“I recently wrote about 5 reasons to take employee wellness social. It was the preface to this article, knowing that companies must first believe social conversation will add to their efforts before they’ll take the plunge and start using the tools. After all, the media’s merely the channel. It’s the behavior we want.”

read more from my article, featured in “good company,” the psychologically healthy workplace program’s (PHWP) newsletter. PWHP is a collaborative effort between the american psychological association and the APA practice organization.

i’m a co-facilitator of cohealth, a monthly tweet chat about workplace wellness. yesterday, we had a very lively chat about the relationship between engagement and happiness. i’ve recapped the discussion here.

if you’re interested in wellness, please join us every third wednesday at noon EST. next month’s topic is crowdsourcing wellness design. if you’re not familiar with tweet chats and need a little assistance, holler.

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while an earlier iabc/buck analysis found that internal comms folk weren’t embracing twitter, recent discussions on twitter and blogs suggest a tide change. in fact, there are more stories of organizations using twitter for team-based knowledge-sharing, collaboration, and employer branding now than only three or four months ago. in fact, fistful of talent posted one on the latter only this morning.

me? i’m a total convert. twitter makes informing, listening, facilitating dialogue, and reaching out to various audiences all very simple to do. the fact that it’s public and not reliant on company email addresses (like yammer) reduces barriers to access for families and even companies who don’t share email conventions.

of course, twitter’s not going to replace all other internal communication channels, nor will every idea work for all companies. how about if we get our creative juices going by entertaining ideas for using it more?

before you go any further (caveats!)

1. while some ideas presented here aren’t exactly new, i tried to expand upon them.
2. this post doesn’t tackle integrating these ideas into an overall communication strategy, determining security levels, creating separate locked accounts for some of these uses—all those things you’d resolve before executing.
3. twitter may have a limited shelf life; but whether it’s twitter or some other micro-blogging tool, the idea of transparency and openness with hr communications is here to stay.

attract

the way companies tweet (or don’t) reflects the way companies work. are they open to new ideas? do they proactively build a connection with and listen to their customers? do they deliver what they say they will? do they respect, trust, and recognize employees?

we’ve all heard how southwest, zappos, and other “best practice” companies are flinging their doors open to give customers and future talent a glimpse inside. but i’ve yet to see anyone approach it like the chicago law school. as part of their recruitment efforts, they created tweetchicago. it does everything you’d want a school recruitment effort to do: shares a day-in-the-life, makes their diversity visible, underscores professor accessibility, and highlights academics and extracurricular interests. students quickly grasp the school’s culture and use this information to assess their fit, resulting in a form of self-selection i’d have to believe leads to substantially reduced mis-hires.

onboard

from the practical to the political, twitter can jump-start employee onboarding. tweets about business innovations, customer interactions, and company performance help new hires learn the biz. in the same way, can’t twitter also lower silo walls by connecting new hires to innovators and subject experts, supporting organic relationship-building and creating community? or be used to relay important information to new hires and their families? these types of tweets convey to new hires the way “things are done around here”—and they do so directly, rather than in a well-intended, though contrived values statement. for family members, they’ll understand that they’re considered and involved (important when it comes to expat assignments, health care). and the message to customers and potential talent? that you just might be a great place to do business and work.

train and develop

conference learning, fostering team-based collaboration, supplementing online learning, and providing links to online learning modules (a la @oshasafety) are just a few ways to use twitter for t&d purposes. i’d also add twitter chats, whose user-driven design makes them perfect for subject-based knowledge sharing. more informally and informing, organizations can let the community use the vehicle and decide the topics—a simple way to unearth what is and isn’t working. but it’s schools that are employing twitter in increasingly creative and numerous ways. perhaps we can simply ride their coattails.

manage and identify

here, i’ve only questions, as i’m still wrapping my head around the idea of using twitter to deliver performance management feedback. i think it’s more provocative than practical, but let’s say twitter does get used this way—is the next logical step to also use it to identify future leaders? why not? doesn’t twitter rally us around certain knowledgeable, inspiring people? couldn’t an organization follow tweets to find who are natural leaders?

educate

twitter is a drip-feed, delivering just-in-time educational doses—which, when used thoughtfully, is a boon over out-of-date and hard-to-search intranets. i’ve already shared some thoughts on how organizations can put twitter to use for benefits communication; many of the reasons it works for benefits cross content lines. but benefits-related or not, organizations can direct employees to valuable, trusted resources, tools, and service organizations simply by whom they follow.

engage (and retain)

whether it’s for informing, listening, interacting, or recognizing, twitter provides a direct to-the-people channel for any organization’s leadership team. it gives employees a voice and provides a gateway to the organization’s key influencers. virgin media uses twitter to build connections, humanize the organization, have fun, and celebrate. zappos takes twitter so seriously that a class on its use is a standard part of their company training curriculum. and company ceo tony hsieh credits twitter for building personal connections with people, as well as for something he and zappos take very seriously—happiness. (if you read no other link, i encourage you to read this last one where tony addresses and asks employees to consider: how can you use twitter as a tool to help you grow as a person and be happier?)

when you think about it, the ways to use twitter to communicate with employees are as infinite as the number of existing companies.

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[image: nimages dr]

in an earlier post about ways to emphasize wellness in your annual enrollment communications, i mentioned work i did last spring with beth gleba, internal information manager at ikea north america, llc, on their upcoming annual benefits enrollment.

as part of our planning, we talked about twitter. we love the tool and think it has great application for helping people find resources in a just-in-time fashion.

at that time we wondered if twitter could be used as another annual enrollment communication channel. it has so many pluses:

√  easily digestible

√  accessible outside the workplace

√  drives people to important information

√  goes directly to any follower (e.g., spouse, dependent)

√  allows for conversation and individual support

√  opens the door to future tweets on a variety of human resources topics

√  no cost

we went ahead and created a strategy to use twitter for annual enrollment and to expand the content afterward. in the current issue of employee benefit news, you can read the case study and an elaboration on some of these benefits in an article by jennifer benz, beth’s and my partner in crime. if you’re interested in learning more about ikea’s annual enrollment communications, our work is featured on my website. you can also comment, tweet, or… whoa!…call.

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for the past few years, high deductible health plans (HDHPs), while controversial, have been the silver bullet du jour for employers trying to keep their costs manageable for themselves and their employees. coming quickly on the HDHP’s heels, employers have been weighing the value of wellness programs that focus on altering lifestyle habits and reducing barriers to preventive care.

personally, i shoot for rational wellness — i work out regularly, don’t smoke, do drink, and must have a sweet after every meal, including breakfast. all of the above keeps me fairly healthy, clears my mind when i need it, and generally makes me much nicer. professionally, i believe corporate wellness programs are a smart move even though there are differing views on whether well-designed programs truly deliver stronger financial performance and increased productivity, improved engagement, lowered presenteeism, and positive employer image. really, they had me at “it’s the right thing to do.”

with annual enrollment coming up — and employees facing the prospect of choosing their health benefits — many companies are refining their benefits program and retuning their annual enrollment communications. whether or not your company offers a comprehensive wellness program, there are a number of ways you can incorporate wellness messages.

#1. frame your message wisely.

after years of hearing about rising costs, how to be an informed health care consumer, and “we’re in this together,” employees are tuning out. yes, there’s much employees can do to help maintain costs by choosing the right plan, enrolling in programs they need, mail-ordering generic drugs, and the lot. but this is change in a minor key. there’s precious little they can do to change the cost structure in a major way. this fact makes framing your company’s wellness message around cost containment not nearly as inviting — or successful — as framing the message around things near and dear to your employees’ interests: feeling good, being around to see their children grow up, and living long enough to retire at a better time for retirement than today.

#2. add completing a health risk assessment to the steps leading to enrollment.

i’ve been involved in health communication for roughly 14 years, i get the lingo, and i know what i need to do to enroll yet every year rob and i procrastinate, then muddle through at the final hour. it’s such an onerous task, and making the wrong decision seems fraught with potential doom. because choosing benefits is so overwhelming, annual enrollment communications often offer a step-by-step guide to break the process into manageable bits. typically, the steps include understanding how much you used your benefits in the past year, reviewing any big changes to prices and plans, and working with available tools to find the best plans. this year, why not add completing a health risk assessment (if you don’t offer a health risk assessment, you can suggest getting an annual physical)? more and more companies are doing so, and it makes great sense. encouraging completion as part of annual enrollment makes the HRA the hub of managing one’s health. once employees know their health risks, they’ll have a better sense of their true health needs. their interest will also be heightened, as employees are often surprised by what their assessment tells them. and with employees worried about the confidentiality of the HRA, framing its completion this way emphasizes that the HRA is a source of information for the employee to use, not the company.

#3. reference existing programs that support healthy lifestyles.

with any decision support you offer — whether online tools, print, or web — look for opportunities to reference those additional programs your insurance provider and other health partners offer, such as acute care and disease management; diabetes, asthma, and other free pharmaceutical programs; health coach programs; and stress and financial counseling. these are often overlooked and misunderstood benefits.

#4. add wellness to your employee meetings.

many companies hold employee meetings during annual enrollment. if you’ve ever run one of these meetings, you know they’re guaranteed to pull a crowd. like most face-to-face communications, they’re highly valued because they allow employees to hear firsthand about any big changes and get specific answers to their individual questions. while you have employees gathered, dedicate a portion of the meeting to wellness issues. what you focus on depends on your company’s needs — what are the top chronic conditions present in your workforce? do people need a refresher that preventive benefits are fully covered? given the stress we’re all under, would it be a good time to remind everyone what your EAP offers? options abound, and so do speakers. your EAP, insurance provider, or local chapter of a national health organization can send a speaker — or you can provide prepared materials for the HR presenter.

#5. reach out to the family.

sending annual enrollment communications to the employee’s home is one way companies reach out to the family, a population that typically represents upwards of 60% of the health care price tag for most companies. you can reach out further this year by including direct messages to your employees’ families, letting them know what benefits are available to them. and be sure to invite families to your annual enrollment meetings, where you’ll have another opportunity to encourage their involvement, participation, and informed decision making.

#6. use social networking tools to inform, connect, and motivate people.

wellness-related social networking sites are well-established in the marketplace. there are community groups and twitter profiles for smoking, cancer support, losing weight, increasing fitness — you name it. using these same methods internally is another way companies can talk with and support employees and families, and some companies are already starting to use them.

since we’re talking about annual enrollment here, i’m going to share just one story. (i’ll cover other examples — both in-use and potential ideas — for social networking and wellness in a future post.) during their march 2009 annual enrollment, ikea created a blog so their co-workers could talk with an HR service center representative. ikea also used twitter to communicate with co-workers and family members about improved benefits, available resources, and enrollment deadlines. their use of twitter has since expanded to cover business messages as well as broader HR topics. (disclosure: i worked with ikea on this effort. jennifer benz, a partner in the work, is writing a case study for a future issue of employee benefit news.)

phew! that was a long post. let me know what you think.

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[image: pinksherbet]