The Association of Physical Activity and Work Engagement Among Participants in an Employee Wellness Program

Abstract

: Work engagement has been linked with employee health and work performance outcomes making it an area of attention within the field of human resources management. However, work engagement among the US workforce has declined in recent years. Literature suggests physical activity may play a role in improving work engagement, which has raised interest among human resources and workplace health professionals. Employee wellness programs are uniquely situated to promote a physically active workforce. Therefore, the primary aim of this study was to examine the relationship between physical activity and work engagement among employee wellness program participants at a public university. A secondary aim was to examine the relationship between strength training exercise and work engagement. We analyzed data on work engagement, and physical activity from a survey completed by 6,923 employee wellness program participants at public university. We defined respondents as physically active (PA) if their combined moderate to vigorous exercise met or exceeded 30 minutes on at least three days per week. All others were defined as inactive (IA). Respondents were defined as strength trained (ST) if they reported muscle strengthening exercise on two or more days per week, while all others were defined as untrained (UT). Work engagement score was based on responses to the three-item Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-3). We performed two-tailed t-tests to determine differences in mean work engagement scores between the physically active (PA) and inactive (IA) groups and between the strength trained (ST) and untrained (UT) groups. Differences in work engagement scores were statistically significant (p < 0.0001), with higher scores observed in the PA group (11.987) compared to the IA group (11.025). Differences in scores between the ST group and UT group were also statistically significant (p < 0.0001), with higher scores observed in the ST group (12.132) compared to the UT group (11.446). The findings from this study support earlier research and suggest promotion of physical activity and strength training may be a potential strategy to improve work engagement. Workplace health promotion and human resources professionals should consider the information gleaned from this evaluation to help them optimize human capital and business outcomes.