Engaging Our Employees to a Clinical Psychologist

Angelika Inglsperger, Group Head People, Allianz

The health and mental well-being of our employees is key to the success of Allianz. The Covid-19 pandemic has dramatically highlighted the importance of mental well-being under remote working conditions, and it is more obvious than ever that employers play a fundamental role in keeping their employees’ spirits high and supporting their employees’ health and mental well-being. Allianz has set up a global framework to advocate workplace health and to provide a wide range of initiatives to create a healthy working environment and to avoid work-related stress. The benefits of this approach include reduced absence, higher productivity, and a better employee experience.

"To foster employee well-being and engagement, we have developed the Allianz Health App Well Together for all employees"

To achieve our ambition of maintaining and improving employee health and well-being, we focus on three key dimensions: mental and physical resilience, motivation and engagement, and work effectiveness. We are convinced that by addressing these three dimensions, we will promote employee health and well-being in a globally consistent and sustainable manner.

To foster employee motivation and engagement, we have developed the Well Together App for Allianz employees together with an external partner. Within the app, we take a holistic view on the topic of health and well-being and use various healthy activities to provide incentives for a more active and healthier lifestyle.

There are six categories in the Well Together App:

• healthy body

• healthy food

• healthy environment

• healthy workplace

• healthy mind

• healthy finances.

In each of these categories, we offer users various activities, such as workout training and meditation tips, recipes and recommendations for a healthy diet, or suggestions for living more sustainably. As Worldwide Olympic and Paralympic Insurance Partner, we have prepared a sneak-peek into athletes’ experiences in selected activities within the app: In the healthy nutrition category you will find favorite recipes from athletes. Athletes’ workouts will be available in the healthy body category, and in the healthy mind category, you can learn how Olympians and Paralympians have recognized and overcome their fears. In other words, users will be able to experience the Olympic & Paralympic Movements in selected activities within the app.

Users collect Eagle Coins for all of these activities, as well as for every kilometer covered on foot and by bike. For a defined number of Eagle Coins, Allianz supports a non-profit reforestation project, and a tree is planted. Various team challenges motivate employees to actively use the app and support the charitable project as a team. The winners of the team challenges can experience special prizes, such as virtual meetings with an Olympic/ Paralympic athlete. In addition, the collected Eagle Coins can be redeemed for small vouchers and gifts in kind.

The idea behind the Well Together project is that we want to motivate our employees in a playful way to live a healthier lifestyle and connect our employees across OE boundaries as one Allianz. The app is structured in such a way that, thanks to its different categories and activities, it appeals to a large number of people: athletic but also less athletic. Therefore, one of the success factors is that as many of our Allianz employees as possible from various OEs register and use the app. Through the joint activities and challenges, the feeling of togetherness is strengthened, and we are growing closer together as a global company.

In addition to fun and information, regular use of the app actually means that users move more often. A study showed that app users walk 4.5 times more on average, cycle around 2 times more, and forego about a third of their car journeys. This indicates that the app not only motivates people to maintain a healthier lifestyle but also to live more sustainably and in a more climate-neutral way.