New Case Study by Wisdom Works Group Reveals Wellbeing as a Brand and Team Asset During a Crisis

Colorado Springs, CO, February 19, 2022 --(PR.com)-- Wisdom Works Group releases new case study, Evolving Self, Team & Brand in the Midst of a Pandemic: A Transformational Wellbeing Journey for Barilla’s Mulino Bianco showcasing how brands can prioritize wellbeing for employees and consumers. Global surveys show stress rising and wellbeing eroding for employees around the world. Yet, through a partnership with Wisdom Works, the leading bakery brand in Italy, Mulino Bianco, has shown increases in employee and team wellbeing, plus new activations to advance wellbeing for its consumers.

As COVID-19 intensified a mood of survival across Italy and rendered the team’s ways of working no longer applicable, Mulino Bianco’s Vice President of Marketing Julia Schwoerer, worried about the team’s connection with each other and their alignment and innovation for the brand. She partnered with Wisdom Works, a leadership and culture development firm, to help Mulino Bianco employees reset their lives and work in a pandemic world by prioritizing their wellbeing. “Addressing wellbeing is not a separate conversation from work. It’s about people seeing each other as whole human beings,” says Schwoerer, “It means creating an environment that integrates work and life, plus supporting each other in our journey to thrive.”

Wisdom Works designed and delivered a 5-month targeted program for the Mulino Bianco team, centered around the use of Be Well Lead Well Pulse®, the firm’s science-based assessment measuring 19 psychometrics factors that facilitate thriving and stress resilience. After using this tool, Mulino Bianco team members were supported with coaching and team sessions to apply the science and practices of wellbeing at home, at work, and with the brand.

Prioritizing thriving during the pandemic provided stability and improved collaboration for Mulino Bianco’s brand team. The team reawakened Mulino Bianco’s brand DNA for caregiving, activating this wellbeing element through the bakery product, ABBRACCI (English “hugs”), to honor Italy’s frontline nurses as special pandemic heroes. One year after the program began, team members also reported:

- 20% increase in their overall thriving and resilience during change
- 21% increase in actively using wellness behaviors, such as healthy eating, exercise, sleep and rest, and mindful breath, to effectively manage their stress and energy
- 43% increase in their engagement and wellbeing at work
- 229% increase in focusing on the wellbeing of each other
- 59% increase in a culture of participation and teamwork

Reflecting on this unique, integrated wellbeing development program, Mulino Bianco’s Senior Manager of Brand Equity & Communication, Andrea Dipace, says, “The team built trust together across disciplines, across hierarchy, and across positions, and they are proud for the opportunity to discover each other and know each other as more complete human beings.”

“Mulino Bianco’s journey shows how using an evidence-based platform that allows employees to holistically assess and embrace their innate abilities to thrive can strengthen personal wellbeing, team cohesion and effectiveness, and organizational performance,” says Renee Moorefield, CEO of Wisdom Works Group, “At Wisdom Works, we believe thriving is the new standard of leadership success. Whether during periods of crisis or growth, we are better able to meet the complexities and demands we face when we are well.”