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From the Summer 2002 Wellness Works Newsletter  Exercise Boosts Employee Job Performance Regular exercisers at the Principal Financial Group on-site fitness center in Des Moines were found to have higher performance ratings, stayed longer with the company, cost less in medical and prescription claims, and cost less in both dollars and time due to absenteeism. · Now if that doesn’t make company execs want to install onsite fitness centers, what will?        Results of a rigorous study at this major corporation, known as an early adaptor of wellness in the 1970’s, show the value of making regular exercise a part of the company’s corporate culture.       Researcher, Kaye Halvorson, MS, the company’s Wellness Department Manager, compared an exercise group of 312 employees with 5,553 employees in the nonexercise control group.  Those selected in the exercise group participated an average of three times a week in onsite aerobic classes, Precision Cycling, used the wellness center facility, or took part in Lifetrek (the company incentive program). Key findings: · Job level, educational level, and gender of employees made no difference in performance ratings.  Men and women in the exercise group came from all job and education levels.  In other words, success was not limited to white-collar workers or to those with a college education. · Regular exercisers tended to have worked at the company longer (10.94 years) than those in the nonexercise group (9.32 years). · Higher performance ratings were measured in regular exercisers, through the company’s performance management system in which employees are rated in a 1-4 scale for work performance. · Medical claims for exercisers were up to $724 less than for nonexercisers.  Prescription costs were $124 lower for exercisers who were in the PPO plan, yet slightly higher for those in the HMO plan. · Losses from absenteeism were lower in terms of dollars for exercisers who lost an average of 20.9 hours compared with lost worktime of 36.63 hours for nonexercisers.      “Improved worker health is being seen as a means to increase individual and group productivity, team performance, individual work capacity, worker resilience, quality of products, creativity, innovation, and intellectual agility,” Halvorson points out.      More research is needed in the value of providing onsite wellness and work/life programs and services to link improved work performance, employee commitment, and ultimately corporate profitability,” she concludes.      But regular exercise is not the whole key to success.  Halvorson notes from her own innovative work in corporate wellness that other factors contribute to the success (measured by lower costs, higher performance, and tenure) of the employees in the exercise group.      “What is it within a person that makes him or her want to take a greater interest in their health? She asks.  Does it make sense that some of these same qualities help people to do well in all aspects of their life, such as parenting, career, and community service?” – a subject for further research. Source: Halvorson, Kaye, MS.  Does exercise affect employee job performance?  Master’s thesis, Nebraska Methodist College, 2001.