Closing The Activation Gap On Workplace Mental Health with Ryan Komori, Savor Lining

What if mental fitness sat on your calendar like any other business priority? We sit down with Ryan Komori, founder and CEO of Savor Lining, to map a practical path from good intentions to real behavior change at work. Ryan shares a raw account of his own burnout and recovery, then lays out a system that helps teams build skills before crises hit: anonymous, therapist-led classes scheduled during the workday and Mental Health First Aid training that turns bystanders into effective supporters.

We dig into the activation gap—the space between knowing you should care for your mind and actually taking action. HR leaders often promote EAPs and teletherapy, but busy calendars, stigma, and decision fatigue keep usage low. Ryan explains how organizational activation removes friction: a simple, optional calendar invite with no registration, no cameras, and clear guardrails creates psychological safety and drives participation. The focus shifts from treatment to training, with practical tools like grounding, boundary-setting, assertive communication, and mindfulness that employees can apply under stress.

For executives still asking about ROI, we explore concrete signals: fewer leaves tied to mental strain, earlier referrals to care, better benefit utilization, and a shared language that reduces conflict and improves performance. We also cover what’s hardest about Mental Health First Aid—encouraging professional help—and why repeated practice in a safe setting builds the confidence to have tough conversations that can change outcomes. Along the way, we highlight “golden feedback,” a simple rule for day-to-day empathy that strengthens trust across teams.

If you lead people, manage culture, or simply want a healthier way to work, this conversation offers a blueprint: treat mental fitness like training, not a taboo. Ready to try it with your team? We’re sharing a free pilot therapist-led class for groups of 50+. Email pilot at savorlining.com, then subscribe, rate, and share to help more leaders close the activation gap.

Transcript

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Welcome And Guest Introduction

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Welcome to the HR Chat Show, one of the world's most downloaded and shared podcasts designed for HR pros, talent execs, tech enthusiasts, and business leaders. For hundreds more episodes and what's new in the world of work, subscribe to the show, follow us on social media, and visit hrgazette.com.

SPEAKER_01 0:26

Welcome to another episode of the HR Chat Show. Hello, listeners. This is your host today, Bill Bannham. And in this episode, we're going to dive into the crucial topic of mental fitness and workplace well-being and how organizations can bridge the gap between awareness and meaningful action. My guest today is Ryan Kamori, founder and CEO over at Save Aligning, a company dedicated to empowering teams to live more joyful, productive, and mentally healthy lives. Ryan is a certified mental health first aid provider and a passionate advocate for accessible mental health education. His journey from personal crisis to purpose-led leadership is truly inspiring. Ryan, how are you doing? Welcome to the show today. Hey Bill, how's it going? Super happy to be here. I am doing well, sir. I'm looking forward to this conversation. Let's start with your journey. You've spoken openly about your personal experience, Ryan, with with depression and anxiety and how it led you to create Save Aligning. Can you maybe share a bit about what that turning

Ryan’s Personal Mental Health Turning Point

SPEAKER_01 1:31

point was for you and how it helped shape your mission? Yeah, sure.

SPEAKER_02 1:36

So I'm really open to talking about my own mental health journey. Um, I've been an entrepreneur and a startup founder pretty much my entire career. My last company was a mobile gaming company. And after growing that company for about 10 years and having it be quite successful, I found myself in a position where I had crippling, depression, and anxiety and wasn't really aware of how bad things were. What it led to was uh me attempting to take my own life multiple times. And it was a really unfortunate thing to put my wife through, to put my kids through. And what it did was it really highlighted to me how bad things were, obviously, when you get to that point. Um, it ended up being sort of a blessing in disguise. I know it sounds really weird to say that, but I ended up uh and I found myself in the ER at UCLA's uh hospital. Um, ended up then going through an adult partial hospitalization program, which sounds a lot more intensive than it really is. It was just like going back to college again for about six to eight weeks. I spent most of my day from like 9 to 3 or 4 p.m. in a classroom-like setting at UCLA's neuropsychiatric hospital, and it was just like going back to school. It was these group classes that were led by uh licensed clinical social workers, and it really was there to help serve as a recovery program where people like myself, burnt out entrepreneurs or burnt-out trial attorneys or ER docs or even those that had been dealing with serious mental illness for their entire lives, could go and recover and really learn and sort of rewire their minds and reset as it applied to mental health. And so that was a transformative process for me. I learned a ton, not only about um mental health and fitness and really important skills, but it was just a way to reset. And so when I came out of that, I found myself wanting to return back to the startup scene. And that's how I ended up starting saver mining, where wanted to find a way to part these impactful mental health and fitness, uh, these tools and skills to people before they necessarily realized they needed it, because I knew what it was like to go through that myself, where I didn't realize how bad things were until they got really bad. And so we currently partner with HR leaders and comp at companies, schools, nonprofits across the country to offer these therapists-led classes to their team so that they can get these tools and skills in a much more low-touch, educational, classroom-like setting rather than having to find out the hard way like I did.

SPEAKER_01 4:20

Let's talk about the the activation gap. You've said, Ryan, uh many employees want to support their mental health, but lack the time or energy to seek out resources. What does that activation gap look like in real life and how does save aligning help, Bridget? Sure.

SPEAKER_02 4:39

I think the activation gap is similar to anything in healthcare. You know, when you ask somebody when the last time was they went to see their primary care physician, you know, that might be once a year, maybe two years ago. And it's a thing that people

From Recovery To Founding Savor Lining

SPEAKER_02 4:55

may not necessarily do unless they have an acute problem. And so, you know, what we see in companies is oftentimes the head of HR or HR business partners will tout the company's EAP or other benefits, whether it's you know, 12 virtual telehealth sessions with a therapist that employees have access to each year. But it's really hard for employees to use them because it takes the employees' action to schedule out time in their own calendar to schedule an appointment with the provider or an EAP. And in people's busy lives, like you and I both have kids, it's really hard to carve out an hour for yourself between work, family life, and anything else that you have to take care of and to do that on a regular basis. And so I think the activation gap comes from the fact that employees have to take agency over their own healthcare and take the steps to focus on their mental health. And oftentimes that's secondary to their physical health. And so what we do is when we partner with companies and HR leaders in those companies is we end up providing our therapist-led mental fitness classes on a monthly, bi-monthly, or quarterly basis. And it's up to the HR team to decide how often and when they want to schedule those. But it's all done during the workday. Um, most of our partners make it optional. A few of them make it required, but most of them make it optional. And it's just a way to that the company can say to their team, like, hey, we think your mental health and fitness is important. Here's some time on your calendar to focus on this. This is a class led by a licensed therapist. It's they're actually all anonymous. Um, and so employees don't have to come on camera or talk at all. We actually don't let them so that it's something that a team can participate in, a cyclic psychologically safe space without their coworker necessarily knowing that they're on the call. But it's a way that people can get these impactful tools and skills without having to take those activation steps themselves. Their HR team and their company does it for them.

SPEAKER_01 7:00

Let's now talk about the idea of mental fitness. We've had a few guests on the pod over the last couple of years. For example, Dr. Bill Howard, uh regular listeners of the show will be familiar with Dr. Pill. He uh he also guest hosts a few episodes and he has a big focus on mental fitness. Um, we we often hear terms like mental health, resilience, and wellness. But how do you define mental fitness and why is that framing so powerful for individuals and organizations?

SPEAKER_02 7:30

So I think mental fitness, again, I'm gonna make another corollary to physical fitness. You know, if you get injured physically or if maybe you're you've got the flu or come down with a common cold, the more physically fit you are, it sort of helps to protect you. The the term resilience that you use, you know, I think being physically fit really helps to bolster you when you're unwell physically. And I see it, and we see it the same way mentally, where if you are aware of what might be going on when you feel down or depressed or anxious or in a really challenging and a personal situation, and are able to say, okay, I have a tool set that I can apply, whether it's assertive communication tools or grounding tools or mindfulness tools or being able to set boundaries. It helps a person to you know sort of combat that on their own, to say, like, okay, I'm in this challenging situation. I have some of these tools and skills, and I'm aware of these concepts, and so I can start applying them. And it it the situation may not be as taxing or as you know challenging as it would be

Defining The Activation Gap At Work

SPEAKER_02 8:40

for somebody that doesn't have those tools and skills.

SPEAKER_01 8:43

Ryan, let's now talk about the mental health first aid action plan, which includes steps like assessing risk, listening non-judgmentally, and encouraging professional help. Which of those steps tends to be hardest for employees to apply in the workplace? And how do you help them build confidence? And as part of that answer, how important is it at the very start that employees feel like they're in a safe space?

SPEAKER_02 9:09

Sure. So mental first aid, it's it's something that we teach and we certify folks on. It's a it's a full-day training, much like CPR is, and it comes with an actual certification. We do this because we've been asked by a number of our corporate and educational partners to do this. It's something that they want companies that have been wanting to put their people leaders or their teachers through. And some states here in the US require it for their frontline workers and their government workers and teachers. Um, in terms of what you asked, which action plan step is the hardest, I think it's probably encouraging professional help. It's not easy if you have a friend or family member or even a coworker or somebody you kind of know as an acquaintance to say, like, hey, I don't think you you look and are acting uh, you know, as well as you could be. I think you might need to go and seek some help. That's a really hard thing to say to somebody that you know even well. Um, it's probably easier to say it to a complete stranger. And so a lot of what mental health first aid does is it equips people with the tools and skills to really identify when someone close to you might be going through a mental health or substance abuse-related crisis. But it really gives you in a lot of practice through case studies during the training where you actually have to say some of these things and ask somebody if they are thinking of taking their own life or committing suicide, which again is a really hard question to ask somebody. Um, it having that practice really helps people leave with the confidence to do that in real life because that could end up being the difference that you help somebody, whether it's at work or at home, to get some help, to inform them and to really even help them realize where they're where they're actually at. Um, when I was going through my own mental health crisis, I had no idea how bad things were. I mean, I liken it a lot to you know, having a few drinks and somebody asking you if it's okay to drive, and you think, like, yeah, totally fine. That person doesn't necessarily know how drunk they are. And so what I found personally is I had no idea how mentally unwell I was. And you know, mental health versus aid training is really something that helps people help others to identify that for themselves.

SPEAKER_01 11:28

Let's talk about the the the business case because the the reality is some leaders will still see mental health as a soft topic. What you've shared today so far, Ryan, is pretty powerful. And I'm sure there's a lot of people out there who can relate to what you've said, and like me, have got so much respect for for you being able to um talk openly about it, be authentic, and create a business on the back of it as well, right? But what what's your message to HR business executives who need to see the ROI before prioritizing mental fitness initiatives?

SPEAKER_02 12:04

Yeah, so I get asked this question all the time. The ROI is really difficult to pinpoint to a specific dollar or cent. But what I will say is almost every single company we work with has at least one or even more employees out on a leave of absence for a

Mental Fitness Vs. Mental Health

SPEAKER_02 12:20

mental health-related reason or a substance abuse related reason. And so it's something where you know you save a lot of time and monetary cost uh by not having that person out, by having a team that um is as healthy as they can be. And so, you know, the hard thing, especially in the US, is you can't really ask somebody, especially an employee, about their own health or their own healthcare. And so it's something where you can't say, like, hey, you know, when was the last time you went to the doctor, or when was the last time you saw a therapist? That's those are just not it's fairly taboo to ask those questions. And so by having us come in to do these recurring therapist-led mental fitness classes, it's a touch point where people can opt into it anonymously. They can attend it, they can get the tools and skills. A lot of our core partners actually have somebody from their HR team come in at the beginning and the end of our uh live virtual classes to plug any benefits or EAP programs just to serve as another touch point. And so it's really just a bridge to help employees activate either into taking advantage of other benefits or just to take away the tools and skills that we share in our classes.

SPEAKER_01 13:38

How often do you lead a session where a participant a participant goes in and maybe they're not even aware of their own poor mental health? Um, and then by the end of that session, there's some sort of self-realization.

SPEAKER_02 13:55

I think it happens pretty often. Uh, we obviously don't know because the exact amount because people aren't reaching out to us all the time, but we do get people who will email us immediately after a class and say, like, hey, I want to start doing therapy. Do you folks offer one-on-one therapy with your licensed therapists who are the teachers? And unfortunately, we don't, because we actually don't provide any healthcare. We are just learning and development and an educational provider. But it's something that we see fairly often where individuals will come and ask us. Um, oftentimes we'll refer them back to their head of HR or whomever our contact point is in the company. Uh, but I'd imagine it's it's fairly often.

SPEAKER_01 14:40

Okay, let's talk about training the whole team then. So mental fitness can't just be for managers or HR. What strategies do you have or what have you found effective in getting everyone involved from frontline staff to executives in in building a mentally fit culture? You mentioned earlier some of the companies you work with mandate it, but usually it's a voluntary um opportunity for employees. So how can how can companies get more people involved?

SPEAKER_02 15:08

Sure. So one of the things that we do is, and it sounds really basic, but what when we run these therapist-led classes for our partners, we send the head of HR a calendar invite. And that calendar invite will have the zoom link in it

Mental Health First Aid: What’s Hardest

SPEAKER_02 15:23

for employees to join. And we just ask them, like, hey, can you please just forward this calendar invite out or duplicate it in your own calendaring system and just send it out to everybody? And it doesn't require sign up, it doesn't require them to register. Any of those activation steps I talked about earlier are sort of gone. People can just sort of opt into it if they have the time on that specific date and time. And so we actually get a fair amount of engagement based on that. I'd say a little bit more than half of the people that get sent that attend it every single time. And so that's a good amount if you think about uh, you know, if you send it out to your entire company. Um, and so that is probably the most effective strategy we've seen is just make it an optional opt-in calendar invite where there's no active action required from the employee itself.

SPEAKER_01 16:09

You mentioned in the previous answer that uh you can get into uh legal hot water as a as a manager, as an HR person, if you directly ask an employee about their mental health. Um, however, feedback is important. One of your core values is give golden feedback. What does that mean in the context of mental health conversations and how can leaders practice it day to day?

SPEAKER_02 16:33

Yeah, so the golden feedback is based on the golden rule, it's really just treating somebody else how you would want to be treated. And so I think, you know, empathy is a big part of that, and being able to, as a manager or an HR leader, just really have empathetic discussions with folks. Um, you know, whether it's, you know, and and that can show up in various forms. It doesn't have to be around mental health or even performance, it can even just be in day-to-day interactions to signal that empathy so that when the time comes, if and when, employees feel comfortable talking to their managers or to HR about these things. You know, I've been at companies where there's no way an employee would have ever felt comfortable going to somebody on the HR team or even their manager to talk about challenges personally or mentally. And so I think empathy and um just the golden rule is a big part of being able to build that type of culture.

SPEAKER_01 17:28

Okay, and just finally for this particular conversation, Ryan, uh, how can folks get involved? So, how how can listeners connect with you? Is that LinkedIn? Do you want to share your email address? Are you all over different socials, such as Instagram, TikTok, whatever you want to share there? Um, and how can folks also get their teams trained in mental health first aid or maybe partner with Save Aligning to support workplace well-being?

SPEAKER_02 17:51

Yeah, so as part of uh just us being on this podcast, for any listeners that are part of teams of 50 or more employees, and not all 50 have to attend, but we we target sort of that team size. We are more than happy to offer a free pilot therapist-led mental fitness class. Uh, it would be a 60-minute long class, virtual live training that is led by a licensed therapist, totally free, no strings attached to continue. You can just email us at pilot P-I-L-O-T at savorlining.com, and we'll connect with you and we'll be able to coordinate that for your team.

SPEAKER_01 18:28

Perfect. And uh just to clarify, some uh the largest minority, about 45% of our audience, are in the US. You mentioned earlier on you are national. If folks in Canada, the UK, elsewhere are interested in the virtual services that you guys offer, can they get in contact too?

SPEAKER_02 18:44

Yeah, we're more than happy to provide any of our mental fitness events that our licensed therapists led to folks in Canada or the UK. We have um some partner companies that we work with in some parts of Asia as well. Um, the only thing that we can't do or that we're not certified to do is to do the mental health first aid training in both Canada and the UK. So in the US, there is a certifying body. Uh, they're a US-based national nonprofit. And in Canada and UK, I believe there's a separate certifying entity that uh we are not sort of licensed to do the trainings for. And so um it's really easy if you just uh Google Mental Health First Aid and look at your country, you can find out who that certifying entity is and find an instructor to do MHFA training for your team.

SPEAKER_01 19:32

Okay, well that just leaves me to say for today. Uh Ryan, you you you're a great guy. I've got so much respect for you. Um, and I think you're doing great work. And um the story that you shared today is extremely powerful. Thank you very much for being our guest.

SPEAKER_02 19:45

Yeah, thanks for having me, Bill. I really appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 19:50

Thanks for listening to the HR Chat Show. If you enjoyed this episode, why not subscribe and listen to some of the hundreds of episodes published by HR Gazette? And remember, for what's new in the world of work, subscribe to the show, follow us on social media, and visit hrgazette.com.