Welcome to the bringing the human Back To Human Resources,
podcast, the podcast, all about the delicate balance between
people and business. And quite literally reconnecting
the to my name is Tracy Ruben, and I've spent nearly my entire
professional career in h.r., join me as I share stories
opinions and words of advice with you each week.
Hey everyone. Welcome back to bringing the
human Back To Human Resources podcast.
Before we get into the episode, I just want to let you guys know
that we have a couple events coming up.
Tuesdays are office, happy hours on Instagram live at 9 p.m.
Eastern. Please, join us there.
It's great. Bring a cocktail mocktail.
Whatever you want to bring to get into the mood of talking to
your resident HR partner about anything that's on your mind.
I spent so much time talking about things that weren't even
hr-related, but it was such a fun and warm environment.
I could feel The Vibes even though it was just being on the
video. But I hope that soon enough I
will have some guests on the Instagram live too.
So check it out there and then the second event is that on
Thursdays on clubhouse, I am a co-moderator for a room talking
about navigating workplaces and change in The New Normal.
So again, take a look at my Instagram.
All of the information is there. R and that is Thursdays at 7
p.m. Eastern.
If you don't have clubhouse, at the end of this episode, I give
you some tips on how to get an invite.
Let's get started. Thank you guys for joining me
for another week of the podcast. It really means so much to me
that you're coming back to listen every single week.
And it seems like we have a lot of new listeners just based on
some of the numbers that I'm seeing.
So if you And yet, please rate review And subscribe and welcome
to the HR Tracy family. Make sure you're following me on
Instagram Clubhouse, LinkedIn, where ever you prefer to consume
content. So, let's get right into the
episode. I have been more active on
social media now more than ever. And I think it's because I have
HR Tracy Instagram, and I'm on clubhouse, and it's made me
think of a few things. The first is authenticity, and
I've talked about this before on other episodes.
Odds. But I'm just getting kind of
sick and tired of what I'm seeing.
Can I, can I have like a vent sesh right now.
I'm on clubhouse. I'm on LinkedIn.
I'm on Instagram. We already covered this and I
like them all for different reasons.
I like Instagram because it's aesthetically pleasing.
You've got videos. You have stories.
You have live. I feel like it covers everything
and I actually feel like it's a lot more authentic.
At least in the HR Community the Being recruiting side of things
like on the career and Entrepreneurship side of
Instagram. I feel like it's really, really
authentic, and dare I say wholesome, and I love that.
Clubhouse is a game-changer. I love that.
It's Audio Only. I love that.
The trolls have to come off of mute in order to troll like that
probably sounds ridiculous. But keyboard Warriors are the
bane of my existence? Like I just don't get it.
And so removing that element, I love it.
I love it. And not only that like not to
just focus on the negative. The best part of Clubhouse is
that you connect with people, you probably never would have
connected with otherwise. And I love the open Forum of
discussion and conversation hard-hitting, topics.
I love it. And at first, I was a little
skeptical. I was like, what is this going
to do for me? But now getting more involved
and being more consistently engaged in the platform.
I just love it. LinkedIn love-hate, relationship
with LinkedIn. It's amazing for networking.
Finding a job asking for support mentorship, Etc.
But I hate the inauthenticity. Do you guys know what I'm
talking about? When I say that you're
scrolling? I'm going to take you, take you
on a journey here. You're scrolling looking at
things, maybe you're like, brushing your teeth.
I guess. That's an honest admission,
that, that's what I do. I'm brushing my teeth, while I'm
scrolling through Linkedin scrolling scrolling.
And you see this heartfelt, one, liner, and then there's a space
and then it says, read more. I knew click it and it's like
five inches of texts broken up by one line each.
And it's like, is this a real story?
Sometimes I think it's just people looking for cloud or
looking for recognition and so it feels so devoid of
authenticity. Again, I think it's great for
certain things but I feel really strongly that authenticity is
what develops loyalty and creates.
Loyalty. So for you as a listener, it's
important to me that, you know, I'm always going to be authentic
and it's important to me that, you know, that what I put out or
what I speak about or who I speak to is coming from a place
of authenticity and not just trying to Garner some kind of
attention. Because really, I mean, I've
said this before, I thought the podcast was only going to have
five people tuned in and that's not true.
So it's all the more important to me that I remain true to
myself. And what the purpose of this
podcast is which is really to bring humanity and the human
back into Human Resources, back into the business back into
functions of the world that have been so, human absent.
And so, thinking about that on LinkedIn seeing posts that in my
opinion again are not authentic or seem to have one goal, which
is to gain followers, it's just kind of frustrating.
I mean, yes, we put out content, I put out content in order to
gain traction, and to gain interest and engagement.
But it's not because I want a certain number of followers,
it's because I feel I have an important message and I want to
get it out there and I want people to listen.
Then I want businesses to be more people Centric.
That's what I want. And so, if that means that I
have to put out, content on clubhouse and Instagram and be
engaging, then I'm going to do that, but I'm going to do it in
a way that's authentic. And so I'm in a bit of a or I'm
at a Crossroads I guess I should say with LinkedIn.
I'm somewhat feeling like I don't really want to mark it on
there anymore, but I don't have that option when I'm trying to
To grow a very specific following which is people who
are looking to have answers related, to questions that are
coming up in their experiences and their careers.
And for people who are in the same space as I am in h.r., in
any industry. So there is a need for me to be
on LinkedIn, to Market on LinkedIn, but I just don't want
to do it in the way that others are doing it.
And so, I'm thinking of ways that I can continue to be
authentically myself. While not following the lead of
people who I feel are being potentially inauthentic.
I get the reason why people want to go viral, you get people
buying your products, listening to your podcast, buying your
book and that's fine. But I've just not sure I'm
bought into what LinkedIn is becoming.
I feel like there's a more authentic way to go about it.
On my Instagram story is a few weeks ago or a month ago.
I posted that someone connected with me and sent a video.
Audio greeting basically and he introduced himself through a
video. It was raw it was in the moment
off the cuff and I loved it. I thought it was a brilliant way
of capturing my attention hearing what he was all about
and really being open to a conversation and I replied back
with a video. And now, since being connected
with him and seeing him on my feed, he posts a lot of videos
and there's Thing about seeing a video that's different than
reading a long post about something heartfelt or something
that we've learned. And I don't know if it's just
that you can get the tone of voice that you see the person's
reactions, it's just better in my opinion.
I find that it's more authentic. It's easier to relate to and it
doesn't make me question whether it's a real story or not, it's
just one hundred percent more authentic and this made me We
think about the way that we engage and build relationships
at work. In this new space, we have an
opportunity when we are working remotely to be connected by
video. And especially for those of you
who are in new positions, I think this is really, really,
really important. People don't know you.
If you're starting a new job in the pandemic, people don't know
what it is that you're passionate about necessarily and
The video gives you an opportunity to relay
information. That's different, that's harder
to relay when you're not on video.
So I think about before the pandemic, how we used to have
conference calls and we dial into this long number we'd have
a conference code number. We would punch in the numbers.
We would wait for everyone to join everyone would announce
their names and then we'd start talking and it just like wasn't
a great way of connecting. And I remember back in In March,
when we first close the stores, we were still using these
conference call numbers and I said to everyone, like, we got
to ditch these numbers, we have to use like, Microsoft teams,
which is the tool that we are using as our platform.
And I remember getting a lot of pushback like, oh, people don't
know how to use teams. They don't know how to use the
the functionality that, you know, they're so used to the to
the conference call numbers, and I was like so wet.
We should connect over video, we're not seeing each other.
We should connect over video and we should get everyone familiar
with using that technology and we did.
And slowly people started joining by video initially, no.
And joined by video, we were all in sweat.
So your our hair was up, you know, no makeup, whatever and
even still wear that way. But in some in some cases but my
point is that there was a hesitation to adapting.
To this new technology. And so, what I've realized is
that, as we've hired new managers hired new employees, as
we've hired new, even interns. For example, they are starting
in an environment that is 100% different than had.
They started a year ago and bringing them on onboarding
them? Helping them acclimate to this
new environment has been really interesting, we've taken
training virtual, we've taken all of our Um, resources virtual
for the most part and I think it's actually allowed us to
develop closer relationships when we're focused on actually
doing that. So all of this is to say that I
think there are better ways that we can express ourselves
authentically, whether it's in the workplace or in our side
hustles like this podcast, for example.
And so, if you are a new employee or if You're a content
creator or you have a business of your own.
I challenge you to, think of ways to challenge, again,
challenge, the status quo. I know I've been saying this,
like, on every single episode for the last few weeks, but if
LinkedIn is your your place to go, that's great.
But is there a way to that? You can be more authentic to
capture and heightened engagement or heightened level
of Engagement without negating? Your authenticity, is there a
way to You on board in a new company where you are adapting
to a new environment. But you're also being
authentically yourself and you are taking the bull by the horns
and you're connecting with people and you're getting on the
video. Those are all ways that I think
challenging the status quo is really valuable coming back to
this bubble of what feels like inauthenticity in the online
space. Clubhouse has been an app and
I've talked about this, I know on the last few episodes where
people can really have open format discussions.
We can make mistakes we can talk about it.
I think it's devoid of that cancel culture, ask environment
that we all navigate every single day in our written
communication. I don't know about you.
Anytime I put something in writing, I think like, is
someone going to get mad at me? Is someone going to say that
I've done something wrong that I've offended them?
I mean, I really always think about what is the perception
that someone is going to have when I put out X Y or Z content,
and of course that ink that's inclusive of when I'm speaking
on this podcast because it's recorded it's out there.
It's not going anywhere. And while I really try not to
edit anything, there have been moments where I'm like, I don't
know that that's going to be received well so let me do that
over. That's just a natural response
because of the career that I'm in.
I try to be very very cognizant of the audience and how my words
will be perceived and my thoughts will be perceived at
the same time. I also share with all of you
exactly what I'm thinking and feeling and even if I make an
edit to what it is that I say on my podcast, I still say it.
I just think about do I need to say it differently.
So what I've seen from Club Houses, that it's really very
much, an unscripted unedited version of our opinions.
And I love that. I think it's what Society needs.
I think that we need to be able to have the conversation about
anything. I mean, I said this on my
Instagram live for the first office, happy hours that there
was one day where I was listening to a holocaust.
Survivor the very first Holocaust Survivor ever to be on
clubhouse. And that was an incredible room
and then I went to a room. The next day that was about
stocks that you should be on the lookout for and I just love the
variation in topics and interests and I just can't
highly recommend it enough. But I have been an audience
member, I guess we can say on some Clubhouse rooms or in some
Club has rooms that have really not been welcoming.
I was in a room that was for HR people that I found or felt was
really geared toward people listening to themselves.
Just wanting to hear themselves speak.
And I got really frustrated and I did speak twice.
I spoke twice. And it was I don't want to share
what the topic was about because I really don't want to throw
anyone under the bus. And I just want to focus on the
meat and potatoes if you will of how I felt leaving that room.
But I did feel like unless you were part of the Inner Circle,
or unless you said something that complemented, what someone
else said before you. There wasn't enough room for you
in the room. You didn't have a platform to
speak and I say that because actually there was someone else
in the room that had a very similar experience to me and we
actually ended up connecting because she was a really
interesting person with interesting things to say.
So I followed her, she followed me back, we connected on
Instagram, and we had a little bit of an exchange where I was
kind of like glad to hear that it wasn't Just me taking that
away from the room because I realized sometimes I can take
things. Personally, we're all human.
Sure? I can take a direct message,
tell me anything you want directly.
No, emotion were good. But after I share something,
depending on the response, sometimes I can feel really
insecure about what I've just said.
And at the end of the day, I'm not going to fret about it
because I was authentically me. I was vulnerable and this is
Where I felt that element of like, oh man, did I say
something wrong? Did I say something to offend
someone, but looking back on it actually, In being able to
follow more people and have more people follow me back.
I was like, okay, actually there were people in the room that
benefited from something that I said and that, that matters.
So anyway, going back to this point of the room with other HR
people I had shared a point based on the topic of the room
that was contrasting to something that someone else
said, I don't think they liked it.
I just, I'd they didn't like it. It's not even I think, They
didn't like it. And what happened from there is
that someone jumped in no one said like, hey, thanks for, you
know, taking part in the conversation.
Like so glad to have you, they just jumped to the next person
and the next person started talking about things that
literally didn't make any sense. There was no connection to the
topic. There was no, it was almost like
they were just saying words to say words and I realized that if
you're not in the HR Space. When you hear someone talking
about HR, you hear someone talking about a topic that they
are an expert in. You are trusting what they're
saying. This kind of comes back to the
last episode from a couple weeks ago, where I talked about
navigating mentors and public advice.
If you don't look into what they're saying, it all sounds
factual, it all sounds like it makes sense because they're
using words that you've heard before and they're charismatic
and all of the above But when you're on the inside and you
know what they're talking about, you can tell when it just
doesn't make sense. So when they moved from me with
no thanks, thanks for being here.
Great to have you blah blah blah and they moved right into that
person that other person. And then that person was talking
about things that literally made no sense.
I was like, oh, they low-key hate me, like they're done and
actually, the transition was like pretty aggressive like
this. They said, I can't even
remember, but they said something like, oh, you know,
there's someone who I think has a perfect response to this and
then they went into that person right after me and I was like
kind of feel a little shut down. But all right, we it's fine.
You know, it is what it is. So moved on from that right.
Still in the room, I'm listening great.
And again, it was just like the other person talking to talk.
And Saying things that didn't make sense?
Was it related to the topic? Yes, we're there nuggets of
information that I thought were really good.
Yes. But then there was just a
continuation that it felt like it was just a room to boost
those people's platforms. And that's not the point.
And those people do similar things on other platforms.
And it just it makes me feel like they're not in this for the
reasons that help other people where they're being authentic
and they're looking to support development and like if that's
not there, their mission great that's fine.
But their mission they say that their mission is to help and
support people. So why are they only talking
about their platform? Don't get it.
So I'm sorry I'm really digressing here.
And again, I'm not looking to shoot down anybody.
Like, I'm just kind of expressing the frustration that
I am feeling and some of these social media networking
platforms because it's such a bubble, like, it's a bubble that
we've got a burst, like, be yourself, be open, like, there's
a wall there and you're keeping people out and you're not being
vulnerable. So, Even though I was just shut
down, like, 10 minutes, prior, 15 minutes.
Prior I decided to shoot my shot again.
And I failed, I spoke I was super brief, maybe 20 seconds
and I was talking about how every leader.
Every people manager has a responsibility to be HR leaders,
that was the essence of my point.
That it's not just HR that manages, the people function, so
to speak. It's everybody to me, that's a
really good point. Like, that's what.
I really try to hone in on them so many of these episodes and
with my own employees and again, they shot me down, I completely
failed, I completely failed and may be on the outside looking
in. I didn't fail because I did get
a few people who reach out reached out to me on clubhouse
like by following me. But also, then on Instagram
saying, hey like, you know, I really liked your points,
whatever. Which that again that's not why
I was speaking. I really just wanted to engage
in great discussion about this particular topic, but then it
gets words They didn't say anything.
They didn't say thank you. They they just totally ignored
me and then they moved me from the stage to the audience
rejected rejected. In clubhouse terms, in order to
speak, you have to raise your hand, or you have to be invited
to speak and basically that brings you up on stage.
If you are just listening and you don't have anything to say,
you just want to listen, no problem.
You stay in ads, the audience but even still once you go up to
the stage you can stay there so that you can engage in the
discussion which sometimes I do. Sometimes I don't in many rooms,
I actually don't even join the stage I just listened because I
like to hear what other people have to say and they're really
small. Are interesting people out
there. I mean it's just it's
incredible. I keep saying this.
So they moved me to the audience and they moved to other people
to the audience with with me. I'm sorry, I'm like recalling
this and I'm just I can't help but find it so amusing that
there's such a power trip over this.
That's that's the perception I have.
It could be completely devoid of that.
It's possible that that's not even what they were doing or
what they were feeling. Nevertheless myself and to
others. We got kicked out, we got the
boot, okay, we got the boot and this is what I was referring to
before that. There was this really
interesting person who I had reached out to on clubhouse, we
both followed each other, and then we connected on Instagram,
and she, and I were talking about how we were booted to the
audience after we spoke and how abrupt and aggressive it was,
and how unwelcoming it was. And I was like, yeah, don't
forget about So, and so guy, who was also booted, like it was
just the three of us and I thought it was only me.
She thought it was only her and it was just so funny because
that's not a way that you engage in thoughtful discussion and
they have these events that are recurring and now I just kind of
feel like I'm not going to go to them.
Maybe I'll just create my own version that's more welcoming
and more open. So there is a There was a silver
lining there that this, this woman, and I were able to
discuss outside of Clubhouse, how it made us feel and what
we'd want to do differently. And then, it's so funny later in
the day, we ended up being on the same or in a same room for
women in Business and Entrepreneurship and we were
able to share this story and the women in this room were like,
that's crazy. Like, that is not cool, but it's
all about finding the right Roofing.
Room for you. So, moving away from that, long
story that I just shared the key here.
And the reason why I am taking this week's episode to talk
about authenticity is because while I am so focused on D
stigmatizing HR. I am now.
So focused on the authentic self, there is nothing that
destigmatize has HR more than authenticity and transparency.
That is the Kryptonite of HR. People who are not authentic and
I've come to this realization, after those weird Clubhouse
moments this week. But I'm glad that I got there
and I'm glad that I'm coming to the point where I don't care
that those people have massive followings and they could help
me get more engagement or more Focus or whatever.
I don't need them because I don't want to be like them and
so I am focusing my platform. My Episodes for you guys, my
content, whatever that means on being authentic, remaining
authentic, because I've always been myself and bringing people
on who want to be vulnerable and want to be authentic.
So all of that is to say that I have some really exciting
episodes coming up for you guys. I'm going to have a few guests
on in the next few weeks and I'm just really looking forward to
the future of this podcast. I mean, every single I tell you
this. I'm so grateful for all of your
support and that you listen. And that you subscribe, it's
really given me the ability to be vulnerable.
But also have space to talk about things that I'm probably
not alone in feeling be authentic, be vulnerable and
don't feel like you need to be in someone's Network just
because they have a wide reach. You can create that for
yourself. I'm going to listen back to this
and I'm Going to remind myself that not only am I speaking to
you about that, but I'm also speaking to myself.
So I'm just really excited to continue to meet people who have
like-minded approaches with what this whole social media thing
offers us. So I hope you guys have a
wonderful week as a, reminder, every Tuesday, I am doing an
Instagram live office, happy hours.
So the first one went really, really well.
I'm still deciding on whether 9. I'm Eastern is the right time I
did. Do a poll in my stories.
It looks like we're a bit 50/50 but I might rotate it.
So for this week coming up, it's going to be 9 p.m.
Eastern. Please make sure you join if
you're listening to this episode way later than Tuesday, the
second week in February, that's okay.
Just take a look on my Instagram for the time that the Instagram
live is going to be. I also on Thursday, zico
moderate In clubhouse. A room that is all about
navigating the workplace in this new normal.
So again, if you don't have Clubhouse yet, make sure you
find someone with an invite. I don't have any invites right
now but reach out to me on Instagram, sometimes I do get
them randomly and I'd love to be able to invite you and help you
navigate a really wonderful new. Social media Network.
Don't forget to rate review And subscribe.
Connect with me on Instagram at HR.
Tracy on Clubhouse as HR. Tracy, you can go to my
Instagram and click the link Tree in my bio and that will
connect you to every single place where you can find me.
Thank you guys so much for joining me for another week and
I will see you next week.