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Starting a Workplace Health and Well-Being Committee: A Step-By-Step Guide for Managers

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A Health and Well-being Committee, or HaWC, is a new form of participatory program that gives employees a channel to voice concerns and ideas for improving the workplace. Research has found that HaWCs can significantly lower turnover among frontline workers—and in the process, save an organization money by reducing recruiting and training costs. In addition, HaWCs, which provide an opportunity to empower more people in the organization to share their ideas and perspectives, can have beneficial effects on workers’ psychological well-being. 

The HaWC model was developed by researchers from the MIT Institute for Work and Employment Research (IWER) at the MIT Sloan School of Management and from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, as part of a collaboration with a national retail organization. The HaWC program was developed in response to employees’ and  managers’ concerns and reflected input from interviews with employees and managers at the company, as well as insights from recent research on what makes a successful participatory workplace program. The program was then tested in a rigorous field experiment that took place in the e-commerce division of the retail organization. 

HaWCs had positive impacts on employees’ mental health in the first six months and reduced turnover by 20% over 12 months, all at a comparatively low cost. The researchers estimated that, to achieve the same reduction in turnover through wage increases, the company would have had to raise its hourly pay for frontline workers by 1.5%. These results speak to the value, for both an organization and its workers, of giving employees opportunities to voice concerns and participate in addressing workplace problems.

In the guide available for download below. you will find information on what a HaWC is and learn how to launch a HaWC program in your own organization. Topics covered include how to prepare to launch the program, how to set up the program, and how to effectively run it. 

In addition, to complement the guide, you can access a range of online resources that can help you launch a HaWC. They include: 

For more info Erin Kelly Sloan Distinguished Professor of Work and Organization Studies (617) 324-4116