Employee wellness vs corporate health: which one are you?

15 Jun Employee wellness vs corporate health: which one are you?

At Healthworks we’ve been noticing an interesting trend recently: the rise in popularity of the term “employee wellness” instead of “corporate health”.

We’ve noticed it in social media and blog posts from experts in the industry. And, we’ve noticed it in the keywords that our prospective clients are typing into Google when they’re looking for services like ours.

What does it mean?

For some, these terms are interchangeable. But to me, it means a wonderfully positive shift in the way people – and businesses – look at the issue of health and wellness at work.

Employee wellbeing comes first

By using the term “employee” first, I believe it shows that the managers looking for wellness services are genuinely concerned for the wellbeing of their employees. They want each employee to feel great at work, and be able to perform at their absolute best.

And by choosing the term “wellness” over “health”, people are showing a holistic understanding of the need for mental, emotional and physiological wellbeing. It’s a perspective that looks further than simply reducing the risk of injury or disease.

Corporate health still tops the charts

Chart from Google Keyword Planner

“Corporate health” is still the most commonly used term for our industry, along with workplace health.

Corporate health is often associated with large corporations; think traditional multinationals. It’s the longest lasting term – we used it back in the 1980s when I first launched Healthworks.

However, we’ve noticed that even our largest most “corporate” clients are moving toward an annual wellness program to incorporate employee wellness services. They’re moving away from the standard, compliance-driven basics of health checks and flu vaccinations. They genuinely want to find wellness solutions that speak to their employees’ needs – and that includes the needs of Gen Y and Millennials.

Increasingly “corporate health” is shifting to “corporate wellness”. This reflects a similar shifting of the to include the concepts of mental health, stress management and creating a workplace culture of wellness.

Workplace and wellness

Of course, there are many other variations. “Workplace health” rose through the ranks as a keyword around a decade ago, as more organisations, government department and small businesses took up health programs. It tends to go hand in hand with “workplace health and safety”, and is often very focused on injury prevention and risk management.

“Workplace wellness” is also popular. It seems to show a good mix of A. an understanding of the importance of wellness, and B. a diversity of employer-types. It says “we want to make our workplace a place of wellness for our employees”.

But this is all just based on opinion. I’d love to know what you think. Which terms do you use to explain what you do? Do you see any significant difference between the terms? Share your thoughts in the comments below.