Melvin Durai
Zerodha, the Bangalore-based financial services company, may have some of the healthiest employees in the world—and I’m not just talking about financial health.
The employees are healthy because of an incentive programme that rewards them for meeting their fitness goals. If they meet their goals, Zerodha’s CEO Nithin Kamath allows them to use his parking space for a month.
Actually, the reward is even better than that, as Kamath revealed in a series of tweets.
“On our internal forum, we asked everyone to set a 12-month get-healthy goal and update the progress every month, to create accountability,” he wrote. “To increase participation, we said everyone who reaches the goal will get a 1-month salary as a bonus and 1 lucky draw for `10 lakhs.”
One-month salary and a chance to win `10 lakhs? Where do I sign up? For these kinds of rewards, I’m willing to set some lofty fitness goals and work hard toward achieving them. Here are just three goals that I will achieve:
- I will run regularly—and not just when the neighbour’s dog chases me. I will run to catch the bus, run to the bathroom and even run for the sake of running.
- I will lift weights regularly—and not just after watching Mirabai Chanu win a silver medal at the Olympics. I will lift barbells, dumbbells and even cowbells.
- I will become ‘yog-fit’ by doing lots of yoga and eating lots of yogurt.
Here is my tweet to Kamath: “Dear Sir, I have set some lofty fitness goals. If I achieve them, will you give me one-month salary?”
Here is his response: “Dear Melvin, yes, of course. Since you don’t work for us, your monthly salary is zero. We will be happy to give it to you.”
This is so unfair. Apparently, you have to be an employee of Zerodha to participate in their incentive programme. Even so, it’s a great programme that owes its existence partly to the first lockdown of 2020.
“Post the first lockdown, like everywhere, our team at Zerodha as a whole was probably the unhealthiest ever, due to the lack of physical activity, work-life imbalance, bad diet, and more,” Kamath tweeted.
Usually, you might find the ‘unhealthiest ever’ in a hospital, but the lockdown meant that many unhealthy people could be found providing financial services at Zerodha. Thankfully someone thought of the incentive programme and the results have been ‘phenomenal,’ according to Kamath.
“The transformation stories are super inspiring and pushing others to take action as well,” he tweeted. “We also have proof that getting healthy improves professional performance as well. Our Get Healthy programme will now run permanently.”
Yes, it’s true: getting healthy improves professional performance, and you may be surprised to learn that it improves amateur performance, too! Whether you’re a professional or an amateur, you can improve your performance merely by getting healthy.
You just cannot put a price on your health, even if you work for a financial services company. Rewarding employees with a month’s salary is a wise investment for Zerodha, and Kamath hopes other companies will follow suit.
Zerodha isn’t the first company to offer health incentives to its employees, of course. But the rewards offered by most companies are not that enticing. One company, for example, rewards employees who complete an annual medical checkup with an all-expense paid trip to the dentist of their choice. (No, you cannot pick a dentist in Bali.)
Another company rewards employees who participate in an annual wellness programme with a free week. They have a choice of what’s free. They can work for free for one week; or they can have a week that’s free of work (and free of pay); or they can have a work week that’s free of harassment from the boss.