Resiliency Through CliftonStrengths: Physical Wellbeing

Ryan Wolf, Gallup's Physical Wellbeing Lead, was our guest on a recent Called to Coach. Ryan spoke about practical ways in which you can improve your physical wellbeing, including:

• What physical wellbeing means
• What leaders, coaches and managers can do to encourage people in this area
• Some ways for you to enhance your exercise program, in person and virtually

Access other webcasts in this Resiliency Through CliftonStrengths series: Career Wellbeing; Financial Wellbeing; Community and Social Wellbeing.

Below is a full transcript of the conversation, including time stamps. Full audio and video are posted above.

Physical wellbeing is a whole lot more than just going to the gym or eating broccoli. Now that can help. But the bigger thing is ... that physical wellbeing is all about building up energy.

Ryan Wolf, 3:32

I would just encourage leaders and managers to really communicate about how health and wellbeing right now [is] a safe subject. So it's safe to talk about.

Ryan Wolf, 27:58

[To replicate a high-energy, in-person exercise experience] virtually, think about who gives you energy and who gave you energy prior to this, and how you could connect with them.

Ryan Wolf, 25:20

Jim Collison 0:00

I am Jim Collison, and live from our virtual studios around the world -- at least for us here in the state of Nebraska -- this is Gallup's Called to Coach, recorded on August 21, 2020.

Jim Collison 0:22

Called to Coach is a resource for those who want to help others discover and use their strengths. We have Gallup experts and independent strengths coaches share tactics, insights and strategies to help coaches maximize the talent of individuals, teams and organizations around the world. If you're joining us live, there's actually a link right above me there in the live -- on the live page. That'll take you to a YouTube page that has the chat room on it. Log in with a Google account; let us know that you are there. You are welcome to ask us questions live during the program. If you're watching the recorded version on YouTube after the fact, or the podcast, you can send us questions: coaching@gallup.com. Don't forget, if you're there on YouTube, subscribe and Like us while you're there. If you want to listen to us as a podcast and you haven't subscribed yet, search "Gallup Webcasts" on any podcast app, and you get access to the 7 or 8 podcasts that we have available for you out there. Ryan Wolf is my guest today. Ryan works as a Physical Wellbeing Lead here at Gallup. And Ryan, not your first time on Called to Coach. We've had you on before. Welcome back.

Ryan Wolf 1:18

Hey, great to be here. And good to see you. Dude, we have known each other for -- since 2007. And basically every single week since 2007, we see each other and, and it's been, it's been a while. So yeah, good, good to be back here and looking forward to talking with you.

Jim Collison 1:37

As we think about physical wellbeing, you are my physical wellbeing champion. You've been my coach for 12 of those years. You've watched me run 5 marathons, climb vertical miles, mountains, and have been kind of my physical wellbeing champion of -- through all this. Today as we talk about this idea of resiliency through CliftonStrengths and physical wellbeing, there's some stories, just from the 12 years you and I have been doing things together, and a great kind of testimony. We made it through the '09 debacle. We've gone through a lot of things together workwise. We're doing the pandemic together. By the way, still connected. You're still my coach during this pandemic time; we still meet together. And so folks, folks who don't know, Ryan was also on a Theme Thursday back for Season 1. And I think we talked about your No. 1 theme of Discipline, right? You have Discipline, Achiever, Futuristic, Activator and Harmony, which is pretty great that you've got Discipline and Harmony there together. That's pretty awesome.

Ryan Wolf 2:38

It's a good balancing act.

Jim Collison 2:40

Hey, talk a little bit -- just before we get started, give folks an idea. What is your role at Gallup? And what does that, you know, "Physical Wellbeing Lead" is what I said. But what does that really mean?

Ryan Wolf 2:49

I support all of our health and wellbeing initiatives. So when you think about anything from physical health to more comprehensive wellbeing, helping our associates and our clients think about what helps them make a life well lived. And we provide resources and coaching and consulting around that.

Jim Collison 3:08

I think when some individuals come to physical wellbeing, they kind of think of it as just working out. Right? It's more than that, right, what, what else more is it more of than just working out?

Ryan Wolf 3:18

Well, this is, this is an important point that actually, when I was thinking about this, kind of yesterday, you know, what points do I want to hit on? And I do want the coaches to really help us spread the message that physical wellbeing is, is a whole lot more than just going to the gym or eating broccoli. Now those -- that can help, that can contribute. But the bigger thing is in the message that, the message that you can send to your clients and the people who you coach managers and leaders is that physical wellbeing is all about building up energy. OK?

Ryan Wolf 3:53

So, so really, that's the end game here. You want to be able to do all the things -- you want to be able to eat well, sleep good and be physically active, in order to build up your energy. So you can, you can have and explore your purpose in life, so you can have a great career and better relationships and, and, and all the elements of wellbeing. So, so that's what physical wellbeing is -- not just to me, but to, to the science and research that we've done on the topic.

Jim Collison 4:24

Jim Harter, kind of our Chief Scientist around wellbeing, says all the time, "It's hard to thrive when you're suffering." Like, it's hard to be thriving in any of the categories, if you have a, if you have a category that you are suffering in. And so I think we're gonna, we're gonna spend the next couple months kind of working through the 5 elements in out of our wellbeing book, creatively titled Wellbeing. And so if you, you can pick that up. The book's 10 years old; this is not new for Gallup, right. We've been in the wellbeing space a long time. We've actually partnered with a lot of organizations around wellbeing. Ryan, take a second, just because we're kicking off this series today of resiliency and wellbeing, what are the 5 elements of being -- of wellbeing? Can you just kind of talk about those?

Ryan Wolf 5:11

So there's Career Wellbeing, which sometimes we've referred to as Purpose Wellbeing, and that's really liking and loving what you do each day and being motivated to achieve your goals. And then there's Social Wellbeing. So having a lot of support in your life, and great relationships and experiencing love in your life. And then there's Financial Wellbeing, which, which doesn't mean getting rich; it means being able to manage out the stresses that finances can bring to our life. There's Community Wellbeing, which is all about liking where you live and feeling safe. And actually, even at the highest level of Community Wellbeing is having pride about where you live. And then of course, the, the the Physical element, which I, which I explained before.

Ryan Wolf 5:55

And Jim, we didn't just, we didn't just pick these 5 elements, right? We didn't just say, all right, what, which 5 do we want to make our top 5, in terms of wellbeing? We actually did -- there's a lot of research that went into it. And in 2010, you're right, the Wellbeing book came out. It was a culmination of a couple years of studying on our World Poll to really discover what are the common elements that people experience through all countries and walks of life.

Ryan Wolf 6:27

So that happened in about 2008, 2010ish -- in that range. But actually, our, our research on wellbeing dates back to the 1950s, with our founder. So George Gallup was keenly interested in wellbeing, and one of his projects was actually on Physical Wellbeing. So I hold it near and dear to my heart. He, in 1958 and 1959, he spent 3 months compiling a bunch of, a bunch of surveys and data on individuals in the United States who were over the age of 95. So he was super interested in learning about what helped them live a long and prosperous and resilient life. So he set out and gathered a bunch of great data. And the, you know, the, the methodology and the formulas that he, that he established back then are still in utilization today. So that's kind of how we, we ended up with the 5 elements we do today.

Jim Collison 7:29

Yeah, and for me, I was new to the organization when the book came out. And for the first time, it kind of walked me through or gave me a framework, much like CliftonStrengths gives me a framework to be able to talk about my talents. Well, this Wellbeing book gave me a framework to talk about these parts of my life that, if one is out of balance, can affect the rest. And it gave me the ability to really talk about them in a way I hadn't before. And so it, again, it created that framework. We have used that as well. When we say resiliency, Ryan, what do we mean by that? What does that really, in the, in the context, because I'm hearing that word thrown around a lot. When you say "resiliency," what do you mean by that?

Ryan Wolf 8:08

It's really being able to, to thrive in the face of adversity. So when there's, when there's challenges and there's illness and there's hardship, being able to get back on top of your game and being able to perform like, like kind of everybody expects you to and the level that you are -- that you're used to performing.

Jim Collison 8:31

OK, I think a great definition. And when we think about this area of wellbeing, it really is both subjective and objective, right? There's these two elements, can you talk a little bit about that?

Ryan Wolf 8:44

It's important, it's important to know that, you know, wellbeing is subjective and objective. And when, when Gallup measures wellbeing, we talk about how we're kind of measuring this objective area of it. So subjectivity is we're measuring how people feel, and how they experience their lives and how they evaluate their lives. So that's subjective. But what we've done is we've been able to tie those, those results and those ratings to some objective data. So, so it's important to kind of distinguish between the two and then know that sometimes wellbeing, wellness, it can kind of feel soft, but there's definitely some hard data that goes along with it.

Jim Collison 9:26

Can you talk a little bit -- just kind of quickly, what, what kind of hard data, when you say that, would we look at or what somebody could look at?

Ryan Wolf 9:33

So, yeah, we've, we've done a lot of research on it. So, so we found that those who are, who are engaged are more likely to be thriving in their level of wellbeing. And thriving means that you rate your life on account on the Cantril scale, 0 to 10, as a 7 or higher, and also as an 8 or higher when you answer the question, "What will my life look like in 5 years?" So when you rate those questions a 7 and an 8, that's thriving. There's two other levels below that. But when we look at those who are engaged and also thriving in their wellbeing, they're 38% less likely to have unplanned days off of work due to illness or sickness. So they're a lot -- a lot more likely to show up and be there, day in and day out, which is kind of resilience, right? They're also a lot less likely to leave the organization: 30% less likely to leave the organization, if they are engaged and they have high wellbeing.

Jim Collison 10:38

What other, you know, so we think about absenteeism. And we think about turnover. Those are important. But what other -- inside organizations, because it's -- this is really important, especially during this time. What is the, particularly with physical wellbeing, when we think about stress, when we think about mental health, what do we know about physical wellbeing and its ability to combat that?

Ryan Wolf 11:02

Well, they're really correlated and it's, it's symbiotic. And you can kind of think of physical wellbeing and mental wellbeing as being one in the same. And, and because they're the same, so are the -- the other elements are also symbiotic. In the book, Harter refers to it as being interdependent or interrelated. And when, when we have, when they can lift each other up, and, and, you know, I kind of like to help people think about kind of their wellbeing in terms of a pie. So it's, it's physical wellbeing is 20% of it, or, yes, 20%. So, when you're working on physical wellbeing, you're not, you're not just taking that 20% away and just focusing on, on it and kind of reducing your pie. You're actually increasing the size of your pie because it has so much spillover effect, and you can feel it in other areas and other elements of your life.

Jim Collison 11:53

Ryan, at Gallup, of course, we have you, and we actually have teams working on this for us, right, on behalf of the employees at Gallup. We, one of the great things -- I just celebrated 13 years at Gallup, and one of my favorite things about working there is when we publish something, when we talk about something, we don't just say it. We actually do it. And in some cases, we do it more than anybody else does. I'm thinking back, when we think about resiliency, I'm thinking back to '09 and things, the U.S. economy is crumbling, right. And we're, we're diving into one of the deepest recessions that the world's seen in a while. And leadership makes the decision to not just do a Q12 to find out how we feel, but we do 4 that year. Every quarter, we implement a Q12 to ask ourselves how we're feeling, right, this idea of that.

Jim Collison 12:41

Likewise, at Gallup, I come in and see you 4 times a year to get a check on my own physical health, right, blood, blood pressure, weight. We talk about goals, fitness goals, some of those kinds of things. When you think about how we're attacking the, the area of physical wellbeing for Gallup, what do we do -- what kind of programs do we have that helps our employees be resilient?

Ryan Wolf 13:03

Yeah, before the pandemic, we had a great fitness center that was operating. It never had closed since 2003, when we first, when we first opened up and built that Riverfront campus in Omaha. But, but now it's all virtual. And we're providing a lot of, a lot of variety of resources, which I think is important, and, and tidbits of information. Not anything that's, that is super comprehensive, because a lot of people just don't have time or the bandwidth to really tackle something that's maybe like your typical wellness or physical wellbeing type of program, that's maybe a whole week long or a whole month long -- type of an initiative. So we have quick little bites. We have, we have Zoom classes. We actually have a lot of talented associates at Gallup who are certified in yoga or jazzercise or other forms of group exercise leading classes. So we host those.

Ryan Wolf 14:01

We have, we have a Teams channel dedicated to just physical wellbeing, and people can, I'm contributing to it every day. Others can contribute and participate in it and kind of feel that, feel that and share that -- that, those, those health, health knowledge and inspiration. There's also a big emphasis on the EAP -- Employee Assistance Programs -- which which are super, super important. And you know, before the pandemic, the the utilization of of EAPs was, you know, between 1% and 5% for most vendors. And those, those rates have just completely shot up, which is great to see. People are feeling like they -- that now they at least know about this, this benefit and now that like now it's time to actually kind of take advantage of it.

Jim Collison 14:53

We, we have created a Peloton group just as an informal, right?

Ryan Wolf 14:57

Tell them about it.

Jim Collison 14:58

Folks who have -- have the Peloton bike. You don't have to have the bike to participate in the group, which is super great if you, if you have a bike. Actually, the Peloton app has walking workouts; it has running workouts, right? I mean, there's lots of things associated with it. It's actually inexpensive for the app; I think it's $12 a month to be able to participate. They have coaching sessions that you can go in there and get, get yelled at. And, and sometimes not.

Jim Collison 15:24

They also -- Peloton is kind of let out in this by being -- of doing some mindfulness during their workouts. The, their coaches do some mindfulness-type activities during the workouts for you, which is super great. Not that we all need to run out and support Peloton, but the idea, like, Ryan is that as an organization, we have rallied around some common things with us, right. We've rallied around some activities that work for us. We have found some things together as an organization to do that.

Jim Collison 15:54

I think the key, though, is we've, we've really kind of added some of those questions into what our managers are following up with. We're going to talk -- in a little bit, we're going to talk about the 4 Needs of Followers. We're going to kind of bring that all together in that. Don't want to go to a quite yet. But I think it's kind of really, really important, as we think about the 5 Conversations, and now the 5 Conversations that managers have with their employees. How in their Quick Connects and how in their, you know, those times that they have together, right? Are they bringing it in? Ryan, do you get any kind of sense that -- we used to be able to do that when we'd see each other? But now we have to be about intentional on Zoom. Has that changed the equation? Or would you get any advice? How do we talk about physical wellbeing virtually?

Jim Collison 15:57

People are just talking more about it. And you just got to not be afraid to discuss it and just help people understand. It, you know, wellness or physical health, it kind of started off as a, as a kind of a private topic. But now it's all out there. It's -- talk about physical wellbeing, back to my main point early on, as, you know, a way to build your energy, your productive energy. So when, when you come with that in mind, and that backdrop, then it's not as personal to talk about, you know, what, what kind of physical activity have you been getting in? Or what have you been thinking about doing? Or who have you been involving in your routine? Or, you know, what, what are some of your goals? Or what have you been doing that you found that, that makes a difference for you? And could you share that with the group? sort of thing.

Jim Collison 17:22

With nutrition, we have been, here at the Collison house, starting at the pandemic, we immediately went back to 100% meal planning. So every week, every meal is planned, it's intentional now. I'll be honest, we're eating better now than we were prepandemic. There was a lot of fast food. There was a lot of eating out that was associated with that. We used this as an opportunity here to kind of refocus and to get, get kind of more purposeful in what we're doing moving forward. What kind of, what -- besides things like that, from an organizational standpoint, how can organizations help people in that area of meal planning or preparation or diet, when we think about what we eat?

Ryan Wolf 18:07

I would reach out to your partners and vendors that you have relationships established with already. They likely -- so things like your EAP, there's pretty good chance that you're in a larger organization, you've got an EAP and your health, health insurance provider. They have a ton of these. Start there. They have a lot of resources that, that can open up a lot of doors for people. Then, then start passing the mic around and letting people share what works for them. Recognize other people. And, and that way, others can kind of get an idea of what, what people are experimenting with, trying, and kind of break down any barriers that they might have previously had that -- "I can't do this" or "That's not for me." It just really helps people to have that, maybe that, that example.

Jim Collison 19:05

Yeah, and I think we also work in this area, right? If there's organizations that are struggling, they don't want to try to figure this all out on their own, right. They can contact us, right? What would be the best way -- if they wanted to have a conversation or get some, get some consulting started around this idea. You're our lead on that. How would they contact?

Ryan Wolf 19:24

Yeah, the gallup.com page has, has a submission form. You can you can email me email Jim [Harter] or myself. We can talk about this and get you into the right channel and people to get something established. There's, there's also questions. Jim probably knows more about this than me, than -- like on Access -- that can, you can, you can survey and pulse the organ -- large organizations about their wellbeing so that can be measured and managed effectively.

Jim Collison 19:56

Yeah, no, that's a great point. So for our enterprise clients who are on Access and have access to the Q12 and the pulse, the ability to survey out through Access, now would be a great time for organizations to start thinking about, Hey, maybe we need to ask questions beyond "How do you feel?" But "What are you doing?" And "How are you doing it?" And "What's being effective? What's in our current program that's being effective?"

Jim Collison 20:21

I think, Ryan, and, and let's just talk a smidge about this. If you are -- you're a Certified Coach, right? You're a, you're a Certified Coach. What kind of advice would you give to coaches coaching both managers, teams, organizations or individuals? How do they use this physical wellbeing element inside of their coaching? What kind of advice would you give to them? How do they bring it up? What kind of questions could they ask? I totally didn't prep you for this question. But kind of just tell me like what kind of advice --

Ryan Wolf 20:50

The wheels are spinning.

Jim Collison 20:51

Yeah. What kind of -- you have Discipline; you're gonna do great. What kind of advice would you give individuals -- coaches?

Ryan Wolf 20:58

First, to let the wheels keep going in the background here, you got to -- most people here probably know Maika, right?

Jim Collison 21:04

Yeah.

Ryan Wolf 21:05

She leads, she leads and spearheads the Peloton group. She kind of she got it started before -- prepandemic, right? And has she talked much about it publicly?

Jim Collison 21:19

No, we actually haven't. No, we haven't. But this is a great, a great avenue to be able to talk about the outcomes. I think the key is, so here, let me give key No. 1: Coaches, as you're helping organizations, you're helping individuals, start identifying individuals in an organization who have that natural tendency (sounds like strengths) towards, towards doing these kinds of things, right.

Jim Collison 21:41

In our case, Maika had this -- she bought a bike; she wanted to do it. She, she met with you and said, "Hey, I want to start this group." We started the group; it's been very, very successful, right? But it was successful because you let her, you let her lead out with that, right. So find those natural tendencies inside organizations where these kinds of things are happening. Oftentimes, they get squashed because it didn't follow the right path. Like it didn't come from HR or whatever, right. And so --

Ryan Wolf 22:09

Those grassroots leaders are great. So do, do amplify their efforts. And also just let them, let them have that, that space right now. Now's not a great time to be, you know, bureaucratic and think about, "Is this the right way to do it?" If it feels like it's contributing to others' wellbeing, just keep going with it and keep letting it happen organically, which is great. I mean, that, that truly shows that somebody cares, which is, you know, one of our engagement questions, somebody cares about you at work. If they care enough about your, your health and your physical wellbeing, that's going to lead to those some of those outcomes that I talked about earlier.

Ryan Wolf 22:49

You know, think about, as coaches, talk, help people really lean in and intentionally use their innate abilities as it relates to their health and wellbeing. So don't -- you know, if you think about like Influencing themes, you know, encourage them to just kind of tell others what they're doing. And don't just keep it to yourself. You know, start a, start a new routine or a group with, with friends and colleagues. So you don't have to go out and do it on your own. There's probably others who want to join you. And, you know, think about, you know, with Maximizer, think about ways you can kind of get more out of what you can do. If you go to the other themes, there's a lot that you can dive into. That was kind of painting with a broad stroke there with Influencing themes, but think about each, each of those, those themes and, and how it can contribute to your health.

Jim Collison 23:45

Ryan, I think we have a question from the chat room. Marina asks, For many people, exercise is a group activity, right? We have a fitness center. It's empty; it's locked at this point, right? You can't get in. How can you help them keep that high energy that usually comes from, you know, high group energy level, right, when we're doing this? And I think the same is true when we think about just being together from an accountability standpoint. How do we replicate those, or what's some advice on replicating those accountability groups in a virtual world?

Ryan Wolf 24:17

Yeah. Well, you can, you can think about who you can build that energy with. If -- I'll come back to virtual groups, but physically, who can you safely do this with? And, like, for me, I have Harmony, so, so it's hard for me to get out of the house and go work out. So what do I do -- because (I'll tell you why; I'm getting ahead of myself here), but it's hard for me because I've got 3 boys at home. It's a busy, it's a busy household. If I just left and picked up and went to the gym or went for a run or bike ride, my wife would be stuck trying to entertain 3 boys. So that's, that doesn't feed my Harmony strength. So, so what I do is I get them involved. So that's, I, we go out to the garage, we do push-ups and pull-ups. We do burpees and whatever they want to do. That gets me going. It, it feeds my social wellbeing as well. It's something that I'm naturally inclined to want to do, and it fits with and jibes with my life.

Ryan Wolf 25:20

Virtually, think about, think about who gives you energy and who gave you energy prior to this, and how you could connect with them on Zoom, or whatever, pick your technology, communication piece. There's also, you know, there's -- when we started this pandemic, there was a lot of free stuff going out. So there, there might not be as many going on now, but you just got to choose something that you feel like is a good fit for you. There's, there's a lot -- Peloton is a great example. But there's probably for every Peloton there that is a good example, there's, you know, 20 or 30 more out there that could be the right fit for you.

Jim Collison 26:01

Yeah, no, I began the pandemic by just actually taking walks around the block. I have a hill right behind me. So I could walk up the hill and walk up the hill and walk up the hill. That'll come back. It got really warm, and it just wasn't comfortable doing it that way. So I've had to find other things to do. That'll come back in the fall. And I'll mix that back up again, as I'm home, days I'm home. We are going in on a more regular basis. It's still not every day, but, you know, any, hey, any idea when our fitness center will open back up again?

Ryan Wolf 26:33

We don't know. It's a, it's an "evaluate every week" kind of thing. And there's not a hurry. So, it, you know, there's a lot of chatter people.

Jim Collison 26:44

I'd like to use that bike --

Ryan Wolf 26:45

Yeah.

Jim Collison 26:45

I'd like to use that bike that's in there.

Ryan Wolf 26:47

Yeah, there's just a lot of caution, caution that goes into it. But we'll get you on your bike soon.

Jim Collison 26:53

Ryan, we've been working on a framework for the last couple years Theme Thursday, Season 3, and this current season, Season 6, we've been talking about leaders. The Season 3 strengths based leadership, we talked about the 4 Needs of Followers a lot. And so if you haven't, if you're listening to us for the first time, you're new to our podcasts, you may want to go back and review Season 3. We've got a whole bunch -- about 30 hours of content for you around each one of the themes; this season, as well, as we focused on the book, It's the Manager and teams and managers out of this.

Jim Collison 27:25

We wanted to review kind of this framework. When we think about leading resiliency through followers, right? There's 4 areas that we need to kind of look at. And I want you to spend, we're going to spend a few minutes looking at each one of those -- Trust, Stability, Compassion and Hope -- through the lens of not only just wellbeing, but maybe physical wellbeing as well. So when we think about Trust, and coaches helping managers or managers who are listening, give us some, give us some clues there on building trust with the follower -- with followers.

Ryan Wolf 27:58

I would just encourage leaders and managers to really communicate about how health and wellbeing right now -- it's a safe subject. So it's, it's safe to talk about. It's, it's secure to bring it up. You can, you can bring it up with me. If you're not comfortable with that, you can bring it up with our, our EAP. Some, there are definitely some, some issues that people have that, that they, they want to go to, to a more professional source for, for solutions. But talk about how it's completely safe zone, let's talk about it. And, and that way, it's just less comfortable -- or less, less uncomfortable -- to, to at least bring up.

Jim Collison 28:47

Yeah, for, for managers, their teams are in a completely different environment than they've ever been before. And they're not seeing them every day. And so that communication, I think, becomes really, really important intentionally. We've got to work harder and try harder. We're 4 or 5 months into this. If managers have been doing it well, it's gotten stronger. If they haven't, right now is when we start to see issues, right?

Ryan Wolf 29:13

Yeah. And it's not too late either, if they haven't, so it's never too late to bring up.

Jim Collison 29:20

But you mentioned the idea of a pulse survey earlier. And now, now would be a great time -- maybe the best time to do it was yesterday. But the second-best time to do it is right now, and start thinking about how are you feeling, right? That builds that trust there of, Oh, someone cares about who I am, right? Someone is caring. They're asking some questions. And so, coaches, managers, if you're not, if you haven't, maybe a great opportunity to communicate, to communicate some opportunities and some options.

Jim Collison 29:46
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Also communicate to get feedback, like how -- what's working well; what's not? That may be some great questions to ask on a team. "Hey, what's working for you?" I've shared, both here on Called to Coach and Theme Thursday, my idea of micro, kind of microworkouts. I've shared those -- like little 10-minute workouts throughout the day, where I have an opportunity. And I've communicated to those to my teams to say, "Hey, think about this. It may work for you. It may not," right. But to build that trust, that rapport, because we're not seeing them every day. All right, No. 2 is "Stability." What would we say about that?

Ryan Wolf 30:19

With Stability, I think it kind of goes back to one of the points I made earlier about how providing a lot of variety of solutions. So not just Zoom classes, which are kind of like maybe A, to Z, which would be probably like your EAP, or your mental health resources. But provide a lot of everything in between. So think about how, you know, people who need something to hold onto and grasp onto, it's probably a little bit different than what their neighbor needs or wants. So providing that variety is an important way to add the Stability.

Jim Collison 30:58

So adding variety, adds Stability, talk a little bit -- that doesn't seem like it, but --

Ryan Wolf 31:05

Right. It doesn't; it's, it sounds contradicting. But I just saw in the chat where someone's like, Yeah, I need that high-energy space for a workout. So how do I get that? That's great. There's also, there's a lot of different kinds of -- types of physical and mental needs that that people have. And it can go all the way to serious mental health solutions that are needed. So that's a little bit different than like I need to, I need to sweat in a workout today. So providing a lot of solutions in between that A and Z is important for people to say, "Well, they're just focusing on Zoom. Zoom's not for me. I don't want to get on live and work out in front of my friends, because I can't dance and nobody wants to see that." If you just go the opposite end, then, then there's some other needs over here that could be unmet.

Jim Collison 31:55

Yeah, I think, and what I hear you saying in this is providing a more than a single channel to be able to complete a particular activity or a goal or, or whatever opportunities. We have, we've seen this even in our webcasts of being able to, during the pandemic of making sure we are everywhere. Like how -- I don't want anybody to miss the content anywhere that's available to them. That confuses some, because they're -- for some who are "completists," or for some who want to be involved in everything, you have to give them permission to not, you don't have to do everything in this.

Jim Collison 32:32

So I think it's really clear that you communicate that not all channels have to be followed. You'll have those, right; they're -- they, they have some FOMO. They don't want to miss anything. But at the same time, I think overcompensating, providing stability by having multiple ways of getting to the same path are critical. Getting back to that idea that measuring those paths, what's working and what's not, you got to find out what it is, and then kind of begin to bring those resources in together again, like we did when we were in person. So that's great. So Trust, Stability. No. 3 is "Compassion." How do we handle that?

Ryan Wolf 33:06

Yeah, Compassion is just your time to shine and, and tell, you know, your managers and your clients and your leaders who you're coaching to, to really shine in terms of showing how much they care about their employees, and not just, not just about their career, about their health and their whole self. So, and also their happiness, which is a big, important topic. So, so really just demonstrating their care by talking about it, discussing it, and recognizing people for it is an important way to kind of feed that Compassion need.

Jim Collison 33:48

Yeah, you mean we can be happy during these times? Is it OK? Is that OK?

Ryan Wolf 33:52

It's encouraged? Yes!

Jim Collison 33:54

There is a little bit, you know, we go through these times, and there may be some who are facing guilt for being -- for thriving like they've, I've talked to individuals, and you know, what, I may even fit into that. There's some things, some parts of my life that are actually way better than they were, but we don't want to talk about them because other people are suffering. How -- as leaders as managers, Ryan, how do we handle that, this idea of Compassion when some are thriving, when others are suffering? How do we reconcile that, do you think?

Ryan Wolf 34:26

It's very difficult and you'd have to, you'd have to just really think about your team and your individuals, and what, what you what you say to them, what, how you communicate with them, what you amplify or what you might not echo? So, so I think it's just so so unique and individual for each team and person. But, but yeah, being -- I think you bring up a great point, Jim, that we should be aware of that. And there's going to be high levels of physical wellbeing and a lot of low levels as well. So let's just be sensitive to, to, to that fact.

Jim Collison 35:08

Yeah. No, I've been really, really careful not to post some of those things on Facebook or whatever just during this time, just to be sensitive.

Ryan Wolf 35:15

I do think it's important though to be positive, right, and recognize. So that, you know, you can't, you can't apologize for, for doing that. You don't, you won't ever need to apologize for recognizing being positive.

Jim Collison 35:29

Yeah, no, right on. Dr. Shane Lopez taught us kind of about Hope. And we have a whole bunch of research on this. But as we think about Hope, Ryan, kind of bring us in on this, on this final pillar.

Ryan Wolf 35:42

Yeah, for, for me and, in the, in the literature, it's all about, you know, having faith in the future and that things are going to get better. And, and that, it's exciting. And there's a bounty at the end of this. And it's not too far away. And sometimes we might just need to wait it out a little bit. And, and in the meantime, let's keep sharing success stories. And let's keep asking our clients about when they were their best. And that can spark some hope into into their into their day.

Jim Collison 36:24

Later in the series, we're going to talk about social wellbeing, and I'm going to bring it up here because I think it's appropriate when you think about Hope. There's a few individuals I've been meeting with on a fairly regular basis for what we call "happy hours" and, and getting together via Zoom for the express purpose of encouraging one another. Not -- we talk about work, but it's a, but it's an opportunity to ask, "How you doing? How are things going? How do you feel?" right, and on a very, very regular basis. And I think this -- leaders, managers, you need to be encouraging your people to find those other people. Like we have that Q10 question, "I have a best friend at work." The pandemic has thrown that, maybe for some into whack, or out of whack. And -- I don't know if you can get into whack!

Ryan Wolf 37:11

That'd be pretty cool.

Jim Collison 37:13

Not sure what that is. But kind of to get out of whack. And to get us centered again, because those relationships are important, right? We know that through our book Power of 2. We know those relationships are just equally important in what we're doing. And I, and I think it's important that we find ways, in this case, for that accountability. I am still talking to you on a regular basis about how my physical wellbeing is, right. You're my coach, you're my accountability partner on this. You're the one who holds me to the standard. You never let me off the hook. I can, I can say the difficult things with you. I think coaches, we, and leaders, we need to encourage everybody on teams to still continue to have those kinds of relationships, even though we're not seeing people anymore. And, and those been a key component. Would you add anything else to that, Ryan?

Ryan Wolf 38:02

No, that's, that's good. Being intentional about it is smart. And let's say you haven't been as good as Jim and his teammates about being intentional about it. That's fine; you can start doing it now. And it doesn't necessarily have to take a separate meeting to bring it in. And to let it play out.

Jim Collison 38:23

By the way, those individuals -- not on my team, they're outside. Yeah, they're outside of my team. And it was intentional -- for me; it's different for everybody. I needed some folks beyond -- because I, I actually do spend a lot of time, you know, I think Austin, which a lot of folks in the community know, Austin, he's our Channel Manager for, for strengths. I spend a lot of time with Austin, and he's super, he's super encouraging. I needed some folks outside of that loop, so to speak, that would work for me.

Jim Collison 38:49

And I think, coaches, this is a great conversation to have with those that you're coaching or leaders, a great conversation to have with those that you're leading of asking that question: "Who are, who are you reaching outside of your network, or even inside your network, that's encouraging you on this, we'll say this element, physical wellbeing today, who's encouraging you on that element? Are you suffering or are you thriving, and why? And how do we get you there?" And so it's great. Ryan, any final thoughts as we think about wrapping this up? Any other final thoughts that you want to bring in here today to talk about?

Ryan Wolf 39:23

Yeah, I just think that it's -- just if I could just hit on the two that I, that I talked about previously. It's that you know, wellbeing and wellness can sometimes feel a little soft, but there's a lot of great hard data out there on news.gallup.com. Brian Brim and Dan Witters wrote a great story that went along with some data we did in a research project last year, so you can search their names. It's 2019, about October. Where, where I brought some of that data in today. So, so check that out when you want to understand the science of wellbeing and resilience, and also some other important business outcomes. And then just -- I'll start with it and end with it. Just remember that physical wellbeing is all about being able to build up and live, live healthy and build up a lot of good energy so you can explore your passions and find really good, truehearted purpose in your life.

Jim Collison 40:24

No, I think it's a good way to end it. I, I do believe we actually can thrive during this time. And there are some who are. And that doesn't, we don't want to minimize the folks that are suffering during this time, because that's happening too. But like strengths, I think we have an opportunity to look at some things in a new way. We have the opportunity to discover some new things in this, some new patterns, some new, and at the same time, maybe reset some patterns. Managers, an oper -- an opportunity right now to reset some patterns of things that go on in your team. And maybe you didn't like them before and this completely disrupted them. And so you've got an opportunity to, to refocus, to reemphasize, to rebuild those pieces. And to give that Hope, that Stability, that Compassion, that Trust back inside of those roles. Ryan, thanks for taking some time today to be a part of this. A very popular topic. We might have to bring you back for a Part 2, maybe first of the year, and -- we'll maybe do kind of a reset.

Ryan Wolf 41:24

Sounds good. Yeah. Always, always good to chat with you, Jim, and the coaches and everyone out there. Thanks a lot for tuning in.

Jim Collison 41:32

I'm just really glad that you can't pinch me anymore, cause that hurts.

Ryan Wolf 41:37

I bet, yeah.

Jim Collison 41:39

So with that, we'll remind everyone to take full advantages of all the resources we have available now through Gallup Access. We mentioned that. If you haven't been out in a while, you might want to head out. Head out to gallup.com/cliftonstrengths. There's a login in the upper right hand corner on the screen there. Log in and see the new Access. We actually continue to improve that every single month and some great options for you. If you're in an organization that has Access, you've got some learning opportunities for you; kind of depends on what levels you're in. If you're new to it, and you've never, you haven't checked that out in a while, head back out there: gallup.com/cliftonstrengths. Great opportunity. Your themes report, if you're a CliftonStrengths customer, your themes report is there: Top 5 and opportunity to upgrade to 34. All those pieces available for you, again, gallup.com/cliftonstrengths. If you want to subscribe to us as a podcast, any podcast app, just search "Gallup Webcasts." You can also find us on YouTube, just search "CliftonStrengths" and -- or "Gallup." You'll find us there available. We have lots of videos and lots of learning. Ryan, you talked a little bit about micro -- we were talking a little bit about microlearning. I talked a little bit about microworkouts. We've got some great content available via YouTube. Maybe that's the channel that you learn best through. That's kind of what I've defaulted to during the pandemic. So lots of great resources. If you want to follow everything we do live, maybe join us live, it's more fun live. We have a great chat room. And about -- almost 90 listening right now, which is pretty great. Head out and register at Eventbrite. Go to gallup.eventbrite.com, create an account, follow us there. And every time I post something new, like I just did today, you'll get a notification that it's available for you. So as well, if you want to join us in the Facebook group: facebook.com/groups/calledtocoach. Maybe you're not a Facebooker -- you can join us on LinkedIn. Head out or head out to LinkedIn and search "CliftonStrengths Trained Coaches" and I'll let you in that group as well. We want to thank you for joining us today. We'll do a smidgen of a postshow when we're done here. So if you're listening live, don't, don't go away right away. With that, we'll say Goodbye, everybody.

Ryan Wolf's Top 5 CliftonStrengths are Discipline, Achiever, Futuristic, Activator and Harmony.