Moving From Employee Wellness to Holistic Health With Dr. Jarik Conrad

My guest today is Dr. Jarik Conrad, vice president of the Human Insights and the HCM Advisory team at UKG. Dr. Conrad also serves as the executive director of the UKG-sponsored Equity At Work Council, an interdisciplinary group of experts and practitioners dedicated to providing you with evidence-based strategies to eliminate workplace inequities.

On today’s show, Dr. Conrad and I talk about the world of well-being and wellness, what it was like before COVID-19 and where it is today. We discuss how we can start thinking more holistically about employee wellness and how to better connect employees to answers for their physical and emotional health needs. So if you work in human resources and you’re wondering, “How do I make my organization a little healthier?” sit back and enjoy this conversation.

Punk Rock HR is proudly sponsored by UKG. They are an award-winning all-in-one HR platform. If you’re curious and want to fix work and do HR better, check out our sponsors at UKG.com.

Download my white paper “The Way Forward: A Look at Post-Crisis Work Life,” created in partnership with UKG.

Thinking More Broadly About Employee Wellness

Back in the day, when I worked in HR, I was 25 pounds overweight, not sleeping, not eating right, not putting myself first like a business does, and my bottom line was depleted. And someone walked into my office and asked me to organize the 5K for our company. And I’m like, “Why are you looking at me? I can’t walk 5K, let alone run 5K.”

I think that sometimes organizations give stuff to HR, and I was in no position to run a 5K program with any integrity. That’s a small example, but I think companies sabotage well-being programs. They demand a lot of their workforce, and they don’t necessarily give them time to recuperate, sleep or even eat right.

I wanted to talk to Dr. Conrad about this because I think that companies get in their own way.

According to Dr. Conrad, “we think about physical health. We think about mental health, but we think about it in terms of depression and bipolar and all that stuff. For me, wellness is when you pick up your phone, and you see these alerts and people are fighting on the airplane: something is not right. Something is going on, and you can’t have any disagreement in public now without it getting to be some violent, confrontational situation.”

This state of affairs is unsustainable, Dr. Conrad says. “You can’t be well if you can’t even engage in a conversation without getting emotionally overheated; something is going on in your life that has your nerves on edge.”

The solution starts with looking more broadly at issues of wellness. “If you’re somebody who hates somebody, just because they’re different, there’s something not quite right there in your life,” Dr. Conrad says. “There’s some insecurity. There’s something that you don’t like about yourself. So, I just think we need to put a different lens on a lot of the challenges that we’re seeing. It gets back to, ‘Is this person healthy and well?’”

Connecting Employees to the Answers for Holistic Wellness

I believe that there’s absolutely something broken in our society. And companies can only do so much, but I wonder if there’s also an opportunity for HR to get ahead of some healing. When we do our jobs right, we’re proactive. We can see a problem before it becomes a scene in the middle of a flight, 38,000 feet up.

I asked Dr. Conrad about toeing the line between being fake psychologists and being helpful.

“I think we might not have all the answers, but we ought to be able to connect people to the answers. So, we need more robust mental and emotional health services in our organizations. All of us have EAP programs. You and I both know they’re underutilized. There’s still a stigma associated with this whole category — and especially to mental health services at work and all that.”

Availability of resources isn’t necessarily the problem, but rather people not knowing how to access them, Dr. Conrad says. “Make sure they know what’s available, make sure there’s no stigma associated with using those things and make sure we fill in the gaps.”

“I have a passion for diversity, equity, inclusion, belonging, just like I have a passion for health and wellness. And if you think about it like this, let’s say you’ve done your job as an HR person, you’ve done some research. You present all these stats about how underrepresented you are regarding certain populations in the workplace. We need to do something about that. We need more diversity, equity and inclusion for all these reasons and the business imperative.”

Well-Being Starts With Emotional and Physical Health

Dr. Conrad left us with some final thoughts on the importance of understanding employee wellness holistically.

“I think all this starts with emotional and mental health. I think that has to be the foundation. And it has to be the groundwork for everything that we’re trying to do. You can tell people all day long, ‘Eat these foods, work out this many times a week, get this much sleep.’ You can tell them that all day long, and they can have good intentions. They understand it intellectually. And they have very good intentions, but something happens in the brain when it comes to understanding and executing.”

Wellness programs need to start earlier, with helping people understand their minds and their processes, Dr. Conrad adds. “So, I just think we got to be smarter about that and how stress is affecting our decision-making. How stress is affecting our interactions with each other. And how we look at ourselves. All this is foundational stuff before a wellness program can come in and say, ‘OK, let me encourage you to run 5K.’ It’s got to be deeper than that because I want to know why you weren’t exercising in the first place. If I can flip that switch, I’m good.”

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Full Transcript

Laurie Ruettimann:

Punk Rock HR is proudly sponsored by UKG. They’re an award-winning all-in-one HR platform. If you’re curious and want to fix work and do HR a little bit better, and I know you do, because you’re a fan of Punk Rock HR, check out our sponsors at UKG.com.

Hey everybody, I’m Laurie Ruettimann, welcome to Punk Rock HR. My guest today is Dr. Jarik Conrad. He’s the VP of the Human Insights and the HCM Advisory team at UKG. Dr. Conrad also serves as the Executive Director of the UKG-sponsored Equity At Work Council, an interdisciplinary group of experts and practitioners dedicated to providing you with evidence-based strategies to eliminate workplace inequities. On today’s show, Jarik and I talk about the world of well-being and wellness, what it was like before COVID and where it is today. So, if you work in human resources and you’re wondering, how do I make my organization a little healthier? Well, sit back and enjoy this conversation with Dr. Jarik Conrad of UKG.

Hey, Dr. Conrad, welcome to the podcast.

Dr. Jarik Conrad:

Hi, Laurie, delighted to be here.

Laurie Ruettimann:

Well, I’m thrilled to have you here, Jarik. And before we get started, it’s a tradition to have the guests say who they are and what they’re all about. So, why don’t you get us started with that?

Dr. Jarik Conrad:

I guess, officially I’m the VP of Human Insights at UKG, and nobody understands what that means. So, I have to explain that. I really lead a thought leadership group at the company. And we’re thinking about the future. What the future workplace is going to look like? What are going to be the needs of future workers? How do we make sure we prepare our company and our customers for their future?

Laurie Ruettimann:

Well, to know the future of work means that you must study the today of work a lot. So, what’s work like today, in 2021?

Dr. Jarik Conrad:

Interesting. I mean, obviously, everything is dominated by COVID and everything is influx now with this fluid return-to-work situation. You think you got the green light, then you get a yellow light. You don’t know if you anticipate a red light. And so, I think we’re still dealing with a level of uncertainty and a high level of anticipation. There are pockets of people who want to go back and pockets of people who are like, “Look, everything is fun. I like my new setup.” So, this is just an interesting time. I think this is a time that organizations and organizational leaders really need to be listening to what their employees are telling them, because it might be different for different organizations, different industries. So, it’s interesting right now.

Laurie Ruettimann:

Well, I know you’re focused on workplace wellness and the health of organizations. And at the very micro-level, I work with a bunch of people and they’re like, “I’m healthier than ever. Now that I’m working from home, I’m running 50 miles a week. I don’t commute anymore. I get to see my kids in the morning.” It’s mostly men, by the way. And then, on the other side of things, there are individuals, I would never say they’re all women, but they’re exhausted, they’re burned out. So, talk to me a little bit about individual workers and how they’re feeling.

Dr. Jarik Conrad:

Yeah. I’m glad you said it that way, because we tend to read articles and if we get a number that says the average are 50-something percent, we roll with that. The reality is there’s a variety of experiences that are going on right now. And I know just personally for us early on, when it looked like this was going to be a long-term thing, my wife and I made a pact that we were going to be on the healthier side when we came out of it. So, we recommitted to working out and eating well. Now, I don’t know whether this is a good thing or a bad thing, because I like to support local businesses, but we have not eaten out at a restaurant for 18 months. No, carry out. I’m a gourmet chef now, Laurie. [crosstalk 00:03:52].

Laurie Ruettimann:

I’m coming over when things are better, oh my goodness-

Dr. Jarik Conrad:

That’s right, I can take care of you. So, we went into this saying that, we know human behavior, that some people are going to fall off. We don’t want to be those people. So, I think that some people went into it with that approach. So, it’s really mixed. And I think organizations, again, I’ll go back to, we’re going to have to meet where people are, and how do we get them back adjusted and ready to work in this new environment? And a big part of that — a huge part by the way, always has been, but it’s very obvious now, very visible — is the health and well-being of their employees, is critical.

Laurie Ruettimann:

Well, I’m often skeptical when people talk about the workforce globally, because come on, we’re all different, right? I mean, that’s one of the lessons from 2020 that we can’t make these sweeping assumptions anymore. And yet, there are some global trends happening in the world of work, as it relates to wellness and well-being. So, where are we globally? Are we all burnt out? Or, at least is every organization dealing with this? Where do things stand?

Dr. Jarik Conrad:

I hate to use the term “interesting” again, but I guess a lot of things are interesting right now. It’s mixed, obviously this pandemic has affected us all, right? There’s nobody on Earth that hadn’t been affected in some way, shape or form by the pandemic. So, we’re all still reeling, and we’re all on this rollercoaster. Everybody’s got the same rollercoaster, some countries get it before we do, some countries get it after us. So, globally, we’re still as uncertain. I mean, you got here, it’s very difficult to get a sizable part of the population to take the vaccine. You got other countries that will do anything to get an opportunity to take the vaccine. So, it’s just a unique time to sit back and understand what’s happening on a global scale.

I will say this, though, if it’s possible, let’s put the pandemic aside and talk about where we were before. And unfortunately, some of the richest countries weren’t doing so well, the United States being chief among them, we have not had the best health outcomes for a long time. And so, we’re struggling from a health perspective for individuals, which then means organizationally, there are a lot of people who were already calling out of work, who were present, but not really there physically, or mentally, emotionally. I’ve been talking about the health crisis prior to the pandemic and all the pandemic did was exacerbate these issues.

Laurie Ruettimann:

Well, that’s really well-said. Because, I feel like I was burned out before it was cool. And you’re absolutely right, there were plenty of us who were dealing with health issues and financial stress, right? And student loan payments and all of this, which culminates in a broken well-being system. But, you tell me, how did we get here? Especially, here in America, to a place where the pandemic just put our well-being in a negative way on steroids.

Dr. Jarik Conrad:

I’ll talk about it from a couple of angles. From one angle, we got to look at the systems, the structures, the institutions that perpetuate the challenges that we have. So, just on a practical level, look at what we eat. I mean, fast food is ubiquitous. The marketing of it is great. It’s convenient. Convenience has been a real detriment to our health and well-being, even though it’s had all these promises of making our lives better. In some ways it’s made us lazy, right? So, we’re struggling from a systems perspective, a structural perspective. We know we had issues with the opioid crisis, and you know how some of that was orchestrated. So, we have all these issues going on.

On the other side, there’s a degree of individual responsibility that’s part of this, as well. We don’t eat right, we don’t exercise enough, and we don’t sleep well. And we’re dealing with an incredible amount of stress. You mentioned being burned out. I mean, people are dealing with an incredible amount of stress. And on top of all this, you have these tremendous inequities and disparities. And some groups were lower on all these scales than other groups. So, we already had some structural issues that resulted in some people being marginalized, on the outskirts. And again, with the pandemic, that’s exacerbated that problem, right? People who are struggling the most, are the people who were already struggling.

Laurie Ruettimann:

That’s really well said, and an interesting way to put it. Because, back in the day, when I worked in human resources, I was 25 pounds overweight, not sleeping, not eating right, not putting myself first like a business does, and my bottom line was depleted. And someone walked into my office and asked me to organize the 5K for our company. And I’m like, “Why are you looking at me? I can’t walk 5K, let alone run 5K.” So, I just think, sometimes organizations give stuff to HR and I was in no position to run a 5K program with any integrity. So, that’s like a small example, but I think companies sabotage well-being programs. They demand a lot of their workforce and they don’t necessarily give them time to recuperate, to sleep, to eat right. So, let’s talk a little bit about this, because I think companies get in their own way. What are your thoughts on that?

Dr. Jarik Conrad:

Yeah, yeah, and I think we do need to look at ourselves in the mirror. I’m an HR professional as well, been doing HR for 20-something years. And I’ve tried not to be one of the problems, but I’ve definitely been on HR teams where, we have this wellness program, we do this big launch of this wellness program. We make up some contest for people, encourage them to eat right, workout. But every Friday we bring in donuts. It’s mixed messages. So, all the things that we told them not to do, are the things that we did, whenever there was a celebration. And you and I both know there was always some promotion, a retirement, or something worth celebrating. So, I think we’ve got to think about this stuff much more serious. The other thing, Laurie, is I think that we’ve got to think more broadly, in terms of health and wellness.

We think about physical health. We think about mental health, but we think about it in terms of depression and bipolar and all that stuff. For me, wellness is when you pick up your phone and you see these alerts and people are fighting on the airplane, somebody is not right. Something is going on, and you can’t have any disagreement in public now without it getting to be some violent, confrontational situation. You can see that we’re on a pace that is unsustainable. You can’t be well if you can’t even engage in a conversation without getting emotionally overheated, Something is going on in your life that has your nerves on edge.

So, I think we need to step back, and we need to think about wellness more broadly. I know diversity, equity and inclusion is a big focus now, as it should be for so many organizations. But, if you’re somebody who hates somebody just because they’re different, there’s something not quite right there in your life. There’s some insecurity. There’s something that you don’t like about yourself. So, I just think we need to put a different lens on a lot of the challenges that we’re seeing. It gets back to, “Is this person healthy and well?”

Laurie Ruettimann:

Yeah, I love that perspective, and I don’t necessarily think that it’s an organization’s responsibility to solve some of these systemic problems, nor can it. But, when your employee is one of those who is picking fights at work and then is ultimately arrested on a plane, you’ve got some responsibility to either give them resources, or give them access, or teach them a different way. But, do you? I mean, they’re adults. I don’t know. What are your thoughts on this? This is so complicated.

Dr. Jarik Conrad:

Well, I think, the first thing, you’ve made an investment. You’ve hired people. And if I’m right, that means there’s something not quite right within, right? That they don’t feel good about themselves in some way. So, if we look at them as vulnerable, if we look at them as if they need something, what if we, as an organization, can provide that thing? What if we can connect with people enough to know what it is they’re insecure about? What it is that they’re struggling with? If we can provide those resources, we help them. And then, obviously we help the organization. So, I think an investment in them is an investment in us.

Our natural reaction when you have people who misbehave, and you know this from our experience in HR, it took me a few years to learn this. The natural reaction is the person who was just misbehaving. You go in, you discipline them. You make sure that they don’t do it. Actually, that’s oftentimes a cry for help. And again, it took me a while to learn that. And I would go in and ask a lot of questions, and it wasn’t unusual for those people to break down and there’s tears everywhere. This reminds me of a quick saying my wife used to say before I left the house every day, both as an HR person, and especially, when I started my own thing, I was doing executive coaching. She’d say, “Don’t make anybody cry today.”

Laurie Ruettimann:

Oh, my goodness. [crosstalk 00:12:19] My friend, that is the goal of HR, though. So, you’re right. And there’s absolutely something broken in our society. And companies can only do so much, but I wonder if there’s also an opportunity for HR to get ahead of some of the healing. When we do our jobs right, we’re proactive. We can see a problem before it blows up 38,000 feet on a plane. And so, I just wonder what your thoughts are on towing the line between being fake psychologists, but also being helpful?

Dr. Jarik Conrad:

Yeah, well, I think we might not have all the answers, but we ought to be able to connect people to the answers. So, we need more robust mental and emotional health services in our organizations. All of us have EAP programs. You and I both know they’re underutilized. There’s still a stigma associated with this whole category. And especially to mental health services at work and all that. We need to make sure that people know what’s available already, because in some organizations we have the resources, people just don’t know where to get to them. Make sure they know what’s available, make sure there’s no stigma associated with using those things, and make sure we fill in the gaps — I mean, if we don’t have what they need available. And we need to be making sure that we’re thinking about where people are in their lives as we try to move our organizations forward. Let me give you another quick example.

I have a passion for diversity, equity, inclusion, belonging, just like I have a passion for health and wellness. And if you think about it like this, let’s say you’ve done your job as an HR person, you’ve done some research. You present all these stats about how underrepresented you are, regarding certain populations in the workplace. We need to do something about that. We need more diversity, equity and inclusion for all these reasons and the business imperative. And all this stuff. Well, let’s say I’m a white male and I hear you say that, but I’m a white male who is at risk a little bit. When you think about Maslow’s hierarchy, we have a similar path we’ve created called the life-work journey. If you think about those initial categories, if I’m at risk, and you just told me that we need more diversity, what have you just told me?

You are coming after me, you’re trying to replace me. I’m already feeling at risk. On the other hand, let’s say that I’m a white male, but I’m further along. I’m at legacy stage. I’m thinking about retirement, I’ve done well here, I have savings. I’m secure in who I am and what I contribute. And you tell me the same thing, I might say, “Great. How can I help? I want to be around people from different backgrounds and perspectives. I enjoy that. I learned from people.” So, if what I’m saying is true, as an HR professional, maybe we ought to be investing in our people and understanding where they are and move them to a place that we can introduce these concepts and face less backlash, have a likelier, greater chance, a higher likelihood of these things being successful. So, I think we need to rethink everything that we do and look at it from the lens of where people are in our organizations and how are they likely to respond?

Laurie Ruettimann:

Well, that’s empathy and compassion in action, what you just described. And I love that, because we’ve been throwing around those words, they’re the buzzwords, du jour. Empathy, compassion, we’re showing it all the time, but we’re not … and I think you’re right, it takes hard work, it takes boots on the ground to actually be empathetic, to be compassionate. And there’s almost not enough time. We want HR professionals to connect individually. We also want them to have their fingertips on the pulse of everything and to know all these different resources, but we also want them to fill the 52 jobs that are open and be the diversity officer-in-chief, and do all of these crazy things. And I think one of the things that HR professionals say to me is that, “I haven’t had a vacation in 18 months, I’m doing 15 different jobs here. I’m exhausted myself.” So, I wonder if there are really great organizations that you work with, with HR departments that are doing it right. What do those departments look like? What is a healthy, functioning, HR team do that others can emulate?

Dr. Jarik Conrad:

Now, I probably shouldn’t say, “Well, UKG we have so-and-so’s.” I won’t do a commercial here, but there are a few things that we know. This debate has been going on since I started HR, 20-something years ago. “How effective are we? Do we matter? Do we have a seat at the table? Can I get to the strategic stuff? Because, I’m caught up with the tactical stuff.” The reality is, I think, our function needs to mature, not the people. I’m not saying we have immature people, but our function is not as mature as it needs to be. I think ultimately, you’re going to have HR departments that are divided into two. I think right now, we’re asking the same person to do both of these functions. And I think ultimately, you’re going to have a people sciences area and these people scientists — they’re into emotional intelligence and psychology and neuroscience, and what makes people tick? And how do we then take that knowledge and use it to help them tick better, all that stuff.

And we’re always going to have a group that needs to be handling these tactical, the compliance, the day-to-day operational things that are critically important for our success. I just think we need to be more clear about these two functions and that they’re different. The skills that it takes to do one are not the same as the skills that it takes to do the other. So, I think we need to try to get there. This is one of our megatrends going into 2021, by the way. So, I hope that we can get there with this shift, this rebirth of HR is what we’re calling it. Now, while we wait to get there, here’s all my advice for an HR person. You got to take the vacation. The reality is you’re probably not as productive and as effective as you think you’re being by trying to be all things to all people and not taking care of yourself. You’re probably not meeting anybody’s needs, and it’s not sustainable.

So, what happens then if you get overstressed? And now, you got to take an extended vacation, because you just can’t deal with it anymore. That’s not going to be good for you, it’s not going to be good for the organization. So, I know it’s easy to say, but we have to take that time. Furthermore, we ought to be models for what we’re trying to have other people in our organizations emulate. And so, if we are hard-driving, not taking the time, not investing in ourselves, how are we going to tell managers that they should be doing that for their employees? We got to be able to walk the talk, so that work will be there. The company is not going to fall apart because you take a vacation. I promise you, they’ll be OK.

Laurie Ruettimann:

Yeah, I’ve learned that myself, the hard way. Absolutely. Well, as we wrap up the conversation, is there anything else you’d like to leave with the audience, with the listeners, with the people who are watching about the world of work, the world of well-being and the world of health and happiness at work?

Dr. Jarik Conrad:

I’ll just reinforce that, I think all this starts with emotional and mental health. I think that has to be the foundation. And it has to be the groundwork for everything that we’re trying to do. You can tell people all day long, “Eat these foods, work out this many times a week, get this much sleep.” You can tell them that all day long, and they can have good intentions. They understand it intellectually. And they have very good intentions, but something happens in the brain when it comes to understanding and executing.

And so, I think, the training around emotional intelligence and helping people understand what’s going on in their brains, when they see food? What’s happening in their process? So, I just think we got to be smarter about that, and how stress is affecting our decision-making. How stress is affecting our interactions with each other. And how we look at ourselves. All this is foundational stuff, before a wellness program can come in and say, “OK, let me encourage you to run 5K.” It’s got to be deeper than that, because I want to know why you weren’t exercising in the first place. If I can flip that switch, I’m good.

Laurie Ruettimann:

Well, I have to tell you, I learned the hard way that nobody can make you run a 5K. You got to arrive there yourself. So, I learned how to do it. And then, I started running marathons, and I’ve never looked back. So, if anybody like me can run a marathon, anybody else can do it. It’s just training. So, there is hope for all of us, and Jarik, it was really lovely to connect with you today, thanks for being a guest.

Dr. Jarik Conrad:

Well, terrific, terrific. Thanks for having me.

Laurie Ruettimann:

Hey everybody, I hope you enjoyed this conversation with Dr. Jarik Conrad. For more information, including a link to download an awesome white paper that I wrote about the changing world of work with UKG, head on over to LaurieRuettimann.com/podcast. Now, that’s all for today and I just want to thank UKG for being a great sponsor, and we’ll see you next time on Punk Rock HR.