Healthcare is more than just dollars and cents; it’s about value. Relying solely on past claims data for expensive care overlooks a significant opportunity to proactively shape tomorrow's healthcare costs. Effectively managing workforce health requires a holistic approach that considers every step of your employees' healthcare journey and addresses challenges along the way.
Better relationships build value
Employers that thrive in today's market are investing and embracing long-term, people-centered workforce strategies that take a holistic approach to proactively supporting their employees' health and well-being. A healthy workforce – especially one that wants to come to work – is a less expensive workforce and a happier one.
When a workforce feels cared for and cared about, they’re more willing to put in that extra effort to better themselves and their organization. Eliminating presenteeism – that lost production value when someone comes in but isn’t operating at 100% because of an illness – can increase the value of your organization, as well as how valued your workforce feels.
Proactive risk prevention > reactive interventions
The easiest way to mitigate costly risk is to lessen it as much as possible. If you focus on managing high-cost claims and minimizing administration fees in the short term, you'll be locked in a cycle of reacting to costly risks rather than proactively addressing them. Zooming in on a single high-cost claim, makes it easy to miss other needs and conditions that may go unsupported. This fragmented approach limits your ability to understand how to best manage the health of your entire workforce population.
Adapting your strategy is less about altering it entirely and more about rethinking how you see your employees' needs and how your solutions support them. When you zoom in on a single high-cost claim, it's easy to miss other needs and conditions that may go unsupported. In addition, this fragmented approach limits your ability to understand how to best manage the health of your entire workforce population.
User experience is key
There’s nothing simple about keeping things simple. Many promise to deliver it in the solutions they offer, but what you experience says it all. When your health plan gets the experience right, the value for you (and plan members) multiples.
Personalized data and services help predict when members have needs. That information can then be used to prompt them to proactively act on those needs. For example, personalization takes factors such as age, BMI, health history and more to predict when members will have emerging musculoskeletal pain needs, and proactively reach out to them with programs that help prevent and delay pain, as well as guide them to the appropriate site of care if their pain becomes chronic.
Both you and your workforce deserve a multidisciplinary team of experts dedicated to meeting members where they are in their care journey to ensure they get the right care at the right time and in the right way, and health plan support teams to help your employees find support specific to their individual needs. Not just support for surface level health concerns, but a focus that considers provider subspecialty, geography, race, ethnicity, or language or cultural fit, including access to an online directory of social services and community resources to meet social determinants.
Don’t overlook this simple truth: your health plan is only as valuable as it is accessible. From prioritizing user-friendly digital experiences to eliminating barriers to care, ensure all parts of your plan are clear, simple and navigable. With a thoughtful and streamlined plan experience, value for you (and members) increases and risk decreases.
You and your workforce don’t need to swim upstream to get the most of health programs. The beauty of simplicity and experience makes the ability to problem-solve, remove barriers to member care and build equity into all programs so much easier.
Your people are your future
Managing your workforce's health can feel like a tug of war when showing real return on investment (ROI) or any sustainable value over time. The demanding economy and the pressures of rising costs make it easy to focus on recent high-cost claims and health plans with lower administrative fees. While these strategies appear to save dollars in the short term, they can quickly increase costs over time if they don't include aligned teams working tightly together across the same technology and processes.
Invest in long-term, people-centered solutions for a healthier workforce and reap the lasting rewards of a thoughtful organization focused on improving employee health and well-being.