Founded by Adrienne Smith in 2015, Corporate Wellness Ireland provides a complete range of wellbeing services and programmes to businesses around Ireland, creating healthy, happy, and productive workforces.
Inspiration
Adrienne qualified as a holistic therapist in 2011. She provided massage and reflexology for private clients and in 2013 the opportunity presented itself to work with a Dublin based company.
“After their 20-minute session, staff returned to their desks feeling grounded and utterly content. This in turn, had a positive effect on their interactions with colleagues, managers, and customers. It was as if a euphoric wave washed over the office, creating a sense of joy, light-heartedness, and gratitude.”
As time moved on an appetite for positive rewards, proactive work-based initiatives and a sense of employee recognition became prevalent.
In December 2015, Corporate Wellness was registered as a sole trader, ready to bring a new slant on wellbeing to workplaces in Ireland.
Research & Team Building
Adrienne started to research other companies that were providing workplace wellbeing.
Researching the competition gave Adrienne a sense of how she wanted to present her vision. She needed to connect with other potential providers and this was a challenge.
“I decided to reach out with a linkedIn post requesting wellbeing providers to contact me if they were interested in offering corporate wellbeing.” Adrienne recruited team members who shared the same vision and purpose- to help companies support their employees to lead healthier and happier lives whilst doing what they love – the perfect WIN/WIN scenario.
Making the Decision to Become Self Employed
“When the team came together, we were all self-employed already and providing wellbeing services such as mediation, counselling, massage, beauty treatments, yoga, and nutrition. Some of us had been self-employed for many years and all of us agreed that it can be a lonely journey not having colleagues to bounce ideas off and most importantly to have a good laugh with. So, to meet people with like-minded values and a real passion for helping others felt like being part of a dream team and the friendships that began to form were genuinely heartfelt.”
Challenges & Opportunities
“As a new business, reaching out to companies, promoting our services, trying to make a connection whilst changing perceptions around wellness was tough at the start. Shifting the mentality of wellbeing from a treat to an essential service that benefitted both employees and the company took some time but with patience and conviction we persevered.
In 2017, we reached out to one of the biggest health insurance providers in Ireland, they responded and since then we have been in a unique position to bring our services to tens of thousands of employees in Ireland and also globally. This professional relationship has given us a platform to reach a plethora of employees who need support, a sense of belonging and ultimately the knowledge that we are not alone, there is strength in numbers!” Adrienne tells us.
Deciding on a business structure that would work for five self -employed people was particularly challenging. The team knew that they had the opportunity to not only provide wellbeing services, but to live wellbeing as part of their business model.
“The amazing opportunity to bring our services to so many employees knowing that we were part of changing someone’s thought process is the best outcome of the services we provide. Even if we connect with just one person, and it changes their line of symmetry, then we have done a good job whilst planting seeds of inspiration for others to follow.”
To date, Corporate Wellness has connected with approximately 200 companies and over 80,000 employees.
LEO Supports
“The trading online voucher was a blessing. It was monetary support that made us sit down and really analyse where we wanted to take our company. It brought us back to basics with a simple question. “How can we help you realise your potential?” We responded to this by creating a fabulous new website which is only a stepping stone to where we want to take this.”
Corporate Wellness are now in the process of applying for a second trading online voucher.
“There are also other LEO training and networking options that we feel will really benefit us in the future. During this process, the team at our local LEO and the Trading Online Voucher team have been a source of inspiration. They have been extremely supportive in helping us fulfil our goals.”
After working with Michael Gough through the Mentoring Programme, Corporate Wellness decided to consult him for the creation of a shareholders’ agreement. Having decided the best fit for them was a company limited by shares, the team asked Michael to help us create their own bespoke agreement among the directors that would be flexible and yet robust.
“His input was really useful and helped us to again clarify for ourselves how our vision for the company and who we are as a group of individuals can best be understood in corporate terms.”
Covid 19
Covid 19 put a halt to business for Corporate Wellness. Literally overnight all of the services were cancelled one by one. Particularly the one-to-one services such as massage and beauty, which accounted for 30% of revenue, were the hardest hit and have still not been active services since March 2020.
“It was a time of great uncertainty but within the madness of the new reality that was unfolding there was still hope and it became clear that the seminar aspect of our business was needed more than ever. Immediately we knew that we needed to move online so that we could continue to bring a sense of connection, hope, community, and wellbeing strategies to employees, who like us, were walking unmapped terrain.
One of the silver linings of covid has been to shine a light on the absolute necessity of wellbeing support for employees, rather than the luxury that was being cut. Wellbeing is now a pillar of most companies' internal structures. As a wellbeing company, Corporate Wellness want to always ensure to understand trends that customers are experiencing and meet those needs with positive and proactive solutions. The team began presenting seminars on the topics that were extremely prevalent during Covid, such as:
- Coping with isolation
- Parenting skills
- Productivity whilst working from home
- Work Life Balance
- Positive mental health
- Nutrition and immunity during Covid
- Connecting with nature
- Wellbeing in challenging times
- Building resilience
- Fitness
- Yoga, Pilates, and Qi Gong
- Diversity and Inclusion
- Managing online fatigue
Next steps: 2022 and beyond
Right now, Corporate Wellness are continuing to enhance their new website to include an exciting podcast, an online portal that allows companies to access beneficial content and possibly an interactive wellbeing app.
“Since we moved online, we are aware how accessible our services are to the whole world. We already have experience working with employees based in different countries such as the UK, USA, Japan, and Australia. We would love to take this a step further and bring our services to more companies and employees worldwide.
When the first lockdowns occurred, we had just reached a level of competency in delivering services to a growing number of companies and organisations interested in promoting wellbeing. Then we learned to adapt our services in a virtual world with all the technological and personalisation challenges that came with it. 2022 and beyond is not for us to determine but to anticipate and remain agile, so that we can continually evolve and improve our capacity to meet our clients and customers wherever they need to be met.”
Given the overwhelmingly positive response from the corporate world to their services, Corporate Wellness are planning to expand their services to other sectors, including schools, colleges and wider communities.
“Giving back is a very important part of our culture so working with charities to support their staff and volunteers is something that we feel is an integral part of what we do. We have already identified some charities that we would like to work with in 2022.” Says Adrienne.
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