There’s a new pep in everyone’s step here at Davis & Warshow’s Maspeth Headquarters.  Many of our employees have signed up to participate in the Virgin Health Miles program, Richard Branson’s popular employee health tracking application.

Employees who participate in the program pay a monthly $5 fee and carry a small pedometer throughout the day.  The device measures the number of steps, the frequency of steps and several other metrics which get automatically uploaded to the Health Miles website when you plug the pedometer in to the computer.  The website gives you all sorts of stats on how far you walked, how many calories you burned and how many ‘active minutes’ you had in each 24-hour window.  Participants get points for reaching goals and upping their steps – points can be traded in at the end of the year for prizes or even cash.

Figure 1 Davis & Warshow’s Corporate Gym

Seems a little corny… but it’s actually really fun!  Each employee gets to make a profile (see mine below), input goals and even make challenges to co-workers and bet their points.  Surprisingly, people around the office are getting into the spirit, bragging about their step count, hitting our company gym at lunch for extra points and making lots of jokes about “attaching the pedometer to my dog”.

It’s great for any company out there looking for a good team-building activity that encourages healthy behavior… and it could even lead to a reduction in health insurance fees!