In this overpaced, overscheduled, over-expectational world, would you be willing to invest 30 minutes if you could gain a couple of hours of productivity?

That’s one of the questions Virgin Pulse CEO Chris Boyce posed during his main-stage address at his company’s Thrive Summit 2015 this morning. He was talking about exercise: 70 percent of people don’t get the recommended 30 minutes a day, and the lack leads to 23 percent decline in cognitive ability for the rest of the day, he said.

But he could have also been talking about rampant distraction: “Forty-three percent of employees say they’re distracted 75 percent of the workday. If you could erase that, you could pick up 2.1 hours of productivity a day,” he said.

And then he shared about how much sleep he’s been getting. A year ago, he said, he was getting 4-5 hours a night, thinking that he was “one of those guys who didn’t need more.” But at last year’s conference, he said, speaker Arianna Huffington discussed the importance of sleep, and now he’s averaging seven.

That has helped not only his productivity, he said, but also, his relationships have flowered. “When people start to live a sustainable life, their engagement will [blossom],” he said, and promised, “We plan to prove that.”

Virgin Pulse provides tools to companies to boost wellness and engagement, hence Boyce’s slant. “As a tech company, we focus on the habits,” he said. One habit he expressed particular pride about is that “members,” Virgin Pulse’s term for employees of their client companies, average 720 interactions per year, meaning they check into the web interface for wellness several times every day.

“We cam help people change their habits,” he said. “If you can establish these habits [in the workplace] that matter in people’s lives, the social context will take over and everything will begin to change.

Boyce listed five key habits to healthy change:
1) Personalize the right behaviors for each individual. “Present things that will work for them.”
2) Make the behavior easy to do. “If you can chain small simple habits together, you can make big changes.”
3) Trigger the behavior. His example was that for people who want to begin running, one tactic might be to put the running shoes by the door, as a reminder. “Technology can be a great aid for this, too,” he said.
4) Help people feel successful. “When people feel successful, they want to keep going.”
5) Help people revise, so that when they go astray, they can get back to the new path they’re trying to follow.

Virgin Pulse’s release of a new generation of the software that connects members with their companies’ wellness efforts was a key point in Boyce’s presentation. Though it was officially released only yesterday, at the opening of the conference, some clients have been using it already.

Boyce said early returns show that member visits to the site, which has introduced monitoring categories including nutrition, sleep, and physical activity, are even higher than they’d been. He boasted that the rate of member engagement has remained constant — 50 percent of those who’ve ever engaged with the product have stayed engaged, month over month, for the product’s five-year life. He said with the 2.0 product, the rate has risen to 64 percent.

“This is habits,” he said.

Disclosure: I am Virgin Pulse's guest at this event, which includes lunch and beverages. I was not required even to share what I'm writing with anyone, never mind gain approval.