Our guest this episode was Darren Steeves, Chief Supporter & Founder of JackHabbit. Darren joined Reuben Hall to discuss the design and implementation of strategies for health and wellness platforms, as well as the negative perception surrounding tech solutions in health.
“We have to embrace IT. We got to make sure that it works. We’re not going to get 4,000 more doctors. We’re not going to get 10,000 more nurses. It’s just not gonna happen.” Darren Steeves on the critical role of information technology in addressing healthcare challenges.
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Read Transcript:
Reuben (00:01.442)
Welcome to the MindSee Podcast Series, Moving Digital Health. Our guest today is Darren Steeves, founder and CEO of JackHabit, a personalized health and wellness platform. Thanks for joining us today, Darren.
Darren Steeves (00:15.516)
Thanks a lot, I’m grateful to be
Reuben (00:19.512)
Can you tell us a little bit about your background?
Darren Steeves (00:22.902)
boy. I always find that a loaded question. I’ve had a pretty eclectic background. I was supposed to be a teacher, but decided I didn’t like working with kids. Just kidding. Yeah, but I quickly, I was going to go into student teaching, but I had met my very first mentor at a YMCA and said, you know, why don’t kind of go into the fitness field and stay with us? I had done a summer job there.
Reuben (00:36.429)
Ha ha
Darren Steeves (00:52.23)
Yeah, so that led me into the fitness, wellness, health industry. Really enjoyed it, liked working with adults, liked working with young adults, and then continued on, wanted to go back to school. So then moved to Halifax to work Dow full -time and go to school part -time to do a master’s in health and human performance. And then just kept going, started a couple companies in consulting, coaching.
I got into high performance sport, but when I kind of sat down and realized to make this even more long -winded, I realized that my purpose was to help people and I enjoy that. And that’s what got my battery boosted or kept my battery boosted. So everything that I’ve done is kind of related around that. But my latest iteration and to kind of jack have it, I had started a consulting company with a couple of colleagues.
kind of health and wellness space. We did a lot with insurers. We did a lot with big consulting companies and realized that there might be a need for a platform that could personalize the journey, the experience of trying to build a habit, trying to form health habits. And it seemed to be lacking. A lot of people still kind of focused on self -directed. So
taking a bit of the behavioral science background, kind of led all of this long pathway towards Jack Habit.
Reuben (02:27.104)
Okay, interesting. And so how long ago was that when you started
Darren Steeves (02:34.072)
We started doing some studies in 2016, because I’m a big believer in kind of evidence -informed, evidence -based approaches, but really started Jack Habit in 2020. My co -founder, Zach Miller, how I met him is he had stolen my wife’s hotel room at a hotel when he was on his honeymoon.
and ended up chatting, joking about it. my wife, yep. And after discussions, she said you should meet my husband because he’s kind of in a similar field. And so he was a machine learning IT guy working in the health space. So yeah, we just kind of kept in touch, kept talking. And, you know, I felt and I believe that we have value alignment.
Reuben (03:05.582)
That could have gone the other way.
Darren Steeves (03:31.464)
So we just kind of, he helped with some of the studies in 2016, stuff we did in 2018, and then said, well, why don’t we go for it and give it a shot. So we started that in 2020 together.
Reuben (03:43.759)
And what did that first MVP version look like?
Darren Steeves (03:47.896)
yeah, we decided to take a big bite out of the apple. You everyone says how to eat an elephant, you know, one bite at a time. But we decided to take a pretty big meal by building a platform rather than just a tool. a little more painful than I thought, because we had signed a deal right out of the gate to build a platform for an insurer.
which ended up being console powered by us, Jackabbit, because that’s what we do on the Jackabbit side is use our platform to customize and personalize. So yeah, it was an experience building a kind of a white label platform. So we had not fake it to make it, but we had build a rough
MVP to kind of show what the experience would be like and then continue to build and continue to build to this day. So like I said, a little different than your traditional kind of MVP where we were trying to go bigger and build kind of a behavioral science ML platform that’s white label.
Reuben (05:02.862)
Yeah, having that first customer must have been key though, because that’s always one of the biggest challenges, getting those first few customers in the door and then customizing your solution to them,
Darren Steeves (05:19.174)
Yeah, I couldn’t agree more. Like I said, our sales cycles are a lot longer than B2B or B2C when you go B2B2C or B2I. So yeah, it certainly did help. Obviously we had a champion on the inside, which was great. Someone in the mental health space who kind of understood IT and the advantages and how it could be helpful.
But yeah, no, was certainly, and it opened up the door to more grants and more support, which has been terrific as
Reuben (05:56.076)
Okay. And how has that original MVP evolved over the past few years?
Darren Steeves (06:05.222)
Yeah, obviously we like to do what everyone does and kind of do the customer discovery. So that certainly hasn’t hurt and helped us. you know, sending out, doing focus groups. We probably, not probably, we spent more on the backend. you know, being, trying to develop a personalized engine, which we ended up coining a growth management system, kind of that next evolution beyond learning management systems.
So I would suggest spending more time on the UX UI, which has been important considering that we had to invest a lot in building the engine, you know, as opposed to the UX UI. So I would say that’s probably where we’ve been going more in the most recent past.
Reuben (06:57.878)
Okay. And so, you know, what does the Jack Pabbit platform look like right now? I know you have kind of different solution for employees versus students. You know, what are, you know, what are the different pillars of your offering?
Darren Steeves (07:16.486)
Yeah, so we say that we’re a white label customizable platform, but we also have a suite of products and they can be turned off and on or as a standalone. So our products are Qlife, which is a quality of life tool that is in the student space, both post -secondary students and the employee space. So we can use the tool there.
And then on the white label side, I would say there’s three verticals, student employees and citizens. So we are in talks with some governments to build an e -health solution for them. So yeah, we look at those three different groups. And then we would, so we have this foundational component, know, foundational platform Jackabit. And then of course, in the discovery phase, we
customized to potentially one of those three groups, whether it’s post -secondary students, employees, or citizens. So we have some content, as I just said, it’s weird products, but what we do is bake in their content or their third -party providers. So again, that first solution I discussed had six different solutions in it, two of them being publicly traded companies where we would…
aggregate, navigate, and personalize the experience with that content, if that makes
Reuben (08:44.578)
Yeah, so you’re packaging elements of your own platform like Qlife, along with other solutions to form a kind of holistic offering.
Darren Steeves (08:58.246)
Yeah, totally. The term in the industry is, you know, a big one is called stepped care, which is what you just said, which is more of a holistic approach. So, you know, for example, in mental health, but even kind of total health on one end of the spectrum is kind of your proactive health behavior. So Q life, you know, you want to get physically active, you’re ready for it. Then the next level up is kind of maybe.
ICBT, like cognitive behavioral therapy. So you might do an IT service for that. The next level would be peer support. And a good example that people can check out is called Togetherall. That’s an IT service that has peer support moderated. Then you might go into coaching, like a coaching software program. And then you get into what people would probably know as telemedicine. So if you can put that all under one umbrella.
and you can see a lot of people in industry talking about it, rather than having to download six, seven, eight different solutions on your phone or an insurer having eight, nine different solutions. If we can get it under one digital front door, that’s what we’ve been focused on. And that’s again, as I said earlier, my background is the easier it is, the more personalized it is, that increases confidence in the user and the more likely they are to use
more likely they see value in it, and the more likely of them to get the right help at the right time at the right intensity.
Reuben (10:31.638)
Okay. And the putting my tech hat on, that sounds like a whole lot of integrations and yeah, third party, integrating a bunch of third party services is never easy. So maybe talk about the tech side a little bit and how you’ve handled
Darren Steeves (10:50.406)
Yeah, I’m surprised I’m the one with no hair as opposed to Zach because yes, is a, I gather it’s quite stressful from what I watched. I’m not the tech person. I know enough to be dangerous as many use that analogy. I’m more the IP on the business side, but like I said, I’m involved in all of the conversations, but yeah, I gather it’s, it’s, you’ve got
That’s why when, when Zach built it from ground up, we did privacy by design and he built the system. If you want to do a podcast with Zach, he could describe how he did it. But yeah, that was a part of the goal from ground up is make sure that we have privacy baked in and make sure that the integrations are easy, but it still came with some, some pretty big challenges because it’s a partnership as you know, better than I, because you need their support.
with our support to make all that work. So that’s been, yeah, that’s been an interesting experience as well. yeah, building from the ground up has been pretty important that we knew that that’s who we wanted to be.
Reuben (12:03.98)
Yeah, certainly the privacy by design approach is really important when you’re dealing with personal health information and just having that trust of the user that they feel their data is secure. You also mentioned mental health is part of the solution. And I know you talk about resilience a lot.
why is resilience so important to that aspect of care?
Darren Steeves (12:35.272)
Yeah, it’s a great question, Ruben, and complicated. You know, I obviously was a physical health expert for a good chunk of my career and then recognized probably 15 years ago or more that you can’t really separate from neck up and neck down. They work together. You know, I appreciate the word mental health, been soaked in it. You know, I’m a little bit more of a fan of total health because your mental health could be improved by physical activity.
quality sleep, nutrition, and I could explain for all those reasons, but then more traditional mental health concepts like practicing optimism, learning about it, problem solving, practicing acceptance. There’s a number of different strategies. And everyone I think is pretty clear that we’ve hit an epidemic in that space.
It wasn’t really a focus 20, 30 years ago. It’s certainly getting its due now and rightfully so. You know, and again, I do a lot of international talks and talks about potentially why our resiliency is a little lower or why our mental health is struggling. It is complex. You know, there’s two components to resiliency. One is your environment that you’re soaked in and then the other is your skill set. You know, can your skill set
the environment that you’re in, if you have a really difficult boss, you’re in a tough relationship, you’re soaked in an environment. But I guess at the end of the day, what I feel and what you’re asking is improving resiliency skills or improving quality of life skills, which resiliency is component of, can help. I think you’ve looked at a few of our papers. So we’ve validated that we can improve mental health, we can improve
overall health with skill development. Why is it lacking? Again, it appears that we’ve missed some skills. Every generation believes the generation ahead of them is weaker for the last 4 ,000 years. My father believes I’m weaker. His grandfather thought he was weaker. But if you talk to people like Dr. Stan Kuchar, who’s in the Senate, looked at
Reuben (14:32.245)
Mm
Reuben (14:49.686)
Yeah.
Darren Steeves (14:55.144)
you know, he was the chair of child psychology. If you talk to Michael Unger, who’s world famous in resiliency and some other people, it does appear that this bubble effect that we’ve put the generation through, like not allowing them to have setbacks and so forth has regressed their resiliency. So we’re seeing, for example, kids at post -secondary who have their resiliency level of like a 12 year
But that can be improved quickly, but they haven’t experienced those setbacks to learn the skills associated with resiliency and quality of life. And what we validated is those can be upgraded quickly, whether it’s an employee or whether it’s a post -secondary student from 18 to 80, they can be improved. I was on the phone earlier with my dad trying to psychologically manipulate and use some strategies I know to help
Reuben (15:22.67)
Yeah, wow.
Darren Steeves (15:51.452)
you know, practicing optimism and so forth. So, and then one thing with being involved in a platform, whether it’s Jack habit or one that works for you is once you build those skills, then having those reminders, and you can see that in, know, the behavioral review scale that we’ve been using, you know, having reminders as part of sustaining your resiliency. So building it up and then how are we going to sustain
And then also recognizing that that changes. So you build your own resiliency battery, your own quality of life battery, but you might move optimism out for a while and you might move mindfulness in for a while. So there isn’t one equation, which is why I’ve been a bit dumbfounded that people aren’t using more AI and ML to drive that individualized experience. It’s just more kind of self -directed drive.
That’s my complicated answer because it is complicated. mean, if we had an answer right now, everyone would be thriving more often rather than struggling. But I think we’re on the precipice of, you know, having some really good tools, like what we’re attempting to do and continue to do to help people flourish more often. know, flourish and thriving are the big words right now and resiliency is a component of that.
Reuben (17:06.892)
Yeah. And maybe talk about, you know, how do you build resilience or, you know, help people increase their skills through a digital platform, right? Like what type of tools, how are they learning and improving through that?
Darren Steeves (17:23.718)
Yep. Great question. We as a cold start, a lot of this came out of not just my own experience, but I’m a collaborator. So there’s quite a few people that sit in behind who do research, who do so forth that I’ve kind of handpicked to have part of the group. Could name some of them, but they’re psychiatrists, they’re psychologists, head of exercises, medicine, nutrition. They’re all kind of sitting in the eye making sure we’re doing the right things.
This did come out of like a bit of live courses that I used to teach, the life coaching that I did. you know, having those positive experiences and then the research I was reading. So, you know, I know you would appreciate this. We use a cold start. So a mini assessment to actually drive where are going to start because you have to start somewheres. So we validated and we’re actually publishing this summer our own Q Life scale.
For console, we used a validated scale that the insurer wanted to use, which console was for post -secondary students. So was a student stress index. So that helps the engine start. And then when they get on the inside, then we try to use behavioral science, kind of where are you ready to start? Are you ready to start? And then provide that personalized experience. So with regards to resiliency,
stupidly taking the time to write a couple of white papers that are 50 60 pages long but You know, I believe some foundational components which appear to be missing in a good chunk is self -awareness And I can give you a practical example. So knowing where your battery is at So for today, I’m at about a six out of ten So if I can wake up and go kind of self -evaluate and self -reflect and become self -aware Then I’m at a six out of ten. Then I let people know then
that kind of can help dictate my day. What can I accomplish and so forth. If you get up at a two out of 10 and you know that, then you know, okay, here’s what I’m gonna be able to do today. Here’s how I’m gonna have to charge my battery. So we feel that that’s a foundational component to sustain your resiliency or quality of life. Then from there, then it starts to get into your purpose, vision, value. So in North America, we’ve been acclimatized to set a goal.
Darren Steeves (19:45.564)
But there’s a lot of work that needs to be done before we set a goal, because then it helps kind of ground you when you fail, which everyone does. If we have this purpose, vision, and value figured out, then you’re more likely to be successful. You’re more likely to come back. So yeah, we can use like push notifications and all kinds of stuff. But when people first come in, most times we put people through purpose, vision, and value exercises, like really quick exercises.
Reuben (20:13.24)
Mm -hmm. Yeah.
Darren Steeves (20:15.058)
We do vignettes, so video content associated with that. We ask people to journal and log. They don’t have to, because some people don’t like it. But we give them multiple opportunities to build those foundational components. And then we start to keep pushing them out. And remember what you said your purpose was, your values. And that helps sustain the resiliency. And we’ve done, you know, we’ve been…
Darren Steeves (20:45.362)
foolish enough to do like usability studies. So we actually look at, we’ve had funded PhD students to look at, does this content engage with people? Do they like it? Where should it fit in? So we’ve done all that kind of stuff as well. So that’s the way.
Reuben (20:59.811)
Well, would certainly say that’s not a foolish undertaking. We’re a big fan of usability studies ourselves to understand how people use the product and how to make it better.
Darren Steeves (21:05.766)
Yeah, thank you. Thank
Darren Steeves (21:11.048)
Thanks, no, I appreciate it. I use those jokingly and facetiously, but I wouldn’t have done it any otherwise. I mean, as you can tell, it’s challenging as a startup to do all of that, but I wouldn’t have done it anyways. you know, there was a big report out in 2022, about 94 % of let’s call them competitors or people in this space don’t do anything that we’ve talked about so far. They just kind of throw it out and hope. And the privacy is really limited.
A lot have been caught doing some nefarious things. So it’s been, you know, it’s challenging to do evidence -informed evidence -based, but it keeps my battery charged, our team’s batteries charged, and we would continue to do it. So yeah, I think the way that we’ve tried to, how do we get behavioral science? Because a lot of places are, and I’m not trying to poo poo on…
people who are doing it, but they use terms like, you know, our platform that uses behavioral science and we’ve looked at them and they, they don’t really. And I know you cited one paper and you know, we could certainly post that in your podcast, the paper that we did on mobile applications and looking at, you know, using a behavioral reviews scale to study. But yeah, I mean, trying to get good behavioral science into a platform that we know can be successful when say,
Ruben hires Darren to work with them one -on -one. It’s how do we take that and put it into a $15 a year solution rather than working with Darren for 15 ,000 a year. That was always kind of the vision. So yeah, we use that cold start to assess and then do those foundational components. And then after that, it’s all the stuff that most people think about like mindfulness and optimism and sleep and nutrition and physical activity.
Reuben (22:43.586)
Yeah.
Darren Steeves (23:02.152)
Then you start to sprinkle those in and nudge people and say, how are we going to round out our resilience here quality of life plan? you know, like I’ve mentioned a few strategies that we use on the platform, you know, exercise and so forth. At end of the day, it is a bit of work. And, you know, I’ve talked about that for 25 years. It’s, you know, it’s not that you can just all of a sudden wake up
live a healthy lifestyle, there’s a bit of work and our goal is to try to make it as minimalist as possible, but there is a bit, if you wanna make that change.
Reuben (23:42.722)
Yeah, and certainly, you could have the best tool or tools available, but it’s getting people to use them can be another challenge too. And you mentioned reminders or different ways to keep people engaged, but just wondering if you have any other insights on getting that engagement, getting people hooked into that habit of using the platform.
Darren Steeves (24:14.312)
Yeah, great question. So when we did some work with the computer science lab out of DAL and a couple other places, we definitely looked at, you know, customization, personalized features and what does work. I will say a couple things. One is contextualization. So if you’re working with a student population, it needs to resonate with them. So if we look at behavioral science 101,
If they feel like it’s personalized and contextualized, they’re more likely to use it. So that means content that’s speaking to being a post -secondary student, content that’s speaking to being an employee. That’s a great place to start where, like for example, some insurers, it’s just a generic resiliency program where you go like, well, this doesn’t resonate with me. Or for Darren,
for me to get the benefits of physical activity in my hub, I might turn off, because I’m like, they don’t know me. I mean, I’ve been exercising for 25 years. I don’t need to know the benefits, but I appreciate some content or an experience of take it to the next level, for example. Yeah, having it in context and then having it personalized to your behavioral science is really what we’re trying to study.
Reuben (25:28.332)
Yeah,
Darren Steeves (25:37.65)
So where are you at on the continuum? So, you know, I’ve had a sleep disorder my whole life and it’s never gonna change. So what strategies are you gonna use for that person on a platform rather than just your generic PDF that says get a good night’s sleep? So there are specific strategies that we can use for that. So those types of things I feel are critical and where we’ve seen success in engaging people, because like you said,
E plus VOI equals ROI to me. So engagement that they see a value on their investment of their time is actually gonna lead to this return on investment. So they’re lead indicators towards ROI. So, you know, again, putting people through that purpose, vision and values are important. We’ve used external motivation to drive internal motivation. So that’s where you get into this term extrinsic intrinsic.
So we’re not totally against badges and collection of points, but what I felt a lot of the solutions have fallen down is that’s their primary way of motivation. And we know that that doesn’t work long -term. So we work with our clients or our customers. We’ve developed like onboarding strategies because we still need to get people to the digital front door.
And then once we get to the digital front door, using those behavioral science tactics of where do you fit on this continuum and providing experience focused on that and moving with you is how we keep people engaged.
Reuben (27:17.986)
Yeah. And I’m wondering between like the different populations that you’ve worked with, like segments like students, you know, versus employees, do you see many differences, whether it’s, you know, generational, you know, age -based or, you know, other aspects that you have to address for?
Darren Steeves (27:41.372)
Yeah, you had sent me this question earlier and I think it’s a great question and of course, I will say sure, I will say the younger generations are less tolerant of any glitches. It’s kind of that, I don’t know if I’m allowed to use term, like the Facebook, Instagram, where those are free services that are multi -billion dollar,
products. So we’ve really got to be cautious to have any glitches with the kids. The employees seem to tolerate it a bit more and kind of understand that things can be a little glitchy the older ages. So I would humbly suggest that’s one thing.
Reuben (28:29.25)
The expectations for usability of a mobile app, for instance, are very high because they’ve just grown up with like, this thing always just works the way I want it to. And there’s never any issues. And I just expect everything to just work just as smoothly.
Darren Steeves (28:46.344)
So you do get one, like you just said, Ruman, and you know it better than me, you get one and done. Like if one mistake with them and your good chance you’re gonna lose them. That can improve with time. Like if you get them in and use the behavioral science and it’s feel like it’s customized, they’ll send you a message and say, hey, this isn’t working or it’s glitchy. But again, it’s almost two and done. You really only get one shot.
So I do that fine, the difference, and yes, I’m sure you can attest to this, love to get your feedback, because I’m sure you’ve worked with both populations. But yeah, like you said, the UX UI experience has to be pretty high. For the younger generations, where I do find the older ones, it’s not as critical. I wouldn’t suggest there’s a big difference, we’re only talking micro differences, they still expect a high UX UI experience. But of course, the younger generations feel that. It does have to,
Be quick. Like obviously I can’t, we can’t drop in video content that’s six minutes long. We’ve done research on engagement levels with that crowd. So what? Totally.
Reuben (29:52.512)
Yeah, certainly the bite -size content is going to play much better.
Darren Steeves (29:58.48)
Yep, obviously mobile application. Although I don’t know what your experience is. We are seeing a shift back to web. And I think it’s because, you know, we’re obviously in the student population where, you know, during COVID they did a lot of coursework and they didn’t want to do the coursework on the phone. So they got back to used to using like their laptops. So that isn’t as big and actually we’re
seeing people asking like, is this also like web -based? Can I get it on my laptop? Cause it’s easier to consume the content if they’re bought in and cause we are learning experience. I don’t know if you’re finding that as
Reuben (30:39.214)
I find again, it’s like high expectations. People expect it to be on both platforms and to work seamlessly between. So I might be on the bus on my phone, want to do something there. And then when I get home, I’m to pull up my laptop. I want to be able to switch and just smoothly have all my data updated and then do something else and just have that multi -platform experience without any, like you said, glitches or barriers.
Darren Steeves (31:07.1)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and as you know, we’re getting into tens of millions of dollars in those solutions. So you have to be pretty agile. I know that’s the interim these days in your field, our field. You gotta be pretty agile in making those decisions of where you’re going to spend to make it. I would say those are a couple of what we’re experiencing. I’m not finding a big difference between.
the two crowds from the age of 17, 18, 19 all the way up. I feel like it’s because we’re in the learning space. So people expect a learning experience rather than a TikTok or that kind of video. They’ll tolerate a little bit longer because they know they’re in a learning experience. We’ve really focused on the exercises that we ask people to do, keeping them quick, like you said.
Reuben (31:45.879)
Mm
Darren Steeves (32:04.388)
and meaningful. Yeah, so like I said, when I saw that question and I’ve talked to other people about it, not seeing a huge difference. I will say that group is also less tolerant of… We’ve had it happen three or four times where pronouns or the right name wasn’t used and got very, very upset.
Reuben (32:31.201)
Right.
Darren Steeves (32:31.378)
Because for example, we do bulk entry. So the university had sent us all of their names and emails and we inputted it and didn’t have their chosen name. And so that was something that we actually put in the onboarding strategy now to make sure that we get the right, cause you’ll lose them with that where other, you know, the older generations are a little more tolerant and would send a message saying, Hey, could you use this? Where the others are like, I’m done.
can’t believe you use that. So we’ve had that experience with that generation. But again, for both groups, it’s getting through the noise. Because there’s 15 ,000 different solutions. Yeah.
Reuben (33:12.236)
Yeah, so many other options, so many distractions, like where you fit in in their day and how you again kind of build that habit where they do come back on a regular basis.
Darren Steeves (33:27.526)
Right. And it’s a fine balance for us because we’re not like social media. We’re trying to figure out what’s the least amount of contact we can have to have the benefit, but we want to keep them engaged. So yeah, it’s, it’s a fine balance because obviously for promoting get out walk in nature and do mindfulness and so forth. It’s like, we’re trying to have minimal, minimal contact to grow healthy behaviors
Reuben (33:38.968)
Mm -hmm. Yeah.
Darren Steeves (33:56.454)
sustain the health. So yeah, like I said, not a big difference between the two besides those smaller ones.
Reuben (33:58.028)
Yeah, for sure.
Reuben (34:04.558)
You mentioned a few times just the focus on research and evidence at Jackabit. I know one of the studies you mentioned was mobile applications for health and wellness systematic review. I’m just wondering if you have any key insights from that research or maybe other research that you’ve done over the years that were really like kind of eye -opening like aha moments.
Darren Steeves (34:31.964)
Yeah, I mean, we had the good fortune of having some pretty strong PhD students, some pretty strong graduate students, and then some professors involved. I will say, which we wrote the white paper, which is a condensed version of what we’re talking about for Jack Habit. I think the behavioural review scale and looking at persuasive technology design strategies were pretty aha for me, like what works, what doesn’t work.
you know, looking at reduction, tunneling, personalization, simulation, rehearsal, which strategies work. And if you get towards the end of that paper, it’s what are different groups using? I’m also, I can be a little overwhelming. So it’s like, let’s get all 28 strategies in. Where actually, if you, if you read the paper towards the end, it’s like, it can be quite overwhelming if you’re trying to use all the different behavioral science state strategies and persuasive system.
Reuben (35:17.048)
Ha ha ha ha
Darren Steeves (35:29.446)
design strategies. So yeah, just trying to figure out which ones are best. Can you get them all in there and then even try to customize those? Then I think that’s where, you know, getting more in depth with persuasive technology and using the behavioral design, because again, you know, it’s very limited. Again, even if you read that one paper that you’ve cited,
a lot of places are still just kind of using self -direction. And self -direction is not a good tool. Most people want to be directed. You still can provide, which we do, is everything’s there. You can self -direct yourself if you want to do something or learn something. But the goal of our hub -based system was that’s where you get your customized
you know, here’s what you’re experiencing, you know, even within the journal, using analysis to provide content based off what you’re saying. So one of our other papers was we took, you know, over 20 ,000 journal entries and said what were, we did a thematical analysis and looked at what are 10 things taking away from resiliency and post -secondary students and what’s 10 things that we’re adding. And then we’re trying to figure out, okay, how do we make sure we’re using that in the system as
So I’d say those are the two things that the more and more I learn, I wanna learn more about one of these persuasive strategies that we can use for good. Behavioral change, IT systems for good. We certainly know how they’re used for bad. Not that they’re all bad, yeah, but we know how, and there’s a lot of chatter over that. know, Ruben, I also thought we’d be here by now
In the US and Canada, there is starting to be a push over who is doing this. In the US, there’s a big push to have similar to the FDA, like the food and drug in mental health applications. So who can actually do it? What are kind of the rules and regulations around it? So we’re not, we’re not there yet.
Reuben (37:42.792)
More kind of checks and balances around getting review and approval before being able to bring people onto a platform.
Darren Steeves (37:56.582)
Yeah, same as physiotherapy, massage therapy, know, doctors back in the day, was, you couldn’t call yourself a physiotherapist if you didn’t have this criteria and you were certified. So, you know, it’ll probably relate around terminology and who can say their mental health or whatever the term, you know, it’s going to take some time to devise that, but obviously evidence informed and evidence based is going to be there. So besides it’s my own personal values.
I feel like it’s coming down the pike where it’s, you you have to be doing this. Like similar to the privacy stuff, it’s going to be the similar on the other side as
Reuben (38:37.506)
Yeah, it’s a tough balance because, of course, any kind of review process is going to slow down new products to get to market. And it’s like another cost and another barrier for a startup to get through. But when it comes to health care, maybe that’s for the best because if you get these
products that just go to market and aren’t validated, don’t really work, or worse have like a negative impact, then people just get jaded to digital health solutions overall. And then like you said, are less likely to try anything that does work because of those negative experiences with unproven products.
There’s definitely a trade off like I see both sides, but certainly a huge benefit to making sure that products in the market say or can do what they say they can do and
Reuben (39:45.88)
scientifically validated to do
Darren Steeves (39:49.468)
Yeah, that’s why you’re wise and I do follow you on LinkedIn, Ruben. That’s a pretty good summary. We don’t want to slow down innovation, but we also don’t want vaccines and drugs coming out that don’t do what they say they’re going to do. So as you know, we’re on this cusp. I’m using that as an example, but we’re on this cusp of IT potentially having the same standard.
I feel like there’s a way to do innovation and there is a call happening now. There is, like you just said, I can let you know there is kind of a negative vibe in the industry. We hope we’re not part of the call. It is trying to break through a lot of the industry’s negative experience. Unfortunately, we hit right at that time where people were going, are these actually working? Are they meaningful?
Are people actually engaging with them? Cause we had a lot of people in the industry and competitors who would do everything not to give reporting back to the industry, back to the client. You know, they would use percentages. Well, 40 % saw improvement, but it was only four people of 40 ,000 people who were actually using the tool. So yeah, there’s a, you know, a bit of negativity around using IT in this space. plus
You know, governments and people are believing we’re gonna age our way out of this, you know, health crisis. We’re not. But people don’t wanna be told that IT is a solution right now. Because of those negative experiences, I don’t mean to get too philosophical, but, you know, we have to embrace it. We have to make sure it works because it’s probably one of the only ways to, let’s say, support.
or save healthcare. We’re not gonna human resource our way out of it. That’s my own personal belief and I feel like as you said on LinkedIn today, I usually have some backup information for it. It’s not just a random, this is how Darren feels, but yeah, we have to embrace IT. We gotta make sure that it works. We’re not going to get 4 ,000 more doctors. We’re not gonna get 10 ,000 more nurses. It’s just not gonna happen.
Darren Steeves (42:09.682)
So yeah, having that continuum and saving those people for the really challenging stuff is kind of the philosophy of up -stepped care.
Reuben (42:19.554)
Yeah, certainly. hopefully while things are shaking out, the best solutions will survive and be adapted. Well, not all of them will. Yeah, looking forward, what’s next for Jackabit? Where do you see the platform evolving in the future?
Darren Steeves (42:45.458)
Yeah.
I feel like there might be a bit more opportunity with governments. You know, I’m a pretty honest speaker. We’re upbeat. We’re trying to miss the call. We’re trying to say that we’re evidence -based. I will say a lot of insurers and the large health consulting groups, you know, the concept was buy, build or lease. You know, some have decided to buy. We were close with one very large group and they ended up buying a company for 400 million.
Can we still affiliate with that IT service they bought? Yeah. But it appears governments, as we’ve seen here in Nova Scotia, across Canada, even in the US, are getting more into e -health services and realizing they can’t just lease 20 services and hope the citizens use them. So they need more platforms that can customize and personalize. So we’re just about to sign an LOI with a foreign
government potentially in Africa. Yeah, so they’re like obviously way behind, but that’s really great because they don’t have any preconceived notions. haven’t, they don’t have any legacy systems. It’s like, let’s start from here. So
Reuben (43:51.137)
Yeah.
Reuben (44:04.716)
also the potential for more of an impact for an opportunity for improvement,
Darren Steeves (44:11.504)
Yeah, totally. agree. So yeah, we’ve had some chats with some European governments, you know, certainly in the Canadian government as well, and some in the US. So I feel like that may be a better fit. But we continue to talk to some other insurers who obviously provide e -health services or, you know, e -preventive services. And we’ve also punched out the QLIFE.
You know, it’s really a standalone solution as well. and we feel good that it’s more robust and encompasses more. So you don’t have to have like a physical activity, a nutrition, a sleep, a, tool for quality of life and so forth. I feel good that we put that as a standalone because it encompasses a lot of different pieces. so I would say that we’ll continue on that B2B market, but we also.
have four or five distribution groups that are considering, for example, Qlife as well. So insurers and so forth. So, okay, if we can’t be your platform, we’d still like to be integrated and use our service and then maybe we can help on another aspect. So that’s where we’re going with Jack Kavett, talking to more governments, continue to talk to the people who provide e -health.
and then have grown a bit into the B2B space. ultimately our goal is to help people. We want people to engage and build health habits. Again, another reason or another potential savior. For example, you know, I have all these little tidbits. If we can increase physical activity by 10 % in Canada, it’s about a $2 billion healthcare savings.
Reuben (46:07.308)
Yeah, yeah, let’s hear it.
Darren Steeves (46:08.114)
So if we can get people to do more proactive stuff, we can really make a difference.
Reuben (46:14.04)
Well, certainly lots of reason to be optimistic and exciting potential there. I really appreciate you joining me on the podcast today, Darren. It’s great to hear your experiences and your insight from so many years of working health and wellness in different aspects. And yeah, we’re really looking forward to see where things go next.
Darren Steeves (46:39.922)
Yeah, what a great way to finish considering that optimism is the number one trait of resilient people. Yeah, so, you know, the more we can practice that the better and you know, as an entrepreneur is in a business owner as yourself, it’s something that you have to put at the forefront is being optimistic. The last thing I’ll say is the number one trait of happy people is gratitude. So I try to practice that as much as I can. So yeah, grateful that we got a chance to speak.
Hopefully it sparks more conversations and people reaching out to yourself or myself or both of us to continue the chat because I love
Reuben (47:20.888)
Yeah, again, great to talk with you. Really thankful for having you on the podcast. And for everyone who’s listening, thank you for listening. I really appreciate that you tuned in.
