turnkey. At Horizon, employees
bought the pedometer to track their steps. Each gets a personal, private web space where they can
record medical information, set health goals and see how they compare to the company. Denmon
gets reports on the walking indivdiuals and groups do.
Like all programs, there’s a certain amount of cheerleading to get it started and periodic contests to
keep up enthusiasm. Next month Horizon is competing against a Chicago software to see which
company will log the most steps.
This month, the campaign is “Avoid the Elevators. “Our company is divided between two floors and I
have seen a tremendous increase in stair use,” Denmon says. “I even designed a t-shirt for this
specific campaign. Of course you have to win the shirt with various challenges during the month.”
John Zappe was a newspaper reporter and editor until his geek gene lead him to launch his first
website in 1994. Never a recruiter, he instead built online employment sites and sold advertising
services to recruiters and employers. Besides writing for ERE.net, John consults with digital
content operations, focusing on the advertising side. Contact him at [email protected].
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Add New Comment Couple good points here. First youneed to know what motivatesindividuals, it is not always the same
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