An Employee’s View to Corporate Wellness

Randy Eck

Feb 8, 2010

Peter Drucker once wrote “every business has two functions, and only two functions.  They are marketing and innovation.  Marketing and innovation produce results.  Everything else is a cost”.  Mr. Drucker was profoundly interested in the behavior of people.  Ironically, people (i.e. employees) are usually the biggest cost of a corporation, but we are the biggest asset.  Every sales dollar that every company earns is through people.  People at suppliers fulfill the material needs of the company.  People at service providers provide warehousing, transportation, and other requirements.  Employees at the company perform various functions to efficiently fulfill customer requirements.  Each customer is a person, or an entity that has employees.

The whole economic system is about people.  How much attention is given to the wellbeing of employees and their families in the boardroom?  Data, metrics, scorecards, financials, strategy, and tactics are reviewed to drive out costs, increase efficiency, and improve service to result in higher profits and business growth.  All are required and important.  However, perhaps businesses need to develop metrics associated with the wellbeing of their people.  Currently, stress related costs to business are exceeding $300 billion per year.  Employee engagement in their job may be at an all time low.  Balance between work and life is teetering for most people.  In addition, health care costs will exceed GNP in the next fifty years if the current trend continues.  Obviously, the system is going to break unless business leaders and employees wake up and evolve.  Health related problems due to stress is now of epidemic proportions across society.  The results of stress affects work performance, health, families, and every community.  Again, everything is about people.  Even marketing and innovation that Mr. Drucker discussed has to be developed, executed, and managed by people.

I entered Corporate America over twenty years ago.  I have managed many diverse groups of employees in my career.  A strong relationship exists between recognition and employee productivity.  Job performance recognition and recognition of the employee as a human being are both important.  For example, it is not difficult to ask how an ill family member is doing, and express appreciation for being at work.  General Colin Powell and other leaders have stated “you have to love the people you lead”.  Stress levels will decline, productivity will increase, corporate barriers will fracture, teamwork will manifest, and people’s health will improve.  In addition, studies have shown a direct correlation between employee engagement levels and business profitability.  However, business leaders cannot force engagement.  It has to be earned.  Employees need to be more than a name and dollar amount (salary) in a box on an organizational chart.  Likewise, I have worked for nearly thirty five different bosses in my career.  Many had money, nice toys, but no time to enjoy them.  Many revealed advanced biological aging in contrast to their chronological age likely due to stress and poor lifestyle habits.  Many had significant health problems.  Health and money are similar.  We tend not to think about either of them unless we do not have them.

Let’s now discuss what we can do at the individual level to improve our health.  The healthcare industry takes care of us when we do not take care of ourselves.  Our wellness is up to us as individuals.  Unfortunately, many of us abuse ourselves and show up totally unprepared for a medical exam complaining, and perhaps hoping for some magic pill to address our problems.  Generally, people prepare for college exams, driver license exams, and job interviews.  This mentality needs to be the same for your health.   Practicing these five guidelines will improve health and wellbeing.

1. Be conscious of your thoughts and feelings.  We become what we think about, believe, visualize, and act upon.  If I think and visualize positive thoughts of success, joy, happiness, love, and gratitude, then my feelings will be the same.  My life will be fulfilling.  Likewise, constant worrying or thinking depressed, angry, spiteful, and other negative thoughts, my feelings will be in direct correlation to my thoughts and result in added stress both mentally and physically.   Leading medical experts estimate that 90% of disease is either caused, or complicated, by stress.  Many scientists believe that cellular damage is caused by stress.  Stress is created largely from our environment, and our environment is created largely by our thoughts, feelings, and beliefs.  Also, science has proven we become addicted to our emotional state.  “Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be”  - Abraham Lincoln
2. Get enough sleep.  Sleep deprivation prevents our bodies from regenerating which leads to added physical and emotional stress which leads to premature aging and a higher risk of degenerative diseases.
3. Eat well.  We have not evolved very much physically from our hunter-gatherer ancestors.  Diets consisted largely of protein and fat.  Carbohydrates came from natural sources of berries, greens, grains, vegetables, and other fruits.  Our ancestors did not munch on bags of chips while on their hunt.  Also, they did not stock their caves with processed foods containing processed sugars, processed white flour, and processed meats and cheeses.  Our bodies need carbohydrates, but not a lot.  Our intake of carbs should be largely from natural high fiber sources.  Our muscles need carbs for energy, and our colon needs fiber for cleansing.  Once our muscles are saturated, our body converts the excess carbohydrates into fat for use when times are too tough to hunt.  Likewise, if we eat a couple of doughnuts in the morning and figure we will make it up at lunch by eating a salad, it is likely too late.  We have thrown that metabolic switch.  We can eat a raw head of broccoli for lunch, and it will be largely stored as fat.  Another metabolic switch is related to dieting.  Consuming less overall calories signals the body that access to food is difficult.  Therefore, our bodies will throw the metabolic switch to store more fat.  As a result, many people coming off diets have reduced their weight, but increased their body fat percentage.  The key is not weight or caloric intake.  The key is achieving a low body fat percentage.
4. Exercise.  Cardiovascular exercise is good for the heart, cardiovascular system, and the lymphatic system providing significant benefits.  However, strength training is paramount along with proper eating habits to achieve a lower body fat percentage and optimum health.  Muscle weighs more than fat, and requires the body to increase and maintain higher metabolic rates.  Proper strength training three times per week also burns the stored carbohydrate energy.  Subsequent consumption of additional carbohydrates delivered to the muscles replace utilized fuel in lieu of being stored as fat.  I suggest utilizing a personal trainer for at least one session to understand and implement proper strength training techniques.  Consulting a health practitioner before starting an exercise program is also a good idea.
5. Supplementation.  This is a bit of a paradox.  Many health practitioners and wellness coaches do not endorse supplementation largely because absorption of nutrients from pill vitamins into our bodies is minimal.  However, most fruits and vegetables we consume are harvested before ripening severing their nutritional source at a critical time.  Also, soil is largely depleted of most of the 200+ minerals we need at various levels.  Lastly, our need for antioxidants is much greater than our ancestors due to excessive free radical bombardment on our bodies from external sources.  We cannot realistically eat ten to twenty servings of fruits and vegetables daily.  Finding an effective supplement with an efficient delivery system in the deregulated ocean of ineffective products is difficult, but necessary. 

All of us have a role as leaders of our business, families, and communities to work together toward the health and wellbeing of those that depend on our leadership.  To be effective leaders, we must also be good servants.  As Mother Theresa correctly stated “if we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other”.  Stress, health, wellbeing, and engagement of employees must be measured and discussed as a key performance indicator in business along with implementation of incentives related to prevention of illness.  As individuals, we also have a responsibility to our families, employers, and community to take care of ourselves.  Working cohesively, we can jointly increase productivity, profits, and job security for all while reducing hundreds of billions of dollars in lost productivity and healthcare costs.  All this means economic prosperity, and I believe we all will agree that more money in our pockets is also a major stress reducer.  It sure is for me.

Randy Eck is an accomplished Logistics, Distribution, and Customer Service professional with broad supply chain experience in both global and domestic markets across multiple industries including Food, Technology, Third Party Logistics, and Consulting.

A customer focused leader with strong team building skills, Randy has managed teams as large as 300 and has led team building sessions with diverse employee groups enabling the shaping of functional teams creating efficient and cost effective distribution networks.

Randy’s specialties include distribution network optimization, distribution center startups, business analyses and metric development, domestic and global transportation management, and Customs Compliance program development including NAFTA, Customs Trade Partners Against Terrorism (C-TPAT), and Importer Self Assessment (ISA).

Over the last ten years, Randy has attended numerous wellness seminars and clinics to achieve optimum health and share his knowledge and experience with others.  He is a certified personal trainer and has conducted numerous wellness seminars in his community.  Randy also has a passionate interest in Quantum Physics and the untapped power of the human mind as well as being a leader in his church and community.