Motivating employees to lose weight

Every company wants to have healthy employees because it reduces their health insurance costs. Smokers and overweight employees will increase your health insurance because they are prone to visiting the doctor frequently. What can companies to do help motivate employees to lose weight?

Don't single out the employees that need to lose weight. Try to get the entire company behind you and have everyone work together as a team. Motivate all the staff members to do something that will benefit their health in some way. The healthy program you implement needs to talk about changing diets and including daily exercise in their routine. Try to come up with ideas that will help everyone at the company. You can provide information about new snacking rules in the office and that you are going to clear out the vending machines and replace them with healthier alternatives.

Hold a staff meeting and be honest with the extra costs of health insurance. Provide the employees with a list of all the things that increase health insurance costs. Tell them if they are willing to lose weight, you are willing to negotiate for higher wages or other benefits when the health care costs start to decrease. Let them know simple things they can do (like washing hands) to reduce the spread of infectious diseases. Find out other things you can do to prevent illness from spreading around the office. After the staff meeting, hold one-on-one meetings with each staff member. Talk to them about their goals and find out if they are willing to participate in the new healthy program you are initiating. Truly express your concern for their health and ask them what you can do to help them improve their health.

Losing excess weight is not an easy task, be realistic with your deadlines. You can divide the program into a 6-week course or you can divide it into quarters. Keep motivating your employees each week don't just start out strong and forget about it 3 weeks into the program. Keep your employees focused on their goals and do things to help them meet their targeted body weight.

The best way to get everyone on-board with the new healthy program is to offer incentives to them. Most companies will do small things like cash rewards to gift cards or extra vacation time. Whatever the incentives are, make sure they are attractive to the employees.

One way that helps companies to motivate employees to lose weight is to divide everyone up into teams. The team that loses the most weight will get the largest reward, although you still need to provide smaller rewards to everyone else that participates in the program. Even offering everyone a free lunch at work one day will show them you appreciate their commitment to living a healthier lifestyle.

In order to keep your employees motivated about losing weight, you need to place banners all over the office. Do things that will constantly remind them of their goals and to lose weight or to live a healthier lifestyle. Send out weekly e-mails to everyone, showing them the progress of the teams. This will inspire a little friendly competition between the teams. Removing all the junk food from the office will also help to inspire the employees to lose weight. When they get a craving for food, the only choices they will have should include fruits and vegetables. Granola bars, trail mix, and carrots make for some great healthy snacking food.

Encourage employees to exercise while at work. Give them an extra 15 minutes for lunch where they can go outside and walk. Purchase a few treadmills and set aside an exercise room for them to use. Set a good example for your employees by participating in the program and tell them how your progress is coming along.