Corporate Wellness programs appear to be losing steam across the country.  According to the Wall Street Journal, companies find them expensive, and the return on investment that they expected – lower health insurance costs – isn’t what they anticipated.

But Huffington Post contributor Henry Albrecht says companies may be overlooking the real benefits.  Wellness and well-being programs nurture employee engagement and satisfaction – two key factors in retention and productivity.  He sites a recent Gallup poll that found that those who were engaged and reported good well-being were 27 percent more likely to report that their work performance was excellent.

Albrecht sites another study from the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine that tracked the stock performance of 54 publicly–traded companies with high-scoring wellness programs.  Those companies outperformed the 500 largest US companies on the S&P 500 by 235% over a six year period.

If your workplace is establishing a wellness or well-being program, or breathing new life into an existing program, Gallup recommends these 5 tips.

Strongly encourage participation in wellness activities when setting job expectations.

Recognize employees for their well-being achievements.

Link each activity to one of Gallup’s five elements of well-being:  purpose, social, financial, community and physical.  This will add depth and dimension to making employees feel cared about.

Solicit employee ideas and incorporate them into your offerings.

Finally, include well-being goal setting and milestones in work review and progress meetings.

The stellar performance of companies that take wellness seriously is proof that it is not necessarily about the savings. Increased output, job satisfaction and lower turnover are the benefits driving strong bottom-line growth.