United Way of Muscatine is pleased to announce its designation as a Blue Zones Worksite™. United Way will be presented with the Blue Zones Worksite Designation certificate on Thursday July 11 at noon at their office located at 208 W 2nd Street Suite 201. This award reflects the organization’s appreciation of employee well-being and the resulting considerations developed to provide a safe, healthy, and enjoyable work environment. The designation measures and rewards the strides area organizations are making to help Muscatine become a healthier place to live, work and play. “One of United Way of Muscatine’s focus areas is community health, the other two being education and financial stability. Participating in this process was a natural fit for us. We are delighted to be the first worksite in Muscatine to receive this designation.” said Shane Orr, United Way of Muscatine CPO.
Blue Zones Worksite designation requires employer actions to be coupled with employee participation and enthusiasm. Working through the process allowed United Way of Muscatine to reflect on the provisions already in place to assist employees with developing healthy work/life balances, while providing motivation and support for on-going improvements. “Many of our current policies and organizational values already fit in with Blue Zones Project™ recommended policies. For example, we encourage our employees to volunteer, it was just a matter of getting a more formalized policy in writing.” explained Orr.
The Blue Zones Project is based on Blue Zones® principles developed by Dan Buettner, National Geographic explorer and author of The Blue Zones: Lessons for Living Longer from the People Who’ve Lived the Longest. It employs evidence-based ways to help people live longer, better lives by taking a systematic, environmental approach to well-being, which focuses on optimizing policy, social networks and the built environments where people spend their time. Brought to Iowa through an innovative sponsorship between Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield and Healthways, the initiative encourages all Iowa communities to change their built environments to make the healthy choice, the easy choice.