Fortify pioneers the psychiatry and psychology-based work competency development market
Psychiatrist… Management Consultant Experience
Dealing with personal psychology such as anxiety and burnout… Expanding to manager mental health coaching
Modify behavior and way of thinking after analyzing the target… “I dream of a workplace where everyone can show off their true self”
Technologies and services created by startups often become like social infrastructure. The process by which startups find such services is similar to the evolution of living things. It is created while adapting to the environment. When starting a business, you often discover new possibilities from the accumulated data that you didn’t even think about.
40fy started as a non-face-to-face service that allows individuals suffering from anxiety and depression to easily receive psychiatric benefits. This service was created to eliminate the inconvenience of having to wait 2 to 3 months to receive hospital consultation even if someone feels they have symptoms of depression.
Afterwards, I learned that many of the problems they experience arise while working at a company or institution. Therefore, we created a service that allows individuals within an organization to work more stably and improve the organization’s performance. Unlike management consulting, which focuses on organizational diagnosis, it focuses on helping individuals increase their potential within the organization based on self-understanding. Fortify believes that this approach has the effect of preventing burnout or depression.
Fortify CEO Moon Woori (39), a psychiatrist, also has experience as a management consultant. CEO Moon, who met at the Gangnam office in Seoul on the 7th, said, “The new service focuses on establishing leadership based on self-understanding of leader-level executives and employees within companies or organizations. “This is because their health has a significant impact on the performance of the organization as well as its members.”
● Efforts are being made to collect data necessary to identify subjects
Fortify has launched a new ‘Up People’ service starting in early 2023. The purpose is to help middle managers and above in an organization achieve leadership in a healthy manner by demonstrating their individual strengths.
Mr. A, a 35-year-old research and development team leader, was found to be at risk of decreased efficacy and burnout in Up People’s occupational health status analysis. He said, “I wonder if I can do it well…” . “I feel frustrated just thinking about going to work,” he said. In the multi-faceted leadership diagnosis, team members said that the team leader takes into account the perspectives of others and leads the team atmosphere smoothly, but because he considers the perspectives of many people, he sometimes postpones clear decisions and gives instructions that make it difficult to understand what they want. He was tired of putting off work and handling work on his own.
![The team leader who was last in the company rose to the top… It is possible if you start from ‘self-understanding’[허진석의 톡톡 스타트업]](https://dimg.donga.com/wps/NEWS/IMAGE/2024/10/11/130202116.1.jpg "The team leader who was last in the company rose to the top… It is possible if you start from ‘self-understanding’[허진석의 톡톡 스타트업]")
Fortify ‘measures’ and ‘analyzes’ the subject’s condition based on psychological theory and then ‘resolves’ it. Data related to the subject is collected through a self-developed UpPeople test, HR team interviews and internal evaluation data, feedback from colleagues, self-diagnosis of the subject, and non-face-to-face counseling.
And specifically identify the behavior or thoughts that need to be changed. At this time, one of the 20 types created based on the 20,000 cases accumulated so far is found. The next step is to identify the root cause. Identify the subject’s underlying thoughts, beliefs, or needs. It even uncovers factors within the organization to which the individual belongs. Fortify classifies the root causes of leaders’ difficulties into about 200 types and is establishing related solutions.
CEO Moon said, “Steps such as collecting target data, defining the problem, and identifying the root cause are aspects that have been neglected in many existing management consulting services,” adding, “We have provided the ‘Mindling’ service that addresses depression and anxiety of individuals that we have provided since 2001, and the “This is Fortify’s unique ability newly built through the ‘Waymark’ service that enables magnetic analysis,” he said.
Once the root cause is identified, the subject’s behavior or way of thinking is inspected one-on-one online every two weeks for three months as an implementation task that can be immediately applied in practice, and improvements are made. Mr. A, who went through this method, was identified as a ‘relationship-oriented person who does not want to be a person who is hated,’ and carried out the task of conveying specifically and clearly what the team needed. The image of a leader was also redefined by saying that a good leader is not someone who does not cause inconvenience, but someone who gives trust. Mr. A said, “I gained confidence.” The results of the multi-faceted evaluation, which was in last place, rose to the top level.
Fortify provides most of its services online. The process is carried out by connecting a professional coach who fits the type of problem the subject is experiencing. Many companies, including domestic telecommunications companies, major game companies, and listed startups in the healthcare sector, have used the UpPeople service. CEO Moon said, “The response from human resources managers and target users is good, so the same company often uses it to expand the target audience.”
● ‘Mindling’ and ‘Waymark’
Founded in 2020, Fortify began its online psychotherapy business by launching the ‘Mindling’ service in 2021. Mindling is an online program that helps users take care of their minds and keep them healthy. It evaluates the user’s personality traits and causes of stress and provides a customized program. Solutions are also provided for psychological problems such as perfectionism, self-esteem, anxiety, and anger.
CEO Moon, who provided psychiatric care at Seoul National University Bundang Hospital, said, “It was a pity that I could only devote less than 5 minutes to patients who had come from far away for several hours, which became the seed of my business.” So, we created an app service by dividing the various methods of mental and physical stability that we wanted to provide in the clinic by type. He said, “About 160,000 people use it, and there are more than 20,000 paid subscribers. I feel proud when I see user reviews saying, ‘I turn on the app on the bus every day and relieve my anxiety.’”
The next product launched after the Mindling service is ‘Waymark’, a career diagnosis service for office workers. The purpose is to help office workers identify their own tendencies and strengths and make better career choices. You can identify your tendencies and strengths with an in-depth diagnostic test of 230 questions, and you can also consult with experts online.
The reason most services were developed online is because they want more people to use them conveniently. Consultation is a labor-intensive form that requires individual intervention by experts, so it is important to save time and increase efficiency.
● Combination of psychiatric care and management consultant experience.
After graduating from Seoul National University College of Medicine, CEO Moon received a master’s degree in public health and business administration from Johns Hopkins University in the United States, and a doctorate in medicine from Seoul National University. He also worked at McKinsey, a global management consulting firm. The Up People service is a service that incorporates all of his experiences.
But the challenge is not easy. This is because, due to the nature of the service, it is not easy for consumers to distinguish which service is objectively superior. Another challenge is to achieve consistent coaching effectiveness as coaches each have different experiences and tendencies. For this reason, Fortify places emphasis on internal training on its self-developed diagnostic and coaching framework. CEO Moon said, “We are also conducting research to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of services through the combination of artificial intelligence (AI).”
He plans to focus on Up People for the time being. This is because if a manager is not healthy, it will have a negative impact on the organization and other members. CEO Moon said, “To manage others, you must first understand them. And in order to understand others, you must be able to manage yourself, and to do so, you must start from self-understanding.” He went on to say, “I dream of a workplace where everyone can demonstrate their ‘self’ in a healthy way and a world where such workplaces come together.”
