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Ideas to Promote Healthy Weights
The following ideas is to help promote healthy weights in the workplace. This idea is a starting point, tie in physical activity events and healthy eating strategies in the workplace to promote a healthy weight too. Be creative and target your events to the employees' needs. Mix and match ideas, incorporate other health topics into your event, and use a variety of ideas to reach everyone!
 | Healthy Weight Loss ChallengeOffer a healthy weight loss program with a twist. This activity is best done in an environment where a large freight scale is available (but it's not necessary). The freight scale is useful in any weight-control activity involving teams or departments. At a scheduled time, such as break or lunch, gather teams at the freight scale. Have one team or department step on the scale together. Competing teams or departments see the weight of the entire group. Repeat with all teams. This activity is one way of incorporating everyone into a fun event. Even those who don’t need to lose weight can support those who do by maintaining their weight. Participants who would benefit from losing a few pounds, but are not sufficiently motivated to do it on their own can contribute to the group effort. The fact that other teams witness the weigh-in adds to the sense of commitment to the group goal. Be careful to structure the event to foster healthy weight loss (no more than 1-2 lbs or 1 kg per person per week) rather than a competitive frenzy that could lead to rapid or too much weight loss by highly competitive individuals. One way to do this is to reward the team that is closest to their group goal rather than the team that loses the most weight. |