Battle against obesity moves into workplace

Idiocy.

At a small Sanford, Fla., company, everyone’s talking about weight.

Walk in wearing a new dress, as Paulette Howard did one day recently, and everyone oohs and aahs — and wants to know what size it is. Every week, they want to know how much their colleagues have gained and lost.

The weighty discussions started at the beginning of the year, when the company launched its own version of “The Biggest Loser” contest, and 25 of the 71 employees signed up. They formed teams and held weekly weigh-ins followed by salad-bar lunches. At the end of their first 12-week contest, the group had lost 400 pounds collectively, and the winners walked away with cash prizes of $150...

Under the new health care reform law, Americans will probably see an increase in workplace wellness programs and more incentives for employees who meet certain health criteria.

This is an idea corporate America already is embracing. In a survey of U.S. businesses conducted earlier this year, the Society for Human Resource Management found that 28 percent offered rewards or bonuses to employees for completing certain health and wellness activities.

These programs are flawed at their very foundations and have no chance of succeeding.

To have even a prayer of success, a business must eschew the conventional and the "proven time after time to fail" approach and do something different.

Remember what Einstein said about insanity.