St Kilda Football Club has continued to embrace the importance of mental wellbeing and awareness among its club personnel through the use of new wellness platform, Readiness.

Founded by former Saints Sports Science Manager, Simon Kearney, and supported by former Board member Gerry Ryan OAM in partnership with Swinburne University, Readiness aims to increase individual awareness around wellness and self-sufficiency, improve resilience and the ability to cope with life’s stressors and most importantly, empower and educate.

The Readiness platform officially launches this month, with all St Kilda Football Club admin and football staff participating in the program since June.

St Kilda Football Club CEO Matt Finnis said the benefits of the Readiness platform were significant, especially in light of the immensely challenging year that’s been.

“I’m finding (Readiness) a really useful tool to monitor the wellbeing of my people through this pandemic,” Finnis said.

Not only does Readiness provide the full end to end wellbeing program, even just to have a reference point for the start of a conversation is incredibly powerful.

- Matt Finnis

“I highly recommend Readiness for any business wishing to improve the wellbeing of their people and ultimately increase the performance of the organisation.”

In 2020, the importance of understanding one’s own mental health couldn’t be more paramount as the world deals with the ongoing implications of a global pandemic.

Like countless other organisations across the globe, St Kilda has been forced to temporarily stand down members of staff, abandon its headquarters at RSEA Park in favour of employees working from home and has even seen staff, players and coaches relocate to Queensland for the past three months in order to keep the 2020 AFL Season running.

St Kilda admin and football staff take part in one-minute questionnaires three times a week to gauge, manage and better understand their mental health and wellbeing.

Users can continue to ‘check-in’ with themselves and become aware of their own wellbeing, with Readiness providing custom resources and referrals to improve wellness based on results.

For more information about Readiness, click here.