Blackmores CEO Alastair Symington on how to foster wellbeing in the workplace

Employers can no longer brush aside the importance of staff wellbeing. Research by LiveTiles shows that 38% of employees want access to better wellbeing initiatives, and 37% of employees are willing to switch to a lower paid job for a better experience at work — that’s more than 4.7 million Australian workers.

The global pandemic, and with it the rise of hybrid work, has forced businesses to rethink their role in supporting the health of their teams. For Alastair Symington, chief executive of the ASX-listed Blackmores Group, fostering wellbeing among the company’s 1200-strong workforce is about “ensuring employees are safe, protected and have the tools at their disposal to manage their health”.

The natural health company, which has a presence in 13 markets across the Asia-Pacific, recently launched its first masterbrand campaign in four years. Dubbed ‘Good Health Changes Everything’, the marketing strategy seeks to appeal to every consumer, regardless of their location.

“Whether you’re sitting in Jakarta, sitting in Bangkok or you’re here in Sydney, good health changes everything is a universal truth,” Symington says.

If good health can change everything, it can surely change a workplace. So how does a global company in the business of selling vitamins support employee health? SmartCompany Plus caught up with Alastair Symington to find out.

From a health food store to the ASX

It’s been 90 years since the British immigrant and naturopath Maurice Blackmore established Blackmores in Australia. He created products based on what Symington describes as an “innovative” understanding of natural medicine. In 1938, Blackmores opened its first health food store in Brisbane and since then the business has cemented itself as a leading Australian vitamins brand.

A pivotal moment in the company’s history took place when Maurice Blackmore’s son Marcus took over the business at just 27 years of age. Marcus went on to build the brand over the course of his 57 years as executive chair and later director of the company. He then acted as interim chief executive in 2019, before Alastair Symington came on board.

For Symington, the company’s successful expansion, particularly into Asia, was testimony to the direction of Marcus Blackmore, who he says “was a frontier man and really ahead of his time”.

In 1987, Blackmores listed on the ASX. Today, Blackmores is in the ASX200 and has a market capitalisation of $1.85 billion. It sells products from 15,000 distribution points made up of pharmacies, supermarkets, airport stockists and an online store. The business also expanded its range, acquiring the pet brand PAW and practitioner’s brand BioCeuticals in 2010 and 2012.

Much of Blackmores recent growth, Symington says, came off the back of successful debuts in southeast Asian markets and China.

“We saw very explosive years of growth from 2013 to 2017,” he says.

During that period, Blackmores tripled in size and its share price famously shot up above $200.

Throw forward five years, Blackmores’ share price is $90 at the time of writing. The coronavirus pandemic hit sales, particularly in Australia, where revenue was down 14% in the financial year 2020-21 compared to the previous year. Globally, however, the picture was brighter. Blackmores reported $575.9 million in revenue, which was up 1.3% on the previous year — largely due to an increase in revenue of 27.8% in China.

In the same month Blackmores went live with its ‘Good Health Changes Everything’ campaign in October, a dispute played out about its board members. Marcus Blackmore, who owns about a quarter of the company, was unsatisfied with chair Anne Templeman-Jones and reportedly said the board had become too risk averse.

Despite Marcus Blackmore’s efforts to secure a position on the board for George Tambassis, a former president of the Pharmacy Guild of Australia, the shareholders chose differently. In an annual general meeting in late October, shareholders voted in favour of Templeman-Jones’ re-election, with the final vote showing 60.4% voted for her.

While speaking with SmartCompany Plus, Symington declined to comment on the board matter.

Health inside and out

Symington says Blackmores’ value of promoting wellbeing is “absolutely” directed internally as well.

“It starts and finishes with your employees,” he says. He even cites a recent Atlassian and PwC study to underscore the staggering importance of providing a good employee experience. The survey found that 69% of employees would consider turning down a promotion in order to preserve their mental health.

For Symington, the pandemic shifted the goal posts about what building work-life balance into the fabric of an organisation looks like. He notes how the rise of hybrid work has made staff prioritise having a reasonable workload, as the lines between the home and office blurred.

“It’s not about staff working harder and then putting health initiatives on top, there is a balance that employees are looking for,” he says.

An idea that is now baked into Blackmores’ approach to hybrid work is for staff to bookend their day.

“We used to bookend our days with travel to and from the workplace, which often signalled the start and end of the day,” Symington says. But with the shift to work-from-home that habit was wiped out, increasing the risk of staff working outside their contracted hours.

According to Symington, one way Blackmores addresses overtime is through training and having hybrid workplace guides. These guides encourage teams to build habits to mark the end of each day, blockout non-work periods and prioritise tasks based on their level of urgency.

“The key here is to be outcomes focused, to make agreements and communicate these protocols,” he says.

When it comes to wellbeing initiatives, staff at Blackmores have access to a portal called Rise. The portal features online tools and a booking system for in-person classes. Symington says the resources are broken down into four keystone areas: mental, spiritual, physical and emotional health.

“People can take information from it and use certain health initiatives to create something that’s personal to them,” he says.

Rise is also a chance for employees at Blackmores “to practice what we preach,” Symington says. Staff are encouraged to give different things a go, such as naturopathic training, meditation classes, goal planning workshops and gym sessions — all with the aim of gaining positive health outcomes.

Being in the health industry, Symington says, Blackmores is connected to other businesses and has a range of partnerships with practitioners, such as Dr Tom Nehmy, the director of the mental health education organisation Healthy Minds.

“There are sessions going on all the time,” Symington says.

About 600 of Blackmores’ staff are located across Asia and the remaining 600 work from Australia and New Zealand. Because there is no central location, the company has invested in building its Rise portal, offering classes and resources digitally.

“We try to make the experience as easily accessible as we can because we want to make it equal,” Symington says, acknowledging that the business has invested a lot in improving user experience on the platform.

A program fit for your values

Symington’s advice for others — be they managers or chiefs of people and culture — is to “reach out to employees and get feedback” before establishing new wellbeing programs.

“Part of the beauty of the program that we created was there was a sense of co-creation with the employees,” he says.

Symington says whether you have 50, 100 or 200 employees, “showing up interested in understanding what good health means to them is the starting point”.

He adds that while factors like your budget will influence which programs you can adopt, your industry, location and the demographics of your employees should also shape your approach to health initiatives.

After sourcing feedback, Symington says, employers should “just try things”.

“If you try things here and there, what you’ll find is that some things will stick and you continue with those, and others won’t and you can let them go,” he adds.

“That way, you can cultivate a program which is right for the size of the company and your values.”