Measuring Outcomes and Mitigating Risk with the Workplace Outcome Suite in the Federal Workplace

Abstract

Federal Occupational Health (FOH) is the largest provider of occupational health services in the Federal Government, serving more than 360 federal agencies and reaching 1.8 million federal employees. FOH began providing Employee Assistance Program (EAP) services in 1980, and is Health and Human Services’ recognized expert in this key area of employee health programs, delivering specialized EAP services exclusively to over 905,624 federal employees. More than ten years ago, we integrated our EAP with our WorkLife program and many of the Agencies we serve are accustomed to our integrated set of resources. FOH has a rich history of working to advance the knowledge of the EAP field, and was an early supporter of measuring program outcomes. Selvick, Stephenson, Plaza and Sugden (2004) published one of the few studies that demonstrate statistically and practically signifcant outcomes from the FOH EAP. Their work showed significant improvement from pre- to post- EAP intervention on measures of productivity; work and social relationships; perceived health status; attendance and tardiness; and global assessment of functioning. In an effort to revitalize the findings with more current outcomes, FOH engaged an industry gold-standard tool, the Workplace Outcome Suite (WOS). A 5-item measure, this tool is psychometrically tested and easy to administer telephonically during the intake proces. It consists of 5 scales that measure absenteeism, presenteeism, work engagement, life satisfaction, and workplace distress, In October of 2015 FOH began to collect data on specific outcomes for clients who accessed the EAP.