Companies that provide Incentives and Wellness Programs to employees for staying healthy

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PV Vyshnavi

Aug 30, 2021 — 9 min read

In the current day and age, most employees find it difficult to balance their work and wellbeing. This is why many companies are providing their employees with incentives and even coming up with unique wellness programs to keep their employees healthy. While wellness programs might not be a new thing, they have grown over the past years as the top MNC companies are coming up with unique programs that can benefit their employees.

According to the Health benefit survey done by the Kaiser Family Foundation in 2020, the average amount that is contributed by covered workers for health insurance in 2020 were $1,243 for single coverage and $5,588 for family coverage. Whereas there are some companies that provide their employees 100% of the health insurance costs, which will help employees save up a lot of money, stay productive and remain loyal to the company.

Despite the incentives, companies are now also coming up with programs to promote health, happiness and productivity by unique program ideas that are engaging, fun and promotes holistic approaches to wellness. Only 44% of the big companies are said to offer their employees incentives to participate or complete such a program. In a survey done by LinkedIn in 2018, 49% of employees prefer health-based incentives and wellness benefits over other perks.

Another study found that these benefits and incentives are responsible for over 75% of career decisions. The main goal of providing incentives and wellness programs to employees is that it will help employees adopt and maintain healthy behaviours. This is the list of companies that provide their employees with amazing health-based incentives and wellness programs.

Zerodha
Google
Accenture
Microsoft
Asana
Netflix
Airbnb
Deloitte
Frequently Asked Questions

Zerodha

On 29^th August, Nithin Kamath the founder and CEO of Zerodha one of the top financial service companies in India announced that the company will be giving its employees one month of salary as a bonus and a lucky draw of Rs. 10 lakhs for staying fit. This was done because of how the recent work from home culture has had a negative impact on the employee’s mental and physical health during the Covid 1 Pandemic.

Covid 19 has had a major impact on work-life balance, this is why Nithin Kamath of Zerodha stepped up and made efforts to promote a healthy lifestyle. The aim of providing this incentive was to promote a healthy lifestyle and guide the company employees in the right direction. Nithin Kamath went on to Twitter to inform his employees to set a 12-month goal to get healthy and share their progress on the monthly basis.

On our internal forum(@discourse), we asked everyone to set a 12-month get-healthy goal & update the progress every month, to create accountability. To increase participation, we said everyone who reaches the goal will get a 1-month salary as bonus & 1 lucky draw for Rs 10lks 2/3
— Nithin Kamath (@Nithin0dha) August 28, 2021

According to Nithin Kamath "Post the first lockdown, like everywhere, our team at Zerodha as a whole was probably the unhealthiest ever, due to the lack of physical activity, work-life imbalance, bad diet, & more. We thought of a way to nudge the team to get healthy and the results are phenomenal," he quipped Nithin also added that, “The transformation stories are super inspiring & pushing others to take action as well."

The tweets of Nithin Kamath went viral and the comment section was filled with netizens who appreciated the initiative. This inspired many on the social media platform and encouraged many other companies to take up innovative initiatives to help their employees stay fit. This proves how health can play a major role in improving the professional performance of employees. And because of this positive feedback, Nithin also went on to make this initiative a permanent affair and named it the 'get healthy' program.

Other companies that provide employees health-based incentives

Google

Google is already well known for its workplace wellness, as the company offers various incentives and programs such as on-site healthcare services, access to gyms and fitness centres, classes and community bikes. The healthcare services on the site can include physicians, chiropractors, including physical therapy, massage parlours etc. The Google employees can also take up classes for cooking, coding, guitar among the cool options.

The google campuses are popular as they have nap rooms, ping pong tables, cafes that offer colour-coded healthy meals and snacks. It also has good financial wellness resources such as financial advisors and even financial planning services that help employees in any way. Google has set a new standard with the office experience and health-based incentives that many companies are struggling to compete with.

Accenture

Accenture's is one of those companies that care about both the minds and bodies of their employees. The company offers its employees assistance programs for mental health problems like stress, substance abuse, depression and anxiety. When it comes to physical health Accenture provides its employees support with their choice of the medical sector like dental or vision coverage. The Accenture employees get specials incentives, offers and discounts for gyms and other fitness centres.

Besides that, it also gives its employees access to telemedicine, free second opinion services and programs for weight loss. These programs have an app for tracking fitness, nutrition and provides cash rewards based on its report. Accenture also has telemedicine services where an employee can ask physician’s health-related questions 24/7. Their unique wellness programs help their employees set health goals through their apps and even review rewards for completing those health activities.

Microsoft

Microsoft is known for the world-class benefits such as competitive pay, bonuses and stock awards based on their employee’s performance. The company is also one of the best when it comes to provides health-based incentives and wellness programs. Microsoft offers its employees resources for smoking cessation, weight management and even fitness training. The company provides its employees with over $1,200 annually for wellness-related expenses that can be used for staying fit physically.

This can also be used for gym memberships or even fitness classes and services like meditation programs, massage, weight-loss program fees, caregiver support, financial advising, and debt management. Microsoft offices have free on-site flu shots, mammograms, biometric screenings, and more. The office campuses have fun alternatives such as Zumba classes, running tracks, and courts for basketball, volleyball, baseball, etc. The Microsoft CARES services is an employee assistance program that offers free personal and family counselling and refers you to child cares.

Asana

Asana is a project management software company with headquarters based in San Francisco, California. The company is widely popular for wellness programs as Nap rooms where employees can rest, recharge and de-stress by sleeping and even get paid for it. The company values their employees so much that they provide them with unlimited PTO so they can maintain a healthy work-life balance.

The company also offers its employees incentives for yoga programs as well as free gym memberships. Besides that, the Asana campuses offer their employees three healthy and nutritious meals with ingredients purchased from organic farms. Asana also promotes living an active lifestyle, offers mentor programs and even immunity workshops before flu season.

Netflix

Netflix has many unique incentives and health benefits for its employees. The company is known to offer its employees over $16,000 every year to cover their medical, dental and vision benefits. If the employee's don't use this allowance they get back over $5,000 back at the end of the year. Netflix also provides its employees with unlimited paid time off, providing to tell them how your workload will be handled while you're away.

The company has a flexible and free mentality when it comes to their health care options as the employees can choose how to allocate the funds to each type of benefit. The Netflix model has two factors which are diverse providers and yearly allowance. They offer 100% coverage for certain preventive care at in-network providers.

Airbnb

Airbnb is also among the top companies that provide good incentives to keep their employees healthy. The company provides insurance to cover the health, dental and vision that can help employees save over $1,243 annually. Airbnb is also known to provide contributions towards dependent care.

Unique benefits of Airbnb are providing its male employees with over ten weeks of paternity leave, while the female employees get long maternity leave for healthy bonding after a birth or adoption. Another benefit of working at Airbnb is that if you like volunteering, then the company will offer you paid volunteering time to do what you love and maintain a healthy work-life balance.

Deloitte

Deloitte also has one of the best healthcare benefits and incentives as it allows its employees a month of unpaid leave for any reason and up to six months of partial paid leave in order to help them pursue their personal opportunities. Besides that, the company also offers a 50% payment for social cryopreservation and up to a maximum lifetime benefit of $20,000.

Another unique incentive that Deloitte is that it offers over $50,000 for adoption and surrogacy expenses. It has other healthcare options to meet the needs of its employees, family and their children of up to 26 years of age. Deloitte offers programs, a 24/7 online health portal and professional help for marital counselling, child care, anxiety, and even for conflicts at the workplace.

Conclusion

Especially in times of the Covid 19 Pandemic, it is important to provide employees with incentives and wellness programs are important as they will boost productivity and result in the reduction in absenteeism. Another advantage of providing employees with incentives and wellness programs is that it will bring about a competitive advantage in hiring good candidates and will help in the company’s retention strategy. This is why companies must start offering their employees health care benefits and incentives.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the companies that have the best healthcare based incentives?

The companies that have the best healthcare based incentives are Deloitte, Google, Microsoft, Airbnb, Netflix, Asana, and Accenture.

What are the basic healthcare incentives that big companies offer?

The basic healthcare incentives that big companies offer on-site healthcare services, access to gyms and fitness centres, and insurance to cover the health, dental and vision.

What are the top health incentives?

The top health incentives are

offering cash-incentive payments and gift cards.
reimbursing workers for gym memberships.
providing free health coaching.

What are health insurance incentives?

These incentives can include cash payments or discounts on insurance premiums.

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