Monthly Archives: January 2012

John Thomas Financial and its Services

Posted on by admin

New York City is known as the “City that Never Sleeps”, therefore, as one of the busiest cities in the world famous for entertainment and luxury, the city is also rich with influential businesses which all dwells in Wall Street, the city’s business district in the United States, if not in the whole world. These businesses make up for the stock market, a humongous dominion of a network fast-growing by the minute.

One of the businesses highly recognized in the business community is the company that world-renowned financial expert Thomas Belesis built, John Thomas Financial. JTF is an independent brokerage firm dedicated to providing services and investment options to their client which is empowered by the company’s ability to predict the stock market’s movement. They cater to their client’s financial needs through their roster of financial experts and analysts sought-after by every company in New York because of their flawless and ninety-nine percent precision in analyzing and predicting the equity market. At a regular, John Thomas Financial pleases their clients with their sheer wisdom about their fields and advisories to their clients in making investment decisions.

Because of being highly productive, they have been recognized by FINRA and SIPC as a member. Their client-centric approach to administer the company, along with their affiliate companies such as the JTF Private Wealth Management, provides brokerage investment services including short term and long term investments, portfolio management, income generation, liquidity and hedging strategies. They also offer strategizing and market analyses that generate ideas regarding the ups and downs of the stock market exchange. With these analyses, their clients will be able to come up with better decisions which are based on facts and not just from luck. Lastly, they have banking services for the capital growth of companies in the private and public sectors.

Their newest affiliate mentioned above, the JTF Private Wealth Management is a separate company Thomas Belesis founded designed to focus on advisories for people with a huge net worth and how they can manage and allocate their money for a better spending and investment habits. Their clients on the JTF Private Wealth Management consists of high-powered individuals in the business and entertainment industries who needs to have informed decision of how they are going to handle their net worth and the money they earn from year to year. They walk through these clients in the tedious process of retirement planning, asset management, estate planning, insurance, risk management and their children’s educational planning among others. They also see to it that these wealthy clients are encouraged to have benefit programs for their employees and insurance programs for executives to make sure that the people working in their businesses are well-compensated which will encourage them to work harder as they are getting what they deserve.

Worksite Health Promotion: A Global Perspective

Posted on by admin



When Dr. Robert Karch first developed what is now the American University’s Master’s of Science Program in Health Promotion Management in the late 1970s, the curriculum was built almost exclusively on how worksite health promotion and community initiatives were practiced in the US. But some very progressive initiatives were taking place outside our borders, while other countries were struggling with issues someone else had already solved.

A Global Health Promotion Network

In 1996, with the help of about 30 people from 18 countries, the International Institute for Health Promotion (IIHP) was formed. It has grown to about 80 institutions with a network of hundreds of people around the world. Their goal is to foster information sharing and collaboration among international academics, industry, governments, foundations, and other professional thought leaders in health promotion.

When asked which countries took the lead, Dr. Karch says, “Canada was extremely progressive in the mid-’70s through the early-’80s. Some of their early work was way ahead of the US and served as a model for other countries. But they approached it more from a public health perspective and less as a worksite health promotion initiative.”

Countries like Japan and Brazil have required annual physicals as part of their employee health programs for many years. As a result, they gathered valuable information about the health status of their workforce and developed strong workplace wellness programs. While other countries — such as Germany, the UK, France, and Singapore — also have strong programs, most are primarily driven by the private sector.

An increasingly globalized economy explains the growing international interest in wellness. The US is clearly the leader when it comes to worksite health promotion. Though credit goes to the private sector, the government may become more involved in the near future. Subsidiaries of many US-based corporations now operate in other countries, and management wants to implement initiatives they’ve seen in America. As these companies move people to other countries, employee wellness concepts go with them. Academics visit the US to attend conferences and take ideas back to organizations in their countries.

Undeniable ROI

The international community is becoming increasingly aware that healthy workers represent a real return on investment. Government officials and corporate decision makers hear about successful workplace wellness programs through the international activities of organizations like the IIHP. They read about the growing body of evidence through the Internet and the broader distribution of professional employee health periodicals. Average citizens hear about these benefits on TV and radio and want such services for themselves and their families.

As US companies establish overseas operations, host governments respond to demands for enhanced services. Even emerging countries may offer programs and service opportunities; American companies need to learn where to look and how to ask.

This exposure to employee wellness concepts hasn’t been a one-way street, as other countries had lessons to teach American companies. In the early days of the automobile industry, corporate wellness programs were primarily an executive perk. Unions began demanding similar services. Japan has provided their manufacturers with corporate health promotion services for years. When a large Japanese auto maker set up a plant in Lexington KY, it built a community wellness center, not just for management and their employees, but for the families and community. This model and similar experiences led other progressive companies to follow suit.

Features of Top-Notch Programs

Because they have deeper pockets to fund more comprehensive programs, international companies with the best worksite wellness practices are often larger corporations.

They seem to share certain common features:

Clear commitment starting at the very top Adherence to internationally recognized quality management principles Progressive Internet digital and video communication systems Technologies that convert wellness messages into other languages Quality professional staff placed in major international locations Incentives built into management practices to meet corporate wellness goals A strategic plan to deliver culturally appropriate programs in foreign settings.

According to Dr. Karch, one characteristic of overseas corporations sets them apart from the US. Many international professionals Dr. Karch meets are highly trained physicians who refuse to be satisfied with old wellness programming models. “While it’s easy to get set in our ways and resist change, these decision makers want only the very best and latest models. They spend time in the States and see the best practices. When they go back home, they take what they’ve learned here and make it fresher… better. They create new wellness campaigns, develop innovative policies, and build healthier environments from scratch. Overseas companies constantly push the envelope.”

Challenges Ahead

Dr. Karch admits there are still challenges. “Just as no company can be competitive without a strong, healthy workforce, neither can a country. The worker is the economic engine that drives any country. Chronic disease states are universal. Every country faces this problem. Part of the solution is lifestyle. What better place to deliver healthy messages to the greatest numbers than in the workplace?”

For many years, companies in countries with a more socialized medical delivery system failed to recognize the benefits employee health promotion brought to their bottom line. From an insurance perspective, they had little to gain. The increasing use of tax breaks and tax incentives are getting employers’ attention. Growing emphasis on productivity, presenteeism, and workplace safety are motivating corporations to provide environments that promote a healthy workforce.

Corporations operating overseas should seek out employee health resources available in their host countries. This is especially true for smaller companies with limited internal resources. And it’s not just a question of providing employee health services for American workers. There is also the challenge of designing programs compatible with the culture and traditions of their foreign workers. The IIHP has established Regional Centers to bring the collective resources of their membership to regions worldwide including Europe, China, and South America. Others are being developed.

Occupational Health – Workplace Health Management

Posted on by admin



Workplace Health Management There are four key components of workplace health management:

Occupational Health and Safety Workplace Health Promotion Social and lifestyle determinants of health Environmental Health Management

In the past occupational health policy was frequently driven solely by compliance with legislation. In the new approach to workplace health management, policy development is driven by both legislative requirements and by health targets set on a voluntary basis by the working community within each industry. In order to be effective Workplace Health Management needs to be based on knowledge, experience and practice accumulated in three disciplines: occupational health, workplace health promotion and environmental health. It is important to see workplace health management as a process not only for continuous improvement and health gain within the company, but also as framework for involvement between various agencies in the community. It offers a platform for co-operation between the local authorities and business leaders on community development through the improvement of public and environmental health.

The Healthy Workplace setting – a cornerstone of the Community Action Plan.

The Luxembourg Declaration of the European Union Network for Workplace Health Promotion defined WHP as the combined effort of employers, employees and society to improve the health and well-being of people at work

This can be achieved through a combination of:

Improving the work organization and the working environment Promoting active participation of employees in health activities Encouraging personal development

Workplace health promotion is seen in the EU network Luxembourg Declaration as a modern corporate strategy which aims at preventing ill-health at work and enhancing health promoting potential and well-being in the workforce. Documented benefits for workplace health programs include decreased absenteeism, reduced cardiovascular risk, reduced health care claims, decreased staff turnover, decreased musculoskeletal injuries, increased productivity, increased organizational effectiveness and the potential of a return on investment (Mossinik, Licher1998(Oxenburgh 1991).

However, many of these improvements require the sustained involvement of employees, employers and society in the activities required to make a difference. This is achieved through the empowerment of employees enabling them to make decisions about their own health. Occupational Health Nurses are well placed to carry out needs assessment for health promotion initiatives with the working populations they serve, to prioritize these initiatives alongside other occupational health and safety initiatives which may be underway, and to coordinate the activities at the enterprise level to ensure that initiatives which are planned are delivered. In the past occupational health services have been involved in the assessment of fitness to work and in assessing levels of disability for insurance purposes for many years.

The concept of maintaining working ability, in the otherwise healthy working population, has been developed by some innovative occupational health services. In some cases these efforts have been developed in response to the growing challenge caused by the aging workforce and the ever-increasing cost of social security. Occupational health nurses have often been at the forefront of these developments.

There is a need to develop further the focus of all occupational health services to include efforts to maintain work ability and to prevent non-occupational workplace preventable conditions by interventions at the workplace. This will require some occupational health services to become more pro-actively involved in workplace health promotion, without reducing the attention paid to preventing occupational accidents and diseases. Occupational health nurses, with their close contact with employees, sometimes over many years, are in a good position to plan, deliver and evaluate health promotion and maintenance of work ability interventions at the workplace.

Health promotion at work has grown in importance over the last decade as employers and employees recognize the respective benefits. Working people spend about half of their non-sleeping day at work and this provides an ideal opportunity for employees to share and receive various health messages and for employers to create healthy working environments. The scope of health promotion depends upon the needs of each group.

Some of the most common health promotion activities are smoking reducing activities, healthy nutrition or physical exercise programs, prevention and abatement of drug and alcohol abuse.

However, health promotion may also be directed towards other social, cultural and environmental health determinants, if the people within the company consider that these factors are important for the improvement of their health, well-being and quality of life. In this case factors such as improving work organization, motivation, reducing stress and burnout, introducing flexible working hours, personal development plans and career enhancement may also help to contribute to overall health and well-being of the working community.

The Healthy Community setting In addition to occupational health and workplace health promotion there is also another important aspect to Workplace Health Management. It is related to the impact that each company may have on the surrounding ambient environment, and through pollutants or products or services provided to others, its impact on distant environments. Remember how far the effects of the Chernobyl Nuclear accident in 1986 affected whole neighbouring countries.

Although the environmental health impact of companies is controlled by different legislation to that which applies to Health and Safety at work, there is a strong relationship between safeguarding the working environment, improving work organization and working culture within the company, and its approach to environmental health management.

Many leading companies already combine occupational health and safety with environmental health management to optimally use the available human resources within the company and to avoid duplication of effort. Occupational health nurses can make a contribution towards environmental health management, particularly in those companies that do not employ environmental health specialists.

Coming up. Key steps in developing New Workplace Health Policies