21.06.2022 Christin Müller 11216

What are the trends in BGM?

The good thing first: a well-implemented OHM process in the company helps to motivate employees, keep them healthy and identify psychological risks (GBU Psyche), but also to return people to work after a long illness (BEM). 

In the war for talent, health-promoting measures that also contribute to the well-being of employees and a healthy working environment are also essential. 

Michèle Penz, head of the BGM provider pme Familienservice, points out: "Today, it is no longer enough to provide a healthy lunch or tips for a mindful working life. There are many different factors that interact to make up a company's wellbeing factor. Young employees can sense when the structures in a company are not right and prefer to look for an employer that offers a good atmosphere. But the baby boomer group also needs to be motivated, committed and kept healthy in the long term.

Nutrition and health psychologist Frédéric Letzner adds: "An effective OHM addresses the factors that affect employee satisfaction, well-being and health. If we don't address these issues, it's only a logical consequence that well-trained professionals will go where more emphasis is placed on their needs."

3 BGM trends with which you can finally reach all employees 

According to the latest DAK Study 2022, only around 40% of employees surveyed have received an offer for one or more workplace health promotion measures from their employer. Of these, only around 40 percent participate in the so-called BGF measures (workplace health promotion). 

On average, only 10 to 20 percent of employees are reached by traditional OHM. 

Tired, stressed, no time? Reasons why BGM measures are not used

Those who make use of the company's BGM offerings are usually already active in their private lives and have good access to the topic of health. 

However, the majority of employees fall completely through the cracks because they have no access to measures or do not take part in the offers. These are usually the people who are most likely to benefit from preventative health measures at work, for example those who are reluctant to exercise or those with risk factors such as high blood pressure or chronic illnesses. 

Even if the motivation is there in principle, the offers usually fail due to individual factors such as lack of time, work and private stress, the wrong offer, tiredness after a long working day, lack of technical interest or travel times. The list of counter-arguments is long.

For OHM expert Frédéric Letzner, investing in OHM management is worthwhile: "A good BGM has the advantage of increasing employee satisfaction. Satisfied employees are also healthier and more productive employees".

Individual communication is key 

But how do you reach the 10 to 20 percent so that they take part in the health services offered by the company health management program?

Because as different as people are, their approach to health measures is just as different. The personal feel-good level is - just like health itself - highly individual. Frédéric Letzner gives an outlook for the future: "It is becoming increasingly important to think about health communication in order to reach more than just the health-interested target group.
 

BGM of the future: 3 health trends 

With these three OHM trends, you will be able to reach your employees better in the future and recognize which needs in the company really help. 

1. blended coaching: presence and digital in harmony

The coronavirus pandemic has accelerated digital change enormously. Networking platforms and video conferencing tools have become an integral part of the working lives of many professional groups. Online yoga, step tracking, heart rate measurement, calorie counting: Half your life can now be controlled with a smartphone app. What artificial intelligence cannot do, however, is imitate human contact. 

Blended learning or blended coaching - a clever combination of digital offerings and face-to-face formats with real human impulses - offers a solution for occupational health management. It describes a new way of overcoming mental challenges such as stress, overwork or sleep disorders and supports employees in the right way and at the right time, taking into account their individual circumstances. 

 
Digital tools include e-learning, online platforms for employees, online counseling, online sports courses and health apps such as the Mindance app to support mental health:

"With the Mindance app, we can install a broad-based and sustainably effective workplace health promotion program for entire workforces," says Sebastian Hämmerl, Managing Director of Mindance. "At the same time, we focus strongly on the individual needs of each and every person." In combination with face-to-face formats such as personal individual coaching, group coaching, live exercise offers and specialist lectures, different groups of people can be picked up, motivated and kept on the ball in a needs- and goal-oriented manner. (Read more about this below under "User Journey").

Michèle Penz is also convinced that the blended approach offers many opportunities for individual needs: "An integrated blended concept combines the best of both worlds. E-learning courses can be completed flexibly and at an individual pace, but learning progress is documented and reflected on with the help of personal support and a valuable exchange of ideas.

This demonstrably leads to greater learning success and fewer drop-outs among participants. This is interesting not only for large companies, but also for small and medium-sized enterprises and service providers, which are less flexible in their day-to-day work and are sometimes severely affected by the shortage of skilled workers.

To the article: Mindance - the app for the mental health of employees

2. gender OHM: keeping gender and different phases of life in mind

If the OHM is considered without differentiating between gender affiliation, important factors and thus adapted measures may not be used. 

According to the DAK Health Report 2022, women are more likely to take part in exercise programs, for example. The difference is even clearer when it comes to stress management measures. Women also have far more days of absence due to mental illness (352:100) than men (211:100).

In addition, women are more frequently diagnosed with depression within a year (9.7%) than men (6.3%) (RKI, 2018; Thom, Kuhnert, Born & Hapke, 2017). Men, in turn, are more likely to take advantage of BGF measures than women. While men are more likely to deal with topics such as heart or prostate health, women tend to focus on breast cancer, menstruation or menopause.

Participation in BGF offers, source: IGES according to the DAK-Gesundheit 2022 employee survey, p. 99

Example of menstruation: even low-threshold measures can help

Fee Reinoso from Vision Period has made it her mission to educate companies about menstruation. For her, the reason why it is worthwhile for companies to deal with the topic is obvious:
"Because menstruating women make up about half of the employees in our economy and because they face individual physical and mental challenges due to hormonal processes that have hardly been taken into account in the world of work to date".

How the topic of menstruation is dealt with varies from company to company. Even very low-threshold measures can help, says Fee Reinoso: "For example, freely accessible period products in the toilet. This takes the worry out of sudden bleeding and reduces the financial burden. Or the option of working from home, which offers time for regeneration, reduces stress and gives confidence. Relevant for both physical and mental health". Health-promoting further education, training and mentoring can also help. 

Some companies support absence due to menstrual cramps. For example, menstruating employees with severe symptoms can voluntarily take a few days off with pay, organize their work more flexibly during menstruation and make up hours elsewhere or work from home. 

No matter how a company approaches the issue, it requires a great deal of trust from its employees and empathy from the managers responsible.

3. user journey: individual BGM offers 

Every person is unique and, accordingly, the experience of health and illness is individual. It is important to recognize what employees need within their living and working environment before developing measures.

It is essential to take a close look at the individual employee and develop tailor-made solutions for emotional, psychological and physical factors. In addition, individual contextual factors such as social conditions or - quite simply - the job also play a decisive role.

For example, a sales representative may have completely different needs than someone who works at a fixed location. A manager with personnel responsibility and high budget responsibility has different needs than a shift worker in production.

Tailor-made, individual user journeys can also reach people or groups of people who usually find it difficult to access health-promoting measures. It is important that the individually tailored OHM measures are low-threshold. 

Michèle Penz is convinced that a user journey offers the best possible support to an employee or a team with a similar environment from the outset: "Our experience is that people who are unfamiliar with health have difficulties in identifying exactly what their actual needs are and are also overwhelmed by the sheer mass of health offers. Our task here is to look closely at individual needs and determine the right measures".

Heart problems do not have to be caused by a lack of exercise or a poor diet. The DAK health report states that one fifth of employees in Germany have at least one psychological risk factor. "Depression, anxiety and chronic work stress are already a great burden in themselves for those affected, but they can literally get to the heart!" Individual coaching can be used to find out exactly where the problem lies and measures can be suggested to provide relief.

Conclusion

However a company goes about it, it is important that it starts by creating a health-promoting framework for work in order to be equipped for increasingly complex issues such as error and management culture, chronic time pressure, excessive demands and other psychosocial stresses in the future and to keep employees fit and productive for as long as possible in times of a severe shortage of skilled workers and demographic intensification.