When Inc. magazine named Dalton, Georgia-based Workzbe one of its 2024 Power Partners a couple of months ago, it could just have well been referring to its CEO, Emily Elrod.
The magazine tapped Workzbe in its “small and mighty” category for “small businesses that thrive at powering other businesses, often without the resources of their larger peers or competitors. These are the companies that have done the most with the least.”
So why would “small and mighty” apply to Elrod?
“I’m 4-foot-10,” says the Dalton native, whose diminutive stature didn’t keep her from captaining two collegiate competitive cheer teams and becoming a professional ballroom dancer.
“I’m the one who’s fearless,” she adds. “I love the competitive side, and testing limits.”
Launched in 2019 and named by Elrod’s then-8-year-old son, Workzbe specializes in “accountability coaching, performance management and cultural design for both sports
(organizations) and business,” she says. In recognizing Workzbe, Inc. magazine says the company “navigates the complex problems of high-performing teams using executive coaching as well as strategy planning and implementation.”
At Davidson College in North Carolina, for instance, Elrod says she studies baseball recruits — but not in the same way the coaching staff does.
“I watch how a player acts,” she says. “I watch how he interacts with his parents, how he’s likely to assimilate into a team environment.
“All this is team dynamics,” she adds. “What do you bring to the team — or the company? Because it’s the same for both — work or sport, you’re part of a team, and you want to perform.
“We do things differently. We get to know the human.”
Workzbe has been engaged by several Chattanooga-area businesses, including The Patten Group, CHI Memorial Hospital, CBL Properties and Q Cells, but Elrod’s company has also worked with Major League Baseball teams. She says that while Workzbe is based in Dalton, it has staff stationed all over North America.
“We’ve trained more than 26,000 team members,” says Elrod, one of just 10 individuals named a Top Health Promotion Professional in 2019 by the Wellness Council of America (WELCOA).
Elrod grew up working with her father, Anthony, at his company, SRT Machinery, where she was “always tinkering” with the carpet-making equipment the company produced.
“What I learned is that the world is not designed for someone my size. Most things are made for 6-foot men,” she says. “My dad told me to be really good at whatever I did. He inspired me to do what I do now.”
Elrod earned an undergraduate degree in exercise and health science in 2010 and a master’s degree in exercise physiology in 2013, both from Kennesaw State University. She signed on at Hamilton Health Care System in 2015 and built its wellness program from scratch.
By 2019, she was handling wellness programs for Hamilton clients including flooring giant Mohawk. She says it was also the year in which she told Hamilton’s then-CEO and COO that she was going on her own. And when she launched Workzbe, Hamilton and Mohawk were among her first clients.
“I’m a very passionate person,” Elrod says, “and I’m a person of faith. When God finally gave me the word, I was so blessed to be able to have Mohawk and Hamilton right from the first.”
Workzbe’s home office is in Dalton, Georgia, about 42 minutes from downtown Chattanooga, traveling primarily on Interstate 75 South