A groundbreaking partnership between SAP and Arianna Huffington’s Thrive Global will enable SAP SuccessFactors customers to improve employee health and well-being and end the epidemic of workplace burnout, which affects an estimated 70 percent of employees.
According to Arianna Huffington, founder and CEO of Thrive Global: “Many organizations are beginning to realize the healthier and happier we are as people, the more creative and productive we’ll be as employees. Through our partnership with SAP SuccessFactors, we’re excited to bring health and well-being to the forefront of corporate planning, placing employees and businesses in a position to thrive. Together we are igniting a new wave of management that recognizes the new scientific findings on the connection between well-being and productivity and empowers organizations to make profound changes that will have a real impact on healthcare costs, recruitment, retention, and performance.”
Exclusive Thrive Pathways for Change
SAP SuccessFactors customers will receive access to exclusive Thrive pathways designed to improve employee well-being and productivity and encourage positive behavior changes. These will be delivered via the SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central and SAP SuccessFactors Learning Management solutions in the coming months.
Each pathway will be activated when a user chooses to participate in a Thrive Pulse survey, which will provide immediate feedback and links to science-based courses that have been developed and tested in organizations globally. The first pathway will focus on improving productivity in the workplace by adopting behavior changes to better manage employees’ relationship with technology, empowering them to unplug, recharge, build resilience, and create more meaningful connections in their work and their life.
Leveraging SAP SuccessFactors analytics and intelligent services capabilities, Thrive Global and SAP will jointly create a library of personalized pathways targeted to specific employee needs and triggered by key life and work events.
The variety of triggers will include an employee going on maternity leave, which could prompt a pathway for “First-Time Parenting” or an employee who receives a promotion and pay increase, which could prompt a pathway for “Money Management.”
Behavior Change Solutions Across the SAP SuccessFactors HCM Suite
Using machine learning and analytics, SAP and Thrive Global will also integrate Thrive behavior content into key parts of SAP’s value chain, leading to fuller participation and deeper engagement by employees, and resulting in employees getting more value from SAP SuccessFactors solutions and benefitting personally and professionally from Thrive’s behavior change content.
By integrating SAP SuccessFactors with Thrive assets, SAP will get new functionality and a new source of data not available in rival software that will be used to personalize Thrive’s behavior change content as well as help employers analyze and quantify well-being within their organization. This adds an additional layer of capability of global reach on the SAP SuccessFactors platform, coupled with scalability and data privacy.
Thrive Global’s mission is to prevent stress and burnout by offering companies and individuals sustainable, science-based education to enhance both well-being and performance. This mission closely reflects SAP SuccessFactors’ goals of helping global organizations utilize its leading cloud-based human capital management (HCM) solutions to better engage employees and ignite their passions, while also helping organizations implement health and well-being initiatives which truly benefit the workforce.
“SAP and Thrive Global are two organizations aligned with the unifying vision to help improve people’s lives, and this partnership is built upon a purpose-driven commitment to help the world run better,” said Jennifer Morgan, member of the Executive Board, SAP SE. “The world can only achieve its highest potential when each and every one of us is healthy, happy, and inspired to do our very best. And we are proud to partner with Arianna and the Thrive team to lead this effort for our customers.”
When well-being programs are instituted successfully, the benefits on health and the bottom line are clear. Research shows that changing behaviors, like reducing stress, can directly impact as many as 1 million people per day who miss work, which translates into a loss of $150 billion to $300 billion annually for U.S. employers.
“Any corporate culture that breeds unhealthy or unhappy employees results in an unproductive workplace,” said Mike Ettling, president, SAP SuccessFactors. “We’re thrilled to be co-developing innovative solutions that will bring health and well-being initiatives to the center of our clients’ HR strategies. There is a clear relationship between a healthy workforce and business outcomes, and with Thrive, we’re helping everyone enjoy the benefits of an organizational culture of well-being.”
Yvette Cameron is senior vice president of Strategy for SAP SuccessFactors
