Education & Promotion Recommendations

The Canadian Fitness and Lifestyle Research Institute(CFLRI) offers the following recommendations for providing information and increasing awareness of physical activity based on their 2003 survey of workplaces:

• Provide targeted messages depending on the physical activity and motivation level of individuals, or their stage of behavior change.
• Promote national physical activity guidelines such as Canada's Physical Activity Guide for Healthy Active Living.
• Post information about physical activity in wellness and physical activity newsletters, or on bulletin boards or through targeted company emails.
• Post information about the benefits of active commuting to reducing environmental emissions and encourage employees to walk for short trips and combine walking with public transportation to commute to work.
• Promote physical activity as a means of coping with job stress.
• Adopt innovative ideas for increasing employee awareness of physical activity programs. For example, use employee 'ambassadors' to help disseminate information on physical activity programming and to communicate between management and departments within the company.