Adidas UK, Nomura and Gilead Sciences have been named some of Britian’s healthiest organisations.
The annual awards, Britain’s Healthiest Company, which were launched by Pruhealth and Mercer, looked at the health of more than 25,000 employees and the health and wellness facilities provided by 82 employers.
It also looked at a number of lifestyle, behavioural, environmental and clinical risk factors across the employee population, together with a broad view of corporate policies, practices and facilities that could directly impact on employee health.
The award winners
The healthiest medium-sized organisations, with between 250 and 999 employees, were Adidas UK, Discovery Networks and Iris Worldwide.
The healthiest small organisations, with between 50 and 249 employees, were Gilead Sciences, Forrester Research and Grey Matter.
Nomura, the healthiest large employer, provides a range of health and wellbeing benefits to staff, including: a gym that offers 65 different exercise classes a week; a medical facility with a clinical support team, including a full-time GP, dentist and dental hygienist, and nursing and occupational health services; full health assessments complemented by an on-site laboratory, which allows results to be processed immediately; a holistic massage therapy service, parenting programmes, parking for 250 bikes, bike maintenance and cleaning, showers, lockers and free towels.
Gilead Sciences has put PruHealth’s Vitality scheme at the heart of its wellbeing programme for employees.
It provides rewards to its employees for understanding how healthy they are and for taking steps to do healthy things, such as getting active and eating well.
These incentives are designed to help its employees focus on personal goals, such as stopping smoking, and help them track their progress and make healthy choices for their own futures that they can maintain.
Adidas UK has spawned its own independent wellness consultancy, called Wellness International, to serve the health and wellbeing interests of its employees.
Its facilities include two gyms and access to a number of health professionals, including doctors, nutritionists, physiologists and psychologists.
At least 90% of employees know their numbers for blood pressure, cholesterol, body mass index and their resulting cardiac risk score.
The organisation has reduced the average number of sick days to 2.5 per employee per year, compared to an industry average of almost six.
Corporate health reports
Each participating organisation received a corporate health report that details the main health risks facing the organisation, tailor-made recommendations on how to improve employee health and how it is benchmarked against other employers.
Participating employees received a personal health report that provides a unique insight into their health along with recommendations on lifestyle changes they can make.
Neville Koopowitz, chief executive officer of PruHealth, said: “Britain’s Healthiest Company celebrates the country’s most outstanding organisations demonstrating best practice and innovative approaches to looking after the health and wellbeing of their staff.
“There are a number of strategic business drivers that are increasingly becoming boardroom issues. The business case demonstrating the tangible benefits from ensuring employee health is becoming increasingly clear, from the financial cost and impact on the bottom line, the organisational profile and being an employer of choice to minimising litigation by ensuring due diligence.
“The winning organisations are fantastic examples of those that have had the foresight to create a culture that aligns wellness with a business’ overall goals and missions and we congratulate them on these well-deserved awards.”
Chris Bailey, partner at Mercer Marsh Benefits, added: “In recent times, employee engagement and the demonstrable value that it brings an organisation has become accepted wisdom within the business community.
“However, taking an active interest in the health of employees has taken longer to embrace. There seems to be an artificial barrier within corporate Britain where the health of the workforce is deemed the individuals’ responsibility, or perhaps simply people believe it’s an area in which it is too difficult to make an impact.
“Fortunately, we’re finding that more and more employers are challenging this view and are looking to review their current rewards, benefits and working practices to positively impact upon the health or their people. It just makes good business sense.”