Event Dates:  

Registration: opens May 20

Event: June 1-30

Registration at: https://events.healthcode.org/events

Resources:

  • Email Templates (How to Register, Reminder to Log miles, etc.): Click here 
  • Social Media Samples: Click here
  • Marketing Assets (Logos, Race Bib, etc.): Click Here 

“Triathlon in a Month – In Training” 

Implementation Guide

Below is a step-by-step guide for implementing “Triathlon in a Month – In Training” (TiaMIT) at your organization. We suggest kick-off dates but you can change them to accommodate your schedule. The Guide contains everything you need to ensure a successful “Triathlon in a Month – In Training” challenge in June. Contact us at any time with questions: contact@HealthCode.org

May/June

  • New to HealthCode’s events, like “Triathlon in a Month – In Training”? Sign Your Organization Up. It’s Free to sign up as an organization and for participants. (As a 501 c3 nonprofit, HealthCode very much appreciates donations and provides opportunities to donate.):

      If new, fill out the form HERE or email contact@healthcode.org with the below information:

  • Company Name
  • Main Contact (First Name, Last Name and Email)
  • Company Size (# of employees)

If your Organization signed up for a HealthCode event in the past, you are already set for “Triathlon in a Month – In Training”. Your Organization and “teams/groups” are already in the system.

  • Send us your teams/groups:

Commonly a list of office locations, departments or other employee groupings. This is optional, but it is highly recommended for an optimum Company Leaderboard page, especially if you have a sizable employee base or multiple office locations/departments: 

  • Provide a list as a one column in an Excel sheet. This list will be loaded in as-is;  please spell-check and make sure the list is accurate in every way.
  • Email your group/team list to contact@healthcode.org
  • Obtain Senior Leadership Support

Involvement and support from Senior Leadership (CEO, local office management) is a key success factor. Involvement ideas: 

  • Have Senior Leaders record brief videos to encourage registration and participation 
  • Have Senior Leaders send emails to employees encouraging registration and participation throughout the June challenge

  • Engage Your Wellness Activation Team
  • If you don’t already have a formal wellness team at your company, recruit employee volunteers to join a Wellness Activation Team. This team will help you implement “Triathlon in a Month – In Training”, get people moving, and keep people excited through the event.
  • Designate a main point person for communicating with the “Triathlon in a Month – In Training” team (this will often be the person who set up the company, but if different please email that name to us).
  • Designate a point person for each satellite office or department. This person will be in charge of communications, translations, incentives, inner-office promotions for their local office or department.

  • Plan Promotions
  • Review the “Triathlon in a Month – In Training” marketing communication tools such as SAMPLE LOGOS.
  • “How to Register” email (adjust steps 3 and 4 before sending, per the below): 
  • On Step 3: Fill in your company name where it says COMPANY NAME
  • On Step 4: If your company provided “Triathlon in a Month – In Training” with your groups/teams, leave as is. If you chose not to have groups/teams for your company, change this line to read “Skip the Select Your Group/Team pulldown” 
  • All emails: Make edits/additions as needed, such as:
  • your company goals (mile goal as a company and number or percentage of employees participating)
  • per office goals (a great way to unite the local office in a goal)
  • per employee goals 
  • Setup registration promotions at the office in common areas (such as break areas) if currently working in your normal office setting.

  • Establish Incentives:

Internal company incentives are a fun way to boost your company’s registration and participation. Examples:

  • PTO or Vacation hours/days for meeting a goal
  • Gift Cards and Prizes
  • Recognition through company communication channels

  • Set Goals:
  • Set a registration goal: X number or X percent of employees registered by June 1
  • Set a company wide first day mile goal (June 1)
  • Set a company wide mile goal for the entire month
  1. Syncing with activity trackers:
  1. HealthCode provides a simple manual activity platform option, where people can select their miles or minutes when entering activity data
  2. Options are provided to sync up with FitBit. People can also use Strava and MapMyFitness, which allow connecting with other devices such as Apple
  3. Recommendation – Use the same email and Password for their HealthCode account and their tracking device

During Registration Phase (Up to and even during June) And check out our company’s position on the global leaderboards.

  • Emails during Registration Phase (You will find the Email Templates HERE) 
  • May 1-17: 

Send the “HOW TO REGISTER” email to your employees at least once during this period: In the email templates you will find the “HOW TO REGISTER” email. This will tell your employees exactly how to register on the website for the event. Just cut, paste, customize and send (NOTE: Make sure to customize steps 3 and 4 in this email before sending).

  • May 18: 

Send the “Registration Reminder” email: 

  • TIP: In these emails state the goals for your organization – specifically registration goals (number/percentage of employees your company is wanting to have register).
  • TIP: Include a video from senior leadership in these emails encouraging all employees to register by X date to meet the registration goal. Another option is to have the email be sent from the senior leader to all employees. 
  • May  20, 27: 

Send email to employees saying:

  • May 31 is the last day to register before the event starts (Note: employees can still register through June 30, but encouraging them to be registered before June 1 is the best plan for a solid event – people work better with deadlines).
  • In these emails be sure to state any special company plans, occurring on June 1st (or 2nd), to kickoff the TiaMIT challenge:
    1. state your first day goal
    2. hold a special event (walking the first mile together as a company, kickoff ceremony led by CEO, etc.)
  1. June 1st:

Send an email to employees to get them excited that “Triathlon in a Month – In Training” is underway and they can include their activity as of June 1st. Reiterate your company’s first day goals and goals for the month. Provide a calendar of any events your company is putting on or sponsoring (walking groups, company bootcamps, etc.). 

  • Post/Display any marketing assets: Put up posters, table cards, etc. around the office in common areas and high traffic areas (break room, dining area, elevator, meeting rooms, front desk, etc.), or post on internal company websites, on Slack, or other online group messaging platforms. 
  • Registration Incentives: Provide an incentive to register (for example: a drawing each week during May and June, from those who have registered, to win X).
  • Activation Team Promotions: Have wellness activators actively engaging people in registration within common areas (lunch/break rooms, office meetings/status, etc.) or in online groups or chats. 

During Event (June 1-30)

  • Virtual Kickoff (on June 1) 
  • Implement first day kickoff plans. We highly recommend a first day ceremony. Examples:
  • Dedicated time to each complete 1st mile on day 1
  • CEO addresses employees through office video communications and/or email with video
  • Communicate any first day and month goals for your company

  • Company Leaderboard page
  • This is a big motivator for individual employees and the company as a whole. Be sure to communicate and promote that each employee visits this page often to check how they and their group/team are doing. See 2b below for how to access this page.
  • Instructions on how to access Company Leaderboard for your organization: 
  • In your profile, locate the “Triathlon in a Month – In Training” logo  in your Event Stats column.
  • Under that logo you will see the word ORGANIZATION with your company name in blue
  • Click on the company name and it will take you to the Company Leaderboard page. There you can see a leaderboard of individuals from your company and the overall stats for all employees combined. 
  • Click on the “View Groups” link on this page to see a leaderboard of the office locations
  • Click on the name of any group/team to see the individual leaderboard for that group. 
  • On-Demand Reports: Wellness leaders can pull an on-demand report of employee participation by clicking on the “Download All From Organization” link on this page

  • Implement on-going events throughout the month 

Examples include:

  • Walking Wednesdays (set a time for employees to meet virtually each Wed morning, at lunch or after work to walk “together”). 
  • Informal online Bootcamps or Yoga classes
  • Encourage Virtual Walking Meetings
  1. Walk in a Park Day
  • Mile logging reminder emails
    1. We will send an email to all participants reminding them to log miles from the weekend. We see a big bump in miles being logged each Monday when we send reminders.
    2. We suggest that you send an email to all employees every Thursday or Friday during June and on June 30 to remind them to log their miles (especially important for those who do not connect a Fitbit or Map My Fitness account to their profile for automatic logging).
    3. Remind people coming back from vacation that they can enter all their activity data accomplished as of June 1st.
  • Incentives

Provide incentives as you reach milestones on the way to your company goal. For example, if your company goal is 10,000 miles, give away incentives as the employees reach each 1,000 mile marker. Be sure to draw the winner randomly from those who are participating. This prevents it from being about who does the most miles (which can be discouraging to folks who are new to activity) and prevents gaming the system (as there is no advantage to having more miles than others when it comes to incentives).

  1. Social: Encourage participants to take photos and videos throughout the event and share through any company social channels (internal and external). This will go a long way in helping visually connect all employees across the office or the world, as they see other employees having fun and being active!

Use hashtag: #TiaMIT2020, @HealthCodeIAM

After the Challenge (after June)

  • Post Event Celebration: Now is the time to celebrate all that your company has accomplished during the month. We recommend:
  • Email: Send out a company-wide email that congratulates all participants for being a part of the “Triathlon in a Month – In Training” challenge. Be sure to include:
  • all of your company stats (Find these on your Company Leaderboard Page)
  • recognize any goals met for the company. Recognize groups/teams and individuals who went above and beyond or had great improvement across the month. 
  • Special Event: Just like you did on the first day, hold a special event or gathering ceremony (if possible) to close out the June event (either on the last day of June or the first week of July).
  • Reports and Metrics for your company:
  • On Demand Reports: An on-demand report is available on the Company Leaderboard page for your event, by clicking the “Download All from Organization” link. This report will show you first name, last name, office location or group, and logged miles for each person (it will not show any contact or personal information – see below for Detailed Reports)
  • Suggested Stats to Share with employees and senior leaders:
  • Company stats (miles, calories, minutes):  These can be found on the Company Leaderboard page or calculated using the detailed reports. 
        1. Per group/team stats (miles, calories, minutes): Found on the group leaderboard page for each group. Click into the Company Leaderboard page, click View Groups link and click on any office name (or calculate using the detailed report)
  • Projected Health Care Cost Savings: Divide the total calories burned by 3500. Then multiply that number by 9. The resulting number is your projected health care cost savings.*

Noteworthy June Dates: 

June 1: First Day of “Triathlon in a Month – In Training”

June 2: Global Running Day

June 3: World Bicycle Day

June 6: D-Day (WWII)

June 8: World Ocean Day

June 14: Flag Day 

June 19: Juneteenth

June 20: Father’s Day 

June 30: Final Day of “Triathlon in a Month – In Training”

Check out the walk/run events in your community supporting critical issues such as: Alzheimer’s, Breast Cancer, Heart and many other very important causes.

*This formula is based on 2009 Mayo Clinic research and is endorsed by UnitedHealthcare and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas. Explanation: Body fat reduction through the use of caloric expenditure occurs at the known rate of 1 lb body fat per 3500 calories burned/used. Healthcare costs due to weight gain have been calculated at $28 per pound over a three year period, or approximately $9 per pound annually.” So, to get the Projected/Estimated Healthcare Savings we take the total calories burned and divide by 3500 (caloric expenditure to burn 1lb of body fat), and then multiply by $9 (the savings per year per 1lb).This figure is directional and meant to provide an additional guide for how an organization is benefiting from participation, outside of the miles, calories and minute metrics.

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