Name:

23rd June 2020

What are some of the discrimination risks of wellness programs?

Most of the wellness programs try to substitute medical insurance as a benefit in the

workplace. The company rewards employees that participate in it and penalized whom they

don’t, that’s a subtle form of discrimination because the character of the program doesn’t

seem completely voluntary. Besides, we have the health factor, which serves as a criterion

to promote good habits or a tricky way to pressure the employee to take the program.

Recent evidence, also points out that it doesn’t work as well as we expected.

Another risk for wellness programs it’s that it compromises your health information: if the

organization which provides the program is related to vendors or pharmaceuticals, you are

most vulnerable to hacking and trafficking your information. This results in unnecessary

studies (that can damage your health), incorrect diagnosis based on mistaken measures, and

false disabilities. The program looks more like a business than an initiative to help people.

A better goal program it’s found new ways to communicate at work and relieve the stress of

misunderstandings in advance to take care of employee’s mental health. Also, we have to

keep in mind that coworkers and bosses aren’t our friends, they are more like a network or

team. This creates a whole distance between professionalism and social interaction. The

problems that face in a company or workplace, are fundamentally psychological, wellness

programs like naps, physical exercise, quit smoking, and yoga classes are focus only on

social aspects from work.

And, the motivation for these programs is that these activities boost positive thinking,

which makes not essential the worries about mental health. Therefore, the employees who
struggle with mental health issues suffer in silence. They feel judge if they don’t want to

participate and can be more like they are, for example, a person who smokes can feel guilty

about taking breaks for getting cigarettes. Someone who wants a snack or indulgent meals

could be taken for a bad employee. In this case, the wellness programs are

counterproductive and ineffective, because not everyone responds the same way. And not

everyone wants to be a part of them.

The programs that work are focused in treat workers like people, that recognize that people

have necessities, manage stress and needs healthy options to keep working. However, as a

company we have to respect the right of other to refuse them, and don’t judge about their

decisions. I like the assistance programs because of reward scheme and the planning for the

employees: they want to get interested in planning activities to achieve your goals. I can’t

agree with the subtle discrimination in those programs, but facilities to plan and get more

than an incentive it’s something that anyone should have.

Articles.

Berinato, S. (2015). Corporate Wellness Programs Make Us Unwell: An Interview with

André Spicer. Retrieved for: https://hbr.org/2015/05/corporate-wellness-programs-make-

us-unwell

Rise People (2019). 10 Great Examples of Workplace Wellness Programs. Retrieved for:

https://risepeople.com/blog/workplace-wellness-programs/