Active Europe: Implementation of a Health Campaign Using Innovative Technology to Engage Personnel

Abstract

This paper describes a health-related campaign to engage personnel across Europe, together with families and friends, to increase their activity and therefore their fitness and health. The campaign, entitled Active Europe, was designed to encourage and motivate people at all levels of fitness and incorporate a wide range of sports and exercise. The campaign was enhanced and supported by the use of innovative IT tools and apps to allow participants to record their activity. An initial overall campaign target of 22,000 kilometers was set for participants. Using the most recent suite of IT tools, a customized app was developed to enable participants to enter the details of their activities via either a mobile device or computer. A personalized dashboard showed individual contributions, together with a visible leader board to generate healthy competition between participants, locations and countries. An enterprise social networking group was created to allow people to post pictures, videos, stories, achievements and information on their activities. A series of nudges was used throughout the campaign to maintain interest and participation. Events were held at locations throughout Europe including family walks, cycling events, running and table tennis competitions. Personalized emails in local languages were sent from the Regional HSE Manager promoting the campaign with links to the supporting IT tools. An app was developed to capture data in kilometers in the categories of walk, run, cycle, swim, steps, and other. After the initial launch in April 2018, communication messages were reinforced with stories and updates on the internal social media platform, including distance traveled, participation and video montages of events. In the first week, a distance of 10,900 kilometers was recorded, with 253 app entries, 163 members on the internal social networking group with 78 messages posted that were read 7,728 times. In less than 14 days the initial target was exceeded and other regions joined in with entries posted by employees from Asia, North America, South America and the Middle East. By week four, 75,000 kilometers were logged. Participation and interest grew throughout the summer, with the initiative becoming self-sustaining via the internal social network group and performance tracking tools. By year-end, over 300,000 kilometers were achieved. Active Europe is an ongoing 2019 initiative with continued IT tool enhancements. The innovative use of internal social networking and IT performance tracking tools have added clear value to the company in terms of more active, more engaged and healthier employees, all with no capital expenditure.