Feature Story

May 29, 2007

By Terry Timm Moos, News@Cisco

Going for the Gold has never felt better. Cisco was recently named a Gold Award Winner as one of the Best Employers for Health Lifestyles by the National Business Group on Health. The company was honored for its employee wellness program, Cisco Health Connections.

Representing over 200 large employers, health care companies, benefits consultants, and vendors, the National Business Group on Health is the nation's only non-profit organization devoted exclusively to identifying innovative and forward-thinking solutions to the nation's most important health care and related employee benefits issues.

The process is rigorous, requiring applicants to track how they support employee health with programs and benefit plans. Cisco focuses on lifestyle changes including, offering health coaches and health managers for employees, making fitness centers available, and enhancing the healthy menu choices served in the Bon Appetit on-site cafes.

"This is the first year Cisco applied for the award, and we won gold, which is wonderful," said Cisco's Pamela Hymel, MD, MPH, FACOEM, who oversees the Health Connections program. The National Business Group on Health looks for companies with good programs around healthy eating, fitness, and how good the benefit designs are. "They also look to good leadership support, which we have in Chairman and CEO, John Chambers, Senior Vice President, Operations, Processes, and Systems, Randy Pond, and Senior Vice President, Human Resources, Brian Schipper, who have been enthusiastic about the programs," said Hymel.

New health coaching program raises the stakes

"The biggest innovation this year has been the creation of Cisco's health coaching program," said Hymel. "We currently offer health assessments, and now we've taken it one step further to provide coaches, who can help our employees with weight loss, lowering cholesterol, blood pressure management, and other issues that can be prevented and treated," she said.

If the health assessment reveals risk factors, then employees have access to health managers, who take on the role of disease management. "With a diabetes diagnosis, for example, the health manager can help the employee understand in layman's terms the importance of glucose levels, when to check blood sugar, diet and exercise, and when to work with doctors on medicines. They really embrace the disease and work to control it, post-diagnosis," Hymel said.

According to Dr. Hymel, there are two unique aspects to Cisco's program. The first is the financial incentive for employees. "Employees receive $100 just for taking the health assessment, then get another $100 for following the health advice given at the end of the health assessment. It may include working with a health coach or just looking up basic health information in order to stay healthy. We give healthy employees $100 for staying healthy, as that is as important as reducing a health risk." The second is the access to health coaches and health managers. "Cisco has been somewhat of a leader in this," said Hymel. "We want to help Cisco's work force stay healthy. If people start looking at things they can do now to protect their health, they are much better off as they age."

Health Fitness Corporation provides dedicated health coaches to employees

Health Fitness Corporation (HFC) has been working with Cisco since 1995, with on-site physical activity initiatives that have expanded to offices across the U.S. Recently, HFC launched Health Screening Services, Health Advisor, and Health Coaching Services for Cisco employees.

Gregg O. Lehman, Ph.D., President and Chief Executive Officer of HFC, explained the idea of a dedicated coaching model. "After a participant enrolls in our coaching program, they are assigned a 'personal' coach for the duration of the program-similar to a personal trainer," he said. "They develop a close connection, and the employee is held accountable to complete goals. We find that this model generates higher participation and lower drop-out rates than other coaching models," Lehman noted.

The partnership between the HFC health coach and employee is a unique one, with the sole purpose of improving the employee's health and wellbeing. "The coach is responsible for supporting the participant with life long behavior changes," said Katherine M. Hamlin, vice president of health management services for HFC. Research shows that participants who use coaches significantly reduce their risks associated with high cholesterol, high blood pressure, obesity, and low activity levels-versus those that do not.

HFC health coaches have bachelor's, master's, or doctoral degrees in health-related fields, and extensive expertise in the areas of smoking cessation, nutrition, weight management, physical activity, and stress management. "Many of our coaches have licensure or certifications in health education, dietetics, exercise physiology, mental health, and chiropractics," said Hamlin. All coaches complete comprehensive internal coaching training, and most have received coaching training and certifications from several schools of coaching that are accredited by the International Coach Federation.

"HFC is thrilled about the gold award for Cisco's Health Connections Partnership and Program," said Hamlin. "We are proud to be part of the continuing innovation of the Cisco Health Connections Partnership, and equally proud to see the results."

Employees taking charge: Increased awareness in wellness

This year, 52% of Cisco employees have taken the health assessment, up 12% over 2006. So far, 30% of the employees who took the assessments were eligible for coaching. Of that 30%, 65% have taken advantage of this program. Health coaches are for employees, health assessments are available to employees and dependents, and disease management help is available for families.

"We will be measuring over time how this program works," said Hymel, "especially in minimizing or reducing health risks. If you have one or two risks, can we reduce that number to one or none?" Currently, the health coach/manager program is available to Cisco's North American employees. "Eventually, our goal is to take the program to a global level, because there has been interest expressed by our employees in the UK, Australia, and India," said Hymel.

"This award recognition is important to Cisco, because it allows us to gauge our culture-how we support our employees by promoting a healthy place to work," she said.

Terry Timm Moos is a freelance journalist located in Seattle, WA.