Livia Martini- Chief People Officer at Gympass| The Evolution of Corporate Wellness

Frank Cottle [ 00:00:38]: Livia, thank you very much for joining us on the Future Work podcast today. We’re really excited to have you. With your expertise as the chief people officer from Gympass and all the interesting things that you and your organization have been doing. Can you start to give our audience just a little background on what Gympass does, how it works with corporations and sets up wellness programs for their employee groups. 

Livia Martini [00:01:07]: Great. And thanks for having me, Frank. It’s great to be here. So Gympass is a corporate wellbeing benefit. So essentially we partner with people like me, the heads of HR, the heads of benefit in other companies, and we implement holistic wellbeing program for the employees. So this is almost like you have a menu of several activities that you can do and several providers of those activities, all the way from nutrition to an actual regular full service gym or studios. And each employee chooses what they want to do in the program. 

Frank Cottle [ 00:01:50]: So it’s an open menu then of options for the employees. And the purpose of the employer is to improve the well being, the culture, hopefully create another cultural opportunity for their employee group overall. 

Livia Martini [00:02:09]: Exactly. And this, I think, is the magic of a program like Gympass because we encompass all of the workforce. You get a virtual cycle of you seeing somebody doing something different, trying something, getting better in their well being, sometimes inviting you. So we have challenges, for example, that the HR team can launch. And we did, for example, a steps challenge. So we did it by team. So teams got to know one another, they got to get more active. And we saw several benefits of that. And I think we’re going to talk about this a little bit later, but this is over time. I think my peers and people like me have seen how many positive effects you can have from something that seems simple in a way, but so hard to implement in a large scale and sustainably over time. 

Frank Cottle [ 00:03:08 ]: Well, it’s funny. I’m sure you’re familiar with the term gym rat. In my younger years was very much a gym rat. I was working out all the time. Now I take long walks and do a lot of cycling. So I understand the benefit that comes with being active during the day, during the workday, oftentimes taking a break. But wellness has really evolved. The concepts of wellness from a corporate point of view has evolved. There seems to me there’s two elements that are converging. We talk a lot about wellness from a mental health point of view, and we talk about it from a physical health point of view. And now it seems that we’re talking about corporate wellness, combining those two things into a cultural element as well. How have you seen that evolution, and how do you see those things blending together? 

Livia Martini [00:04:10]: Yeah, I think that the key change for me in the conception of wellness is this expansion that you mentioned. And nowadays we can even include financial wellness, we include emotional wellness, even the quality of the relationships that you have. So this concept in and of itself is expanding. But then what I think has significantly changed is the role of the corporation. So before wellness is something private, that people should take care of that on their own time. And now I think companies are seeing, number one, the huge effect that they can have on people’s well being and the huge benefit that they can get from making sure that they take care of this. But we also saw in a recent survey that we just did, this concept is not new, but whenever you choose a job, you essentially choose a company, and the company chooses you. And employees are right now in the survey we did, manifesting their preferences and saying that they would significantly consider, or a significant portion of them would consider changing jobs if the company doesn’t take care of their well being or doesn’t have well being as a key priority. And many of them even say that the well being or the efforts of well being is equally important to salary. So this is at 93% of people, which to me is incredible. 

Frank Cottle [ 00:05:55]: Corporates have been struggling, and you guys deal with the big, broad spectrum of the global Fortune 1000 as your client overall. And I know you’ve got up to 50,000 gyms and just massive global network. So I want everybody to understand that you are global. You’re massive in the number of people. So the data that you have is very well sourced. And I’ve read your 2024 reports and your different reports. They’re very interesting background materials. One of the big things we can look at companies like Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon. Everybody’s got to get back to the office, everybody’s got to do this. And then other companies saying, oh, you know what, remote is working fine. Then someone else. Yes, but how do you do a culture with remote work? Et cetera. And I would posit that if you can’t get everybody to go to the company, but you can get everybody to go to the gym, that you can sustain your corporate culture very strongly in a remote work structure, and you can many times have an even stronger sense of community in that regard. It sounds like I’m shilling for your product, but I really believe this because I’ve seen it in action overall, that’s a whole different dynamic. But it brings the people closer together, makes them more honest with each other because it adds another dimension to their relationship. 

Livia Martini [00:07:39 ]: And having the flexibility of choice, I think, also improves a little bit this as well. But in my humble opinion, I think that every single work structure works. We can make them work as long as they’re cohesive, as long as companies are making deliberate decisions that are aligned with their business needs, that are aligned with the culture that they’re trying to build, and align with the types of employees that they’re trying to hire as well. So maybe let’s say you choose to have a completely remote culture that can work as long as you create, for example, these types of touch points that you go to the gym together or you have challenges that unite people that are from different countries or different parts of the world, and because of this, they have to get to know each other. So the sense of community still builds. But if you want to get back to work and you. Sorry, you want to get back to the office, you have to understand that this work arrangement is no longer for everybody, it’s no longer the norm. So you’re going to have a few people self select in or out, and then you should create the other parts of your daily life to sustain that. But again, I think the beauty of combining those two things is that we in the HR side and the executive leadership of companies, I think we’re seeing more and more that there is no one answer for everyone. There’s no one single solution that’s going to fit 100% of employees or one single format. So in knowing this and applying this, for example, to well being as well, you have to make sure that all that you create has a level of flexibility such that the individual can find what’s the right answer for them. My view of my role is to support that journey, is to make sure that they have the right tools, that they have the right processes and policies around that as well. But to make sure that the employees feel this support such that they can take ownership on their side as well. 

Frank Cottle [ 00:10:04]:  That’s the question. I had one of the questions I had are the employees taking ownership themselves. So let’s create a scenario. Let’s assume that I have a company, a large company, a multinational company, that I’m operating in five countries, and I’ve got 10,000 employees, 2000 in each country. Do you notice big differences and your system is offered company wide? Do you notice big differences in the takeup between different nationalities? Do the Dutch work out more than the English, do the English work out less than the Italians? All of that sort of thing. And what data do you have on. I might be putting you on the spot. And if you don’t have the data, just say, I don’t have it. But what data do you have that says, my company offered this to 10,000 people. How many people did more than just sign up, but how many of them are really utilizing the benefit, let’s say on an 80% of optimum basis. Is it 10% or 90%? Because this is important adaptation of these programs. A lot of times I put stuff together, great idea. Everybody loves it, nobody uses it. That’s it. Have you seen metrics that says, oh, the obesity level dropped down within a particular company, or, oh, the days of sick days decreased? What kind of metrics do you see in these programs? 

Livia Martini [00:11:46]: So I have a few of them off the top of my head, but not all. And your question has many parts to it, but I’ll start with the ending of it, which is we have done studies with companies that work with Gympass, and we have done a very structured study to see, we have a control group. We have people who have enrolled in the program but use it less frequently, and we have people who use it more than once a week, every month. And this specifically is about physical activity, but we are measuring different levers and different types of activities as well. But right now, this study has shown that we can have a decrease in health care costs of 35%. 

Frank Cottle [00:12:38]: Okay, stop right there. Question. If I have a decrease in health care costs, meaning a lower incidence of utilization of the health care benefits I provide, am I, as an employer, reaping the benefit of lower rates? Because as an employer, I’d immediately. That’s the first question I’d ask. My people are healthier than somebody else’s people. I want a better rate. 

Livia Martini [00:13:05]: Yeah, exactly. This is for sure one of the arguments that we have with the healthcare providers. Of course, there are a few external factors. If you are a small company and you have one serious case of disease at that year that maybe tweak your numbers, and then the healthcare provider is not going to be as receptive of that. But this to me is the beauty. What we have is not only people stop using the more expensive services, so when you actually get sick, but they also increase the frequency with which they use the preventive services. So they do more checkups, they follow up on their health instead of trying to cure their disease. So that’s the effect of the reduction. And then to me, the objective of every single person in the benefits and the HR teams has to be to make sure that the vast majority of people do adopt something like this and that they sustain over time, because this only increases, improves over time. And again, it’s a virtual cycle. The more people you have it, the more it becomes a culture around you and the more benefits you reap. And then this is one benefit. But yes, we have less or fewer sick days. We have decreased in turnover because people get more engaged. And this has several elements to it. One because they actually feel better, but also because they have a better relationship with people around them, they can reap the benefits of doing those activities together. 

Frank Cottle [00:14:48]: On the decrease in turnover, again, I’m a data freak, so I apologize. I’ll keep asking you questions about that. On a decrease in turnover, do you have any metrics that says if you have 1000 employees on this program and half of them use the program actively once a week or more, that your decrease or your extension in lifecycle, employee lifecycle is one day, one month, one year, ten year? Do you have any metrics that says how much longer employees stay on average within a company or within a profile of company? 

Livia Martini [00:15:28]: Yeah, we have done this study as well. I don’t have it here up the top of my head, but maybe we can add as a side note here. 

Frank Cottle [00:15:36]: To the we’ll do an article after the podcast. We’ll include that data. 

Livia Martini [00:15:41]: But in the survey materials that we have, 85% of the HR leaders said that they saw a decreased cost in talent recruitment retention and an increase in engagement. So even if you can’t measure to the minimum percentage, we can see that in a day to day basis. 

Frank Cottle [00:16:08]: When you talk about a decreased cost, particularly in talent recruitment, battle for talent is always out there. There’s always a battle for talent. Do your client companies find that their sourcing of talent gets materially improved by having this program over some other healthcare program or something else? Do people really make a decision? Well, I’m going to go to work for Google because they use Gympas instead of Microsoft because they don’t. And I don’t know that one company or the other. So I’m just using that example. 

Livia Martini [00:16:51]: This is very interesting. So we see from the surveys that 96% of employees seek companies who prioritize well being. So this is independently of what type of program you have. But then, for example, in Brazil, that is the first country where Gympass was launched, we actually looked at LinkedIn job openings and the number of LinkedIn job postings that list Gympass as like the top three benefits. So they say, oh, we have meal vouchers, we have health insurance, we have Gympass or some other order of this. There is a vast, vast majorities of companies using this to attract talent. And I think it’s very smart because you show very easily how much investment the company is making in the well being of employees. And this is a serious concern. This is a serious, or it’s part of the culture of the company to have something like this. 

Frank Cottle [00:17:57]: Well, in business today, one of the topics that we hear about, I think too much about myself a little bit, is the loneliness epidemic. Okay, I’m going to assume, and you can fill it in, but I’m going to assume that Gympass by bringing people together, either for cross country challenges, which is something that I think is really unique, I can do more push ups than the guy in Germany. That kind of thing is always fun. It’s always fun to have athletic activities, but actually, the german fellow probably do more than me. But how are you addressing or how do you think this addresses such things as the loneliness epidemic and mental health as opposed to physical health? I think we can all see how this can address physical health. I think we can all see how culturally, by having another way to bring people together, there is an advantage, and it doesn’t matter what it is, there’s always an advantage to that. But how do you see this addressing mental health? 

Livia Martini [00:19:11]: Also, the more studies come out about this, I think we know no longer to separate the verticals of well being into completely distinct animals, let’s say. So if you work out and you take care of your physical well being, you sleep better. If you sleep better, your mental health improves and it’s, again, a virtual cycle. But the way that we are looking at wellbeing at Gympass is to be as all encompassing as we can be and offering different types of solutions for different types of people. So we now have a number of, for example, meditation of, we have a product called trainiac that is a well being coach. So a trainiac coach may talk to you, Frank, and say you want to do longer walks. So potentially you change your nutrition here, maybe change this or that habit to help you with sleep and all of these things also address that topic. And then we have different offerings of specifically mental health solutions. They change per country. But for example, in Brazil, we have a therapy product that also you can enroll just like a regular once a week therapy session, and we’re seeing amazing results from that. We have several clients who have been using this product and giving great feedback. But I really do believe that if you work on only one thing, it already improves all of the other ones. But if you have a combination, which is what we are trying to provide as well, is what has the best results over time. 

Frank Cottle [00:21:06]: If you were to pick one thing within the offering or within the wellness spectrum, I guess forget Jim, pass for a minute. Just from your broad base of experience within the wellness spectrum, if you were to pick one thing and say, all I can do is this one thing, and it’s going to have a biggest impact possible, what do you think? It. I know that’s a hard, kind of a loaded question, but you see a. 

Livia Martini [00:21:37]:  Lot of this, Livia, and I’ve been reading a lot about it, and I particularly am biased because I have chronic illness and I’m dealing with that for many years. So I’m going to give you a loaded answer as well. I think that if you force me to pick one and only one, that would be physical exercise, and to me, it would be something building towards the future. So essentially taking care of muscles, making sure that you are nimble, agile, and everything that you need to age well. However, in my particular experience, I think what revolutionized my life and my level of energy was the quality of my sleep and the quality of my nutrition. So when I combined the three, to me, it was a very clear revolution in my life and my health. And then nowadays, I do have to pick. This week I made that choice. I wasn’t sleeping very well. I was traveling, so different time zone, different pillows and et cetera, and I had to make a choice to sleep 1 hour more or go to the gym. I slept 1 hour more. So now I see the effect of a good night of sleep in my energy, my focus, my everything. And then there are things that we don’t even know that harm our sleep, that we do every day, even watching tv until a late hour or eating too late, close to bedtime. So I also have these glasses, have the lenses against blue light because you’re every day, all day in front of the computer. That also influences how the quality of your sleep is. But then those are simple changes. Very tiny, very simple. That’s why I say do the most that you can. 

Frank Cottle [00:23:35]: They’re all physical changes. I think I read an interesting article the other day about longevity. I have a fair amount of gray hair, so longevity is always of interest to me. And also when I look at the future of work, the extension of your work life is inevitable. We’re living longer. There’s a balance between younger and older employees. Younger employees won’t be able to support older employees. At some point, as that balance picks up, goes out. It’s a baby boomer problem if you think about it, and there is a variety, just like you were getting of these are all the things you can do to have a quality of life. And this isn’t just work life, just a pure quality of life, if you’re going to do that one thing, and they indicated exercise, that if you can keep at it and find joy in it, which you would do with others from your culture, from your company and that sort of thing, that you have a tremendous advantage. And I think we’re going to need that advantage because a lot of us are not retiring at a traditional age, are saying, no, I want to keep working, I want to keep producing. I like the money, I like my job, I like my friends. I don’t want to just be relegated to doing nothing. And that takes health. You have to be healthy to do that. So exercise, and exercise with others in particular is a hugely valuable element to longevity. I know as we look at the future of work, though, as we look at the way people are working as we go forward, all the different models, the corporate remote. I’m working from my home, so that’s a remote worker. You might be working from a co working center, so you’d be a hybrid worker. There’s all these different models that we’re talking about now, and we know that the key, one word is flexibility. That’s in the way that we will work today and in the future. We’ve been saying for almost ten years now that there are no occupiers of space anymore. There are only travelers. Only travelers. And we all are local digital nomads. At the least. We might be true digital nomads living in other countries and doing gig work or something, but every one of us today is a traveler on a local basis, the way we work. So how do you bring a culture of a company together focused on well being in order to reap the benefits that you’re talking about when we’re all in motion constantly and when you’re in motion. I’d rather be in motion moving around from one little workplace to another, from my office to my house or my house to maybe a restaurant for a lunch meeting, that sort of thing, than having an hour and a half commute on a train somewhere. Heaven forbid. That robs, I think, that kind of commute. If you look at the people that take those commutes versus the people that don’t, that work in a remote or a hybrid environment, the physical well being of the latter is much greater than the former because that type of static commute robs you of time. And you need time to deal with the issues, personal issues and well being. But how do you see all that as we go the next generation? How sustainable do you think this is? 

Livia Martini [00:27:34]: We saw in the survey as well that the worst is not even the people who need to commute an hour and a half, but are the ones that need to commute an hour and a half and don’t want to. 

Frank Cottle [00:27:45]: Yeah. 

Livia Martini [00:27:46 ]: So it’s the ones who would. 

Frank Cottle [00:27:48]: Who would want to? Who would want to. 

Livia Martini [00:27:51]: Some people who truly value being at the office, changing environments, seeing other people. We have that. We have a few of those in our team. That’s why I keep saying flexibility, flexibility. And here, to me, the only way, again, to make it work is to have coherent policies and processes and great role models. So you need to have other people who you look up to doing things the way that you would want to do them, or again, role modeling to influence you to do it that way. And I think this is a very interesting role for leaders. I think that this is a natural spotlight that we place on the leaders. If I want to get there in that point of the career as they are, I need to do things as they’re doing. So the leaders need to do that. And the interesting part that I saw is 91% of directors and above say that they can take time to prioritize their well being, but then you go down the ladder. People who are managers. So not directors, only first line leaders and people who are non managers, this falls significantly. So when you’re an individual contributor, only 66% say that they can take care of their well being. So to me, this means that either we’re lacking processes and culture around this, or we’re missing role models because they need to see that the leader goes maybe to a 02:00 p.m. Yoga session, or they build breaks in between their meetings and say, I’m going to have a ten minute meditation right now. Things like that are really influential to people trying to make this work. So even to me, if you are hybrid, if you are 100% remote, if you have never met your colleagues in person, if you just talk about things, it’s already a great step. So things that you do, things that you value, things that are important, maybe for a family member or if you show your set up. I, for example, have a space that I do yoga twice a week at home, so I have that space dedicated to yoga. Showing those things to me has a huge impact. 

Frank Cottle [00:30:23]: Weights at my desk. 

Livia Martini [00:30:25]: That’s perfect. Showing that, talking about that. 

Frank Cottle [00:30:29]: Yeah, it is what you’re saying. I think there’s a couple of big conclusions here. First, you have to have a program. To have a program. 

Livia Martini [00:30:40 ]: Yes. 

Frank Cottle [00:30:41]: Number one, you have to make it, turn it into a friendly discipline that you enjoy with others. Second, exercise. You don’t exercise. All the other elements of well being are diminished. Third, it’s top down. If the leaders aren’t leading in wellness, then the non leaders will not participate to the same degree. So the company and the individuals within the company will not reap the same benefits. 

Livia Martini [00:31:16]: Exactly. 

Frank Cottle [00:31:17 ]: Those are the three big takeaways I. 

Livia Martini [00:31:20 ]: Think that I’ve heard today, and I would add to the top down that it has to be top down and genuine. So, for example, you just say well being is important for us, but you work 24 hours a day. You don’t allow people to take PTO, even the most basic things it shows. So it has to be a top down, genuine decision and that you implement deliberately across the organization. 

Frank Cottle [00:31:50]:  Yeah, no, I would absolutely agree with that. And I think that as we look towards a future work, these changes, which might seem subtle, are really tectonic in their forces. They’re massive overall. And I think that it’s something in the instability that we see in the world today. There’s a little piece of sanity left in just going to work out or that ten minute meditation time. You have to find your sanity a lot of times as much as your physical improvement. So that’s great. Well, OLivia, I really am grateful to you and jimpass for participating with us today. Really. So if someone wanted to learn more about Gympass or reach out to you or one of your colleagues, how would they do? So? 

Livia Martini [00:32:47 ]: I think our website is the best channel. So gympass.com, we have all of the surveys there as well, and we have blog posts that talk about these things that we have been talking about, how to create a culture of well being, how to engage employees. And to my fellow HR folks who are thinking about Gympass I also need to say that we have a lot of support for us. So when you’re implementing the program and you’re trying to build more engagement, there’s a lot of support in that as well, because we know that this is what makes the difference there is to have all of the stakeholders and the whole ecosystem working towards the same direction. 

Frank Cottle [00:33:39]: Well, thank you again very much, and I look forward to working out this afternoon. 

Livia Martini [00:33:44 ]: Perfect. Enjoy your workout. 

Frank Cottle [00:33:47]: Take care, Frank. Bye.

Livia Martini [00:33:49]:Bye.