This article is written by Hamid Boland, former Government of Canada Entrepreneurs from the Canadian Department of National Defence, with contributions from Allegra Loncar, Dr. Madeleine D’Agata, Dr. Joshua Granek, Dr. Michael Haber, and Anthony Jaz.

During the week of 12 April, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, an estimated five million Canadians worked most of their hours from home and engaged in some form of self-isolation.

Research indicates that most Canadians (50%) have reported worsening mental health since mid-March, and crises, such as Covid-19 and previous pandemics (e.g., SARS and MERS), can have various psychological effects on individuals, such as increased distress, anxiety, and loneliness among individuals in isolation.

Interestingly, however, despite the psychological implications of isolation, research has also demonstrated that there are benefits to working remotely, including increased productivity, lowered costs, and improved retention rates.

So how can governments help their employees deal with the stresses of lockdown and promote wellbeing? In Canada, during a study in 2019, we leveraged an existing commercial app to help public servants achieve their health and wellbeing goals by giving them rewards.

Zeroing in on wellbeing

Wellbeing is a multi-faceted concept that includes satisfaction with one's physical, economic, social, emotional and psychological state; as well as engagement in activities and work. Yet it can be simply described as “judging life positively and feeling good.”

It is often measured subjectively and varies from person to person, as such the way in which most individuals experience wellbeing is unique to them.

With over 287,000 employees as of 2019, the Government of Canada (GoC) is Canada's largest employer. The psychological, physical, and social wellbeing of employees is promoted through various wellness initiatives, policies, and implementation strategies.

Recognising the importance of understanding and promoting workplace wellbeing, Canada’s Department of National Defence (DND) has conducted studies that explore the success of these wellness initiatives, which represents a growing body of research.

Government of Canada Entrepreneurs, in collaboration with the Defence Research and Development Canada  (an agency of the DND) conducted one such study in 2019 to examine the impact of a mobile application (app) intended to incentivise workplace relationships across multiple GoC departments. In this study, which lasted approximately three months, we used an app to encourage users to conduct healthy behaviours (e.g., achieving daily step goals and engaging with coworkers) in exchange for redeemable reward points (e.g., for gasoline, groceries, or movie tickets).

A simple way for positive behaviour change

What we found is that individuals were more likely to accomplish their goals — such as meeting a daily step goal or reading a blog post — when they were given a reward, even if the reward was not very big in actual monetary value. This suggests that the perceived value of a reward can make an activity engaging, positive, and motivating.

Another key finding is that digital technologies (such as mobile apps) can be optimised to simplify communication across agencies. Using a mobile app allowed us to oversee content and modify it according to the parameters of the study.

Additionally, we found that most users (~70%) would complete a task (such as reading an educational blog post) if it was incentivised, and the majority of users (84%) had a positive experience participating in the study. This research demonstrates how users’ willingness to engage in positive behavioural change can be encouraged using a rewards system and suggests that knowledge transfer may be more easily delivered through a digital platform.

The advantages of apps

We realised that the app could be used as an example of how to promote wellbeing among our now virtual colleagues.

Numerous mobile and digital apps exist on the market that may be useful in achieving goals such as daily steps and mental resilience (please contact the authors for a complete list of alternate digital programs and apps). These programs are publicly available and designed for individuals (and employers) to promote physical, social, and psychological wellbeing. These programs include features that:

  • Track health behaviours (i.e., eating habits, sleep patterns, and physical activity);

  • Encourage social connections (between individuals or entire departments);

  • Promote user engagement through gamified challenges and rewards;

  • Normalise self-awareness practices such as mindfulness, stress management and self-help, and;

  • Allow for immediate feedback or information gathering via customisable surveys and single-click poll check-ins, or by talking to a chat- or AI bot.

Other possible uses for similar mobile apps include the potential: (a) to engage remote and virtual workers, (b) for organisations to poll the wellbeing of their employees and (c) recruit using newsletters and word of mouth, (d) to gather longitudinal wellbeing data on an on-going basis, and (e) to provide educational content and training to increase engagement with learning tools.

What we learned

If you are interested in following in our footsteps and using wellbeing apps in your organisation, we have created a table of limitations and recommendations (please contact the authors for a complete list). Below is a high-level summary of the lessons we learned :

  • Use an app with rewards that can be personalised to encourage people to participate;

  • Ask users about their preferred type of rewards and apply them to motivate users to participate and remain committed to the study;

  • Increase the number of departments and agencies involved to gain a richer understanding of different users’ experience;

  • When selecting an app, consider user experience and user interface feedback from user reviews to ensure that it will be well-received by users.

  • When selecting an app, also consider the level of control and access to the data and content.

— Hamid Boland, Allegra Loncar, Dr. Madeleine D’Agata, and Dr. Joshua Granek, Dr. Michael Haber, Anthony Jaz

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