Since 1997, Healthwise has received multiple awards, including the Family Friendly Workplace, the Alfred P. Sloan Workplace Flexibility Award, and the 2006 American Psychologically Healthy Workplace Award for a culture that supports and encourages employees to take initiative and make healthy choices in their work and personal lives.
Step inside Healthwise headquarters nestled in Boise's Foothills on Bogus Basin Road, and you'll feel the pressure of a frantic day fade away.
A water feature and soft, natural colors and lighting relax visitors.
Most employees work in private offices off quiet hallways with glass-paneled doors and views of the surrounding Foothills. Some bring their dogs to work. They have trails out the back door, weekly yoga classes, a well-equipped exercise room, lockers, bikes for loan, wellness bucks earned for healthy behaviors and a nutritional, educational snack break.
"The wellness program has been part of the culture the whole time," said Jan Nissl, wellness coordinator and an 11-year employee. "A well workplace is a productive workplace. We support people trying to work from home when they're sick."
The atmosphere is more than good design and great perks. It's been top priority for Healthwise founder and CEO Donald Kemper for more than 30 years and has helped the nonprofit organization become one of the largest providers of consumer health information in the country.
"From the beginning, we've looked at Healthwise a little differently," Kemper said. "When you want to come to work, you do better, work harder and smarter, and have better ideas.
"We're not doing anything other businesses shouldn't be doing."
Healthwise, as in previous years, garnered national and local recognition recently as one of the best workplaces. In October, The Wall Street Journal named Healthwise one of 15 Top Small Workplaces that foster professional growth and an environment that makes employees want to stay.
This month, the American Academy of Family Physicians and the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine honored the Healthwise Information Therapy Conversation "A1c Tests: Taking Control of Your Diabetes" as the 2007 H. Winter Griffith Award for Excellence in Practice Improvement Involving Patient Education.
The Idaho Psychological Association will honor Healthwise officials Monday with a "Best Practice" Psychologically Healthy Workplace Award for a longtime program that brings top executives together with a professional counselor every six weeks to strengthen communication and relationships.
"If you have to work for a living, this is where you want to be," said Tracy Landauer, associate editor of Healthwise's online database.
Landauer has worked for the nonprofit seven years. She said the organization's keystones of respect, teamwork and doing the right thing haven't changed as it has grown larger and more corporate. Healthwise now has 202 employees.
"I work with the most exceptional people of all time," she said. "They really make a huge effort to keep the culture the same. The underlying mission does not vary."
An anonymous satisfaction survey twice a year helps the company discover tensions and maintain alignment with its mission and culture. Employees rated their overall satisfaction with Healthwise and their teams at an average of 8.2 out of 10 for the past five satisfaction surveys. The company has low turnover - about 7.8 percent for the past three years compared with a national rate of 27 percent in the health and education industry.
"We get the dirt and give it to everybody," Kemper said. "What you find is the hot spots move around the organization and nothing gets to fester too long."
Kemper founded Healthwise in 1975 to help people make better health decisions by providing information in an understandable, easy-to-use self-care guide, Healthwise Handbook. The organization now supplies information to health plans, employers, disease managers, hospitals, physicians and managed-care groups, including Wellpoint and Kaiser Permanente. It provides content for WebMD and the Microsoft Network.
Healthwise is a leader in health care efforts to increase consumers' participation in decisions, behavioral changes and treatment through information therapy, the prescription of evidence-based medical information to a specific patient or caregiver at the right time. Future products include online campaigns and a virtual health coach to help those with high-priority health issues through interactive conversations.
The company motto is "Lead from any position." All employees are encouraged and rewarded for taking initiative in solving problems, resolving conflicts, thinking strategically, and accepting personal ownership, Kemper said.
"We're certainly not perfect," he said. "We're intolerant of anything here that slips from the goal. We're all in it together."
Sandra Forester: 377-6464
