HERO SCORECARD VERSION 4.0

Coming soon! HERO Scorecard Version 4.0

The wait is almost over for fans of the HERO Employee Health Management Best Practices Scorecard in Collaboration with Mercer^© (HERO Scorecard). The experts drawn from across the health management industry have been busy analyzing data from previous versions of the Scorecard, writing commentaries based on that data, and developing a brand-new version of the HERO Scorecard—Version 4.0—that will be released in June. Here’s all the information you need to stay up to date on the Scorecard.

What’s new with Version 4.0?

After more than a year of discussing and debating the continued evolution of the HERO Scorecard, our panel of EHM experts have added items to the questionnaire that reflect changing market trends (such as outcomes-based incentives and gamification strategies) and new industry knowledge about the influence of best practices on program outcomes. For example, as an industry we have learned organizations that commit to creating a comprehensive culture of health have better wellness program outcomes. As a result, in Version 4.0 we’ve broadened the “Leadership Support” section of the Scorecard and renamed it “Organizational Support.” This section also includes new questions on culture and the physical work environment. Additional changes that we believe will reflect the evolving nature and practice of health management include:

• Adding questions on incentives, including outcomes-based incentives and intrinsic reward strategies
• Adding questions on engagement strategies, including the use of mobile apps and devices, contests, and other social network strategies
• Updating questions on program design, including more detailed questions on lifestyle coaching
• Adding questions on program integration, including disability programs
• Adding a section on program outcomes with detailed quantitative questions to permit the study of ROI
• Adding demographic questions that will help deliver more precise benchmarking
• Changing the number of points that are allocated to different questions to better reflect the impact that best practices have on program outcomes

Already use the Scorecard? How these changes affect you

If you’ve completed the HERO Scorecard in the past, it will still be familiar, but approximately half of the questions are new or have been substantially revised. That means it’s worth completing the Scorecard again. This also means that the best practice score you earned when last completing the Scorecard will not exactly line up with your future Version 4.0 score. When Version 4.0 is released in June, we’ll provide guidelines on how to compare scores across the two versions.
 

Learning from past Scorecard analyses

More than 1,200 employers have completed the Scorecard and many have done so more than once, enabling them to track their progress over time. In addition, 10 organizations have signed on as Scorecard Preferred Providers, allowing them to use Scorecard data with their clients and, lending their knowledge and experience to help ensure the Scorecard meets the needs of employers.

Over the years, HERO has published 18 commentaries based on Scorecard data. These commentaries have addressed trends and questions such as whether or not including spouses in key elements of wellness programs improves participation and outcomes (it does), and how small employer programs might produce results that are comparable to those of large employers. In addition to these commentaries, articles citing Scorecard data have appeared in numerous trade publications and peer-reviewed journals, most recently the February issue of the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.

Stay tuned and learn more

Watch your inbox for email alerts from HERO and follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook for updates on the release of Version 4.0.

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