Table 1 The Healthy Workplace Participatory Program IDEAS Process

Step 1: Identify problems and contributing factors

Identify the root causes of a top health and wellness concern by generating a list of factors that contribute to or cause the concern

• The “All Employee Survey” that measures physical and psychological health (e.g., sleep, stress), interpersonal relationships (e.g., leadership, affiliation, role conflict), and work-related factors (e.g., autonomy, workload) is used to gather data on employee concerns, all employees complete.

• Employee input can also be obtained through focus groups using HWPP-specific focus group protocols.

• Design Team members (a) review the All Employee Survey results, focus group result, or both; (b) write their top three concerns individually on post-it notes; and (c) place the post-it notes on a flip chart.

• The facilitator guides the Design Team through grouping concerns into related concerns.

• Once all areas of concern are identified, then each Design Team member is given three dot stickers, which they use to vote for their top concerns. Design Team members place each dot sticker on the flip chart near the area(s) of concern they want to vote for as most important. Each member may distribute their dot stickers however they would like (e.g., all three stickers on one concern, one sticker for three different concerns).

• The Design Team (a) reviews voting results, (b) identifies the top priority concern, and (c) creates a fishbone diagram to map the root causes of the concern.

Step 2: Develop intervention objectives and activities

Using the information from the root cause analysis, identify solutions that result in full or partial resolution of the top concern.

• The Design Team develops an objective that represents a realistic and meaningful improvement (e.g., reduce the number of teachers indicating low levels of personal accomplishment).

• The Design Team brainstorms solutions (e.g., increased structured public and private noticing of accomplishments) and specific activities (e.g., daily recording of personal “wins,” staff “shout outs” submitted to office and announced to whole school daily) to enact each solution. The facilitator records all solutions and activities.

Step 3: Set selection criteria

Identify criteria, or key performance indicators, to consider when evaluating any intervention.

• Led by the facilitator, the Design Team determines what (a) the scope of the intervention should be (e.g., how many employees will it reach?), (b) measurable benefits should result from the intervention, (c) resources are available for the intervention, and (d) possible barriers to the intervention exist. Interventions that meet most or all selection criteria are deemed to have the greatest likelihood of success.

Step 4: Form interventions

Group multiple solutions to form interventions, and then rate and prioritize three intervention options that can be considered for adoption by the Steering Committee.

• The Design Team reviews brainstormed solutions and associated activities and groups them into multi-component interventions. These interventions may be distinct from one another, or the Design Team may choose to present a “basic essentials” intervention, a fully comprehensive intervention, and an intervention that includes the basic essentials and a few additional activities.

Step 5A: Rate interventions

Rate the three prioritized intervention options using each key performance indicator.

• The facilitator leads the Design Team in analyzing each intervention against the key performance indicators (i.e., scope, benefits, resources, barriers) identified in Step 3.

• The Design Team rates each intervention as low, medium, or high on each indicator.

Step 5B: Rate and select interventions

Design Team presents their work to the Steering Committee who rates and approves the intervention(s) to be implemented.

• The Design Team presents the interventions to the Steering Committee and answers questions about their process and resulting interventions.

• The Steering Committee rates each intervention as low, medium, or high on scope, benefit, resources, and obstacles. The Steering Committee may provide feedback to the Design Team and request further revisions to the interventions or select the intervention(s) as they are presented.

Step 6: Plan and implement interventions

The Steering Committee develops an implementation plan for the selected intervention(s).

• It is generally recommended that the Steering Committee prioritize the sequence of intervention activities, identify personnel who should be involved, provide training if needed, and develop a communication plan. Few resources and little guidance are provided in the IDEAS Tool for specific actions at this step, as the intervention planning and implementation will be unique to each context and guided by implementation science.

Step 7: Monitor and evaluate intervention activities

Collect data on intervention implementation and effectiveness.

• The IDEAS tool provides few resources and little guidance for specific actions in this step, as evaluation will be unique to each intervention and implementation context.