Editors’ Note

Prior to joining the healthcare space, Joy Altimare worked with leading agencies such as Ogilvy+Mather, GREY, and Publicis on preeminent brands like L’Oreal, Verizon and Colgate-Palmolive. She then shifted into a role at publishing giant Condé Nast, transferring her skills to the media world.

Company Brief

For more than 100 years, EHE (eheintl.com) has been a leader in healthcare and wellness. It is a pioneer in employee health and lifestyle management, empowering individuals to be more productive and high-performing through innovative preventive care. EHE’s mission is to improve the health of a company’s employees while helping to manage healthcare costs. With an industry leading annual exam and customized follow-up resources provided by renowned physicians at premier facilities nationwide, EHE delivers personal, proven and powerful care. The company continues to build on its legacy of groundbreaking, industry-leading care.

How is purpose embedded in EHE’s culture?

It’s embedded in our history. Prevention itself provides a better purpose – it’s not problem/solution oriented; it is really focusing on the deep-rooted challenges of helping people understand how to perform at a higher level to meet their purpose.

It’s our reason for being and it’s why we exist. We think of ourselves as a conduit that connects people to their health purpose. We have crystallized this concept by thinking of both the body and mind holistically. Not only do we consider someone’s physical capabilities, but we also talk about the motivation behind behaviors.

The industry has progressed toward understanding the effects of the mindfulness that is rooted in understanding why someone behaves as they do. This is helping people home in on what their greater purpose is and how to deliver against that.

EHE has always been in the prevention space. We believe the patients we serve want an evolved solution that helps them become their best selves. We believe if we’re going to be their partners and help them achieve their health goals, then we must focus on understanding what motivates behavior and help them maintain a keen eye on their purpose. EHE promotes a centered approach rooted in an understanding of performance, productivity and longevity. We really believe this is the future of the industry.

Would you discuss EHE’s commitment to its employees and focus on employee engagement?

Over the past two decades, the workplace environment has drastically changed. They are more diverse and layered environments, so looking at our EHE employee set has helped us advise and lead our customers as they try to attract and retain great talent across the range of millennials, Gen-X and Baby Boomers.

In general, there is a heightened sensitivity in how one motivates and engages employees who come from different experiences. There is more awareness placed on understanding what tools and resources one has at their disposal to keep everyone engaged with the company’s mission while also doing their individual jobs.

We looked at how to do that for our own employees. Last year, we took an important stance around healthiness within our own population. We equipped all of our employees with Apple watches and we created our own internal EHE wellness challenge, which was the first step toward practicing what we preach.

If we’re going to be this counseling adjunct for our customers, we have to first practice it at home. We have seen heightened engagement in our company and are also seeing better productivity and performance. I would also say that I anticipate it also resulting in people being much happier within their work environment, because they’re working less in silos and more across disciplines.

This all adds up to people feeling more like they’re coming to work with a purpose rather than just working individually and having no context for their contribution.

It all started with the idea of creating a framework where people can work out together, eat better together, and enjoy learning and growing together.

How do you define the EHE brand mission?

“Engaging Healthy Employees,” which reflects both our core mission for a century and our continuing evolution. Our history is centered on prevention, and we do that really well. In today’s world, prevention alone is insufficient. The “healthy” majority of the population needs guidance and resources that enhance overall quality of life.

We are the only company that provides this particular approach to wellness. Our ambition is to help people connect the dots and to understand that traditional “prevention” is only giving them part of what they need. Lowering risks for disease is profoundly important. However, we also want to “engage” our patient community in evaluating what else they can do to ensure their daily lives are as fulfilling as possible.

A narrow view of health means a limited view of potential. People should expect more and, therefore, should expect more from their care providers. We take the process to that next level, and the results are exciting.

It’s a very modern way of looking at each individual’s health, and we work closely with everyone to make sure they know and have what they need. We believe in peer-to-peer relationships because they facilitate results and engagement.

We help healthy people stay healthy, but we also help them perform better, live longer and be more productive. Prevention is critical, but it’s also just one benchmark. “Engaging Healthy Employees” is about getting people to see and understand their health differently and then to take the right steps to live differently.

How has the way EHE communicates with its patients evolved?

Patients told us early in this process that the way they behave outside of healthcare is how they want to be spoken to or interacted with within healthcare.

Traditionally, the impactful brands around healthcare are those that have focused on specific solutions to persistent problems. In our world, we have an added value to talk about the motivations behind behavior and how we can help someone change. It’s about how one performs and feels every day. That’s why our personalized, actionable approach feels so relevant.

Outside of prevention, we want to understand what is behind the numbers. Does someone feel restless? Do they have anxiety? What triggers this? Overtired and overworked are two different things, for instance.

Then it’s about how we can create a plan to help someone overcome their issues step by step. The exam is a first step on a longer health journey.

Our patients want that constant resource on their own terms – they don’t want to be bombarded with messaging that doesn’t make sense. They want a resource to tap into so they can consistently improve on their health goals.•