Collective Wellness Project Impresses Judges At Hack The Crisis NZ Challenge

Two start-ups from different parts of the country joined forces with an ambitious goal - to increase New Zealand’s collective resilience.

Gisborne-based Riposte and Christchurch-based Wanderble met online through the Hack the Crisis NZ challenge, which started Friday night. The 48-hour innovation challenge was run in response to the pandemic and has been held in more than 30 countries. Just over 900 participants registered, submitting 210 ideas. The Wanderble-Riposte team won second-equal of the 55 teams that came together to solve problems over the weekend. Judges included Vic Crone from Callahan innovation, Sir Stephen Tindall and mental health advocate Mike King.

Riposte is a social feedback app that allows communities to collectively see how they are doing using quick daily check-ins and machine learning technology. Wanderble is a Christchurch-based mindfulness start-up that is part of Te Ōhaka, the Centre for Growth and Innovation. Wanderble released a free 28-day mindfulness in isolation course on the day the country went into lockdown.

The project team came together online and included Deb Hancock, Monica Donnelly and Praveen Elango from Riposte as well as Kris Herbert from Wanderble. They were joined by other Hack the Crisis participants from around the country - Toni June, Cherish Wilkinson and Philip Waddell.

The team built tools for measuring and improving well-being. Ninety participants signed up in 24 hours. They were asked to listen to a mindfulness experience and then to record how they were doing in the Riposte app using hashtags to help monitor the data.

The stats showed that people using Wanderble reported 80% positivity (compared to 64% who were not) and 26.7% gratitude (compared to 6.9%).

A Facebook poll run by the team showed 90% of people were more likely to try mindfulness if they could see how it benefited their community.

Wanderble co-founder Kris Herbert says, “This project is all about harnessing that collective action. This crisis has challenged us all to work together for the greater good. And improving our individual resilience works in the same way. Calm is contagious. When we learn to manage our own anxiety, it makes a difference to everyone around us. Working with Riposte, we have been able to turn wellness into a team sport.”

Riposte co-founder Debs Hancock says, “Our mission is to make it easier for communities and organisations to measure the wellbeing of people so they can provide more relevant and timely support. It’ll also help us gain a better understanding of the collective wellbeing across specific groups within our communities. We’re crowdsourcing social wellbeing data using the Riposte app because it’s easier and more fun to use than filling out surveys.”

Wanderble co-founder Kris Herbert says, “Mindfulness has been shown to reduce anxiety and improve immunity so it’s a great time to introduce these tools to people. We can connect our communities to make them stronger and more resilient - because it’s unlikely this will be the last crisis our country faces.”

Hancock says, “Real-time data is powerful because it means that support can be provided when it’s needed and not weeks after the fact, and it gives us a window into how the other ‘bubbles’ around us are coping during these uncertain times.”

The Riposte-Wanderble team also connected with human resources managers and employers during the challenge.

Herebert says, “We found that workplaces are keen to measure the wellbeing of their staff and and finding it hard to connect with them during lockdown. 94% said they would like to learn more about a tool that combines wellbeing and and real-time feedback analytics so that is where we will focus as a business model moving forward.”

Project mentors praised the team, saying, “This is a very well-known problem that the current Government is focusing significant resources and funding on. This is an awesome team that has leveraged what they already have to achieve a lot of market validation and integration over the course of the weekend.”

Sign up to take part: https://www.subscribepage.com/hackthecrisis

View the live data feed: https://datastudio.google.com/u/0/reporting/1JUStwCDp2EWIrRI8s8pVFLufmSJPOk46/page/VG7KB

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https://www.facebook.com/WanderbleandRiposteHacktheCrisisNZ/

Video pitch submission:

https://youtu.be/ZHyRZ7JbZkA

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