Employee Wellness Newsletter : Needs Assessment

An initial health evaluation can include a survey of staff members’ interests as part of the assessment. Effective wellness programs are designed to meet the needs and interests of the staff members. The information you need to get from a survey is dependent upon the scope of your program. A sample survey can be obtained in the HOPE Publications Web site. If you plan to adjust this sample survey or develop your own survey, keep the following hints in mind:

• Ask mostly closed-choice questions, especially if you will be sending the survey to a big number of employees. Closed-choice questions support specific choices and are easy to tabulate. You may want to use a computer for data entry and analysis.
• Invite comments, opinions and recommendations, or ask open-ended questions at the end of the survey. Open-ended items are more difficult to summarize.
• Include a brief explanatory cover letter with the survey with the signature of the business president. Make sure to include a statement about confidentiality and anonymity.
• Ask a group of representative workers to review the survey before it is distributed. Find out if the questions will be understood by workers and will not be objected to.
• Include demographic information at the beginning or end of the survey. Consider various ways that you might analyze the responses by demographic characteristics (gender, age, shift, site, department, etc.).

When thinking of who ought to get the survey, a simple rule is if you have under 500 staff members, everyone ought to receive one. The public relations benefit of everyone receiving a survey can be valuable. Over 500 staff members, a sample of the work population will suffice. A sample saves on expenditures and time. You may want to consider hiring a statistician to determine a suitable sample size for your worksite.

Needs surveys are confidential and anonymous; they do not request information that may identify a person.

Getting reinforcement from management is crucial to the success of the program.

One way to do this is to survey managers (see forms) and conduct interviews with decision-makers in the organization. You can use the surveys here or make up your own. If you decide to do your own, keep the survey short. It shouldn’t take more than ten minutes to complete.

The interview process can also serve as a means of educating management. Give concise fact sheets on the benefits of wellness programs for management. When surveys and interviews are completed, tally the surveys and write brief summaries of the interviews. Give these reports to management.

Once completed present a brief executive summary to management. Highlight a few interesting findings that can be used immediately to make decisions about the program.

Utilize charts and graphs to make your points. Prepare a detailed report for Workplace Wellness Program Committee members itemizing each response. Provide a short article about the survey in the company newsletter.

The higher the response the more valid and reliable the results. A minimum response of 40 percent to 50 percent is acceptable.