Monday, December 17, 2012

It Starts with Food

Preparing for our next co_health book club chat at noon EST on Wednesday, December 19.

It Starts with Food was the selection for this month's co_health chat. It was an interesting choice because it has more of a self-help focus -- diet/nutrition/change on an individual level. I found myself wondering if people selected it because they had an interest in self-improvement or because they saw a broader workplace wellness application. I actually posed that question on our LinkedIn page, but I didn't get a response. Left to my own devices, I thought we might kick off the chat by talking about incorporating nutrition challenges in workplace wellness programs.

How might a nutrition challenge similar to the Whole30® challenge posed in this book fit in a workplace wellness program? I recently chatted about this with Cyndi Fales from LWS and she recommended we offer folks a few different nutrition challenges to choose from. She suggested we also consider -- 


  • The Flexitarian Diet
  • Cooking for an Eco-Concious Life
  • The Sonoma Diet

  • We discussed grouping people by the challenge they choose, collect baseline data and data at the end of the challenge, so people can note changes in weight, body fat, blood pressure, blood sugar etc... Have you done anything similar? I am thinking it might be a nice break from the typical weight loss challenges we hold at the beginning of each year.

    More generally speaking, how can we best support people that are trying to change their eating habits? Are there studies that show what contributes most to people's success? What kind of support is appropriate to offer in the workplace? How can we support people in reading and analyzing the plethora of health information that is out there on food and beyond? (Thanks to @femelmed for that last one.) 

    Of course, these discussions always ebb and flow based on the participants interests. So, we'll see where this chat takes us. If you have suggestions to prompt discussion, please share them in the comments below. 

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