In today’s disconnected world, motivating employees to take actions is more challenging, more important for health outcomes, and more important for reducing costs than ever before. Yet, the reality is that it’s also harder than ever to connect with and engage employees.
A proven and increasingly popular way to drive targeted actions is to incentivize employees with intrinsic or extrinsic incentives. Deloitte lists multiple benefits to organizations incentivizing health and wellbeing activities as lower healthcare costs, better talent considerations, and increased workplace wellness and productivity are all benefits employers see.
There are two main reasons that health and wellbeing incentives are so important right now. The first is that they’re a way to save money for organizations in several different ways, and the second is that consumers want them.
A Powerful (and Overlooked) Tool: Rewards
As experts in incentive design and reward management, our team has seen hands-on what strategies work and which tend to fall flat. And we know that nothing is more rewarding for you and your employees than a strategic incentive plan that is proven to work.
Not only do employees want rewards, but they respond to rewards as an engaging incentive. Did you know 98% of young individuals and 85% of older individuals are motivated by financial incentives?
Why? Because employers and employees have concerns about costs. Employers are taking the heat of covering rising healthcare costs, while employees are worrying about paying their own healthcare bills. Both are looking for ways to save money and relieve the financial burden. By utilizing employee benefits, employers know their employees are taking actions to reduce costs and employees can simultaneously earn rewards, including cash or gift cards
Elevate your Employee Rewards
Incentivizing people to get more involved in their total wellbeing is a great start for employee engagement, but pitfalls and challenges occur when rewards are not optimized by personalizing outreach and aligning the right rewards for completing specific targeted actions.
Optimizing your total rewards program requires going beyond offering a gift card for achieving an aloof health challenge. It takes a smart mix of rewards to motivate and engage employees.
Optimized incentives will impact and motivate consumers, encourage future engagement, drive real behavior change and reduce overall healthcare costs. Ultimately, an optimized incentive program is one that aligns the right outreach with the right incentives with the right behaviors to the right person that motivates consumers to take action. That, we can agree, is rewarding for all.
A successful incentive program must also utilize both extrinsic and intrinsic rewards. Extrinsic rewards are critical for driving employee response, but they are not enough on their own. An employee benefits program must also address intrinsic motivations, which are essential for driving long-term changes in behavior. The final step is to ensure your program is positive and personal. This smart mix is how we, at Personify Health, are elevating employee rewards for our clients.
Feeling Overwhelmed? Personify Health Can Help!
Employers across the nation trust Personify Health to activate their employees in meaningful ways. With over 50 million transactions under our belt, we know the best practices that can help you maximize health-related outcomes and best design an optimal benefits program.
Health and wellbeing rewards are becoming more common among organizations and are even becoming expected by employees. As incentives become more popular it is essential to be thoughtful about their use and how to differentiate your organization when it comes to driving healthy actions in your population.
Our engagement team is ready to activate your employees. Hop on the phone with our experts for a quick 10-minute demo to see Personify Health’s best practices for maximizing health-related outcomes through our use of optimal rewards.