Case Study 2: A Division of a Large Government Department is one of five Workplace Case Studies developed by the Institute for Social Science Research (ISSR) as a part of the Strategic Evaluation of Prevention Programs (SEPP). These Case Studies were informed by 10,000 Steps Coordinators to investigate the relationship between the implementation of 10,000 Steps strategies and their impact on the success of Tournament implementation.
1. Descriptions of the staff composition, local environment, and 10,000 Steps program engagement of the workplaces profiled for case studies.
A division of a large government department based in a major city, with around 100 staff at the local site. There are multiple divisions within the workplace with work that is primarily sedentary. There are hybrid work arrangements with some staff working from home and some working onsite. The workplace ran their first Tournament around a decade ago before discontinuing. Since then, the workplace returned to running Tournaments again and have run a handful in the last few years, at the ‘shoulder’ months of the year, when the weather is neither too hot nor too cold. The Tournaments are coordinated by a team of coordinators as part of their roles as members of the workplace Wellbeing Committee.
2. How the social, organisational, environmental, community and policy levels of support for physical activity in the case study workplaces were influenced by Tournament implementation.
- Tournaments were originally initiated by the work of the Wellbeing Committee, as part of a broader initiative for improving health and wellbeing in the workplace.
- Repeated implementation has resulted from prior success. As a result, Tournaments have become a regular calendar event. The influence of successes of prior Tournaments alongside the drive of the Wellbeing Committee was highlighted by one of the workplace coordinators:
… I think it’s becoming a bit of a stalwart in our calendar of events and – you know, with the right people driving it, and the wellbeing committee, that will be up to the wellbeing committee to keep that alive. But yeah, I think it will continue to be a standard feature in our event calendar. (Coordinator)
- The larger organisation had embraced a new mental wellbeing framework, likely influencing support for continued Tournament implementation.
- The workplace and industry had norms of providing conditions to staff that support for greater work flexibility, wellbeing, and physical activity options.
- Although completing the Tournament was seen as a ‘KPI’ to leadership, manager buy-in had nonetheless been helpful to drive engagement and demonstrate ‘permission’ to embrace physical activity in the workplace.
3. The influence of 10,000 Steps workplace resources in determining Tournament success - profiles of how 10,000 Steps resources were used or adapted by workplace coordinators.
- Made good use of the Tournament and Leaderboard functions of the website and mobile app for team management.
- The CSV export function was used for tracking team performance and progress. The ease of use of this function was well regarded.
- The Activity-to-Steps converter was a popular feature due to participants already engaging in non-step-based sports (e.g., cycling, swimming) and a desire to use these activities to contribute to their team performance.
- They reported that the remaining online coordinator resources beyond the Tournament function on the online platform were not currently being used to assist implementation.
- Strategies for Tournament implementation include pre-emptive communications in the lead up to the Tournament. This provided the benefit of encouraging individuals to register with the website ahead of time as individual accounts are required to use and log steps on the platforms. The effectiveness of this strategy was described by one coordinator:
So it’s just to start off with, just a sort of, soft kind of introduction, ‘Tournament’s coming.’ And then you know, you sort of say ‘This will be the date’ and then, you know, ‘Sign up coming.’ Get them starting to talk in the office. (Coordinator)
- The use of in-person and informal ‘organic conversation(s)’ were noted as useful strategies for recruiting first-time participants.
- The use of incentives or prizes were also used to encourage engagement.