Is Your Corporate Wellness Program Making You Sick And Fat?

Ben Greenfield (0:02)

Hey, folks, it's Ben Greenfield here. And as you know, corporate wellness is a pretty big issue in terms of the millions of individuals spread across the country and across the world who are working in a corporate environment on a day-to-day basis and encountering a lot of barriers sometimes when it comes to staying healthy, staying fit, eating right. And I wanted to address that on today's show.

On the line with me right now is someone who is in the trenches when it comes to corporate wellness and works as a corporate wellness coach. Her name is Sabrina Little. And Sabrina, thanks for coming on the call today.

Sabrina Little (0:43)

Oh, you're welcome. I'm excited.

Ben Greenfield (0:45)

So kind of before we get into some practical things people can do to stay fit, some things that corporations can do to help their employees stay fit.

What is it that you do as a corporate wellness coach? What's your day look like? When you wake up in the morning, what's work for you?

Sabrina Little (1:01)

Basically, I get up and do my workout.

And then I start calling my clients.

So I'm a telephonic wellness coach. And I'm paired up with these people. And they're people that I have talked to before.

And I probably have anywhere from 8 to 15 clients a day. And I get on the phone and call them up. And we start talking about whatever they want to talk to about their wellness. And every person is different. Every call is completely different. You never really know what you're getting. But the coaching is individual to the person. It's all about them. And we talk about what they feel like is their biggest challenge or what they want to pursue. And that's what I do all day, five days a week. And it's great because you make a difference every time you pick up the phone.

Ben Greenfield (2:02)

So do you kind of do that? Are you working independently or do corporations call you and hire you? Or are you working for a company or something of that nature?

Sabrina Little (2:16)

Okay, so I work for US. Corporate Wellness, and our company pairs up with corporations usually that have over 100 employees. And the corporation signs on with our company for a wellness program. And then we, the coaches, get matched with employees.

So, every employee has the chance to get to have their own personal wellness coach that they stick with for as long as their corporation sticks with the wellness program.

Ben Greenfield (2:50)

Okay, gotcha. Cool. That's a unique approach, I think, it sounds like.

So you're working with these folks, telephonically, not telepathically, I know the big difference between these two words, I got to be careful. So when you're talking to these people, and I know there's a lot of these people, as an annual employees who are in the workplace, day to day basis, what are the barriers, the issues that face folks when it comes to staying fit in a corporate environment?

Sabrina Little (3:25)

You know, it's interesting because people, everybody's different, but I feel like the thing that is common among people in the workplace is that they're just stressed, and they feel like they have no time.

They feel out of balance. With the economy, companies have downsized a lot. A lot of employees are doing jobs that used to be done by two or more people, so they're working a lot harder, they're having less energy for outside pursuits, or they're working more hours, because they're working two jobs, so that's stressful, or they're under financial stress, even if they have a job, so it's all about stress for most people and that feeling of being out of balance. And we know stress causes people to get sick, it causes people to gain weight, and they just feel like they don't have a handle on their priorities. So interestingly enough, before people can really address things like, you know, we think about eating, healthy, and exercising, we really have to make sure that the person can get past that feeling of stress and feeling out of balance.

Ben Greenfield (4:35)

And how do they do that?

Sabrina Little (4:39)

Usually, we just talk through what they feel are their biggest issues with their time management or just with, you know, everybody's different, but at the same time, everybody feels out of balance. So, we just talk about individually what their specific barriers are.

And as their coach, it's my job to kind of pull things out of them, point it back to them and say, okay, this is what you're telling me, this is what I think could help. What do you think of that? What do you think would be your next step?