The ROI* of lowering stress in an organization

CDC/NIOSH The Total Worker Health Webinar Series

In their webinar entitled: Intervening for Work Stress: Work-life Stress and Total Worker Health Approaches, Occupational Health Psychologists, Drs. Leslie Hammer and Dan Ganster explain exactly what the benefits of lowering the stress in an organization can mean specifically in terms of ROI.

According to Dr. Paul Rosch of the American Institute of Stress, job stress is estimated to cost U.S. industry more than $300 billion a year in absenteeism, turnover, diminished productivity, and medical, legal and insurance costs.

Forbes Magazine

Workplace stress is responsible for up to $190 billion in annual U.S. healthcare costs

The Harvard Gazette

Data show that 36 percent of workers suffer from work-related stress that costs U.S. businesses $30 billion a year in lost workdays. 

The Atlantic Monthly

The alarming long term consequences of workplace stress. 

*If you’ve been following the ROI vs. VOI debate, ROI (Return on Investment) is being phased out in favor of the term VOI (Value on Investment) by many wellness vendors. That's because, recent studies have disputed the oft-repeated claim that: for every dollar you spend on wellness you get $3 back.

Wellness vendors who promise that their programs “pay for themselves” (in terms of ROI) were basing this claim on old research that was flawed. For example one easy way to claim ROI on wellness was to compare the healthcare costs of the people participating in a company's wellness program vs. those that don't. Unfortunately, this metric just doesn't prove the claim because the people who sign up for wellness programs are likely to be more health conscious to begin with. In other words, their health care costs were probably going to be less than the non-joiners whether they participated in a program or not.

Please understand: we are not making any claims that our programs pay for themselves. What we can say with certainty is that STRESS COSTS AMERICAN BUSINESS BILLIONS OF DOLLARS every year. If you can lower the stress in your organization, you are almost certainly going to lower the cost of doing business in a variety of ways: As Dr. Paul Rosch, of the American Institute of Stress points out in the article we referenced above, reducing job stress reduces turnover, absenteeism, medical costs, legal costs and increases productivity, job satisfaction and customer satisfaction.

But lowering stress in an organization requires more than just handing out stress balls and conducting a 1 hour lunch and learn once a year. Still you need to start somewhere and helping you build a comprehensive plan that helps you lower stress and build resilience in your organization is what this website and StressStop is all about.