A sedentary lifestyle can reduce productivity, which can be detrimental for business owners whose employees are constantly glued to their desks. Studies have shown those team members who engage in some form of mid-day physical activity experience a boost in performance and productivity. Implementing a workplace fitness challenge or wellness program is a great way to support the health and wellbeing of your team members while improving workplace productivity and promoting a healthy workplace culture. Take a look at how you can start a remote office fitness challenge that motivates and engages your team members.
Create the best fitness challenge for your workplace environment.
You should know your workforce well enough to create a challenge that will be met with enthusiasm. Don’t be afraid to start with something simple for the first try. It’s easy to implement one-to-three-minute plank or push-up wellness challenges that employees can complete between meetings or calls. Almost everyone wears some kind of wearable device or fitness tracker, like a Fitbit, that counts steps. You could create a cross-department step challenge and get teams to compete against each other for the highest weekly step count.
Take things a step further and get your workers to participate in a 5K race that will raise money for charity. Remote workers can find local races to sign up for and find friends and family to sponsor them. No matter what type of wellness challenges you create, come up with an attainable prize to incentivize your team.
Make it easy for everyone to participate and track progress.
There are plenty of apps available that make it easy to manage and stay connected with your remote workforce. The free Charity Miles app makes it easy for team members to raise money for their favorite charities and keep track of their progress. Whether participants prefer to bike, run, dance, or walk, every mile moved will translate into money for charity.
The fitness app Tribe allows fitness influencers to engage with and provide fun workout challenges for users. There are also plenty of free YouTube videos that will help challenge and unite your employees. To make it feel more like a workplace bonding experience, you can always create a virtual Zoom event so everyone can be challenged together.
You can find every kind of fitness device and application under the sun on the marketplace. Each of these options features its own interface, design, and functionality. Not all of your team members have the same wellness needs or goals, which means getting everyone to use the same device isn’t practical. The best way to encourage and motivate participants is to create your own office fitness challenge app.
Wellable.co is a customizable and configurable platform that directly integrates with leading wellness apps and wearable devices. It features customizable communications, gamification, rewards and recognition, analytics and reporting, personal wellness assessment, and annual physical verification. Wellable.co is also your partner when it comes to wellness services, smoking cessation, and employee health content.
Every challenge needs a time frame.
Determine how long your fitness challenge will run for. Depending on the nature of your challenge, you may need one to three months of participating. Too long of a challenge could cause team members to lose interest, and too short of a challenge may not allow enough time for growth and change. Give your employees enough notice of the fitness challenge so they have enough time to prepare. Avoid starting things during a busy time of the year, such as the holidays, summer months, or high-demand times of business.
HMC HealthWorks, Inc. is an advocate for collaborative whole person care and personal connection. The healthcare industry is evolving thanks to advanced technologies that lead to more personalized healthcare and medicine. Rather than viewing patients as data points, focusing on building a personal connection while caring for the whole person will result in a better quality of care and improve the bottom line. When patients are supported, they are more likely to follow through with their treatment plans and reap the full benefits of their personalized care.
A workplace fitness challenge is a fun way to bond with your colleagues and engage in some healthy competition.