Communication to Cultivate a Culture of Health: Lessons From 5-Star Achievewell Organizations

Abstract

Creating a culture of health within an organization offers benefits such as reducing costs and supporting employees in becoming and staying healthy. A variety of health and wellness programs within an organization are important for establishing a culture of health. These programs are supported communicatively to encourage employee participation and healthful behavior changes. Recognized for their success in creating a culture of health, a group of organizations, distinguished as 5-Star AchieveWELL organizations, offer an opportunity to identify messaging strategies effective at promoting health and wellness within the workplace and therefore, creating a culture of health. The goals of this study included learning successful organization’s communication strategies utilized to create a culture of health, understanding how new employees are socialized into this culture, identifying how employees may resist the culture, and exploring how resistance is addressed. Based on in-depth interviews with 19 5-Star AchieveWELL organizational representatives and grounded theory analysis of collected data, evident themes related to the goals of this study were identified. Key communication strategies to support a culture of health include using multiple communication channels, demonstrating leadership support, and being willing to adapt and change over time. New employees are socialized into the culture of health during the recruitment process as well as new employee orientation. Resistance to health and wellness occurs in the form of non-participation and employee push-back, with this resistance often being met with compassion. These results offer practical implications for organizations desiring to create a culture of health as well as theoretical implications for scholars studying organizational socialization.