Coordinated Wellness, Award-Winning Results
How Jefferson Center aligned people, a platform, and incentives for lasting success
Last Updated
November 24, 2025
Working in behavioral health can be mentally and physically demanding, but how do you look after the caregivers? At Jefferson Center, they wanted an employee wellness program that was simple to engage, easy to sustain, and supported their workforce both physically and mentally. By adding dedicated coordination to lead program design, incentives, communications, the organization turned a stressed workforce into an award-winning culture, earning the Wellness Alliance Gold Award (’23) and back-to-back Cigna Healthy Workplace Awards (’23, ’24).
Client Background
As a leading behavioral health provider in Colorado, Jefferson Center supports 692 employees across 12 different locations. After its existing wellness platform was discontinued, HR pursued a new partner to maintain continuity, improve usability, and raise the program’s impact on employee health and engagement.
The Challenge
Jefferson Center’s operations spanned multiple sites, varied schedules, and with their previous platform discontinued, Jefferson Center saw the opportunity to elevate its wellness approach. The goal was not only to provide whole-person health resources but also to align partners, design stronger programs, and bring ideas into implementation. Ultimately, the challenge was to prevent burnout and strengthen employees’ ability to sustain their health in a high-stress behavioral health environment.
The Healthbreak Solution
Jefferson Center engaged Healthbreak’s Wellness Coordinator as an embedded partner to take ideas to implementation. The coordinator aligned partners, advised on program design and incentives, and wellness easy to see, join, and sustain across sites.
- Part-Time Wellness Coordination: Established governance and cadence for the program, ran the quarterly planning cycle, aligned the calendar with supervisor workflows, and coordinated partner deliverables to keep execution on track.
- Accessibility: Multiple access points (mobile, web, Microsoft Teams integration, Benefits Hub) made participation simple and inclusive.
- Incentives: Supported the existing incentive program with design strategy that increased year-over-year engagement and achievement.
- Programming variety: Corporate step challenges, Healthy Habit micro-wins, leadership and management team mindfulness trainings, and targeted webinars kept content relevant and engaging.
- Light-touch communications: Program nudge emails, in-app prompts, peer invites, wellness champion network promotions, and other custom communications helped sustain and increase participation.
- Quarterly data review for continuous improvement: Location-level reporting of enrollment, engagement, and population health risks guided program adjustments to ensure employees were supported with the resources that mattered most.
- Committee and champions: The coordinator leads a collaborative wellness committee to build a visible wellness culture and sustain program participation across locations in service of the program’s purpose and mission.
Results & Benchmarks
With an innovative strategy and dedicated coordination, Jefferson Center shifted staff stress into inspired wellness participation. The program not only exceeded benchmarks but also earned national recognition with the Wellness Alliance Gold Award (’23) and back-to-back Cigna Healthy Workplace Awards (’23, ’24).
Increased Daily Activity
Increased daily activity or maintained healthy steps
Blood Pressure Improvement
Decreased or maintained healthy blood pressure
Satisfaction
of surveyed members were satisfied or very satisfied
- Retention impact — 24% lower attrition among enrolled staff vs. non-enrolled.
- Incentive achievement — Higher-level incentive completion nearly tripled (26% → 62%) between 2022 and 2024.
Top-tier incentive achievement grew by more than 50% (18% → 28%) over the same period.
Why it matters
Jefferson Center’s experience demonstrates how a coordinated approach solidifies employee wellness into a company culture for an organization whose mission is to care for others. With Healthbreak as a strategic partner, Jefferson Center had support to increase participation, guide decisions in program design, increase incentive achievements, and provide real health improvements. The result was a program that strengthened company culture, positioned the organization to better meet the physical and emotional wellness needs of employees, and alleviate future medical plan costs.
"At Jefferson Center we use our Wellness program and associated awards/activities to attract and retain staff. We consistently hear from staff that they are satisfied with the wellness program and that wellness hours are their favorite benefit. We track participation in the wellness program and know that employee wellbeing is a key strategy to prevent burnout. Turnover is higher among employees who do not participate in the wellness program. Our Healthbreak wellness coordinator is a key strategic partner, supporting us in so many meaningful ways - ranging from planning and adjusting the annual program to meet evolving workforce needs to providing engaging wellness activities at leadership meetings."
Sandie Coutts
Director of HR Learning & Development, Jefferson Center for Mental Health
