Firm's boot camp reaps rewards

Dustin Bisschoff joined the boot camp to improve his health and lost 26kg in 12 months. Photo / Supplied

Encouraging staff to get fit is helping one firm improve teamwork as well as giving staff the chance to live a healthier life.

Printing firm manager Dallas Bennett offered the company's 65 members of staff the chance to take part in a Les Mills boot camp fundraiser last year and he hasn't looked back since. One staff member has even shed 26kg as the get-fit bug caught on.

Bennett, a director at Benefitz says he heard about the boot camps and thought it would be a good idea to pay the $370 per person cost for staff to take part.

"Among the benefits we got as a company was that it broke down barriers between staff and management as we were all in the training sessions together," says Bennett. "Doing the boot camp was a great way of bringing us together. Suddenly staff saw us as one of them ... as real people."

Bennett says although all staff were given the chance to take part in the boot camps - which ran for an hour before work three days a week over five weeks - 16 took up the challenge the first time around.

"We paid the full cost of the first boot camp," says Bennett. "And for subsequent ones we subsidise the cost."

The "camps" consisted of staff getting to a Les Mills' gym for 6am and a trainer "yelling out instructions to us and about 15 other people from other companies".

"We'd be running, doing press-ups and learning the military way of doing stuff, such as lining up like platoons," says Bennett. "The whole boot camp thing is developed around that army style of training."

He says the reasoning behind taking part in the boot camp was to get fit and give staff the chance to feel healthier. But the spin off has been better co-operation among staff and management across the firm.

"It was a good way of people enjoying other people's company," says Bennett. "What we found was that our social club has been helped along because a lot more people know each other better.

"Friendships have developed out of it and work relationships have improved. Productivity is better too. It is amazing - of the people who did the boot camps, the perception of us as managers has changed for the better. Now our staff really want to be a part of our culture."

While Bennett wasn't able to quantify the increase in productivity, he says the firm is getting more work hours per day from its people than before they started doing the boot camps.

"People are now switched on, they want to work, they like our culture, they like our business, they like the way we do business, and they enjoy being able to keep fit and be with people they like," says Bennett. "For my brother Aidan and I as business owners, it has been massive. That is the biggest thing that has come out of it - the way it has helped the relationships in the business."

Another spin-off is a running club that has been started by staff and which meets once a week. Seven members of staff also took part in another Les Mills training event called Spartan - a more gruelling version of boot camp. Staff have been sponsored to take part in the annual Round the Bays running event and a team from Benefitz took part in the Orewa quarter-marathon in Rodney.

Bennett was among the first people to train on the Les Mills' Spartan programme. He says he was daunted by the prospect but found it to be a rewarding experience.

"It focuses on power, endurance and mental toughness, testing even the fittest man," he says. "I was a bit daunted at the prospect and it was very tough, but I'm glad I did it. I was one of the older guys in the group but I made it through to the finish.

"Before we started, we were told that the programme required 100 per cent commitment, and attendance was mandatory for the whole five weeks. We were required to become part of a tight team with each person supporting the others to work harder, go further, and be stronger. This all happened. I got to the end with the excellent support I received from the other guys."

Benefitz' manager of design and pre-press services, Dustin Bisschoff, has taken the bull by the horns and lost 26kg in around 12 months.

"I joined a gym last year but didn't really do much with the membership," says Bisschoff. "But then the boot camp came along and that really got me started.

"During the first boot camp I lost about 4kg and by the end of it we had such a good time that a bunch of us just kept on going. A few of us did another boot camp straight after the first one and the weight just kept falling off. Since my training started I have had to keep buying smaller clothes."

Bisschoff says what sparked his goal to lose weight was his high blood pressure and sedentary desk-based job.

"When I joined the gym for the first time I had a few tests and my trainer said I had high blood pressure," says Bisschoff. "A second test by my GP confirmed the results and that triggered a series of events - one of which was to lose weight to remove it as a cause of the high blood pressure. I had to make sure my hypertension wasn't a result of my lifestyle.

"Losing weight started out as trying to solve a lifestyle issue, but it has become a bit of a bug really," he says. "You realise that you can lose weight, although it is hard when you start.

"But as it starts to fall off and you get more into it, then you find you want to keep improving. Losing 26kg takes quite a bit off your waistline and so I have had to buy lots of new clothes."

Bisschoff says colleagues keen to improve their eating habits and fitness levels encourage each other to stay on track.

"We keep each other in tow by looking at what each other is eating - not that it always works - and keeping an eye on everyone else's exercise schedule," he says. "I think everyone here inspires everyone else to keep working and to keep pushing. Which has got to be good."

Contact Steve Hart via his website at www.SteveHart.co.nz