Slashing the cost of healthcare in businesses or public/private organizations—anywhere from 10% to 50%—depending on leadership

J. Morris Hicks — Prepared to help business executives lead their associates in taking charge of their health.

Background. For most businesses in the United States, disease and the cost of health care are huge problems. Not only does “disease care” cost a lot of money, it also takes its toll on employee productivity, creativity,  absenteeism and morale. And the numbers are staggering.

4Leaf Wellness. One-page brief for CEOs

According to a Towers Watson survey (See link below) of 512 medium to large American companies, the average total health expenditures per employee in 2011 was $10,982. So for an organization of 1,000 people, that’s an annual medical bill of  roughly $11 million, most of which is paid by the company. If you’ve got 10,000 employees, then the bill is about $110 million.

What about traditional corporate wellness programs?  Virtually all of the 512 companies in the survey already have a wellness program in place—yet the cost of healthcare keeps going up. That’s because those programs are missing the single most important ingredient—The FOOD. By simply helping people improve what they’re eating, those health care bills can be cut in half. We estimate that for any organization—the cost of health care can be cut by 10 to 50% or more. Why the wide range in the estimate? Leadership. That’s the big variable.

The question is, “How important will this health promotion initiative be in your organization?”

Leadership is key. We have concluded that the degree of success for this type of project hinges on the understanding and the degree of leadership from the top executive in the organization—the CEO, the President, the mayor or the governor. So we are committed to finding those special business leaders out there who are ready to do something great for their employees, the families of those employees and the bottom line of their business—by teaching everyone in the organization how to take charge of their health.

To see a Fortune 200 company who truly “gets it” about food, scroll to the end of this blog for a compelling five-minute video. John Mackey (CEO), after showing that their annual $200 million cost of healthcare at Whole Foods Market has started dropping since 2010, states, “If a program works—get more of it, and this program works!”

The most important three ingredients for program success: Leadership, Leadership & Leadership

But will the people actually change? It is our experience that when people become educated about the “big picture” impact of their food choices—many of them will voluntarily change—for any number of reasons. But, by offering an opportunity to participate in a well-organized corporate program, the odds of that positive change rise sharply. Five reasons:

Most companies are striving to build their “green” image these days. And there is nothing greener than consuming an earth-friendly, plant-based diet.

More good news. Certainly the opportunity for a medium-sized corporation (10,000 employees) to save $30 or $40 million a year on health costs would be fantastic! But there are other benefits from such a program that might be even more important to the long-term success of the enterprise. For example:

1. Less absenteeism
2. Higher productivity
3. Better morale
4. Less employee turnover
5. Better public image (most admired, best place to work, greenest company, etc.)

A strategic business advantage. As the first wave of CEOs begins to take advantage of the many benefits that come from a healthier workforce, their primary competitors may have trouble competing with them unless they launch similar initiatives. As such, true health promotion improves the ability of the enterprise to gain market share—yet another reason why it must be led by the CEO. We’re talking about a strategic advantage as powerful as having an automobile company that doesn’t have to pay a dime for all of its steel.

GM spent $4.6 billion on health care in 2007, more than the cost of steel used in their vehicles.

Real world examples. The medical doctors featured in our book have been reversing chronic disease for decades by simply introducing their patients to a health-promoting diet that features mostly whole, plant-based foods, still in nature’s package. But, as we know, you don’t really need to have an M.D. to take charge of your health; you just need to start getting the vast majority of your calories from whole, plant-based foods.

CEO John Mackey is helping his 62,000 employees learn how to take charge of their own health.

Recently, these powerful principles have been harnessed by two very large organizations. The latest one is the City of Chicago, under the leadership of their triathlete mayor, Rahm Emanuel, former White House Chief of Staff. Now we have two CEO role models for healthy eating; Mr. Emanuel and John Mackey of Whole Foods Market.

• America’s fittest mayor (Chicago) goes PLANT-STRONG! He aims to cut his $480 million healthcare bill in half.
• Promoting health and saving money at Whole Foods Market (Also, there is short video of John Mackey later in this blog.)
• Earlier Case Study at GEICO. The GEICO health promotion project

A little background. For most of my business career, I have been involved in managing change, raising productivity, reducing costs and increasing profits in a host of organizations. As a president, general manager or as a management consultant, I have employed the same “process-improvement” skills to identify waste and increase profitability—in a wide variety of business settings. 

I now wish to leverage my business background with more recently acquired knowledge of the whole, plant-based diet-style to help businesses reduce costs and improve productivity. The beauty of this opportunity is the simplicity. In a nutshell, we want to help employees learn the “why” and the “how” for greatly increasing the amount of whole, plant-based foods in their diets. And we want to give them an incentive to move in that direction as rapidly as possible.

J. Morris Hicks and the Ansley Consulting Group are now offering hefty referral fees for client introductions.

Project details. Our role in these projects will be to help educate, facilitate, organize, train, administer, report, celebrate and assist the top executive in every possible way to help all of the employees decide to take charge of their own health.

Realistically, we know that many of the employees will not take advantage of this opportunity, but a great many of them will—enough of them to make a sizable dent in the overall cost of health care for the enterprise. Further, their energy, enthusiasm and morale boost will be felt throughout the entire organization.

And it all begins with providing the opportunity for ALL employees to take charge of their own health. In so doing, they help themselves, their families, their planet and their employer who would be making all of this possible.

Meet. Dr. John McDougall. In the following 13-miniute video, he talks about projects at Blue Cross-Blue Shield, Publix Markets and the latest (2012) at Whole Foods Market. CEO John Mackey talks candidly about the benefits of the process.

While we might very well employ an intensive program like the one described above for certain high-risk/cost employees, our primary effort is to work with our client in developing an employee health promotion program that can be executed by company employees in perpetuity. We’re talking about weaving this program into the cultural fabric of the organization.

Dr. McDougall talks about savings of 44% (of healthcare expenditures) in the test groups of employees at Blue Cross (1999-2001). We’re talking about making the changes permanent and making it available to ALL employees—even the part-timers who’re not receiving health care benefits.

Finally, Whole Foods CEO John Mackey shares with us how he began conducting the “immersion” programs. He called it part of creating a “wellness culture” at Whole Foods— a win-win for all concerned: the employees, their families and the shareholders of the corporation. At one point in the following 5-minute video, he showed a graph clearly indicating that the overall cost of health care had peaked and was beginning to come down at their company.

As he says, “If a program works, get more of it.” The proposition is simple: Promote health and the cost of health care comes down!

I used the word “we” a few times in this article. That’s because we have a team of highly experienced consultants, dietitians, doctors, nurses and health educators who are ready to tackle even the largest of organizations. Please contact me to discuss further.

Do you know any business leaders who might be interested? Please give me a call at 917-399-9700. Or send me an email at jmorrishicks@me.com. For a summary of our expertise in food-based wellness, see Consulting Credentials—J. Morris Hicks

1. Printer-friendly 4Leaf Wellness. One-page brief for CEOs
2. Related blog. Are corporate wellness programs working?
3. Referral fees? Reaching the leaders who save $$ when we get healthy
4. Related blog. Cost of healthcare: Top concern for small business CEOs…
5. Related blog. When the vast majority of people are obese…
6. Related blog. Health insurance of the future; an idea that can work.
7. Letter to Walmart CEO. World’s largest company. World’s largest healthcare bill.
8. Letter to CEO of CostCo. CostCo spending one billion dollars on healthcare (est.)
9. Letter to CEO of CVS. Rx for slashing the cost of healthcare at CVS
10. Letter to Chairman of Ford Motor Co. Urgent letter to Bill Ford
11. Passionate executive leadership. Here’s what it looks like. (10-minute video)
12. Data source. Towers Watson 2013 Survey on Purchasing Value in Health Care
13. Health costs in general. Health spending still going up—with no end in sight.
14. Healthcare $PIE. A look at the cost of health care PIE—in the USA
15. “Seriously Impressive” Corporate Wellness Programs — coming up short.
16. Kaiser Permanente Spring 2013 Journal. Article on Plant-Based Diets.
17. Teaching medical doctors all about whole foods, plant-based nutrition. pbnhc.com
18. 4Leaf Corporate Wellness Vision Document. Click here (eleven pages)
19. J. Morris Hicks. Experience and qualifications for this kind of consulting

Want to find out how healthy your family is eating? Take our free 4Leaf Diagnostic Survey. It takes less than five minutes and you can score it yourself. After taking the survey, please give me your feedback as it will be helpful in the development of our future 4Leaf app for smartphones. Send feedback to jmorrishicks@me.com

Want to find out how healthy your family is eating? Take our free 4Leaf Diagnostic Survey. It takes less than five minutes and you can score it yourself. After taking the survey, please give me your feedback as it will be helpful in the development of our future 4Leaf app for smartphones. Send feedback to jmorrishicks@me.com

International. We’re now reaching people in over 100 countries. Follow us on Facebook and Twitter or get daily blog notices by “following” us in the top of the right-hand column. For occasional updates, join our periodic mailing list.

J. Morris Hicks, working daily to promote health, hope and harmony on planet Earth.

For help in your own quest to take charge of your health, you might find some useful information at our 4Leaf page or some great recipes at Lisa’s 4Leaf Kitchen. Got a question? Let me hear from you at jmorrishicks@me.com. Or give me a call on my cell at 917-399-9700.

Blogging daily at hpjmh.com…from the seaside village of Stonington, Connecticut – Be well and have a great day.

—J. Morris Hicks, board member, T. Colin Campbell Foundation