Influence of Wellness Programs on Organizational Performance in the Banking Industry in Kenya

As employees increasingly find themselves in the midst of work-family conflict due to the emerging work demands, the effect of these conflicts may affect employee commitment decisions which in turn may affect organizational performance depending on the manager’s role in supporting the employee to attain such a balance. Due to simultaneously long or unprecedented working hours and upward trend of nonstandard work schedules e.g. in the evenings at night or weekend as a spread of a more globalized 24/7 economy has also put considerable strain on workers and their families. Customer satisfaction and customer service being the prime work in the banking sector has also evoked changes which consequently have brought changes in work setups. The study objective was to establish the influence of wellness programs on organizational performance in the banking industry in Kenya. This study adopted across sectional survey. A cross sectional approach enhances the credence of results by providing conclusions on data as at a given point in time. The target population initially consisted of 44 registered banks by the central bank of Kenya but 43 banks participated in the study because one of the banks was under receivership at the time of data collection. Primary data was collected using questionnaires that had both structured and unstructured questions. The researcher also used descriptive statistics including frequency distribution tables, percentages and measures of central tendency such as mean. In addition to this advance statistical techniques were also considered particularly measures of variations such as standard deviation and others like regression analysis to establish relationships among variables. The study found that wellness programs influenced organizational performance. This was through preventive care, education and training on importance of wellness on employees as well as through supportive manager. The study recommends that organizations should focus on the use of wellness programs practices as they are necessary to ensure that organizations support their objectives. In addition this study recommends that organizations should increasingly recognize the influence of wellness programs practices as critical in achieving their objectives.