How to Measure Wellbeing

What makes Gallup's research in the area of wellbeing so good? Gallup scientists have been studying how to measure wellbeing in the United States and around the world for many years. Most recently, Gallup has published Wellbeing at Work, a book that discusses how to thrive in the five elements of wellbeing, and the benefits this produces for employees and organizations. Learn more about the rigor of Gallup's methodology and research process, along with other resources available to you, in Part 2 of a series on wellbeing. Guest Anthony Blue, Researcher and Database Manager at Gallup, joins the webcast.

Gallup Called to Coach Webcast Series -- Season 9, Episode 44. This is Part 2 of a 5-part series on wellbeing. Access Part 1, Part 3, Part 4 and Part 5 of this series on wellbeing.

We're relentless with research. We are nonstop.

Anthony Blue, 13:34

Our research really is driven by human beings that care and that know what's going on in life.

Ryan Wolf, 28:10

How important it is for managers to really engage their workers and work with them on wellbeing ... that makes life better for everybody.

Anthony Blue, 35:36

Jim Collison 0:00

I am Jim Collison, and this is Gallup's Called to Coach, recorded on September 21, 2021.

Jim Collison 0:18
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 are listening live, love to have you join us in our live chat room. There's actually, on our live page, there's a link right above me, take you to YouTube. Sign in with your Google account and join us in chat; let us know where you're listening from. If you're listening after the fact and you have questions, you can always send us an email: coaching@gallup.com. Don't forget, subscribe on your favorite podcast app, and subscribe there on YouTube; never miss an episode. Ryan Wolf is our host today. Ryan's a Physical Wellbeing Lead, and Ryan, here at Gallup. And Ryan, it's always great to have you on Called to Coach. Welcome back to Part 2!

Ryan Wolf 0:59
Yeah, thanks, Jim. Appreciate it. Great to be back here. It was, it was about 3 weeks ago when we were here, kicking off this series with Mohamed kicking off our series on wellbeing. And you are fresh off a trip, Jim, to the East Coast; spent last week in Boston and New England. So if you hear that in his voice, that's why. But no, it's good to be back here with Anthony Blue. Anthony, welcome. So great to have you on.

Anthony Blue 1:28
Hey, thank you. It's fantastic to be on with two of the most awesome and illustrious guys I have ever met. So this is a wonderful chance for me to hang out with you all.

Ryan Wolf 1:38
Nice. First time I've ever been called "illustrious"; will take it. But you know, when Jim and I were putting this wellbeing series together a couple months ago, your name came up immediately as a person it would be perfect to, to come on here and to discuss the topic of wellbeing from, from your perspective, because you're a Researcher and a Database Manager for Gallup. So there's a pretty good chance that for our listeners, if they've, if they've come across data or research or articles from Gallup on wellbeing or engagement or leadership, strengths, workplace -- all those, all of the above there that came from, came from you and your team and the time that you guys spend hunkering down, analyzing millions of data points. So I want to kind of start us on, on our topic with our new book. And we've got this new concept called "net thriving." So I was hoping if you could kind of tell us a little bit about net thriving, and maybe start with kind of how that metric came to be.

Anthony Blue 2:46
Sure, sure. So just want to, first of all, tell everybody, so my strengths -- because people love to hear about strengths -- my strengths are Achiever, Connectedness, Learner, Arranger and Belief. So that means you're going to be drinking from a pretty "on" faucet all the way throughout the night. My Connectedness -- I'm connected to you, I'm connected to the data, I'm connected to people doing well for themselves. And I love it. And my Belief, it is fashioned in me. You cannot turn me from it. So I believe in wellbeing. I believe in thriving. I'm engaged in all of this stuff. So you know, Ryan, what's funny about this wellbeing stuff is that Gallup's been actually been looking at wellbeing -- Dr. Gallup was looking at this wellbeing -- way back in 1958. So this has been just a trail coming up this way.

Anthony Blue 3:36
So we can learn and understand about humans, what they're going through, what their personalities are. And just basically, how has the person become the best version of themselves. So let's just start there. Like it's not just a name; it's not just a cool code. It's not anything like that. This is based on real people going through real things in real time. Like that is huge. That is so important. Because we're measuring this every day in over 150 countries. It's so amazing that Gallup gets to be part of what's going on in the world. And one thing that we can help with is your wellbeing. Wellbeing is a massive, massive thing going on that many companies and many people are paying attention to nowadays. So let's just set the level: This is about, not just about Gallup, but this is about each and every person here on this videocast, anybody that listens to us, anybody that participates in anything that's Gallup, it's about wellbeing. And definitely we want to talk about the best, because Gallup stands for excellence, right? Is that right? We stand for excellence, right? So that's what we stand for.

Anthony Blue 4:40
So of course, we're going to talk about net thriving. We're not talking about the people sitting around and, "Oh, well, I don't know what to do about this day or that day." We're talking about, How can you be at your best? How can you see yourself at your best, how can you be excited like I am right now? Like I'm sitting in an awesome office, in my wife's office, with an awesome looking chair that's very colorful, zebra striped, and I'm still happy about that. Cause it's loud, and I can be happy with loud stuff. I am thriving, I am ready to go.

Ryan Wolf 5:08
You are net thriving!

Anthony Blue 5:10
Oh, I just represent it. It just flows to me; it's just who I am. So let me ask you a question. Wouldn't it be great if you could just take a good look at yourself, Ryan, sometimes, to kind of just figure out what's going on with yourself?

Ryan Wolf 5:24
Absolutely.

Anthony Blue 5:26
Absolutely. Well, that's what "net thriving" is. We're going to take a look at yourself, now and in the future, at some other point about 5 years from now. How do you stand? What are you going to look at? This is like your checkpoint. This is like, if you're going to go to your bank and go check your balance, and go, "Huh. I have 0 in here. Hopefully, I have $5 in there tomorrow. And maybe in 5 years, I have $500 in it." "Maybe I have one friend now. But I'm going to go into my work here, make some more friends. And then the future, I'm going to have 10 friends." "I'm going to take a look at where I'm standing at today and then what that balance can be later on," which is huge.

Anthony Blue 6:03
So when we're looking at net thriving, we're looking at two massive questions. Just two questions. OK. These questions have come from much study, much background, information, qualitative and quantitative research. We looked at predictable results. We looked at producible, reproducible results, we look at organizational data, objective measures. We did all these things in order to come up with an awesome measure of what thriving is. So we're going to use two questions, two ladder questions. The first question is, "On which step of the ladder would you say that you personally feel like you stand at this time?" And the second one is, "On which step do you think you'll stand on in about 5 years from now?"

Anthony Blue 6:44
So when we look at the top two, we call those, or excuse me, from 7, from a 7 -- it's on a 10-point scale -- from 7 and above, and then 8 and above for the future, we're gonna call that net thriving. So what we're looking at is we're basically quantifying the difference between the best possible life and the worst possible life. So that's what these items are doing. It's basically a human check-in on where you're at, regardless of if we're thinking about the 5 major wellbeing points, or any of those, it's just kind of like an overbroad spectrum of where you're at. So we're looking at what we call the whole person. So it's not just a snapshot of one area; we're looking at all places. And we're looking at such research points as, Did you have enough food? Did you have shelter? Do you feel personally safe on where you're at? Do you have a good job? Social status. Do you have enough money to do with what you need to? You have your own personal health. You have the health of your family.

Anthony Blue 7:38
And we're really, what we want to look at is like the current decision state of where you are right now. And when we're looking at that, that's that first question, like, where are you at? Where are you at in your current state? And how does that influence the way you see life now? And the next part is the best of your future. So we're going to take all those pieces that I just talked about -- the food, the shelter, the personal safety, the job that you have, of having enough money to do what you need to do, the health, all of those pieces -- and we're going to take a look and say, "How do you feel about those in the future?"

Anthony Blue 8:07
And I got to say, when you're looking at a survey, sometimes it's easy to go, Well, they're just kind of numbers, right? I'm just gonna go select a 6 and a 5. No, no, no, no, no. This is you. These aren't just numbers; this is you. This is how you feel right now, when you look in the mirror, you can go, "I'm feeling like this today. Hopefully, in the future, I can feel much, much better. I can have a much stronger outlook. I can have strength in what we're going to move into." That is so powerful! Like if you're looking at today, and you go, "Hey, I think I'm a 5 today. But I want to move into thriving. I want to be excited about every day. How do I get myself to an 8 in the future?" That's a pathway that you can build to make yourself go forward by doing, taking steps, having coaches just like we have on the line here that can help you get step by step so you can grow. So truly, it is an amazing feature that we can study this.

Ryan Wolf 9:07
So, so tell, so 7 and 8, right, so on that, on Cantril's ladder scale, if you're a 7 right now and an 8 in 5 years or more, then, then you're, then it's called "net thriving." So how did we come up with those numbers? Did we, did you and your team just kind of pick those out of the blue? Or how did they come about?

Anthony Blue 9:33
Well, I can tell you what. We spend so much time going back and forth, deliberating, researching, looking at data, and then catching up on all the past trends that we've dealt with over the past 60 years of human research and science to really develop and come after where these scales come from. So again, it's not just a 7 and it's not just an 8. It's a balance of patterns. So if you're looking at yourself, and you're looking at a 7 or an 8 or a 9 or a 10, it's most likely that these people are seeing the patterns of their life. Like they're happier. They're a lot less stressed. They're dealing with a lot less sadness. Their depression is much, is lower. Their anger is low. They see a lot of hope. There's a lot of happiness. They have energy to wake up in the day. There's interest. There's progress. There's loving feelings that they have with their family and the people around them. They have the physical activities, they're going out and being their best selves. And can I say it's like that word of being your best self.

Anthony Blue 10:29
One thing I love to compare this scale to is the faces pain scale, like when you go to the pediatric and you have to take your, your child in there, and it has that scale of happy faces to sad faces or crying faces, right? So when we're talking about thriving, we're talking about on that very far end of that scale. It's like, this is where it's important. This is where you see your life. And we're doing really well in multiple areas where I'm sitting back, I'm smiling, and this feels great. I'm feeling great about where I'm at. And then looking to the future, man, this is gonna get even better! Which is a really exciting perspective.

Anthony Blue 11:06
I can even have that for my own personal life. It's like, Where did I want to be, right? I received my master's from the University of Nebraska at Omaha here during the recession days. So right when I graduated was right when the recession hit. And my, my wellbeing, my excitement for life, it wasn't so great then, because nobody wanted somebody with a master's degree at that point in time, because everybody was trying to figure out things -- and so was I. But I knew if I had a future hope, I can get where I wanted to go. And I always knew that that future was heading in that direction. So now that I'm working in an awesome place like Gallup, where they really care and focus on your wellbeing, I'm on a scale of an 8 right now, scale of 8 and 9; I'm feeling pretty good. But sheesh, I know, I'm gonna feel a bit better in another 5 years, because things are just gonna get better, you know what I mean? Like, it can get better.

Anthony Blue 11:53
And so you're focused on that. And at this point in time, I'm feeling pretty good about it. So we're looking at that thriving, like, thriving is not just, excuse me, thriving is not just in one area; it's just who you are at that moment and taking a look at it, and then what you're feeling about yourself as time goes on. So it's a fantastic concept. And I love it. And one of the best parts that I really enjoy about it, unlike a lot of static surveys, this one is continuously growing and going. So you can change your ideals or your mind, or maybe something happens, and maybe your wellbeing isn't that high on the next day, but there's always that future hope that you can move into. So your wellbeing, your thriving can change a little bit here and there. But it's a measurement that's based on you at that point in time. So it's not just like something that you're stuck to, you know what I mean?

Ryan Wolf 12:40
Yeah, and I love it. And yeah, we do, we do ask respondents multiple times over and over. And for those who might have caught the, the first edition of this series, Mohamed talked about how that first question -- How would you rate your life today? -- really dropped initially during during the pandemic beginning last year, or in the quarter one, but that second question really stayed steady -- their hope for the future remained, remained high. So it was good to see that. Can you talk a little bit, Anthony, about what makes Gallup methodology and our process in, in research, so good and so, and different than what others are doing?

Anthony Blue 13:25
Well, I can first of all say that at Gallup, here, so I get to work in the Gallup labs. And one thing that we are is we're relentless, OK. We're relentless with research. We are nonstop. We're always looking at trying to be the best at what we do. So we know wellbeing, we know engagement. So we're putting our best efforts into every single thing that we're doing. Dr. Gallup set up a pathway for us by saying there are 5 billion ways to lead a life, and we should study them all. That is huge. And that's what we sit on. So this is not just people, again, looking at numbers and letters or trying to figure out, well, maybe this is going to be a little bit better for sales for that, and this and that. Like these are real-life humans that are sitting back -- people like me, that we're looking at this data. And we know that these data points represent people that represent us.

Anthony Blue 14:20
Like we're taking the scales ourselves, so we can even understand it ourselves. It's personalized. Everything that we do is very, very personal. We agonize over data. We research. We look at it. We look at current trends. We look at past trends. We look at where things are going. We look at what's being said in the social sphere. We look at what's being portrayed and put out there on the news. And we have people with vast backgrounds in workplace research. And they're studying and using their techniques to understand how to best make the most robust research that we have -- that you can have -- that's reproducible, and we sit in it, and it's actionable, and it's meaningful. I mean, I'm excited about it, because this is what I get to do every single day. Like this is the stuff that causes me to be, to thrive at my job.

Anthony Blue 15:09
Like we're looking at, like, we're working out the biases in the research, because people can say A, B and C about this. We want to know exactly what the science says and how the people are reacting to that. We're listening collectively to each other. So there's a lot of different viewpoints in our room. We are a family up there -- we laugh, we joke, we have fun, but we get really serious because we trust each other. And we want to put out the best information that helps the best people. One of my favorite things to do is I've gotten to work around in a lot of different places in life. And I love working at Gallup, because the people that we get to study and the people that we get to answer our surveys, like, those people are me. It's a very personal message for so many of us, because that's where we came from. We came from a service industry. We had to work in the office space, particularly where we're serving, and we've been through those different places in life. And it's really important to us.

Anthony Blue 16:02
So we work really hard to get it right. We're doing as many statistical tests that make sense. We're doing quantitative research; we're doing qualitative research. We're understanding; we're continuously pushing on where things exactly, where they stood before, and then trying to make new headway where it makes sense. So we work really hard in Gallup to come up with the best stuff so yeah, we can serve the world and help everybody be just a little bit happier, a little bit more comfortable and, in this talk, thriving.

Ryan Wolf 16:30
Love it. So just to nerd out a little bit, you mentioned qualitative, quantitative. People might consider wellbeing to be -- they might consider it to be subjective. We, we say it is objective -- we do have objective data on the subject. Can you kind of help us understand the nuances -- the differences between subjectivity, objectivity, and whether or not qualitative data and quantitative data needs to be utilized in in each of those?

Anthony Blue 17:02
Sure. So I like to start out with measurable objectives. Like that word is key for anybody that wants to geek out on science stuff, like, you got to be able to have measurable objectives. Here, we don't sit in an ivory tower, and we're not just like, "Hmm, I wonder what question we can think of today?" That's not what we're trying to do. That's not gonna help anybody. Like, I might have good information, but I don't know if it's gonna be great to Ryan; I don't know if it's gonna be great to Jim; I don't know. So what we do is we take our time, and we do tons of reading, tons and tons of reading, tons of analysis, tons of research. And we look back at that research, and we can develop qualitative studies that can tell us just a little bit more on the topics. And we do focus groups; we do focus studies. We have our panel that we can put information on; we can take a look at items and make sure they work. We do tons of testing once we get there.

Anthony Blue 17:53
And then once we monitor that, we write our papers, we go through the company, see if it makes sense to other people. We check out what it looks like in the marketplace, what other people are talking about -- other researchers are talking about. We add it to our own data, we add it -- our perspectives from our, our Gallup scientists, which are outside of Gallup. And we put all this together, and then we begin to develop our sciences. So it's not something that's subjective. This is stuff that we all live with. This is stuff that we all go through. It's not subjective when you're asking, "Do you have enough food to support your family, you know, for the next week?" or if you have enough money to pay your medical bills for the next week. Like that's not subjective; that's extremely objective. Things that if we're seeing that rates of alcohol is going up, maybe there's an issue in a place of an area that we need to understand and research. And sometimes our wellbeing, our wellbeing research, or our engagement or something that can help understand that information is there.

Anthony Blue 18:49
So there's a lot of pieces that we take our time, we really research and we really take our time to understand and make sure that our points are -- they're objective, because we just don't want to feed anybody anything. Like this is, again, this is extremely personal for us. This is about change. This is about helping. We don't, we don't want to just say, "Oh, well, this is great to me." We want to make sure it's great for everybody.

Ryan Wolf 19:12
Can you go into a little bit more detail about the panel? What is the panel? Explain to our listeners what the panel is and what, how it serves its purpose?

Anthony Blue 19:22
Yeah, so at Gallup, we're very blessed to have a, have a certain types of questions go out to a field or a group of people that's representative for the United States workers. So if you want to work like with the BLS, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, where they report on anything in the United States that's going on, from wellbeing to workplace trends, we have a panel that we work with that also do the same types of things, and answers different types of workplace questions so we can really get the pulse on what's going on around America, with its workers, whether it be full time or part time, and within so many different industries, with different job types, so we can really speak to the common person. The idea is that we want to help people; we want to exact change and understand what's going on with people. So our panel is a very, very special as we get to work with them over, over, we've worked with them for so long. It's, it's a great resource for us to get the tap and the pulse on what's happening.

Ryan Wolf 20:20
Yeah, that's great. And to, to our listeners out there, I would highly recommend checking out news.gallup.com. That's where you can find panel research -- the best of the best research that Anthony and his team's doing gets put there. And you can see data, graphs, a lot of great visuals and then stories behind it. We have great editors who, who just kind of paint, paint more of the picture with words. And it comes out in, in really great articles that are useful, meaningful and actionable. So good place to check out kind of the products of what Anthony's doing each day with, with his partners in both the research and the editing team. So, so Anthony, want to talk about kind of what your favorite parts of your job are. So what kind of, what parts of your research, whether it's, whether it's wellbeing or engagement or strengths or, or anything else is, is the kind of the most personally moving for you?

Anthony Blue 21:24
Well, I can tell you what: I am really excited just about how, here at Gallup, we really want to work with you on your journey, just the journey of life. The journey of life is amazing and different for so many of us, but yet, there's certain patterns and pieces that we can think about. And we can talk about the possibility to make that journey a healthy and exciting journey -- one that you can thrive in. So for, for me, I really love the ability that there's change because of what we do that can exact and help people become stronger and thrive in their life. Like my wife is a health coach, and she loves to talk about thriving. And when we get going back and forth, like it is a nonstop of, Oh, my goodness, people will feel so great. They're gonna feel so good when they walk in, in their, in their office, and their manager is like, "Hey, hope you have a great day today!" when they didn't do that before. And that person's like, 'Yes! I've been finally waiting for somebody to pay attention, you know."

Anthony Blue 22:20
Or if they're like, "You know what? I'm gonna, I'm gonna feel good today. I'm gonna put on my best clothing, and I'm gonna do a little workout and feel good, you know. I'm gonna shake out my clothing and feel great, and I, like, I want to do that stuff." And I'm excited to be a part of anything that gets people to change in such a positive way and to have that influence. So when you talk about excitement, oh, man, we have so many, so many things going on. Like, from the Gallup labs, we are talking about the important topics of ESG and DEI here at Gallup and in the workplace out there. We have all of our wellbeing researchers just becoming so popular, and thank God it's finally taken track and people are holding on to it, knowing that they're not just employees, but they're lives that deserve a chance to thrive. Like why wouldn't they, right?

Anthony Blue 23:11
We have our COVID information, a lot of COVID stuff, which I personally get to work on -- which is exciting, because I know that when people are reading this, it actually makes changes. It makes waves. And you can make decisions on your life. And even if you're confused about what's going on, you might actually find solace knowing that there might be other people like you. Like we get to report on that. And it's not from some political or biased space. We're literally just asking you how you feel, in a representative panel that's accurate and that's awesome. That is so exciting. We have the Center of Black Voices. Wow. You talk about a year of 2020 and this finally getting traction. Like 2020 was the year. And I'm so glad that Gallup has decided to jump into this arena to help people that are disenfranchised and have been for, for centuries. And I'm glad that voice is being put out here, which is great.

Anthony Blue 24:06
So we have that. We have all of our engagement research. Whoo, boy! Whoo, boy! We have so much engagement research. We are the experts on engagement. I read this stuff. I live it. I breathe it. Come talk to us, please. That's great. One of my favorite things that's come out in the last few years is the Gallup's CHRO Roundtable. Getting to talk to so many company leaders in what's going on and what really, what they're really facing, like what they're really facing. So it's not just, Oh, you know, we can't hire people. That just, that stinks. Like no, no, no, What's going on with your culture? How does that really affect you? What's going on with you? How can we help get pipelines of workers in there that are going to stick and then thrive? And then how can you help your managers be more engaged to keep those people? Like that's huge, right? Like that's just big. So that's so exciting that we get to talk to them on a regular basis.

Anthony Blue 25:02
We have our Gallup Senior Scientists. They are some of the coolest people that have some of the most awesome backgrounds and the things that they get to work on. And I'm glad that they get to partner with us so we have just another pulse. It is so exciting! And there's so much more. I'm just gonna stop there. But truly, there's so much to look at. And there's so many exciting things going on. Like, get on to gallup.com like, and this is not just a plug, think -- well, it is a plug. But it's also -- it's not a shameless plug. Yeah. So there's so much going on there, I'm telling you. Just take a look. Subscribe to it, I subscribe to it. And I get something in my mailbox, I'm like, "I don't have any time today. But I got to take time and read this, because this is gonna matter on. This is gonna matter today, or maybe it's gonna matter in a few weeks. But this is gonna matter." OK. And these things aren't like they're like 40 pages long; it's good, objective, quick articles. They're not biased; they're just going to give you the information that comes from the data, but some of the information that we know about workplace and what people are going through. So I find that so exciting and motivating.

Anthony Blue 26:08
And might I say, like, when we're talking to coaches or anybody that's using any of this Gallup material, I just gotta say, it's like, Gallup is a great place for having so many touchpoints, so many listening voices, so many listening boxes throughout the United States. Like, come be with us; come hear us; and then talk with us, too, because we want to hear what's going on. We want to know what's going on out, out there. And like for the coaches that are listening, I just got to say, like, I feel like it's wrapped up in a, just a couple things, is just listen -- that's what we do. We listen. We listen to the individual, just like you do. You listen to the individual and engage them, whether it be like, these people, like, these aren't just -- again, they're not numbers. They're friends. They're families. They're employers. You know, they're employees. They're, they're partners. They're people you know on the street.

Anthony Blue 27:02
Like if you watched the Matrix, Mr. Anderson, he was helping people carrying groceries, you know. Like, those are the people that are taking these surveys that we're trying to understand in one fantastic piece of information to try to give to you so you can help make their lives better. Because as a coach, like, that's what you want. Like, and that's like, why wouldn't you want to read this? This is a great place to start. Like we've been challenged to read it. We've been challenged to read our stuff, because it's so good. It's so rich. If you want to help people, like this is a great place to start. And I'm telling you, especially with career and with social wellbeing, like those are two massive, great areas to start with. So if you want to kick off, it's like just digestible steps. How do you listen to them? And how do you engage them at each of these steps? So I just love it, man. There's so much that's motivating me -- I can go on and on and on.

Ryan Wolf 27:51
Yeah, Jim and our listeners, I dare you to find a researcher who beams more with this amount of purpose and, and wellbeing and authenticity. So, so I love, love hearing all about this and, and how, how our research really is driven by human beings that care and that know what's going on in life not, and they don't just sit in SPSS all day and not actually understand what else is going on, out in the world. So, but you also do some hard things, Anthony. Can you talk about kind of the difficult parts of your job, like the parts of the research that that you're most proud of that are kind of your most painstaking moments that are difficult, where you really have to draw on your Achiever?

Anthony Blue 28:44
Well, I feel like I have to draw on my Achiever every day at Gallup, because at Gallup, you achieve. This is what you do. It's the culture of work hard, play hard, right? So we work really well together. We have many deadlines that we have to work against, because we want to get the freshest information out to everybody. We want it to be fresh. We don't want to sit on it for 2 years, and like "Oh, hey, you know what you thought about what happened in 2019? Isn't that cool?" Like, that's nice to have out there, but we want to be representative.

Anthony Blue 29:14
And the thing is to be representative, it's going to take time. It's going to take analysis. It's going to take looking through the data and analyzing. Oh, I can tell you about days of sitting through and working with Chief Scientist Jim Harter and going row by row by row, understanding the different data points and then going back and forth. It's like, "Well, does that make sense in this degree? Does this make sense in that degree? Oh, no, it doesn't? It doesn't? So let's go relook at that." Or looking at the surveys I'm working with -- excuse me -- with Ben Wigert here, one of our chief scientists as well, one of our scientists as well. And we're working through surveys and we're gonna spend days and days and days making sure that we're going to get this right.

Anthony Blue 29:57
So it's a lot of going back; a lot of going to research. Learning what we've learned already, but knowing that we also need to push things forward. What do people need to hear on a daily basis? We're looking at that. So there's a lot of connection points. And we have to work with a lot of smart, smart people to get things done in the best and most timely manner that we get to do that. And I got to say, something that I'm very proud of in my own personal work that we do a lot of this in, is in our meta-analysis. Now, for some people, they've never heard of that word; for others, like, Yeah, that's a pretty big deal. So we got to work with the late, great Frank Schmidt, the father of the meta-analysis. So he is, I believe he is the most published person, period, out there in research land. That's a pretty big deal. He's the father of the meta-analysis. And we got to work with him.

Anthony Blue 30:48
And through our research, we have produced many different types of meta-analysis. And just like a really quick, just a really quick definition of it, and not to get too dorky. But for our meta-analysis, it offers a lot of advantages, because what we do is we take a ton of individual studies. So these studies are based with outcome data. So it's not just, again, we're not making up data points and going, Oh, here's something that I think is cool; this works. And then we're going to publish the study and the study is out there, and people can read and take it. That's not what we do. We take reproducible information. We take such things as like financial measures, measures of productivity, measures of patient safety, measures of regular safety, measures of turnover -- all those pieces, we're looking at actual measures from actual companies that we work with. And might I say that, again, because I'm so proud of this point, that we work with the companies that we're producing the data from.

Anthony Blue 31:42
So this is not just like a market survey. Some of the other companies, you're going to get a market survey; we actually -- let me say it big time, one more time -- we actually work with the clients that we're getting the data from. So this is their data. This is from them with our measures that we've been researching since 1958. And we put those together to create our meta-analysis studies. So we're taking, instead of just one study, we're taking a lot of studies. So for example, I believe in our last study, we had over 270 different data points that we were working with. Where many people, when they're running a meta-analysis, they're getting like 10, 20, maybe. Like, we are running massive meta-analysis.

Anthony Blue 32:29
We got to talk to one of the authors of the technology, and he said, and I quote, "Nobody else does it this big anywhere else." Like that, to me is a badge of honor that shows that we're doing the work. We're fighting hard for this information. And it's good data. So basically, we're taking a whole bunch of studies, we're pulling them all into one place, and then we're testing them using a statistical method that gives us a strong and strength in the statistical power of what we're studying. Hey, buddy. He's engaged too!

Ryan Wolf 33:06
I think he heard your voice.

Anthony Blue 33:08
Yeah, for sure. Everybody's hearing my voice. So we take this data. And we have the ability to generalize a, or create generalizable results across different populations, to show that this works, not just for this one study, but across all different studies, across different industries, that our data does matter. This stuff does make sense. And now, pay attention to what we're telling you. So we work with just true relationships; we're looking at the actual true relationships, because again, we work with the companies that we're researching; we work with their true relationships; we're working with generalizable concepts with employee engagement across performances, against performance measures, and then we're looking at the practical meaning. Because again, we can be that pie-in-the-sky type people, which we're not. And we actually want to make it actionable. And that's really, really big.

Ryan Wolf 34:00
That is huge. So for, for, for us out here in layman land, can you tell us what, what we should do? Or what, where we can find the meta-analysis? Or is it available to us in the public?

Anthony Blue 34:15
Yeah, so if you go on to your Google Scholar sites, you can pull up the meta-analysis done by Gallup. You can always look up -- it's easy to find it under Jim Harter, and so he can provide names. We also have a couple of studies that I've been on. So like use my name, Anthony Blue, we can find some of that information that gets at the deepness of what we're talking about. And also it's really throughout all of our workplace studies. So you don't necessarily have to get after the meta-analysis to get our great content, because we love to share. If you go on to the .com articles, you'll be able to see a lot of that information through there. It just won't necessarily be stacked up the way that it is here. But you can go on out there and see that information. It's really, really great.

Anthony Blue 34:51
And just, I wanted to add, and I don't want to forget this. I'm going to take off my Gallup researcher hat just for a second, and I want to say something like, I've been excited to say this. So I get to do a lot of different research within the company. One of my favorite things to study is teamwork, right? So how teams work, how teams stay engaged, things like that, like really great concept. Gallup promotes It's the Manager, and we have an awesome book out there. And again, it's not promoting just for promoting; it's a book that you should read, especially if you're a manager.

Anthony Blue 35:23
As I study outside material, the more I find out how people have focused, like, their studies necessarily aren't on the manager, but they end up being about the manager in the study, like, how important it is for managers to really engage their workers and work with them on wellbeing, and how that makes life better for everybody. I just got to plug that and say it's like, go out there and read that book. Sit in it, and then talk about it, because the managers are so greatly important. So removing my hat, it's like I'm reading study after study, and they just keep coming up with "it's the manager"; the manager makes a difference. The manager makes a difference with employees' engagement and makes a difference for career wellbeing, which can impact financial wellbeing, which can impact social wellbeing. It's like the it's the manager. They make such a difference -- I just, I couldn't get away from it, even when I'm not reading my own, like our own research. Like it's everywhere. I just, I just couldn't get, so I just had to mention that, just --

Ryan Wolf 36:22
Yeah, it's a well-titled book, right?

Anthony Blue 36:25
Yeah, I think it's kind of straight to the point.

Jim Collison 36:29
Anthony, let me jump in for some questions, because we got a bunch going. And this is kind of -- this first one's going to be kind of multipart, because it's been asked a couple different ways. So one, for net thriving, is it just about individuals? Or does it work at an organization level? And then they add to that in saying, organizational level is the sum of individual level in an organization? Can you talk, when we, when we roll this up, can you talk a little bit about how we do that with, to get that, that, that score?

Anthony Blue 36:58
Yeah, sure. So there's different things that we, there's different, I guess, sources that we work with. So we had our panel that we talked about before. That goes over to 160 countries out there. And so we're into, we're researching individual results. And it could be, depending on the way that we cut it and depending on what's representative, so we have that on the panel. And then we also do our client work within our company or within the companies that we work with. So they can pull together their data at a top line, which is the company level, at that point in time. Because again, when we do a lot of these surveys, they're at point of time. So when we're running the engagement data, many of the times that we'll, we can run the wellbeing as well. And then you can get the information to understand, like, what the company blueprint looks at that point in time.

Anthony Blue 37:45
So it's like I'm going to survey Gallup on May 22. You get your results back, and you can look at the overall line of what that company is going through. And one of the best parts about it, because you just don't want to look at it just by itself, it's a good chance like we can compare that to like your, your records of, your wellbeing records, like do you have a wellbeing, a wellness plan that's already set up? So are those that are participating in those programs, are they actually, is their wellbeing higher? Are those ones that are participating in the 401(k) or areas like that, to actually see like, what's going on with it? Not just saying, Well, yeah, here's my company, that's great. But like, what does it compare to? And then also knowing, in the background with our own sciences, like this is kind of where you're at. This is where you need, or this is where you're, this is what we see. And maybe here are some things that we can improve on with your wellbeing.

Jim Collison 38:36
And I would say if you're reading one of our articles or if you're reading one of our reports and you're interested, usually in the back, there's a, there's a big section that talks about when this was done and how it was done and where it was selected. And I know in the State of the Global Workplace report -- the new one we did -- there's a whole section on that of giving some industries and where did it come from? And what areas and what regions? So we footnote. You want to add anything to that, Anthony?

Anthony Blue 39:03
Yeah, for sure. We pour on, we are methodology heavy. So we actually employ methodologists here, as well as we have statisticians and people that work hard core in data. So when we pull up data, when we're working through the data, we're always building methodology pages in our presentations, to make sure to show people like what we're doing. Because we're not hiding anything; we're putting it all out there for you to see. So if there's questions, many times in our articles, especially the ones that come from -- like, for example, the COVID ones now -- a lot of that will have the information on exactly who we were serving, the point in time, how we used it, what the samples were, pieces like that, just so you know, just so you know, what we were doing,

Anthony Blue 39:47
And when we're working with the companies, they already, they know, but we, we tell them up front what we're looking for, if we're controlling for anything, what we're doing Business Impact Analysis, all those pieces. So we keep it really above level so we can work with you to help you understand what your employees or what people are going through in the organization.

Jim Collison 40:08
We had Mohamed Younis on the very first session, and he does The Gallup Podcast. You'll often hear the results of what we've done in our research in the guests that they have on The Gallup Podcast. So if you want to cheat like I do, I spend, I spend most of my time listening to the summary of it on The Gallup Podcast. And it's just a great way, if you're busy, in the car, on a train, commuting or not commuting -- maybe you're walking the dog now a little more often than you were before -- a great way to keep up with everything that's going on is through The Gallup Podcast as well. Lisa asks a great question, Anthony. I want to see if you've got the answer to it. For net thriving, how does serenity and living in the moment fit in? If someone responds "8" to both questions, you know, we often say, you know, as we look at the difference, it's a 7 or above for today; it's an 8 or above going forward. And, and we have to, sometimes we think, Well, if I'm a 7 today, I have to be, you know, for hope, I have to be an 8 or above going forward. How does that fit in if I'm 7 today, and I'm 7, I'm thinking I'm 7, 5 years from now, what does that mean?

Anthony Blue 41:14
Sure. So with meaning with these items, it's really important to know that, again, it's not just like a 7 or an 8. It's where you stand at that point in time; how you feel about yourself; where you're at in your area. So there's a lot of things to consider, but it's a lot to consider with yourself. So it's like, Do you feel like you're thriving in these areas? Do you feel not stressed? Do you feel engaged in your work? Do you feel comfortable on where you live? Like, all those pieces. Do you feel like you have enough money to take care of yourself? Do you feel physically fit? Do you feel physically good? Are you being the best person that you feel like you could be today? Like, that's when you're actually looking at your measurement, and then we can see the patterns throughout that data.

Anthony Blue 42:01
So it's not necessarily saying that a 7 means something particularly, but within the range of like 7 through 10, we know that you're feeling, like you most likely have a decent place of shelter. We're probably feeling personally pretty safe, maybe have a secure job, or maybe even more of like a good social status. So it's more of the feelings and the ideas. And then when you're looking for the future, for most of us, and psychologically speaking, it's like, sometimes for many of us, it's like the best is yet to come. So you know that within 5 years, so we didn't put a, like a mark on us, like, is it next week? How do you feel next week? Because that's something that's pretty tangible for a lot of people. When you get out 5 years, like that's a, that's a pretty far-out mark. So in your mind, do you have something to link forward to? Do you have something that you can believe in moving forward to? So I can't say that like moving from a 7 to 7 is bad. I can't say any of these measures, or whatever mark that you put, is bad. Hopefully, there is a place for improvement, and that you can see life getting just that much better for yourself.

Jim Collison 43:05
We spent a bunch of time this spring, when we launched the book, Wellbeing at Work, we spent a bunch of time, I interviewed Jim Harter on the book as well. Might be worth it if you're coming to this topic right now, and you're kind of thinking, "Oh, I want some more information on this," we have a lot of release webcasts from from the spring, so spring of 2021, which you may want to go back and listen to. Some pretty great insights as well coming from Dr. Jim Harter. And some, some really -- as we think about these, and Anthony, you know, this, it's this idea, when we think about that ladder of best possible, a "10" is the best possible life right? And a "1" being the worst possible life in that. And I get a lot of questions around, What's the definition of that? What I'm hearing you say is, How are you feeling? Right? Is it, is it that simple as thinking about, How do I feel about that right now? And why is that important?

Anthony Blue 44:01
Yeah, exactly. See, that's the, that's the kind of simplicity that I hope that we offer with what we do at Gallup is not just, again, about the numbers. The numbers are extremely important; they help tell a tale. But when it gets down to it, it's about you and where you're at and how you see your life. Like I would love it if everybody was sitting at a 7 and moving up to an 8, you know. I would love it if people were, that were at a 5 were moving up to a 9. But truly, in the facet of the place is like, Where do you see -- as a self-assessment today, where do you see yourself at? And do you think that your future can be better? So I'm not gonna say that being a 5 is bad. I'm gonna say, Wow. OK, so time to take a look at yourself. Now, what can we do to get you up to the next number? What can we do to get you up to a 6? What can you do for yourself to get up to a 7?

Anthony Blue 44:52
So hopefully, when you look back in another 5 years, you're like, Wow! I began on this amazing journey. And I started back 5 years ago, and I changed A, B, C, D about myself. I work with a coach. These coaches are great. And they helped me take step by step by step, because that's what my wife does with me. She's my own personal coach. She's my own personal life and health coach, OK? And she makes sure she keeps me on the path. And when I look back, I'm like, Oh, man, like I did that! Like I cannot believe I was trying to just lose 15 pounds. And she actually taught me about taking care of myself for myself, regardless of how I look, because I want to feel good in the morning when I wake up. Like that is what a coach does, and so let me focus on those areas. It's like, we get so caught up sometimes I think in, in these really tangible numbers, when actually, your life is what's tangible. It's like what can we do to move you forward?

Ryan Wolf 45:50
Yeah, Jim, we're two for two here. Mohamed said the same -- Mohamed said the same thing actually, last, a few weeks ago.

Anthony Blue 45:58
He's a good guy.

Ryan Wolf 45:58
He talked about how, yeah, he is; he's wonderful. Talked about just what you mentioned there, Anthony. He said, it really doesn't matter exactly where you're, at what number you're at right now, but it matters more about where you're heading, and what, what numbers you might rate yourself in the future. So if you're, if you feel like you're maybe not thriving -- if you're struggling or suffering -- then, then get that, get that coach and identify areas in your life that you can start making small steps and improvements on.

Jim Collison 46:30
Anthony let's get a little meta on you really quick. What's, what's your day to day look like? There -- Lisa's noticing, it seems like you could be out front selling for Gallup, but you turn your energy towards data. So give us a, give us a one- or two-minute elevator pitch on your, on your role and your job. What's the day look like for you?

Anthony Blue 46:50
Well, Jim, I wake up, and I eat my eggs. I make sure I have my -- no, I'm kidding. But I do eat eggs.

Ryan Wolf 46:58
Not kidding.

Anthony Blue 46:58
Not kidding, not kidding. So what my day is filled with is, I know how my personality works. My personality, I'm very much a people person. So it's funny, I'm with, I work with a lot of IO psychologists, OK. I actually have a communications master, believe it or not. And I love the idea of my Connectedness, working with every single person that I have the ability to. So it's funny. I know how I work. So I schedule my meetings early on in the day, so I can talk with more people at the beginning, because that gives me energy to push through. So am I selling it on the outside with people when I get to talk to them on the street, when I get excited like this, because this is not just what I do for talking to you two, even though I love both of you. This is who I am. And so I do this with the data.

Anthony Blue 47:45
Like when I go back and forth, I wake up, I get out there, I have my meetings early. We have fun, we do hard-core discussions, we work through the data. I'm looking at them, like I really care about what we're working with. I'm connected to it hard core. My coworkers are connected hard core. We review as much as possible. I set my evenings up and my afternoons for writing, because of breaks in how people take their schedules. I take my time for writing and reading towards the end of the day. And then I come home, play with my kids and hang out with my wife. So that's the, that's the, that's the process. I know I work a little bit outside the lines. But for me, it's all connected. Like if I don't do those things, then I'm not thriving. And that's the key. Like I feel like that's what you're asking. Truly, am I selling, am I selling the stuff? I am the stuff. And this happens, and it's not just what happens to me at work; it's what happens every single day. I love it! And I've learned how, and I've, and I work through my own strengths.

Jim Collison 48:44
You, I think you mentioned this a little bit in the beginning, but you didn't start at Gallup -- much like me, you didn't start a Gallup doing what you're doing now, right? This was a progression for you a little bit. And talk a little bit about what you started doing and then maybe what you're doing today,

Anthony Blue 48:59
Right? So it's funny how life takes you and the decisions that you end up making, and how that impacts you going forward. So it's funny enough, I ended up becoming a university instructor, and I had just signed my papers to teach. And two days later, Gallup called me and they're like, Hey, I know we haven't called you back in a year. But we want you to come work for us now. So I had to make a decision. And I thought that I can help the most -- because I love teaching, and I still love to teach. But I thought I could do the best work through Gallup by helping people because I actually care, I really, really care about the data. And I want the data to actually become actionable for people in their, in their normal lives. Like that's just who I am.

Anthony Blue 49:41
So when I went to Gallup, I actually started on the data analyst team. So I worked with data analysis, a lot of client projects, learning systems and things that I didn't actually know I needed to know. And I feel like this is where thriving and engagement and wellbeing come in. So I had an idea of where I wanted to be, and I wasn't necessarily doing that very thing -- to be extremely candid, I wasn't doing the very thing that I thought it was going to do. But I had no clue that the building blocks would be built for me to do even better and more stuff later on in my career. So after doing a lot of data analysis, and I got to learn coding, which I never thought I would learn how to do. I took a lot of stats classes. I got to learn like the underground stats, and how to work with hard-core data, because it's fun.

Anthony Blue 50:25
You come out of grad, you're in grad school, and the data sets are like, "Oh, this is easy. This is clean. Everybody gives 4s and 5s, like this is great science. And then you get in the real sciences, like you got to work with the missing data, you got to calculate, you know, kind of on the fly, and then make sense of it on the fly and put your research methods to it. So I got to learn a lot of that from being a data analyst. And then I got to move up to the practice team, which is where I work now. And with these awesome people that are extremely engaging that taught me so much, I got to move on and work in so many different places in so many different realms within Gallup. I get to work across practice, and I get to do some of my own fun stuff, as well as work on some of the biggest projects. And it doesn't always have to be big projects; sometimes I get to work on small stuff that I'm just as passionate for. And I got to learn so much.

Anthony Blue 51:11
So my engagement's turned up all the time, because I'm constantly learning and I'm constantly growing. And that's what gives me the ability to keep moving. So like I don't even see it like it was a different job. It was kind of a stepping stone to get to the next to get to the next to get to the next. So if I look back 5 years ago, I'm not doing, I wasn't doing the same thing 5 years ago as I'm doing now. But I can tell you what, it's just gotten better. It's just gotten that much better. And I look back, I'm like, thank God I partner with these people. Thank God that they gave me the ability and the chance to work with this. Like, it's exciting. It's -- what a path, what a change.

Jim Collison 51:48
Oh, that's always exciting to hear that. I know, the other record that you've set is that this is the, oh, maybe the most energy we've ever done on a Called to Coach in the 8 p.m. Central time slot. I've done a lot of late calls; you've kept, you've kept me interested. And you've made data kind of exciting. It can be a little, you know, sometimes it can be a little dry. And, and you've brought it -- Ryan, any final questions from you? And then let's wrap it.

Ryan Wolf 52:18
No, and -- I, I just have one more, I think, Anthony. Can you just tell us what we can look for in the future -- stuff you're working on right now that, maybe in a month or two months or later, later in the year, that we might see come to fruition?

Anthony Blue 52:33
Well, I just gotta say, we work on so much. And there's so much material that Gallup produces on a day-by-day basis. I think the work that I'm probably the most proud of that I'm attached to, is anything to do with the COVID data -- like anything to do with COVID during these days. It's a pandemic that's, it's, it's made a difference in all of our lives, has made us shift, it's made us change. There's just been so much that's happened and I'm very connected to it because I care about the people that are receiving the data. And hopefully it can give them some type of solace to know that if you're confused, if it doesn't make sense, like come read the .com articles. Like come and read those, and you can see people that are like you and maybe they don't know what's gonna happen next. Maybe they don't understand what companies or, or what jobs are going to look like or these pieces, but we're looking to provide some solace and answer. We're, we're looking to explain what's going on, using not just what's happening today, but what we know of times past, what we know of recessions, of what we know of troubles in other countries.

Anthony Blue 53:36
Because again, Gallup is surveying all over the world. It's not just the United States; like we're everywhere, and we've been everywhere for a very, very long time. So we're not coming up with anything new. We're using all this past research to tell you like this is what we're seeing now. And then you can apply that to your own life, especially if you're a manager or if you run your own company or something like that. Like the results that I get to work with every day now that I'm personally attached to, like this stuff makes a difference to the, to the real person. This is not just for like, you know, people sitting off in a tower somewhere or -- this is, this is made for every single person to help you be the best that you can be and work through these very difficult times.

Jim Collison 54:19
Ryan, let me, let me, well, let me kind of just bring this full circle and just kind of share. You know today, we launched a brand new report. We partnered -- Anthony talks about where, where our customers are our clients are our data source, right. And Hologic, who we interviewed back in the early summer -- I want to say late spring, early summer on Called to Coach is -- they're, they're a client of ours as well, and we work with them on that. But brand new Future of Women in the, in the World and Women's Health. The Hologic and Gallup recently released results from the first-ever Hologic Global Women's Health Index. We're pretty excited. That just launched today. I think I would be remiss. Anthony, did you get a chance to work on this at all? You have your fingers in, in this report?

Anthony Blue 55:05
I didn't, but some of my great partners did. And I know they took their time and their care when they're putting together this massive, massive launch. So kudos to them and all that hard work that they produced.

Jim Collison 55:18
Ryan let's, let's thank Anthony and then we'll --

Ryan Wolf 55:21
Yeah, Anthony, thanks so much for being on here. Our second, second edition of our 5-part series. Obviously a ton of passion and a lot of purpose and strengths are just kind of oozing out. So thanks so much for sharing that here with us today. And Jim, we'll be back in a couple more weeks to, to give everybody the third edition of this series.

Jim Collison 55:47
Yeah, we're excited for that. Anthony, thanks for joining us. I knew, I knew when we chose to have you on, we were gonna, you were gonna bring it and bring it all. So thanks for bringing it. I appreciate it.

Anthony Blue 55:57
Well, thank you for letting me be part of the most handsome hour that I've ever been a part of. So thank you guys.

Jim Collison 56:03
It's all you, my friend. It's all you.

Ryan Wolf 56:04
Absolutely.

Jim Collison 56:05
With that, we'll remind everyone to take full advantage of all the resources we do have available on Gallup Access. And so if you haven't been out there in a while, head out to gallup.com/cliftonstrengths. And when you sign in, you'll go right to your strengths dashboard. We talked a lot about the news page. Go to [news.gallup.com]. They actually have a Topics A through Z page that has a lot of very helpful things in there. If you haven't been out there in a while, get familiar with it. There's a lot of great research, a lot of stuff to kind of keep you busy reading and thinking about the data of today. So head out there and get that done. For coaching, master coaching or to become a Gallup-Certified Strengths Coach, we can help you with that as well. Send us an email: coaching@gallup.com. No matter where you are in the world, we'll get you set up with the right person to be able to get that done. And then of course, Ryan mentioned Part 3, which will be coming up here in a couple weeks. It, I have yet to post the invite for that, so there's still time to follow us on gallup.eventbrite.com, and you'll get an automatic notification whenever I post that out there so that you do not miss that episode. You can join us at any social platform by following us. Just search "CliftonStrengths"; that'll get you just about everything that we do. We want to thank you for joining us tonight. I know the chat room enjoyed it. Thanks for your participation and all your questions. We'll be back actually tomorrow, so if you're listening live, we're back on Thursday with a brand new Called to Coach and a success story. Love to have you join us for that as well. Head out to gallup.eventbrite.com and get registered today.

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

Anthony Blue's Top 5 CliftonStrengths are Achiever, Connectedness, Learner, Arranger and Belief.