Five minutes with…Harry Bliss, CEO at Champion Health

In our latest edition of ‘Five minutes with…’ Gus Ferguson, Consultant in our Independent Healthcare practice talks with Harry Bliss, CEO at Champion Health. Harry discusses their ever-relevant workplace wellness platform, and the critical importance of prioritising and investing in employee wellness.

You’ve been on an incredible journey to this point, what originally drove you to set up Champion Health?

I came up with the idea for Champion Health while working for the UK’s leading corporate wellbeing provider. I noticed that every area of wellbeing had its own app or its own platform. You have one for mental health, one for physical health, one for mediation, one for sleep and so on, making wellbeing very expensive for people, and for organisations.

I wanted to create a platform that united all these areas under one roof, so that anyone could engage with it, regardless of their wellbeing wants and needs. That’s how the idea for Champion came about.

How seriously should our business leaders be taking workplace wellness?

Whether you view it from a moral standpoint or a business standpoint – workplace wellness must be a top priority for business leaders.

From a moral standpoint, our data has shown the extent to which employees need supporting. Nearly 3 in 5 employees are experiencing symptoms of anxiety, nearly 70% are experiencing moderate to high stress – and tragically around 1 in 12 are experiencing thoughts of suicide or self-harm. These people need support, and they need support right now. By investing in workplace wellness, you could change and save lives.

From a business standpoint, if we’ve learnt anything over the last few years – it’s that people power our organisations, and wellbeing powers our people. As a business leader, almost every single area of your health and wellbeing influences your daily performance levels. This is the same for every single member of your team. If you want your business to perform, then wellbeing is non-negotiable.

You’ve recently been acquired by Physitrack (congratulations by the way!), what impact does this have on what Champion Health can offer now, as well as looking to the future?

Champion is driven by the impact we can have on people’s lives, and the investment from Physitrack is going increase that impact very quickly. The increased funding will allow us to supercharge the development of our platform, so we deliver a better experience for all the clients we work with. We’re also expanding our client base across the world, to have an impact on a global scale.

As a young CEO in a fast-moving sector, what are the hardest lessons you’ve had to learn along the way?

I think one of the hardest things for any founder is learning to let areas of the business go. When you start it’s just you – working across all areas of the business. But eventually, there will come a time when you must trust other people to take things off your hands – especially when you work in such a fast-moving sector.

That is one of the most difficult challenges, but it is also one of the most rewarding – especially when you have the right people around you. The business has grown from being just me to having a core team of 20, and a wider team of nearly 200. Managing that growth whilst maintaining a strong company culture is something that the whole team should be incredibly proud of.

I’ve watched people grow into leaders and take this business to the next level. If we carry on doing that, then Champion Health has a very exciting future.

For more information, please contact Gus Ferguson, Consultant in our Private Healthcare Practice.