Workplace wellness game: Zombies can get you moving

Despite the years I've spent trying to lose 20 or 50 pounds, my bad habits stymie me.

The sense that I was a hostage to bad habits might explain why I was so intrigued when I heard about a workplace wellness game - A Step Ahead: Zombies - developed by Mike Tinney, chief executive of Fitness Interactive Experience.

Wellness games, in which employees sign up for such challenges as counting their steps and changing their diets, seem to be popular and can be part of a larger push by businesses to promote healthful behavior.

The zombie game offers a playful spin on America's fascination with the undead.

As in many corporate wellness programs, players join teams and report their daily progress in achieving fitness goals. But in Tinney's game, reaching those targets has another purpose: to evade pursuing zombies. Teams that fall behind risk becoming zombies.

Keith Kantor, owner of Service Foods in Norcross, Ga., has tried the zombies games with his 100 employees, who prepare and deliver flash-frozen meals and other foods to people's homes. A nutritionist, Kantor had long offered wellness programs: access to a dietitian, discounts on healthful food products, free gym memberships and more. About three-quarters of his staff participated.

"But when the gaming came in, that other 25 percent all got engaged," he said. "They were more excited about doing exercises and running away from zombies than they were in hearing that over 40 percent of them would likely develop diabetes."

The website, www.astepaheadchallenge.com/a-step-ahead-zombies/, explains how the program works: "With a story that unravels over the course of each of the challenge's six-week episodes, teams will race from safe house to safe house, building up to a climactic rescue attempt. Will everyone make it out together?"

Teams have to work together and there are new bonuses each week, which means that every team can be competitive throughout the entire challenge. the website explains.