Arianna Huffington: CEO of Thrive Global (Raise the Line)
Hi, I'm Shui. And today on raise the line, I'm privileged to be joined by Ariana Huffington.
Uh We're all familiar with her as a powerful force in politics, media and entrepreneurship, as the founder of the Huffington Post.
But in recent years, through her work with a company, she started called Thrive Global. She's also become a leading advocate for getting people and companies to address what she describes an epidemic of stress and burnout, particularly because so much of our audience at osmosis consists of learners and professionals in health care, which is such a high stress field.
We're really delighted to welcome you to the show Ariana and we're eager to, to hear what you have to share with us. Thanks so much for being with us today.
Thank you so much. Thank you for the work you are doing delighted to be with you.
So let's get into the questions right away. So I'm curious what was at the root of your passion around the issue of burnout and tell us how trilo is working to address it.
So uh my passion started with a personal story. I actually collapsed from burnout in 2007 2 years into building the Huffington Post, uh being the divorced mother of two teenage daughters and having bought into the collective delusion that in order to succeed, to be great at what we're doing, we have to be all of his own.
We don't have time for ourselves. And then as I started the problem, I realized that that this was a collective uh epidemic.
And indeed, uh last uh spring, the World Health Organization acknowledged burnout as a real um medical syndrome affecting um millions of people.
So, um oh I decided to leave the Huffington Post to launch thrive because I didn't want just to raise awareness around these issues, but to help people take action.
And as you know, she behavior change is the hardest thing um to achieve. So we've created a behavior change product that combines micros step, which is the only way to change behavior with compelling storytelling that captures people's imagination and have seen amazing results.
And why this is particularly important now is that stress and burnout are at the heart of many diseases. And if we look at the increase in chronic diseases, uh diabetes, obesity and heart disease.
And if we look at the increase also in mental, in the mental health crisis, we see how interconnected everything is and how even before the pandemic, we are dealing with this skyrocketing numbers.
And now our priority at thrive is not just to help flatten the Coronavirus curve, but to also flat help flatten the mental health crisis curve and the chronic disease curve.
That's wonderful. And uh uh you know, since you mentioned the Coronavirus, I would like to, you know, speak uh right away to that, you know, obviously this has exacerbated some of the trends uh We have been seeing in terms of burnout and mental health.
I'm curious um kind of what are you seeing as far as the work at thrive global in terms of how uh how you all are uh working to flatten the curve as you mentioned.
And, and uh has this accelerated some of the work that you are planning to do at thrive global. Yes, in two ways.
Uh First of all, um we see our work uh with companies accelerating dramatically. Uh We launched a mental resilience program that we call thriving mine to the over 500,000 accenture employees.
Um Also to all sales force employees right now, we just launched it to um earns young employees around the world. So the demand for this um um services, this behavior change product is greater than ever.
And at Walmart, both with the front line associates in the stores and the leadership. So one of the um optimistic um parts of this crisis, we are all in which of course, has caused so many losses and so much grief is the fact that there is um there is a much greater readiness to address preexisting problems that have um been exacerbated by the Coronavirus crisis.
And the other way in which we're addressing it is through a nonprofit we've launched called First Responders First, which thrive global, launched in partnership with the Harvard School of Public Health and CAA to specifically address um the needs of frontline healthcare workers.
Both you know, the needs that we all know are pa paramount like treatment but also childcare, accommodations, food and mental health.
Yeah, I saw the first responders first and we were uh privileged to be able to partner with thrive global and and also uh bring our audience uh share Fr F with our audience as well.
Uh Thank you for doing all that work. And I'm curious how did that, uh how did Fr F come come about?
And um and also in diving deeper into the healthcare system, I'm curious what you've seen Coronavirus uh exposing as far as the weakness is the underlying weaknesses in the healthcare system.
So I would love to double click on that. Well, thank you for your support.
First of all, um first responders first started with a conversation with Michelle Williams, the Dean of the Harvard School of Public Health and myself around the stigma that so many frontline healthcare workers experience in terms of uh expressing um mental health problems, the stresses that they are under and again, that predates the Coronavirus crisis.
Uh as you know, burnout among physicians is at almost 80%. Um and that leads not just to terrible health outcomes for them but to medical mistakes.
Um So um Michelle and I wanted to do something that would address that and go beyond protective equipment, which of course is number one, but also give um the frontline healthcare workers um a platform where they could find little micro steps, they could um integrate uh into their daily, very stressful lives.
That makes a lot of sense. And uh you know, our audience, we have about 30 million current and future healthcare professionals as well as caregivers and their family members.
Um And I know many of them are obviously very appreciative of the work that you've done uh in terms of burnout, but also, you know, the, the partnership with Marriott so that they can get um accommodation if they needed to in New York.
Um you know, to come and help them center. Um It, you've done a tremendous job of partnering with institutions or organizations like Walmart and Marriott and uh and other companies.
I'm just curious, uh uh you know, while you've been from, from the Huffington Post days to now thrive global, have you noticed uh it's been easier to partner with these institutions because uh employee wellness and well being is more front of front of mind or?
Oh, absolutely. We find that um health and wellness is now on the front burner of every company.
Uh both in terms of how we navigate the new normal. Now, and also as we are looking at reentry, um obviously, companies need to address the physical aspect of social distancing, wearing masks, but also they recognize they need to address the emotional and mental state.
Because if employees come to work really stressed out, really anxious, it's going to be much harder to be productive and every company cares about that.
So we start with this micros step shift, you know, and it's very important to underline that it takes very small daily interventions in order to build healthy habits.
And if we start now, we can enter into the next normal with healthier habits, then, then we uh then we had in the world we left behind and, and I can share just a few of these with you and they all science based.
We, we call them in a behavior change up microt steps too small to fail because um we believe that's the only way to achieve behavior change.
Uh You know, in the past, we have all focused so much on um on big re new year resolutions on uh achieving amazing things quickly and the truth is that we dropped them.
So now with these micros steps, we can really achieve healthier habits. Let me just give you 31 of them is for everyone, whether you are um a frontline healthcare worker or a member of their family or uh their community.
It is so key to set a news and social media cutoff. Time we all want to be informed but, uh, consuming Coronavirus news at all times.
Right. Before we go to sleep is not a good idea.
Right. I trust that.
Yes, I have personally ended all notifications coming to my phone. Uh, I go and get the news when I want to go get the news, don't allow all these fake breaking news notifications and I promise you 90% of breaking news is not breaking news to interrupt what you are doing and add stress to your life.
The other thing is the recognition that it takes 60 to 90 seconds to cause correct from stress. We just need to be intentional about it.
Now, we're never going to eliminate stress from our lives. It's not possible but we can prevent stress from becoming cumulative and it's cumulative stress.
So take these 60 seconds multiple times day to remember three things you are grateful for, to take deep conscious breaths, um, to set your intention for the day to look at pictures that give you joy.
Anything that helps you course, correct. A third micros step that I love because music changes my mood like that.
So create a um, stress reduction playlist, you know, play a song for 60 seconds and that gives you joy. You know, let's say you're having a break instead of blindly kind of and mindlessly crawling through social media, just listen to a song you love and um, and take some conscious breaths and these are all things, but it can do because they are not time consuming.
They just require intention and the recognition that we all have that place that I called the eye of the hurricane. You know, that place of calm and peace and strength and wisdom in it's our birthright.
So can we just take like a minute here and there to reconnect with that? That's wonderful advice.
Thanks for sharing all three of those. I can speak from personal experience about the uh expression, gratitude multiple times a day.
We got all of our teammates at an osmosis uh a gratitude journal so that it's part of their habits now as well. So that really resonates.
Um uh uh speaking of advice, uh you know, so many again of our audience are uh about to become or already are health professionals, do you have any advice for, for them that you'd like to give them, especially in the heart of the COVID pandemic?
Well, first of all, I want to give them a gratitude because uh um they are really are heroes. They are really are the first responders in this pandemic.
And then I want to ask them to really reimagine uh how um healthcare professionals should act, behave and, and run their lives and their work because the way so many people in the profession right now have, have done.
It is not working, it's not um something we can continue to accept as the norm to have almost 80% of people in, in the medical profession at different levels be burnt out exhausted.
So uh I would love for them to be trailblazers to chart a new pass. It's always the people coming in now who have more of a chance to reimagine the way they work and live.
That's wonderful advice, especially since they interact with so many patients, they could maybe lead by example, in this capacity.
So it's when I was in medical school, that's part partially what drew me to some of your writings that you wrote about sleep um which I think was pretty resonant uh there as well.
Um Is there any last comment or question um or a thought that you'd like to pose um while we're on? Yes, I just like to say she, that everything we discussed here, whether it's the micro steps or the fundamental need to reimagine how we work and live um in your profession um is based on science.
It's based on data. Uh part of what we're doing at thrive global is reimagining health and wellness uh to be science based, rigorous and data driven.
So, um you're a scientist, you are data driven. So why not actually practice what is driving the work you're doing that for me is so important and we have an opportunity now because the period of immense crisis and loss and pain is also a crucible, a catalyst for change to come out of it better.
Then we went into it. Those are very motivational and inspirational words.
So uh before we end this episode, I'd like to give a special shout out to our advisor and friends, uh Alan Patrick off and Gregory Coleman who introduced us and made this possible.
Uh And thank you so much Ariana for, for being with us today uh among your busy schedule and, and all the work you've done that thrive global and uh first responders first.
Thank you so much. And we would love for you and anybody listening to write and share your stories with us.
You can email it to me A H at thrive global.com. You can go to thrive global.com/newsletter and um subscribe to my Sunday newsletter or to all our newsletters and let's continue this conversation.
Thank you so much for all you're doing. Thanks again and with that, I'm Shibui.
Thanks for checking out today's show and remember to do your part to flatten the curve and raise the line. We're all in this together.
No notes for this video yet
Try adding a note below