The Green Stylist recently sat down with Evan Ryan, co-Founder of Watku to learn about community in the workplace and the importance of creating healthy, engaged work environments. This new San Francisco based organization curates meaningful, unique experiences for groups and organizations. The purpose of course is to help you strengthen relationships within your team, but Watku also accomplishes this in a way that simultaneously gives back to the surrounding community and local economy. Watku’s founders have a strong commitment to healthy, active living that would inspire anyone to leave their cubicle for some fresh air and a memorable experience.

 

TGS: Tell us a little bit about Watku and your journey and why you founded Watku

Watku was born out of a shared frustration that our personal work environments were doing more harm than good. Even though we were working for companies or causes that we were passionate about, we were having a lot of trouble staying balanced. We felt consistently mired in routine, which meant we also lost track of our inspiration and creativity. After numerous conversations with friends and colleagues, we realized we weren’t the only ones feeling this way.

The reality is that the so called “values revolution” we’re seeing permeate the working world is helping professionals realize that just collecting a paycheck is no longer enough. Inspiration, creativity, social change – these are the things individuals are starting to demand more and more from their pursuits. Watku was developed to address these desires. We help our clients break the routine, interact and connect on deeper levels with each other, and hopefully reconnect with what inspires them most.

TGS: What are your top 3 memorable excursions/trips? 

So far favorites have been the beer tasting workshop, the endangered habitat restoration, and the clamming excursion. We’re constantly adding new programs though, and we love stretching the limits to develop top-notch, unique experiences you can’t get anywhere else.

TGS: Why is this so important?

On a personal level, most of us lose track of how important it is to break the routine and get outside our comfort zone on a regular basis. Most innovation and creativity happens at the edges, and Watku helps people more regularly interact with those edges.

On an organizational level, a stronger community leads to improved performance. It’s that simple. If we care about the people we work with, and understand them more deeply, we perform better as a unit. Casey and I both grew up playing sports, and it’s the same in business as it is in sports. You can’t become a championship team without chemistry. You have to know and trust your teammates, and when you do the results speak for themselves.

Finally, we believe the true path to sustainability starts with developing self-sustaining local economies. Through each of our Watku experiences we promote great local businesses and organizations that represent our local economy, and act as leaders in sustainability and social change in the surrounding community.

TGS: What makes Watku unique from other companies addressing team building or organizational development? 

Our specialty is in providing a whole suite of unique experiences that would be hard to find anywhere else. And since we don’t believe one size fits all, our ability to adapt and curate experiences that fit any type of team or situation means our programs have positive impacts that actually last. We believe this is why we have clients that consistently come back for more.

On top of that, our exclusive partnerships with top-notch providers means we’re able to guarantee an unmatched level of quality in every experience we execute.

Finally, we give equal importance to strengthening community AND promoting local economy. Our programs are not just about enjoying your friends and colleagues, they’re also designed to generate awareness about what we can all do to help sustain our local economies, ecosystems, and neighborhoods. By participating in a Watku program, you’re not only helping your team to coalesce, you’re also learning how to protect and appreciate your surrounding environs.

TGS: What is “forced fun?”

Ahh, forced fun is a term used to describe the top-down approach to office culture. From my point of view it refers to the same old gatherings such as staff meetings with pizza, all-office park days, boring lectures about ergonomics, weird scavenger hunts, etc. The term has a negative connotation, which we think is a bit unfair because most managers, HR departments, or group leaders work very hard to motivate their teams. However, the reality is that these leaders have so much else on their plates, that they don’t have the necessary time or resources to consistently deliver impactful, inspiring group bonding experiences.

We believe the bottom-up approach is much more effective than top-down. Individual employees and group members should play a much larger role in defining the community of their organizations. At Watku we encourage lower level employees and group members to step up and take charge of strengthening team dynamics, and our website is built in a way that allows any employee or group member to organize the Watku experience they think is best for their team.

TGS: What is planned for Watku in the next year?

We just launched our new site (www.watku.net) which features our full catalog of programs. The catalog is constantly changing and adapting to client requests, new ideas we have, and new providers we find along the way. If any of your readers have ideas for new programs, or new providers we should work with, we’re all ears!

We plan to focus on expanding the Watku network. Right now we’re partnered with about 20 great Bay Area businesses, AND we have a group of about 500 friends and acquaintances that we fondly call our “Wat-crew”. Anyone in the Wat-crew gets special discounts to services provided by our partners, and they get invited to Watku test events (whenever we create a new Watku experience, we execute a “test event” to iron out any kinks). After we run a program for a new client, we allow all participants to sign-up for the Wat-crew. In addition, anyone can like us on FB or follow us on Twitter to be added to the Wat-crew list.

By the end of the year we hope to be a recognizable brand in the Bay Area. We’d like to be the go-to solution when groups or teams are looking for new ways to break the routine and strengthen their community.

TGS: Where do you see Watku in 5 years?

Our 5 year goal is to open Watku franchises in most major cities across the US, and ideally make a positive impact on each city we expand to. Our intention is to find talented, motivated, creative young people to open and operate these branches. We believe strongly in the creative power of young generation Y professionals. Not only have they grown up with an intimate familiarity of media, communications, and digital technologies, but they also understand and respect the value of social change.

With Watku we want to lead a movement in utilizing the best aspects of our local communities to improve workplace group dynamics. Work should not be a grind. We should enjoy what we do, appreciate the people we work with, and consistently reengage with our passions. In our opinion, our work should be a reflection of who we are. We want Watku to help more and more people realize this in their own lives, and we want Watku to help open people up to themselves and their surrounding community on a more regular basis.

TGS: Do you think there is an opportunity to create change in the fashion and beauty industries? 

Absolutely. There is opportunity to create positive change in any industry!

The fashion and beauty industry is all about helping consumers to look good and stay healthy, right? If industry professionals don’t take the time to take care of themselves, isn’t that hypocritical? Based on what we’ve seen, fashion and beauty professionals are some of the hardest working people out there. The problem is that, as we all know, work environments have a direct impact on how we look and feel. In my opinion, I think the fashion and beauty industry should lead the way in demonstrating workplace health.

We think Watku is a great place to start because we focus on helping teams stay more balanced. We provide the space for people to recharge and reconnect. Improving how we interact with our coworkers and work environment is a key first step in improving workplace health.

 TGS: What activity would you plan for us at The Green Stylist?

Great question! We love customizing our programs to work for a specific audience or business goal. For The Green Stylist I think our Native Herb Foraging excursion would be a great introduction to Watku. We could focus the foraging around ingredients that are commonly used in beauty products, and our herbalist could lead a session on mixing up a natural salve from the ingredients collected during foraging. I think it’d be a lot of fun for your staff to re-connect directly with nature’s own beauty solutions!

TGS: How would you redefine the American dream? 

Well, that’s a difficult question because the American Dream has been defined in so many different ways. The interpretation I like the best relates the American Dream to freedom and equality. What I don’t like is when people refer to the American Dream only in terms of prosperity and material success. For me the American Dream should be about the freedom to pursue our passions. I think collectively as a nation we are moving in this direction, but we still have a long way to go.

My ideal version of the new American Dream would encourage all of us to acknowledge what inspires us most, and to seek an existence that allows us to unapologetically explore our most authentic selves. In my opinion success should not be measured by the size of my paycheck, where I live, or the make of my car…but instead by the size of the smile on my face when I realize I’m doing what I love, with people I care about.

 

Thanks Evan for your thoughtful answers! Make sure to follow Watku on Twitter as well. ♥ Jules

Images courtesy of Watku.