Study: Walking Meetings Offer Health Benefits

The next time you have an important meeting, consider doing it while walking instead of sitting. According to a recent study, walking meetings can increase physical activity in the workplace, which in turn promotes positive health while warding off disease and illness.

For the study, researchers from the University of Miami's Miller School of Medicine recruited 17 workers who conducted weekly meetings. As part of the study, the workers wore an accelerometer to keep track of their physical activity levels over the course of three weeks. Participants were also asked to follow some basic guidelines while conducting these meetings, such as walking a specific route for at least half an hour during each session.

So, what did researchers discover? They concluded that participants who engaged in walking meetings increased their physical activity to 117 minutes per week. In comparison, participants received just 107 minutes of physical activity the first week and 114 minutes the second week.

Researchers went on to say that walking for just 15 minutes per day at a "brisk pace" can extend a person's life expectancy by an average of three years. That alone should be reason enough to embrace walking meetings.

"Walking is known to have tremendous health benefits,” said Hannah Kling, one of the study's lead authors and researchers. “Having sedentary, white-collar workers consider walking meetings feasible suggests that this intervention has the potential to positively influence the health of many individuals.”

But let's face it, not everyone has the luxury to conduct walking meetings. Many meetings are now held via Skype or other online/telecommunications protocols. As such, walking meetings simply aren't an option. If this sounds like a familiar scenario, you'll need to increase your levels of physical activity elsewhere -- and one option is taking the stairs instead of the elevator. If you normally take the elevator to work, consider taking the stairs instead. The increased walking of climbing stairs offers the same benefits as walking meetings, upping your physical activity levels while promoting better health in the process.

This study was published in the journal Preventing Chronic Disease.