Milco Linssen creator of the Value Based Vitality model
The most powerful framework to design and audit your vitality programme.
Built on measurable outcomes. Create a vitality strategy that becomes the force that moves people and does what it needs to do: create an agile organisation.
Milco Linssen
It is for visionaries — for those who expect their people not merely to be present, but to perform at their best.
It is for leaders who understand that true vitality is not for those who are absent, but for those who are present—and not only for a few, but for all. Vitality is not about pleasing people, it is about the will and ability to move.
Otherwise, you are not leading an organisation — you are running a spa.
This is for leaders who see vitality not as a peripheral gadget, but as the essential foundation for productivity, change and winning.
Yet, vitality is still largely equated with physical fitness, lacking a clear definition and well-defined building blocks. Desired outcomes are often based on wishful thinking.
This underscores the imperative to recalibrate the concept of vitality. Value Based Vitality is that model.
Vitality defined by what it produces. What is vitality in your context? What does it need to deliver — at individual, team and organisational level?
Vitality requirements differ fundamentally across the organisation. The C-suite needs brain power. The operational core needs physical stamina. One programme does not fit all.
Not assumptions. Not wishful thinking. Tools selected on the basis of what actually moves the needle — matched to level and required outcome.
Programmes that are not embedded in behaviour fail. Sustainable vitality is habit-based — making the right behaviours automatic, not aspirational.
After my book on sleep and vitality, I worked on the layer above: organisational vitality. Just as with sleep, vitality was packed with assumptions, a lack of structure, endless wishful thinking, and ditto initiatives.
The name emerged almost self-evidently: Value Based Vitality.
Much like Value-Based Healthcare, Value-Based Vitality applies the same underlying logic to organisational vitality — that of delivering the highest possible outcomes for the individual and the organisation in relation to the effort and costs expended.
It elevates vitality to the highest strategic level — and makes it, a key performance indicator.
The model by Milco Linssen sets the preconditions for designing and auditing any vitality initiative or programme — providing the strategic framework that ensures every intervention is purposeful, level-specific, and outcome-driven.
Say goodbye to wishful thinking.
I help boards see the underlying architecture of their existing vitality programs, so they can identify gaps, optimize their strategy, and implement it independently on their own terms — rather than blindly trusting third parties.
During an audit, I review all vitality initiatives, rank them, and evaluate them against the Value Based Vitality (VBV) model.
It provides a clear and concise impression of the actual added value of your vitality investments for both employees and the organisation.
Depending on your organisation, the audit takes between two and five days.
The results are presented as a written and visual overview. If you wish, I can present it to you and the full board, to build shared understanding of the topic.
Most of the time, it forms the basis for a Strategy Session.
In this session, we — you and, if required, your core HR team — review vitality efforts and primarily do three things:
- Divide them into must-haves linked to genuine vitality that also benefit the organisation (agile), and nice-to-haves — incentives that make work attractive.
- Apply a thinking model to segment vitality needs and efforts across two to three roles (levels) in the organisation. This distinguishes, for example, operational workforce from knowledge workers.
- Link them to the Value Based Vitality model to outline a coherent strategy.
This session takes one day and delivers a blueprint for your vitality strategy at the highest speed and efficiency.
Independent of your next steps, this is a strong way to start aligning vitality with a more focused and effective investment strategy.
A logical next step is to organise a masterclass for the wider HR group. I recommend also involving the professionals responsible for execution, such as occupational physicians, psychologists, coaches, and other caregivers.
In this masterclass, I introduce the group to the principles of Value Based Vitality. The goal is a profound insight into, and understanding of, a new way of approaching vitality.
It opens up thinking and encourages adaptation towards a more effective approach to vitality.
This masterclass can also be incorporated into a leadership programme, and typically takes around two to three hours.
At this point, it is time to translate the strategy into action. The worst thing you can do is try to change everything at once. The best thing you can do is involve those now responsible, and let them come up with a list of choices to make.
In these sessions, we delegate the pillars of the Value Based Vitality model to those who have to work with them.
This depends entirely on your organisation, and covers three broader domains:
- What will be a genuine “need to have”, and what will be an optional benefit?
- How can interventions be divided across roles — what, for whom?
- Evaluating vendor offerings against these criteria.
This is a quick and very tangible next step in the process. Part of these sessions also covers how to integrate and communicate the outcomes.
It’s up to your ambition and organisation.
The path described above is a proven and common way to take fast steps — without over-rushing — and get everyone on board. But you may have specific issues you wish to tackle. That is also fine — see this as one possible path.
Let’s not forget that I started with a new approach to sleep.
It focuses on busy professionals, who most often have a natural problem with sleep. Work will always be a factor during sleep, and is one of its main disruptors.
In this masterclass, I teach people how thoughts and sleep work together — and, at the same time, against each other. I show how you cannot stop thinking, but can learn to steer your thoughts away from work-related, and other, issues.
Every step can be taken on its own, or as part of a longer journey — always shaped around your organisation and its ambition.