Workplace Wellbeing with Dr. Sarah Matyko, Sonic Boom Wellness

In this HRchat episode, we ask are employers ‘missing the mark’ when it comes to workplace wellbeing?

Bill's guest this time is Dr. Sarah Matyko, Vice President of client success at Sonic Boom Wellness. Sarah oversees all client-facing operations and provides coaching and direction for all client success managers, ensuring client relationships are productive, effective, and sustainable when it comes to addressing top population health needs for that client. 

Questions for Sarah include:

• What is the root cause behind the current workforce wellbeing inflection point? 
• Where are employers ‘missing the mark’ when it comes to workplace wellbeing? 
• Employers are busy. How can they provide an employee experience that promotes wellbeing on top of all the other business priorities they are already doing? 
• Is ROI even possible when discussing workplace wellbeing? What's the business case? 
• What are some action items that our listeners can take away from our convo and implement right away? 

More About Sarah

Prior to joining Sonic Boom, Sarah was the corporate director of life enrichment at Senior Resource Group (SRG), where she provided development, oversight, and direction to achieve proactive outcomes via a population health management program. Before joining SRG in 2017, she led the U.S. Navy’s population health program, a $25M initiative designed to optimize Population Health strategies through the integration of healthcare delivery, proactive data analysis & clinical wellness services for 400,000 beneficiaries.

Sarah received her bachelor’s degree in exercise physiology from West Virginia University with a minor in gerontology. Dr. Matyko then obtained her master’s and doctorate from the University of Southern California (USC) with a specialization in Lifestyle Redesign® and Behavioral Science. Dr. Matyko has been an American Council on Exercise and an American College of Sports Medicine certified personal trainer since 1999. She’s also a Certified Diabetes Educator and an Occupational Therapist. 


We do our best to ensure editorial objectivity. The views and ideas shared by our guests and sponsors are entirely independent of The HR Gazette, HRchat Podcast and Iceni Media Inc.   

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

Welcome to the HR Chat show, one of the world's most downloaded and shared podcasts designed for HR pros, talent execs, tech enthusiasts, and business leaders for hundreds more episodes and what's new in the world of work, subscribe to the show, follow us on social media, and visit hr gazette.com.

Speaker 2: 0:26

Welcome to another episode of the HR Chat Show. I'm your host today, bill B , and in this episode we're gonna ask, where are employers missing the mark when it comes to workplace wellbeing ? My guest this time is Dr. Sarah Matiko , vice President of Client Success over at Sonic Boom Wellness. As VP Sarah oversees all client facing operations and provides coaching and direction for all client success managers, ensuring client relationships are productive, effective, and sustainable when it comes to addressing top population health needs for that client . Hey, Sarah , it's my pleasure to welcome you to the show today.

Speaker 3: 1:08

Hi, bill. Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here.

Speaker 2: 1:12

So Sarah , be on my reintroduction there. Why don't you start by taking a minute or two and telling our listeners a bit more about yourself and a bit more about the mission of Sonic Boom Wellness.

Speaker 3: 1:23

Absolutely. I joined Sonic Boom Wellness in 2022 as the vice president of client success. So I oversee the coaching and direction for all of our client success managers that work with our clients throughout the nation , um, and am responsible for the programming and population health needs for each client. I have my bachelor's degree in exercise physiology, my master's in doctorate from U S C with a specialization in lifestyle redesign and behavioral science. I'm a certified diabetes educator and an occupational therapist, so a big nerd <laugh> . And my background and experience in my career has been focused primarily on proactive prevention, lifestyle medicine, and population health.

Speaker 2: 2:09

Okay. So you are an all round good human being, doing good work. Then by the sounds of it. Um, in your opinion, Sarah , what is the root cause behind the current workforce wellbeing inflection point that we're we're all living through at the moment?

Speaker 3: 2:24

Great question. I think there are several factors at play. The truth is that for too long we've really had this artificial barrier between work and home. We've assumed that whatever happens at home should just, we should just be able to check at the door when you come to work and it shouldn't affect you and vice versa. And we know maybe the silver lining of covid covid, that's not how human beings are built . If your kiddo is sick and you're really worried about them, that's gonna affect how you are at work. And it doesn't mean that you're a weak human being or that you're not a good worker. It just means that you're human. On the same note, if you're having a tough time at work, like a really bad day that's causing stress in your work life, it's gonna spill over into how you interact with your family and how you show up for your friends and how you show up in your community. So right now, workers are reexamining what they want from Merck and what they want from life. And it's why around 80% of workers, according to Gallup, not only say that workplaces contribute to their wellbeing, but they also say that they're going to be looking to bring their talent to workplaces that support their wellbeing. So really this driver behind workplace wellbeing's inflection point is, is showing us that workplace wellbeing is a business imperative. And at Sonic Boom , we see this daily with our clients at both the company and the individual level is that success is a byproduct of wellbeing and that important interplay between work and home is a strength. And that's what we do at Sonic Boom . And why I'm so excited to have joined them is that we create environments where workers can find connection and can community, and where they know that they're valued and that they matter. And that interplays what's driving this current wellbeing inflection point because work and health are deeply intertwined.

Speaker 1: 4:22

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Speaker 2: 4:46

Okay, thank you very much. Um, times are a wee bit tougher at the moment than they were perhaps a year ago when it comes to jobs, of course, Sarah , um mm-hmm . <affirmative> certain jobs such as developers, you know , certainly just generally within tech, it's a wee bit more difficult at the moment. And another , uh, skilled worker based jobs . Um , is wellbeing still as important to employees today as it was a year ago? Or are other factors , uh, taking precedent at the moment, like having a job, having a regular salary?

Speaker 3: 5:17

Yeah, great question. You know, all sectors of the economy right now are struggling to fill vacancies to get people back to work. Organizations in all sectors are changing longstanding policies and they're offering unprecedented incentives. I think despite the great resignation and this reckoning that workers are having, this, his historical principle agent model of work is outdated, and that is sort of the transactional model. Historically, we have always thought that workers show up, we pay them to do the work, and they go home. And that's really that transactional model. That mindset isn't valid anymore, it's long gone. And really that's where employees are missing the mark. Um, that model's antiquated and more so right now than ever in the history of the world, workers are going through a reckoning. They're asking themselves what they want out of work and what they're willing to tolerate and sacrifice for work. And it's really not just our tech clients, our developers that are sitting behind a desk working at a computer. It's also cashiers in our grocery stores, people working in our factories and front lines , workers who are in government and nonprofit . It's just all sectors of business across the board.

Speaker 2: 6:41

Okay . So what you're saying is times have changed, bill , um, even if, even if certain jobs are harder to come by right now , um, and, and obviously as you just mentioned there in in many, many different , uh, sectors and many different job types, actually , uh, it's the opposite. There , there is still a talent shortage, but , um, in either case , uh, people, people just won't accept poor conditions anymore. They won't accept working for companies who don't care about their , their wellbeing. And long may that continue. Yes,

Speaker 3: 7:11

I'm , I'm here here,

Speaker 2: 7:12

<laugh>, I'm a big proponent of that. I , I I think that's a , that's a great , uh, thing that came outta the pandemic. The pandemic was a horrible time. But , um, one thing that did come through for all of us, I think is, is a new onus on our mental and physical wellbeing. Um , the reality is though that employers are pretty busy. How can they provide an employee experience that promotes wellbeing on top of all of their other business priorities that they're really dealing with?

Speaker 3: 7:39

Yeah, really great question. Um, you know, I've said, I said this historic before, but wellbeing is the foundation of sustainable, high performance and employee engagement, not a perk or reward for it. So contrary to popular relief , the the proverbial pizza parties don't drive engagement for our employees , um, companies that do it right. And they really, they really stand to gain an immense advantage in terms of talent acquisition, retention, engagement and results, all those things. All that said, the reality really is that we cannot live a long active life alone. And why would we want to? Because we're better together. Connection to others fuels our joy. It gives us purpose and provides meaning. And, and to answer your question, sometimes I find that the most powerful advice is rooted in simple core lessons. And I found that as human beings, we all want to be seen and understood for who we are. We all wanna know that we matter and we all want to be loved for our contributions. If employers inculcate those three things that humanness into the very fabric of their organizational culture , they can make an immediate and tremendous impact .

Speaker 1: 8:57

Thanks for tuning in to the HR Chat podcast. If you're enjoying this episode, we'd really appreciate it if you could subscribe and leave a five star review on your podcast platform of choice. And now back to the conversation.

Speaker 2: 9:15

Okay. Rock and roll. Love it. You are such a positive person. I love your energy. Keep it up. Thank you . Keep it up. Likewise, <laugh> <laugh> . Ok . Let's talk a bit about the business case then. Ok . Cause ob obviously ultimately , uh, all of this stuff has gotta get sold up to, to the bigwig at the top tables. Uh , is , is, is ROIs return on investment even possible when discussing workplace wellbeing? Are there actual numbers that we can point to in terms of retention rates , um, uh, lowered levels of absenteeism or presenteeism, things like that? Um , but also are there other metrics that we should be talking about, return on engagement rates, for example?

Speaker 3: 9:53

Yes, really great question. You know, ROI is complex, especially in proactive prevention. If you start eating healthy and clean and, and change your lifestyle to where you're feeling great, you potentially could have prevented a heart attack or some other catastrophic health illness, but you can't put a cost on that. Um, if we can figure it out, bill, we will become multimillionaires together. But right now, no one really knows how to do that. So ROI needs to be a culmination of metrics and not just one. And I think employers need are starting to realize that and need to continue to think more broadly. Really an integrated approach that encompasses both the individual employee and the organization is essential to optimize wellbeing and performance at a human and company level. So employers need to be analyzing and using a culmination of metrics to really gauge value against their specific goals. So it , it should be aligned with the organization's unique culture. If the employee , if the organization's goal is employee retention, then that should be , uh, a measure that they're , um, including in their workplace wellbeing efforts. For example, I used to work , um, at a company that was geographically dispersed and we had Sonic Boom Wellness. I was on the other side as a client, and I could see that like in our Air Arizona community, our employees that were more engaged in Sonic Boom Wellness, the digital platform, that location had higher customer satisfaction, less employee attrition, and a whole bunch of other metrics. Whereas another location, say in like the state of Washington, those employees weren't as engaged with our wellbeing platform. Our customer satisfaction scores were lower, we had more employee attrition , um, less NPS scores for employee satisfaction. So you've really gotta look at a culmination of metrics in order to truly determine if your efforts are successful. And additionally, research , research is starting to quantify the impact of things like sleep de deprivation, exercise, nutrition on cognitive performance, our ability to think on our feet, to be creative and collaborate and to collaborate online, which is <laugh> much harder than in person . So we're , we're evolving in that direction and I can't wait to see where that research goes.

Speaker 4: 12:29

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Speaker 2: 13:05

Me neither. Me neither. We'll have to get you back on the show, Sarah , uh, to , to talk more about that, that's for sure . I'd love to . Ok . Um, next, I'd love to ask you , what are , what are some action items then that our listeners can maybe take away from our conversation today and, and implement right away? So you are talking to the world's finest HR pros, leaders, and talent pros, of course today . You know , those are the folks who generally tune in, although , uh, we like anybody to tune in if they've got an interest in the world of work. Of course. So what , what are some big tips, some big takeaways that you'd like to leave our listeners with?

Speaker 3: 13:39

Yeah. CliffNotes version is to make sure your employees are feeling uplifted rather than depleted by their jobs. James Clear is the author of a book called Atomic Habits, which is one of my top fa five favorite books. And in his , um, book, he talks about winning the morning and how your mourning behavior set your trajectory for the course of the day, and that your actions are highly leveraged and have a large impact on how the rest of your day goes. And we all know this, right? Like we wake up in the morning and we do some doom scrolling on social media instead of getting up and working out or meditating. But, and so your day kind of just goes math from there. But if you wake up and you set yourself up for success by winning the morning, working out, meditating, taking some time for yourself, whatever that is, the trajectory of your day goes much better. I think that leaders need to apply the same principle for their teams As leaders, we should be intentional and helping our teams find love in what they do every single day. Um, and we know that when leaders take the moment to show and talk about and show care and talk to their teams about their wellbeing, those team members contribute more to the workplace. I , I think the bottom line is focusing on your team members' wellbeing by connecting as a human and instead of a skillset . And if, if we can do that, the workplace is gonna be good for workers and it's gonna be good for the organization too. So it's a win-win.

Speaker 2: 15:17

Very good. Very good. And just finally, before we do wrap up for today, Sarah , how can our listeners connect with you? So maybe that's through LinkedIn, maybe you wanna share your email address, maybe your call and your own places like Instagram and Twitter and such. Um, and of course, how can they learn more about all the cool things happening over at Sonic Boom Wellness?

Speaker 3: 15:37

Absolutely. Um, my LinkedIn would be a great place to connect with me. My email address is Sarah with an h dot Matco , m a t y k o@sbwell.com and the Sonic Boom Wellness website is , um, up and ready. We would love to, to connect with anybody who's interested.

Speaker 2: 15:57

Excellent. And then will of course listeners be links in the show notes in case your pencil broke when you're scribbling down all those details. Sarah , that just leads me to say for today , uh, thank you very much for being my guest on this episode of the HR Chat Show.

Speaker 3: 16:11

Thanks for having me, bill . This was fun.

Speaker 2: 16:13

And listeners, as always, until next time, happy working.

Speaker 1: 16:20

Thanks for listening to the HR Chat show. If you enjoyed this episode, why not subscribe and listen to some of the hundreds of episodes published by HR Gazette? And remember for what's new in the world of work, subscribe to the show. Follow us on social media and visit hr gazette.com.