Apps for Great Company Culture & Employee Health
One of the most effective ways to create/improve a health-focused company culture is to get social support, and often that means introducing accountability and community to get people working together and competing.
Pantheon loves to help companies improve their health and fitness culture by getting employees involved in each others’ fitness journeys, so we thought we’d share some of our favorite fitness apps for companies.
Pantheon
Pantheon is a social fitness app built to help companies get fit together. We do things a little different. Rather than give you a step goal and award whoever gets the most steps, Pantheon recognizes each person based on their level of effort. Pantheon creates objectives based on your activity, exercise, meditation, and ability to cooperate with coworkers.
How does Pantheon work?
Import activity from your favorite fitness apps
Log workouts, meditations, and daily movement
Complete challenges alone or with coworkers
Cooperate or compete with your coworkers
Pantheon reads all your data from Apple Watch, Google Fit, Fitbit, and a host of other apps. As you complete workouts, meditations, or other wellness activities, Pantheon will recognize your accomplishments and allow you to compare or cooperate with coworkers. Learn more about Pantheon.
Pantheon likes to play with others, so if you’re looking for additional ways to compete with your coworkers, here are some other fun apps we recommend.
1. Nike Run Club
The Nike Run Club is a run tracker created by Nike to take your running experience to the next level. Nike has guided runs from running coaches to help you pace yourself or learn new styles of running.
The competition comes in the form of a Leaderboard where you can see which of your coworkers is racking up the most miles. Your coworkers will be notified when you go on a run - which allows them to cheer you on, or lets them know that you’re picking up miles and they need to catch up.
If you want to compete against a broader community, Nike Run Club also includes Challenges. By joining a Challenge, you will be placed into a global leaderboard for that Challenge, where you can see how much distance runners around the world are running.
Select cities have official Nike Run Clubs, which you can find in the app. These Clubs allow you to meet up with runners for special events.
You can download the Nike Run Club app from the Apple App Store or the Google Play Store.
2. Strava
Designed mostly for runners and cyclists, Strava tracks running and cycling. But that’s not the real draw. Strava gives its users the ability to post routes (called Segments) for other members of the Strava community to compete on. Whoever can complete a Segment the fastest becomes the King of that Segment. This leads to hyper- intense competition for runners and cyclists in different geographies as people work to dethrone each other.
Strava also includes community tools for people to connect and plan rides with. So if you are looking to make new friends, you can connect with local cycling communities.
You can download Strava from the Apple App Store or the Google Play Store.
3. myfitnesspal
Although most know for it’s nutrition tracking, MyFitnessPal has become an excellent way to manage all aspects of fitness and compete with coworkers. MyFitnessPal gives it’s users the ability to sync workouts from all their favorite apps and devices and track progress on multiple fronts.
Join your coworkers in challenges, and share your progress from new personal records to weight loss milestones and goals you’ve accomplished.
Similarly to Nike Run Club, MyFitnessPal has a broad community that they encourage you to join. The app hosts very active community forums for tips, motivation, and support.
They have plenty of resources on the free version, but when you upgrade to premium, you gain access to MyFitnessPal’s complete library of workouts. For those of you who have a hard time programming for yourself, this can be a game changer.
MyFitnessPal is available on the Apple App Store and Google Play Store.
4. Headspace
Headspace is a great option if one of your goals is to help reduce employee stress. It’s a meditation and mindfulness app designed to improve health and happiness. According to their website, Headspace users reduce stress by 32% after a month and experience 14% less burnout in just two weeks.
You can buddy up and add your coworkers to meditate together with guided sessions on everything from kindness, to focus and calm. Headspace also has a move mode with mindful workouts.
You can download Headspace on the Apple App Store or Google Play Store.
Want more reviews on the latest fitness tech and gear? Check out our Gear Reviews section to learn more about the tech, toys, and apps that we use to stay healthy and fit.