TL;DR: Employees take their cues from managers. When leaders participate in wellness initiatives, encourage healthy habits, and model well-being, employees are far more likely to engage. If you want better wellness program participation, start by getting managers involved.
You’ve launched the wellness challenge. You sent the emails. You offered incentives. Maybe you even brought in a new vendor or expanded your benefits.
Yet participation remains frustratingly low.
When that happens, most organizations look at the program itself. They tweak the rewards, add new activities, or increase communication. But often, the real issue isn’t the program.
It’s the managers.
Employees pay close attention to what their leaders prioritize. If managers skip the wellness challenge, never attend employee events, work through lunch, and answer emails late into the evening, employees notice. Those behaviors send a message about what is truly valued, regardless of what the wellness campaign says.
The opposite is also true. When managers participate, encourage healthy habits, and visibly make time for their own well-being, employees are far more likely to follow suit.
In other words, the success of your wellness program may have less to do with the program itself and more to do with the people leading your teams.
Here’s why manager involvement matters so much and what organizations can do to turn managers into their most powerful wellness champions.
Employees are constantly picking up on signals from the people above them. Not because they're trying to be people-pleasers, but because it's human nature to follow the lead of whoever holds influence in a group.
When a manager skips the biometric screening, employees notice. When a manager works straight through lunch and never takes a real break, employees notice. When a manager responds to a "mental health day" request with a sigh, employees definitely notice.
None of this has to be intentional to have an effect. Managers send messages all day long, through habits, reactions, and routines, whether they mean to or not.
The signals that tend to stick most are:
These aren't big moments. They're small, everyday behaviors. And they add up fast.
After 25 years of research spanning more than 183,000 business units around the world, Gallup found that 70% of the difference in team engagement can be traced directly to the manager.
Let that sink in for a moment: 70%.
More than any other factor, managers shape how engaged, motivated, and productive their teams are. The way they communicate, recognize employees, provide feedback, and support development has a profound impact on both team performance and workplace culture.
That means all the wellness incentives, portal reminders, and program launches you're investing in are working within a 30% window of influence, at best, if managers aren't bought in.
This isn't just about engagement surveys, either. Gallup's research consistently shows that manager behavior directly shapes how employees experience their workday, including how supported they feel, how psychologically safe they feel, and whether they believe the organization actually cares about their well-being.
A well-run wellness program without manager buy-in is like great food at a restaurant where the host makes you feel unwelcome. The offering is good. The experience isn't.
Most managers aren't actively trying to tank wellness participation. They just have a few mental blocks that make them opt out, or stay neutral, when their teams need them to lean in.
This one is understandable. Managers carry a lot. But here's the irony: the busiest managers are often the ones whose teams need wellness modeling the most. When employees see someone with a packed calendar still making time for a 10-minute walk or a mindfulness break, it signals that it's okay for them to do the same. A manager who's always too busy quietly teaches the team that wellness is a luxury, not a priority.
Some managers, especially those who consider themselves healthy or who don't connect with traditional wellness programming, opt out entirely. But participation doesn't have to mean doing a yoga class. It can mean mentioning a good night of sleep in a team standup. It can mean blocking your calendar for lunch and actually taking it. Low-key participation still sends a powerful message.
This is a genuinely kind instinct, but it often leads managers to say nothing at all. There's a big difference between intruding and acknowledging. You don't have to ask someone about their stress or therapy appointments. You can simply say, "Hey, don't forget the wellness challenge kicks off Monday. I'm planning to join." That's an invitation, not an interrogation.
Managers don't need a complete personality overhaul to become better well-being advocates. A few small, consistent behaviors can shift team culture over time.
Here are some practical things managers can do starting this week:
None of these require extra hours or a big personality. They require intention.
Knowing managers matter is one thing. Building systems that actually develop them is another.
Here's what works in organizations where manager-driven wellbeing is part of the culture:
Most manager onboarding focuses on performance conversations, project tools, and communication skills. Well-being should be in that mix, too. When managers understand the research, and understand how their behavior affects team participation, they're much more likely to take it seriously.
Don't assume managers know they're supposed to model wellness behaviors. Put it in writing. Include it in leadership competencies. Mention it during goal-setting conversations. If it's not expected, it won't happen consistently.
When a team has high wellness program participation, find out who the manager is and acknowledge it. Public recognition of manager-led wellbeing reinforces that it's a valued behavior, not just a nice-to-have.
Managers who want to support wellness sometimes don't know what to say or how to encourage it without overstepping. Providing a simple monthly communication guide, a few easy conversation starters, or a team wellness challenge toolkit makes it much easier to participate actively.
Don't send managers the same email as everyone else. Brief them ahead of time. Give them context on what's being offered and why. When managers feel like insiders, they advocate. When they feel like recipients of an HR blast, they ignore it like everyone else.
You can have the most thoughtful corporate wellness program in your industry. But if managers are sitting on the sidelines, participation will always be limited.
Employees don't just follow programs. They follow people. And the person they're watching most closely is usually their direct manager.
The good news is that managers don't have to make dramatic changes to have a real impact. Signing up. Saying something. Modeling small healthy habits. These are low-lift behaviors with high-impact results.
If you're looking to improve employee wellness program participation at your organization, start with the people leading your teams. Because when managers are wellbeing champions, employees follow.
Strong manager support can be a game-changer for wellness outcomes. We’d love to hear: How do you get managers involved and invested in your program? Share your experience in the comments.