Employee perceptions of wellness programs in the hospitality industry

Purpose This study aims to examine the impacts of employee wellness programs on employee and organizational outcomes in the hospitality industry. Design/methodology/approach A survey was distributed on Amazon Mechanical Turk, targeting hospitality employees who have access to employee wellness programs. Descriptive statistics, confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling techniques were used. Findings Employee perceptions of wellness programs significantly impacted turnover intention, job stress (JS) and perceived organizational support (POS). POS had a significant mediating effect between employee perceptions of wellness programs and JS. Employee perceptions of wellness programs did not have a significant effect on emotional labor. Originality/value Employee wellness programs are often recommended to human resource managers, but there is little empirical evidence of their effects, particularly for hospitality industry employees. This study investigates the actual employee outcomes of employer-sponsored wellness programs.

Prevalence and characteristics of campus-based employee wellness programs among United States accredited colleges and universities

BACKGROUND: Employee wellness programs (EWPs) aim to support positive changes in employees’ modifiable behavioral health risk factors for disease prevention and management. OBJECTIVE: This study described the prevalence and characteristics of EWPs in US accredited college and university campuses. METHODS: Identification of the prevalence of EWPs and programming activities offered in 3039 accredited higher education institutions/campuses, and characteristics of these institutions/campuses were conducted, mainly through searching the institution’s web page. RESULTS: Overall, 36%of the institutions/campuses offered EWPs, with a significantly larger percentage of 4-year public colleges/universities providing EWPs and wellness programming activities than the 4-year private colleges/universities and community colleges. When limiting the institutions/campuses to 4-year colleges and universities with at least 500 employees, the percentage of these institutions/campuses offering EWPs increased to 57.7%, which was comparable to the findings in the literature. The percentage of the institutions/campuses offering wellness programming activities ranged from 18.1%for injury prevention and ergonomics to 30.2%for stress management. The percentage of institutions/campuses offering injury prevention and ergonomics was significantly lower than the percentage of institutions/campuses offering other typical wellness activities. CONCLUSIONS: The prevalence of EWPs offered in accredited college and university campuses do not meet the national goal of 75%, which was set by Healthy People 2010.

Bringing a Taste of Wellness to Workstations

Companies providing employees with nutritious and wholesome meals strike the right balance in achieving a productive, creative and well-bonded team. Compass India’s study on ‘Eating at Work’ (EAW) suggests that energy and productivity levels peak between 9 am to 12 pm. Post-lunch these levels registered a sharp drop due to food intake with a high glycaemic index. Even as we peg it on natural human behaviour, with the right diet, one can boost those afternoon levels. Human resource teams plan for initiatives like sleeping pods, massage stations and yet the outcome continues to be a challenge. EAW research shows that these perks start great, but soon decline, that is, the usage of gyms was less than 2 per cent or 3 per cent. Also, ‘73% chose café meals as their preferred non-monetary perk, ranking ahead of flexible work hours and employee wellness programs’. Good food goes a long way in contributing to productivity. For many organisations, while wellness is a big part of their agenda, the role of food is still at its nascent stage. There is opportunity to elevate that. Hence, companies are taking constant intelligent decisions about workplace food.

Bridging Intention and Action for Employee Well-Being Using the Intentional Action (InAct) Process: Workshop-Lecture Series

Background Employee wellness programs can help manage stress and alleviate burnout. Objective To pilot and disseminate the Intentional Action(InAct) concept for employee wellbeing. Methods Five independent interactive workshop-lectures with an automated audience response system. Descriptive analysis of participant response data. Results Participants (n = 275): rated spirituality, physical environment and nutrition the most highly in contributing to their present well-being. Ninety-eight percent (n = 269) of participants identified a focus area to work on. The well-being area most selected was Exercise, (35% n = 95), however, other non-traditional areas, including Personal and Professional Development (18% n = 48), Relationships and Communication (17% n = 47), were selected, along with mind-body connection and mindful awareness (6% n = 15 and n = 16). Conclusion The pilot engaged employees to reflect and set goals for their future well-being. Healthcare institutions implementing programs should consider a broad range of whole person strategies addressing employee well-being, which go beyond the traditional focus on exercise and nutrition.

A Four Marker Digital PCR Toolkit for Detecting Heavy Alcohol Consumption and the Effectiveness of Its Treatment

Background.—Heavy alcohol consumption (HAC) is a shared concern of the forensic, medical and insurance underwriting communities. Unfortunately, there is a relative lack of clinically employable tools for detecting HAC and monitoring treatment response. Building on the results of 3 genome wide methylation studies, we have previously shown in a small group of samples that methylation sensitive digital PCR assays (MSdPCR) have the potential to accurately classify individuals with respect to HAC in a small set of individuals. Objective.—We now expand on those earlier findings using data and biomaterials from 143 participants with current HAC and 200 abstinent controls. Results.—We show that a set of 4 digital PCR assays that have a receiver operating characteristic (ROC) area under the curve (AUC) of 0.96 for detecting those with HAC. After a mean of 21 days of inpatient enforced abstinence, methylation status at one of these markers, cg04987734, began to revert to baseline values. Re-examination of methylation data from our smaller 2014 study with respect to this locus demonstrated a similarly significant reversion pattern at cg04987734 in association with treatment enforced abstinence. Conclusions.—We conclude that clinically implementable dPCR tools can sensitively detect the presence of HAC and that they show promise for monitoring alcohol treatment results. These dPCR tools could be useful to clinicians and researchers in monitoring those enrolled in substance use disorder treatment, employee wellness programs and insurance underwriting.