Bryan Schielke 0:00

You say safety and performance are two sides of the same coin. What's the biggest leadership mistake you see when companies try to improve safety without investing in human performance?

Kevin Rindal 0:09

Yeah, that's a good question, Brian, because it feels like there's this tension. Like operations wants to be the most effective and efficient and have the most output. And they oftentimes see safety as trying to hold things back and safety slows things down. But, you know, having worked in elite athletics, one of the things I know is that when we focus on readiness, so we oftentimes call that athletic readiness. It's how are we optimizing someone physically and mentally to perform at their highest level? When we take that principle and apply it to the workforce, not only are they performing at a higher level, but they're also performing safely. And so I really see them two sides of the same same coin that when we optimize the human and the workforce readiness, we actually people become much more productive and uh safer and their careers last a lot longer.

Bryan Schielke 1:01

That's a good thing. Very good. You mentioned you've worked with elite athletes and frontline crews. What's one principle from Olympic level performance that translates directly to the job site and one that doesn't?

Kevin Rindal 1:12

Yeah. Well, very similar to what we just talked about, it's pretty audacious as an athlete to think I'm gonna be the best in the world at what I'm doing. I mean, when you think about the scale of the world, is it's pretty, pretty mind-blowing to think about that. And so when you talk about someone who's going to compete at a perform at a gold level performance, which I've been around hundreds of those people who've uh won gold medals, they are so insanely focused on every single detail when it comes to preparation for activity, preparation for training, recovery. And they oftentimes will tell you that recovery is actually more important than the training, because if you just train, train, train and don't focus on recovery, you're gonna fall into a breakdown mode. And so their livelihood, their ability to perform at the highest level is based on their body's ability to perform at the highest level and not be broken down. And so that direct application goes to frontline workers. Every frontline worker will tell you that their body is their most important asset. But in industrial settings, we oftentimes don't treat the body that same way. And a lot of people know more about how to take care of their vehicle, their tools than their own body. And so it's interesting that there isn't that emphasis in how do we maintain the human body, how do we maintain the mind so that we can continue to perform that highest level. And so that's where I've really been able to take the best from Science of Sports Medicine, bring that to the workforce so that we can, you know, help people perform at a higher level, but also elongate their career because it it all comes down to are we taking care of our greatest asset, which is our body?

Bryan Schielke 2:48

Absolutely. Very good. Okay. Vamosity is designed to integrate into daily operations, not sit on a shelf as another safety initiative. What did you learn about behavior change that shaped how you built the platform?

Kevin Rindal 3:00

We live in a different world than even we did 10 years ago. I mean, think about how each of us learn you don't fix your dishwasher or you're plumbing in your house or do a remodel without, you know, sourcing YouTube. And so what we've learned is that we live in this YouTube world, we live in a TikTok culture where people are learning and their opinions are being shaped by content that's you know sometimes less than five minutes, maybe it's 30 seconds. And so traditional safety has focus on long form, VHS, boring safety. And people just hate sitting through that stuff. And so what we've done is we've really tried to figure out how do we get safety messages embedded into the workday. And all the research is showing that adults learn in short bouts. It might be 30 seconds, it might be a minute long. But when those are dripped into the daily workflow, so that, you know, over the course of a month, maybe somebody gets five minutes of training, but it's five different segments that are each a minute long, they're gonna retain that knowledge much better. And they're gonna actually be able to start to put those principles into practice. And so what we found is that we've really tried to figure out what are the different points during the workday where we can integrate safety behaviors or concepts related to workforce readiness and optimizing preparation and recovery and just fit those into the workday. So that could be at the start of uh work, every crew does a pre-job brief. So they talk about the work that they're gonna be doing, they talk about what they want to accomplish from a safety perspective. And those are great opportunities to get those short messages built into the workday or a monthly safety meeting or a weekly safety meeting. So if it can just become part of the workday and it fits into their life and it's all about them and the benefits that they're gonna experience by watching this content, that's a win all day long.

Bryan Schielke 4:54

Very cool. Yeah, we've got uh a little bit of construction. Well, not a little bit, a lot of construction going on around my house. And when I go to drop the kids off at school every morning, I see the crews out there doing their warmups and their stretching as a as a team, right? So trying to stay safe out there. Absolutely. All right. Um, next question here. Leaders often struggle to prove the ROI of safety beyond fewer incidents. How do you help executives connect readiness, recovery, and mindset to productivity and retention in a way that gets the budget approved?

Kevin Rindal 5:23

Yeah. And it's funny, we have that conversation all the time, and everyone is just looking at the bottom line of okay, we're gonna invest $200,000 for a company of 3,000 employees. And how are we gonna get an ROI on that? And so it usually comes back to how many injuries do you decrease? And what we've found is that oftentimes we'll help a company reduce their soft tissue injuries by over 50% in the first year of integration. That could be like millions of dollars of savings. But what I would say is the bigger thing is there's a workforce shortage right now of people in the trades. I mean, our whole environment, especially in this world of AI, is built on are we going to be able to get energy to people? Are we gonna actually be able to fuel data centers that require, you know, tons of energy capacity? And so we really work in construction and utilities on keeping the workers safe and healthy that are performing those job tasks. And any executive will tell you that there are not enough workers to actually do the job that's required to meet the demand. And so when it comes to skilled labor, I just don't know how you can't invest in workforce readiness so that you can maintain that capacity to actually be able to complete these billion-dollar projects, you know, on time and so that we can deliver energy to things that are critical to our national infrastructure and national security.

Bryan Schielke 6:49

Amazing. Very cool. Okay. In industries like utilities and construction, trust is earned fast and lost even faster. What have you found is the most effective way for leaders to create a culture where people actually use the tools and not just comply on paper?

Kevin Rindal 7:03

Yeah. And compliance versus buy like getting people to buy in is it's tough. And I think everyone wants to pencil whip and they want to just check boxes and say, yeah, we we did our daily warm-up, like you just talked about, or we did watch the safety training. But really it all has to come back to what's in it for the end worker. And if you talk to anyone in construction utilities or whatever manual labor trade that you're talking about, their quality of life is based on their ability to live life outside of work, you know, pain-free and be able to do the things that they want to and not retire broken down. And I talk to people every day who are in the trades who they'll tell you stories. My dad, my grandfather, they're so broken down by the time they hit 65 that they could hardly stand up straight. That's not a life that anyone wants to live or aspire to. And so when we make safety and workforce readiness all about what's in it for them and the quality of life and their ability to do the things that they care about and be able to show up at the end of the day and be the best version of themselves, that's what it's all about. And so I think we need to really reframe this whole conversation less about compliance and more about, hey, this is optimizing our human talent, our people on our team so that they can live their best life, both on and off the job. And when you do it that way, it's just perceived so much better and you get that buy-in.

Bryan Schielke 8:29

Fantastic. All right. Last question here. As a founder and podcast host speaking to field professionals, what's the message you're most determined to get through right now? And why does it matter in today's market?

Kevin Rindal 8:41

Yeah, and the reason why I started my podcast is called the Work Ready Podcast, is because I'm really passionate about this concept of workforce readiness and reframing how we take care of workers so that it's it's not just about avoiding injuries, it's about optimizing the preparation, the recovery, the sustainability of the workforce so that they can have meaningful careers and retire strong. And so when we focus on that physical and mental aspect of readiness day in and day out, it just helps people be prepared to perform work safely and be able to live a career, a life that you know is meaningful and they can, again, be the best version of themselves. And so I'm really trying to lead this charge of changing the perception from just safety and compliance to bring performance ideas to the workforce.

Bryan Schielke 9:35

Much bigger picture. Yeah, for sure. Very cool.