The Wellbeing Centre of the Future

- Tim Anstiss -

So, the Government has started to measure our happiness. They have come to the conclusion, reached earlier by many, that economic growth is one thing and the health and wellbeing of the citizens that voted them into power is another.

What makes politicians think they will be any better at improving citizen health and wellbeing than they have been at growing the economy? Well, there’s an emerging science of psychological wellbeing and human flourishing they find exciting and are seeking to apply.

So what do we know? That mental health is a positive thing, much more than the absence of mental illness. That mental health and wellbeing depends on the presence of key things: good relationships, feelings of mastery, competence and achievement, engagement in tasks and activities, the experience of positive emotions and a dose of meaning and purpose.

Over 60 years ago two doctors in South London developed the Pioneer Health Centre in Peckham; a true health centre, not a disease centre. They wanted to ‘create the right conditions for health to emerge’. It never made it into the NHS.

About 10 years ago I shared with a major high street chemist, my ideas for a modern wellbeing and wellness centre. They didn’t quite get it, and chose to sell vitamins and the like.

So, what will the wellbeing centre of the future look and feel like? How will it differ from the modern health and fitness centre? Come to the Flame Conference and find out.

FIA Flame Conference – “Creating Connections – The Key to our future”
Wednesday July 13th at the Telford International Centre.
Click here to book your place now!

How Agile is your business?

- Paul Sloane -

Many leaders of small firms focus on making their business work efficiently and on delivering high-quality customer service. There is absolutely nothing wrong with these objectives. They are both essential aims. However, if they lead to rigidity and the exclusion of variation then they can undermine the key advantage that small businesses have over large businesses - agility.

If you run a small business then your large competitors can outspend you. They have more resources than you do. But they cannot move as quickly as you can. The great thing about running a small business is that you can have a new idea today, try it tomorrow and see the customer reaction the next day. If it works you can reinforce and develop it. If it does not work then you can adapt it or drop it. You can introduce innovations in products, services, messages and methods more quickly and more easily than your larger competitors. Typically they have to go through layers of committees and approvals before they can bring a new concept to market.

So by all means focus on efficiency, customer service, operational excellence and so on. Make the current business model work better. But at the same time allocate some time, money and people to experiment, try some wacky ideas and quickly gauge customer reaction to them. You should try several new ideas every month. Many might flop but that does not matter. Some will have a small benefit and should be retained. But if you keep doing this then every so often you will hit a home run - a really great and novel idea that customers love. That then is your opportunity to really accelerate the growth of your business by seizing a new market opportunity.

Here are some ways to increase your agility:

1. Set a target for the number of new initiatives you want to try over the next 12 months
2. Ask your staff, your customers and your suppliers for ideas to improve your product or service
3. Run regular brainstorm meetings with specific objectives relating to innovation
4. Allocate a small budget for prototypes and experiments
5. Give people time and space to innovate - empower them to try new things.
6. Celebrate success, learn from failure, punish in action

Paul Sloane is presenting at the FIA Conference in Telford on July 13th. For more information on Paul's work visit www.destination-innovation.com

FIA Flame Conference – “Creating Connections – The Key to our future”
Wednesday July 13th at the Telford International Centre.
Click here to book your place now!

If you don’t like change you’ll like irrelevance even less…

- Tim Webster -

Welcome to the Flame Conference Blog for 2011. Over the coming months you will hear from a number of conference speakers on a bunch of issues that currently face our industry and many others. Here’s your starter for ten:

Two or three years ago we were all salivating at the prospect of major government initiatives around activity and obesity and the impact that the Olympics would have on the nation’s desire to exercise.

Here’s a reality check: The Olympics will be great and the opportunities from the Responsibility Deal and the part we are playing in the governments physical activity initiatives are exciting, but we can’t rely on them alone to jump-start the industry. What will help to attract more than one in ten people in the UK is a significant rethink by operators around what it is that the consumer wants and how we can package it in a way that appeals to them.

Let’s look at this through the eyes of the customer:

• Make me feel important and I’ll love you forever.
• Get the results you promised me and I’ll recommend you to all my friends too.
• Connect with me online and I’ll think of you every day.
• Educate me about how to live healthily and you’ll hook me for life.
• Coach me and I’ll work my butt off for you (literally).
• Inspire me and I’ll do things that neither you nor I ever thought I was capable of.
• Entertain me and I might even enjoy working out one day.

But don’t sit on your complacent collective bottoms, palm me off with the same old stuff you’ve been doing for the last twenty years and expect me to pay you 50 quid a month for the privilege.

I want to get fit, I want to lose a little weight and I want to join your gyms. You have a great product that I would like to be a part of, but you need to understand that I’m in the driving seat now and I will exercise on my terms not yours.

FIA Flame Conference – “Creating Connections – The Key to our future”

Wednesday July 13th at the Telford International Centre.

Click here to book your place now!