1 00:00:00,040 --> 00:00:02,480 Welcome to the Bringing the Human Back to Human Resources 2 00:00:02,480 --> 00:00:04,800 podcast. I'm Tracy Chernoff, and I've 3 00:00:04,800 --> 00:00:07,240 spent my entire professional career in HR. 4 00:00:07,720 --> 00:00:10,840 Each week, we'll explore the delicate balance between people 5 00:00:10,840 --> 00:00:13,840 and business with the aim to reconnect the two and create 6 00:00:13,840 --> 00:00:16,720 meaningful outcomes. Listen in as I share my own 7 00:00:16,720 --> 00:00:20,560 experiences, challenge the status quo, and chat with guests 8 00:00:20,560 --> 00:00:23,600 from various industries about our mission to bring the human 9 00:00:23,600 --> 00:00:26,240 back to human Resources. Hi everyone, welcome back to the 10 00:00:26,240 --> 00:00:28,160 Bringing the Human Back to Human Resources podcast. 11 00:00:28,160 --> 00:00:29,960 Thank you so much for being here for another week. 12 00:00:30,280 --> 00:00:32,840 You know what to do. If you haven't already, don't 13 00:00:32,840 --> 00:00:34,880 forget to rate, review and subscribe wherever you're 14 00:00:34,880 --> 00:00:37,160 catching this episode, whether you're listening or you're 15 00:00:37,160 --> 00:00:38,960 watching. And if you're watching, I should 16 00:00:38,960 --> 00:00:40,680 apologize for the bags under my eyes. 17 00:00:40,680 --> 00:00:43,040 I was just telling Steve that it has been quite the week. 18 00:00:43,760 --> 00:00:47,080 But you know, there's always an opportunity to make your week 19 00:00:47,080 --> 00:00:50,400 amazing. And so let me introduce you to 20 00:00:50,440 --> 00:00:54,000 Steve Cadogan, who is a globally recognized talent strategist, 21 00:00:54,240 --> 00:00:57,520 advisor, and author who helps leaders and organizations build 22 00:00:57,520 --> 00:01:00,200 the future of work, which is the topic of today. 23 00:01:00,200 --> 00:01:03,560 And we'll be diving in quite a bit into this topic. 24 00:01:04,000 --> 00:01:07,240 As the founder of Cadogan Talent Ventures, he has advised iconic 25 00:01:07,240 --> 00:01:10,800 brands like Google, Cisco, Intel, Manchester United and the 26 00:01:10,800 --> 00:01:14,280 BBC, as well as leading venture capital and consulting firms 27 00:01:14,280 --> 00:01:18,280 including Andre, Scene, Horowitz, McKenzie, Deloitte and 28 00:01:18,440 --> 00:01:22,040 Clock Partners, best known as Linkedin's first CHRO. 29 00:01:22,040 --> 00:01:24,800 Yes, I did say that. Rewind it back in case you 30 00:01:24,800 --> 00:01:27,200 missed it. Steve out scaled the company 31 00:01:27,200 --> 00:01:30,880 from 400 employees through its IPO, shaping a culture that 32 00:01:30,880 --> 00:01:32,560 became the foundation of its success. 33 00:01:32,560 --> 00:01:35,360 In fact, I don't even think anyone goes a day without 34 00:01:35,360 --> 00:01:39,160 talking about LinkedIn. It is in itself an iconic brand, 35 00:01:39,560 --> 00:01:41,880 and his groundbreaking work has been featured at Stanford 36 00:01:41,880 --> 00:01:44,920 University, where an entire graduate level course has been 37 00:01:44,920 --> 00:01:47,080 built around the culture he helped to create. 38 00:01:47,640 --> 00:01:51,120 Since 2021, Steve has been named a Top 100 Global Thought Leader 39 00:01:51,120 --> 00:01:53,960 in Talent and People, and his insights have been featured on 40 00:01:53,960 --> 00:01:57,880 Bloomberg, CBS and CNBC. He's also a sought after keynote 41 00:01:57,880 --> 00:02:00,960 speaker and university lecturer, bringing decades of HR 42 00:02:00,960 --> 00:02:03,760 leadership experience across industries and geographies. 43 00:02:04,160 --> 00:02:08,039 In 2021, Steve published Work Quake, embracing the aftershocks 44 00:02:08,039 --> 00:02:11,840 of COVID-19 to create a better model of working, which debuted 45 00:02:11,840 --> 00:02:14,320 as the number one Amazon hot new release. 46 00:02:14,800 --> 00:02:18,000 With more than 25 years as an HR executive and experienced living 47 00:02:18,000 --> 00:02:21,320 and working in the US, Canada and Singapore, Steve brings a 48 00:02:21,320 --> 00:02:24,280 unique perspective having sat on both sides of the table as 49 00:02:24,280 --> 00:02:27,880 employee and employer. Today, Steve continues to serve 50 00:02:27,880 --> 00:02:30,840 on multiple boards, advise progressive organizations, and 51 00:02:30,840 --> 00:02:33,560 share his passion for building compelling talent strategies. 52 00:02:33,960 --> 00:02:36,400 And when he's not speaking, teaching or writing, he's 53 00:02:36,400 --> 00:02:39,240 coaching basketball, playing tennis, or spending time with 54 00:02:39,240 --> 00:02:43,360 his family in California. And Steve, I, I, I think that 55 00:02:43,360 --> 00:02:46,840 all of the things that you do are really inspiring. 56 00:02:46,840 --> 00:02:49,320 And I know that there are listeners out there who are 57 00:02:49,320 --> 00:02:52,560 like, oh, OK, Steve is going to be the person on my vision board 58 00:02:52,560 --> 00:02:54,560 now because I want to be like him. 59 00:02:54,560 --> 00:02:56,560 I want to do all of those amazing things. 60 00:02:56,560 --> 00:02:59,640 So kudos to you for all of your accomplishments and all you know 61 00:02:59,640 --> 00:03:02,680 what your entire career has looked like over the last 62 00:03:02,680 --> 00:03:05,240 several decades. Yeah, thanks, Tracy. 63 00:03:05,240 --> 00:03:08,440 You know, we, we face a really awkward reality in the world of 64 00:03:08,440 --> 00:03:12,120 HR that there is no natural progression after you serve in 65 00:03:12,120 --> 00:03:14,560 your operator roles. You know, in finance it's pretty 66 00:03:14,560 --> 00:03:17,960 clear you go on to a board of directors as the audit committee 67 00:03:17,960 --> 00:03:21,280 chair and in HR it's just not as natural progression. 68 00:03:21,280 --> 00:03:24,800 So hopefully my crazy story has given some hope to people that 69 00:03:24,800 --> 00:03:27,800 there are interesting futures out there after your, you know, 70 00:03:27,800 --> 00:03:30,120 operator roles. Absolutely. 71 00:03:30,120 --> 00:03:32,680 I think it's really inspiring and actually I have to. 72 00:03:33,040 --> 00:03:36,240 I have to take it back to my dad for a moment because in one of 73 00:03:36,240 --> 00:03:38,680 the very early episodes that I did when I first started my 74 00:03:38,680 --> 00:03:41,200 podcast already, I think actually by the time this 75 00:03:41,200 --> 00:03:44,560 episode launches, it will be 5 years old, which is so insane. 76 00:03:45,040 --> 00:03:46,920 That's why they say the time passes whether you're doing 77 00:03:46,920 --> 00:03:50,160 something or not. So, but my, you know, I was like 78 00:03:50,160 --> 00:03:53,040 trying to figure out do I want to go into retail management? 79 00:03:53,040 --> 00:03:56,080 Do I want to do HR? Because everyone, you know, I 80 00:03:56,080 --> 00:03:58,000 was working at Target at the time and everyone was like, you 81 00:03:58,000 --> 00:04:01,200 should go into HR like this is like a great path for you. 82 00:04:01,200 --> 00:04:02,480 But you could do retail management too. 83 00:04:02,480 --> 00:04:04,080 And they make like a lot of money and you should. 84 00:04:04,560 --> 00:04:06,680 And I was like, oh, a lot of money. 85 00:04:06,680 --> 00:04:08,680 That sounds great for paying off my student loans. 86 00:04:09,000 --> 00:04:12,400 And my dad was like, look, you could do that. 87 00:04:12,560 --> 00:04:14,520 That's a great, that's a great career too. 88 00:04:14,880 --> 00:04:17,160 And it's like the yes. And right. 89 00:04:17,160 --> 00:04:20,920 And HR is going to open so many doors for you. 90 00:04:21,240 --> 00:04:26,320 And if you have this natural ability, then you should see it 91 00:04:26,320 --> 00:04:28,800 through and you can always do something else after. 92 00:04:29,120 --> 00:04:32,080 And my parents would always remind me, your first job is not 93 00:04:32,080 --> 00:04:36,200 always your last job. And it's very hard to kind of 94 00:04:36,200 --> 00:04:39,480 zoom out when you're like fresh out of college or trade school 95 00:04:39,480 --> 00:04:43,400 or whatever you're doing and you're like, yeah, I can do 96 00:04:43,400 --> 00:04:45,520 other things after this. Like to your point, I can do 97 00:04:45,520 --> 00:04:48,920 things outside of whatever operational role I'm doing. 98 00:04:49,240 --> 00:04:52,560 And that was really pretty life changing for me because I did 99 00:04:52,560 --> 00:04:57,720 decide to go into HR, obviously, and I ended up probably doing 100 00:04:57,720 --> 00:05:00,720 better than what retail managers were doing at the time because 101 00:05:00,720 --> 00:05:03,760 of, you know, all of these opportunities that I was able to 102 00:05:04,840 --> 00:05:07,560 kind of acquire for myself. And so coming back to what you 103 00:05:07,560 --> 00:05:11,720 said and, and actually just thinking about and reflecting on 104 00:05:11,720 --> 00:05:16,240 your career, not only does it open other HR doors, you 105 00:05:16,240 --> 00:05:19,800 actually have all of these skills that, that you develop 106 00:05:19,800 --> 00:05:23,520 and skill sets that you you hone that can be applied and 107 00:05:23,520 --> 00:05:27,480 transferred pretty much anywhere doing anything, which is cool. 108 00:05:28,040 --> 00:05:33,200 Right, without a doubt. And I had no idea of the choices 109 00:05:33,200 --> 00:05:36,480 I was making when I sort of fell into HR about one year out of 110 00:05:36,480 --> 00:05:38,240 college. I started in a company that 111 00:05:38,240 --> 00:05:41,320 rotated talent around, and I started in credit and 112 00:05:41,320 --> 00:05:43,320 collections. And I realized I was really good 113 00:05:43,320 --> 00:05:45,720 at collecting money, but that's probably not what I wanted to do 114 00:05:45,720 --> 00:05:48,840 for a long period of time. And then they asked me to try 115 00:05:48,840 --> 00:05:51,480 out recruiting, and I'd never even heard of HR. 116 00:05:51,560 --> 00:05:55,440 I mean, I was a history major, liberal arts, and my parents 117 00:05:55,440 --> 00:05:58,480 were both in the nonprofit sector, Dad's administer, mom 118 00:05:58,480 --> 00:06:01,120 ran daycare Centers for underprivileged families. 119 00:06:01,440 --> 00:06:05,960 And so I had no business role model, didn't know what HR was 120 00:06:06,640 --> 00:06:09,760 and what two things I found out pretty quickly, which were 121 00:06:09,760 --> 00:06:13,360 amazing and very fortuitous. For those of you who've made the 122 00:06:13,360 --> 00:06:16,440 choice already, which is number one, you're not bound by an 123 00:06:16,440 --> 00:06:19,040 industry or a geography. You can go and practice this 124 00:06:19,040 --> 00:06:23,520 craft anywhere and that makes you sort of downturn, sector 125 00:06:23,520 --> 00:06:26,560 downturn, you know, immune. You know, it's the ultimate 126 00:06:26,560 --> 00:06:29,840 career insurance, if you will, for people who have, you know, 127 00:06:29,840 --> 00:06:31,760 face industry downturns and so forth. 128 00:06:32,320 --> 00:06:36,160 The second thing is you are invited to dip your toes and 129 00:06:36,160 --> 00:06:38,680 explore every crevice of the organization. 130 00:06:38,680 --> 00:06:42,040 You get to hang out with the production, the manufacturing, 131 00:06:42,040 --> 00:06:45,320 the engineering, the operations, the finance, the legal like you 132 00:06:45,320 --> 00:06:50,240 are allowed to engage as much or as little as you want to in 133 00:06:50,240 --> 00:06:53,520 every corner of the business. And that allows you to meet so 134 00:06:53,520 --> 00:06:56,840 many fascinating people, solve so many unique problems that 135 00:06:56,840 --> 00:06:58,480 you've probably never faced before. 136 00:06:59,040 --> 00:07:02,600 And I love that puzzle, you know, and the, and the, and the 137 00:07:02,600 --> 00:07:04,880 constant newness and the challenge. 138 00:07:04,880 --> 00:07:07,080 I mean, if you're not a change junkie, you are in the wrong 139 00:07:07,080 --> 00:07:09,400 place. If you're in HR like this is all 140 00:07:09,400 --> 00:07:11,880 about every day is like Christmas, man. 141 00:07:11,880 --> 00:07:14,160 It's a, there's a new present that you don't know what it is, 142 00:07:14,160 --> 00:07:16,560 but you're going to unwrap it and something's going to walk in 143 00:07:16,560 --> 00:07:17,880 your door. Sometimes it hits you in the 144 00:07:17,880 --> 00:07:20,480 parking lot before you've even landed in your cube or your 145 00:07:20,480 --> 00:07:23,080 office. And I really, I love that about 146 00:07:23,080 --> 00:07:25,440 it. And I had no idea, you know, 147 00:07:25,440 --> 00:07:30,440 that I would be in a in AHR path that would take me to do M&A all 148 00:07:30,440 --> 00:07:33,760 over the world for years. So that would take me to be 149 00:07:33,760 --> 00:07:36,560 posted in Singapore and run HR for all of Asia for a very, you 150 00:07:36,560 --> 00:07:39,480 know, major organization or to be the first head of HR for a 151 00:07:39,480 --> 00:07:41,440 startup company. And just like go through this 152 00:07:41,760 --> 00:07:45,880 IPO growth experience, which I'd never never faced before. 153 00:07:45,880 --> 00:07:48,880 And I think that's one of the coolest things that we have, is 154 00:07:48,880 --> 00:07:51,520 a gift in this profession. Totally. 155 00:07:51,520 --> 00:07:54,400 And you know, something that that dawned on me as you were 156 00:07:54,400 --> 00:07:57,720 speaking is that I think sometimes there's a lot of, and 157 00:07:57,720 --> 00:08:00,200 I know this even from listeners who reach out that sometimes 158 00:08:00,200 --> 00:08:05,040 there's a lot of nervousness around, well, I don't know, XY 159 00:08:05,040 --> 00:08:07,760 or Z thing. I'm not going to be qualified 160 00:08:07,760 --> 00:08:10,560 for that particular role or that next thing. 161 00:08:10,560 --> 00:08:14,360 And, and naturally for you, having been Linkedin's first 162 00:08:14,360 --> 00:08:18,000 CHRO and to your point, you went through this IPO process, you 163 00:08:18,000 --> 00:08:20,600 hadn't done this before and that's significant. 164 00:08:20,880 --> 00:08:24,040 I think it's actually really important that listeners reflect 165 00:08:24,040 --> 00:08:27,960 on that, that you were in this, you know, the, at the highest 166 00:08:27,960 --> 00:08:32,159 level of, you know, HR leadership, at least, you know, 167 00:08:32,159 --> 00:08:35,320 in, in terms of like within the business that someone can be. 168 00:08:35,480 --> 00:08:37,320 And there were things that you were learning. 169 00:08:37,600 --> 00:08:40,120 And that's, you know, of course you want to always have like a 170 00:08:40,400 --> 00:08:43,080 learning mindset. But I think that's actually it 171 00:08:43,080 --> 00:08:45,640 should dispel some of those fears that you're not always 172 00:08:45,640 --> 00:08:49,480 going to know every single thing that your next job or your next 173 00:08:49,480 --> 00:08:50,760 company is going to throw at you. 174 00:08:51,240 --> 00:08:52,800 Yeah. And Tracy to amplify on what you 175 00:08:52,800 --> 00:08:59,360 said, I think there is enormous, let's just say underestimated 176 00:08:59,360 --> 00:09:03,160 energy tackling something new. I think that we've really under 177 00:09:03,160 --> 00:09:06,280 appreciated that how we design job families and career paths 178 00:09:06,280 --> 00:09:08,160 and like you can't apply for another job until you've done 179 00:09:08,160 --> 00:09:11,240 this one for a couple years. I think in a world that's 180 00:09:11,240 --> 00:09:13,480 changing really quickly, we really have to revisit our 181 00:09:13,480 --> 00:09:15,280 thinking around that. And that's part of you know, 182 00:09:15,280 --> 00:09:18,320 what I spent a lot of time with on leaders around the world is 183 00:09:18,320 --> 00:09:22,080 listen, if you take a look at Silicon Valley, where is I call 184 00:09:22,080 --> 00:09:25,040 it crazy, crazy town because it is just nuts and it is not a 185 00:09:25,040 --> 00:09:26,520 perfect world. There's a lot of incredible 186 00:09:26,520 --> 00:09:29,040 things happening there, but I don't think anyone can argue 187 00:09:29,040 --> 00:09:32,760 that there's more creativity, innovation, new value creation, 188 00:09:32,760 --> 00:09:35,720 more high market cap companies created in that small little 189 00:09:35,720 --> 00:09:38,160 portion of the world than anywhere else in the world. 190 00:09:38,400 --> 00:09:41,000 And it also experiences the highest amount of turnover. 191 00:09:41,480 --> 00:09:44,840 And you have, and I tell this to business leaders who are 192 00:09:45,040 --> 00:09:48,480 fretting over high turnover. I said, listen, Silicon Valley 193 00:09:48,480 --> 00:09:51,360 has the greatest amount of innovation and creativity of any 194 00:09:51,360 --> 00:09:54,920 geography in the world and the highest turnover and more people 195 00:09:54,920 --> 00:09:58,320 doing something they've never done before at scale. 196 00:09:58,680 --> 00:10:01,400 When we're building LinkedIn, not only was it a new 197 00:10:01,400 --> 00:10:04,920 opportunity for me to go to a private company that was 198 00:10:05,240 --> 00:10:08,920 relatively small, 400, and grow it into a monster, but we're 199 00:10:08,920 --> 00:10:11,960 building a new sector. We're building a new business 200 00:10:11,960 --> 00:10:15,640 that hadn't existed before. And many of the jobs were jobs 201 00:10:15,640 --> 00:10:18,040 that people people were doing that they'd never done before. 202 00:10:18,440 --> 00:10:22,200 And what I found in that, that that journey was that, man, when 203 00:10:22,200 --> 00:10:25,120 you put someone in the seat of a job they haven't done before, 204 00:10:25,520 --> 00:10:27,920 yeah, there's fear and there's uncertainty, but there's 205 00:10:27,920 --> 00:10:30,160 enormous energy unlocked when you're solving something you 206 00:10:30,160 --> 00:10:34,080 haven't done before. And the sad thing for the world 207 00:10:34,080 --> 00:10:37,680 to work in, HR in particular, is we've designed historically to 208 00:10:37,680 --> 00:10:40,520 prevent that from happening. I want to know that you know how 209 00:10:40,520 --> 00:10:42,280 to do this. So I'm not going to put you in 210 00:10:42,280 --> 00:10:45,120 something new because I want my trust and confidence in you to 211 00:10:45,120 --> 00:10:47,120 be high. And I want you to be a master of 212 00:10:47,120 --> 00:10:48,800 your craft. That's great. 213 00:10:48,800 --> 00:10:51,720 In a world that doesn't change fast, in a world that's changing 214 00:10:51,720 --> 00:10:54,960 quickly, we really need to think like, how do we get someone on 215 00:10:54,960 --> 00:10:56,480 boarded really fast? How do we get someone up and 216 00:10:56,480 --> 00:10:58,840 running quickly? Those jobs that take three years 217 00:10:58,840 --> 00:11:01,760 for someone to sort of settle in, Yeah, they're leaving before 218 00:11:01,760 --> 00:11:03,480 three years. So we don't have three years. 219 00:11:03,680 --> 00:11:04,440 You've got 3. Months. 220 00:11:04,960 --> 00:11:06,920 I was going to say, I don't even know if we have half that. 221 00:11:07,400 --> 00:11:09,280 That's right. Look at the tenure of software 222 00:11:09,280 --> 00:11:11,600 engineers in Silicon Valley. It's a year and a half, you 223 00:11:11,600 --> 00:11:12,880 know, a year and a half to two years. 224 00:11:13,600 --> 00:11:15,640 People go, oh, that's horrible. I go, no, it's not. 225 00:11:15,960 --> 00:11:19,280 That's an opportunity because we get to leverage new people and 226 00:11:19,280 --> 00:11:21,240 new ideas and new ways of solving problems. 227 00:11:21,520 --> 00:11:24,600 That's what we need to optimize for, not making someone a deep 228 00:11:24,680 --> 00:11:26,520 expert. Now, don't give me, I want my 229 00:11:26,520 --> 00:11:28,320 best people to stay as long as the next person. 230 00:11:28,680 --> 00:11:30,800 But if you think people are going to stay longer in your 231 00:11:30,800 --> 00:11:34,040 company in the future than they do today, you really need to 232 00:11:34,040 --> 00:11:36,040 pass me some of that dope that you're smoking because it is 233 00:11:36,480 --> 00:11:38,320 just not going to be realized, right? 234 00:11:38,400 --> 00:11:41,320 And and every leader I asked today is like, Hey, what's your 235 00:11:41,320 --> 00:11:42,640 biggest problem? Say hey, Steve, we're really 236 00:11:42,640 --> 00:11:45,240 struggling with people just aren't staying as long and our 237 00:11:45,240 --> 00:11:47,320 business wasn't built for that. And think about HR. 238 00:11:48,240 --> 00:11:53,880 Every reward that we deliver is indexed off of more. 239 00:11:53,960 --> 00:11:58,320 The longer you stay were four O 1K match, more vacation, more 240 00:11:58,320 --> 00:12:00,760 opportunities for promotion. It's all about tenure base. 241 00:12:00,760 --> 00:12:03,000 But every leader I talk to is like, do you think people are 242 00:12:03,000 --> 00:12:04,760 going to stay longer in the future and they're like, Nope, 243 00:12:05,120 --> 00:12:08,280 probably not. I said so at what point are you 244 00:12:08,280 --> 00:12:10,160 going to plan for that? At what point are you going to 245 00:12:10,160 --> 00:12:14,320 expect my demographics probably going to be your Max five years 246 00:12:14,680 --> 00:12:17,520 and on an average probably around 3:00 to 4:00. 247 00:12:17,680 --> 00:12:23,000 So how do I build a vibrant value creation organization with 248 00:12:23,000 --> 00:12:25,280 that dynamic? And the good news is we've got a 249 00:12:25,280 --> 00:12:28,360 ton of great examples. If you look at Microsoft, you 250 00:12:28,360 --> 00:12:31,640 look at Google, you look at Airbnb, you look at Apple, you 251 00:12:31,680 --> 00:12:35,920 look at Uber, you look at Facebook, Meta, you look at 252 00:12:35,920 --> 00:12:38,520 LinkedIn. These companies are median 253 00:12:38,520 --> 00:12:43,080 tenure 3 1/2 years, OK, They're crushing it in terms of 254 00:12:43,080 --> 00:12:46,080 innovation and new markets and so forth. 255 00:12:46,080 --> 00:12:50,680 So, you know, don't be fearful of that shorter time. 256 00:12:50,920 --> 00:12:52,920 Look for how you can optimize for that. 257 00:12:52,920 --> 00:12:56,400 And and that's, you know, one of the things that really that's 258 00:12:56,760 --> 00:12:58,600 back to your question about like, whoa, what were some of 259 00:12:58,600 --> 00:13:01,280 the big, you know, experiences that LinkedIn presented to me? 260 00:13:01,480 --> 00:13:04,520 That was like, whoa, I'd I'd have been a big company guy 261 00:13:04,520 --> 00:13:06,760 before I went to LinkedIn. It was like all you do when 262 00:13:06,760 --> 00:13:09,120 you're in big companies, not all, but generally is you're 263 00:13:09,120 --> 00:13:11,240 fixing what other people have done before you and you're 264 00:13:11,640 --> 00:13:13,440 modernizing it, You're tweaking it. 265 00:13:14,160 --> 00:13:17,160 When I walked in the door at LinkedIn the first week in the 266 00:13:17,160 --> 00:13:19,920 executive staffing, there was a fight over should we do 267 00:13:19,920 --> 00:13:22,800 performance reviews? I'm sitting around going, this 268 00:13:22,800 --> 00:13:25,400 company's five years old. You never figured this out. 269 00:13:25,400 --> 00:13:28,040 You never talked about it. Like, no, we all hate 270 00:13:28,040 --> 00:13:30,880 performance reviews. And I look at me like, go ahead, 271 00:13:30,880 --> 00:13:32,320 Steve, defend performance reviews ago. 272 00:13:32,360 --> 00:13:34,400 I hate them too. And they're like, what I say, 273 00:13:34,480 --> 00:13:36,480 yeah. I've never seen an executive 274 00:13:36,480 --> 00:13:39,560 tell me that the pivotal moment in their career journey was that 275 00:13:39,560 --> 00:13:42,400 performance review they got back in 1970. 276 00:13:42,880 --> 00:13:44,000 No. And so. 277 00:13:44,240 --> 00:13:48,880 So that was really refreshing and terrifying to me that I'm 278 00:13:48,880 --> 00:13:51,000 walking in and they laid no tracks. 279 00:13:51,200 --> 00:13:52,680 Are we going to do performance reviews? 280 00:13:52,960 --> 00:13:54,440 If we do, how often should we do them? 281 00:13:54,640 --> 00:13:55,880 If we do, should we have a scale? 282 00:13:55,880 --> 00:13:57,720 Should we have a ranking? Should we go one to three, one 283 00:13:57,720 --> 00:14:00,920 to five, zero to seven? Should we go 4 decimal places? 284 00:14:01,040 --> 00:14:03,120 Should if we do a rating, should we tell the employee? 285 00:14:03,120 --> 00:14:05,880 Should we not? Should we also do it with stack 286 00:14:05,880 --> 00:14:08,680 ranking people on performance and potential, you know, and 287 00:14:08,680 --> 00:14:10,920 then you're just like, and should we tie it to compensation 288 00:14:10,920 --> 00:14:13,440 or not tied to compensation? Should it be developmental or 289 00:14:13,440 --> 00:14:15,120 should it be driven off a rewards? 290 00:14:15,760 --> 00:14:19,880 And I was like, if you've never the great learning for me, I 291 00:14:19,880 --> 00:14:23,480 mean, many learnings for me. And it was why it was exciting 292 00:14:23,480 --> 00:14:27,680 and also terrifying was I'd never taken my function HR down 293 00:14:27,680 --> 00:14:30,040 to the studs. Why do you do performance 294 00:14:30,040 --> 00:14:31,560 reviews? What is the point? 295 00:14:32,160 --> 00:14:35,360 And, and the best we could come up with is there is a belief 296 00:14:35,360 --> 00:14:39,360 that measuring performance achieves, you know, the 297 00:14:39,360 --> 00:14:41,880 continuity of feedback manager employee, because, you know, a 298 00:14:41,880 --> 00:14:44,920 lot of managers left to their own devices would never give the 299 00:14:44,920 --> 00:14:47,320 difficult, bad, you know, constructive feedback to the 300 00:14:47,320 --> 00:14:50,400 employee who's struggling. So we want to ensure that those 301 00:14:50,400 --> 00:14:51,800 tough conversations are happening. 302 00:14:52,000 --> 00:14:54,960 But also there's a belief that high performing organizations 303 00:14:55,160 --> 00:14:57,440 give a lot of feedback, right about performance. 304 00:14:57,680 --> 00:15:00,960 So, you know, and we had a board of directors that's like, Hey, 305 00:15:01,120 --> 00:15:02,520 tell us about your performance view process. 306 00:15:02,520 --> 00:15:05,200 And we're like, oh, OK, I guess we better figure this one out. 307 00:15:05,200 --> 00:15:08,280 So you know, there's that there was how many layers should we 308 00:15:08,280 --> 00:15:11,280 have in the org structure? Should we have 30 layers from 309 00:15:11,280 --> 00:15:13,480 the CEO to the front line or should we have 5? 310 00:15:14,760 --> 00:15:17,200 You know, should the sales organization be like, hey, we've 311 00:15:17,200 --> 00:15:20,920 got a European sales and Asian sales, AUS sales, and then we've 312 00:15:20,920 --> 00:15:23,440 got an enterprise sales, we've got small medium business sales. 313 00:15:23,600 --> 00:15:25,120 Or should we have one sales organization? 314 00:15:25,480 --> 00:15:29,560 And then the big one was should we have a business unit org 315 00:15:29,560 --> 00:15:32,960 structure or should we have a functional unit structure, which 316 00:15:33,000 --> 00:15:35,720 means, you know, let's, let's take LinkedIn as an example. 317 00:15:36,000 --> 00:15:38,320 We had three major business lines when I was there there. 318 00:15:38,320 --> 00:15:40,520 Now there's like 5 or 6 because they bought a learning company 319 00:15:40,520 --> 00:15:42,160 and some other ones. But right, right. 320 00:15:42,160 --> 00:15:47,960 It was like we had the sales, you know, selling to sales 321 00:15:47,960 --> 00:15:50,640 leaders to how to use LinkedIn. There's the recruiting product, 322 00:15:50,720 --> 00:15:52,080 right? And then there's a marketing 323 00:15:52,080 --> 00:15:54,040 product. And so we could have the 324 00:15:54,040 --> 00:15:57,560 marketing engineering team, the sales engineering team, the 325 00:15:57,720 --> 00:16:00,280 recruiting engineering team, or we could have one engineering 326 00:16:00,280 --> 00:16:03,560 team. And so those are really big 327 00:16:03,560 --> 00:16:07,360 decisions and big conversations. And when you're building a new 328 00:16:07,360 --> 00:16:11,200 company, what's really interesting is everyone's coming 329 00:16:11,200 --> 00:16:13,320 from their experience where they worked before. 330 00:16:13,840 --> 00:16:19,240 So I had my Cisco refugee, my AMD refugee experiences. 331 00:16:19,240 --> 00:16:22,000 I had my a bunch of executives that were Google refugees. 332 00:16:22,000 --> 00:16:24,880 I had my Yahoo refugees. And everyone had a mixed 333 00:16:24,880 --> 00:16:26,880 experience. And what's interesting about 334 00:16:26,880 --> 00:16:30,760 leaders in HR is if you ask, you know, if you're ever 335 00:16:30,760 --> 00:16:33,040 interviewing at a new company, what I always like to know is 336 00:16:33,160 --> 00:16:35,360 where did they all, where did all the executives work before 337 00:16:35,360 --> 00:16:37,200 and what was their experience with HR there? 338 00:16:37,680 --> 00:16:41,240 And usually when you go in and you say, hey, what does great HR 339 00:16:41,240 --> 00:16:43,560 look like to you? Like I want, if you want me to 340 00:16:43,560 --> 00:16:47,360 be your next HR member, leader, whatever, what does great HR 341 00:16:47,360 --> 00:16:50,560 look like to you? They'll usually say this, well, 342 00:16:50,560 --> 00:16:52,720 not that. Well, not that. 343 00:16:53,600 --> 00:16:54,120 Yeah. All right. 344 00:16:54,320 --> 00:16:56,960 OK, So what does it look like to you? 345 00:16:56,960 --> 00:17:01,440 Well, not that, you know, and and that's, that's miss, you 346 00:17:01,440 --> 00:17:03,480 know, that's, that's unfortunately a big miss. 347 00:17:03,480 --> 00:17:06,920 And it's it's unfortunate that most people haven't seen high 348 00:17:06,920 --> 00:17:09,640 performing in my career. I haven't run into a ton of 349 00:17:09,640 --> 00:17:11,400 people have seen HR just crushing it. 350 00:17:11,800 --> 00:17:14,359 No, unfortunately. Driving great outcomes. 351 00:17:14,640 --> 00:17:17,240 And that's an opportunity for all of us to show folks what it 352 00:17:17,240 --> 00:17:19,640 looks like, right? And we also face this reality 353 00:17:19,640 --> 00:17:21,319 that a lot of leaders are really defensive. 354 00:17:21,839 --> 00:17:25,480 When I interviewed with the Ceoi was his first hire at LinkedIn. 355 00:17:25,480 --> 00:17:28,119 He was very suspicious of me, right? 356 00:17:28,119 --> 00:17:31,160 Like, oh, you're the guy. It's going to, you know, have 357 00:17:31,160 --> 00:17:34,320 all the secrets and, you know, and have some sort of back 358 00:17:34,320 --> 00:17:36,240 office black market for information. 359 00:17:36,240 --> 00:17:38,360 I'm just like, no, that's not how I work man. 360 00:17:40,040 --> 00:17:41,840 He's been triggered. You a little bit I could see. 361 00:17:43,280 --> 00:17:46,920 I it's so true because no, you're so right. 362 00:17:46,920 --> 00:17:51,400 I'm like, I had a flashback my own, my own like experiences 363 00:17:51,400 --> 00:17:54,600 where people are like side eyeing you when you come in 364 00:17:54,600 --> 00:17:56,880 because they think you're going to, you have like these inner 365 00:17:56,880 --> 00:17:59,040 dealings or you're going to like work against them. 366 00:17:59,040 --> 00:18:02,120 And but it's, it's, it's not us. You know, that's the thing. 367 00:18:02,120 --> 00:18:03,920 That's why I was laughing when you were saying that because 368 00:18:03,960 --> 00:18:07,480 it's like, you know, eventually over time they're like, Oh yeah, 369 00:18:07,520 --> 00:18:09,880 yeah, yeah, this is good. Oh, this is a good relationship. 370 00:18:09,880 --> 00:18:12,800 Oh, I'm learning something. I I'm becoming a better, like a 371 00:18:12,800 --> 00:18:15,840 stronger leader because I have an HR partner I can rely on. 372 00:18:16,120 --> 00:18:19,280 This is so yes, that's funny. I had, I did have, I actually 373 00:18:19,280 --> 00:18:20,760 had a few flashbacks at 1 moment. 374 00:18:20,800 --> 00:18:22,240 I was like, who am I going to think of first? 375 00:18:23,280 --> 00:18:25,000 So thank, thank you for that good laugh. 376 00:18:25,000 --> 00:18:28,440 But actually, I, I think all of what you said is so important 377 00:18:28,440 --> 00:18:32,960 and actually you kind of touched on the mission of this podcast 378 00:18:32,960 --> 00:18:36,880 and what you just said that, you know, so many people have not 379 00:18:36,880 --> 00:18:41,440 seen an HR partner or had an HR partner who's like absolutely 380 00:18:41,440 --> 00:18:44,720 killing it. And I mean, in some respects 381 00:18:44,720 --> 00:18:48,800 that's OK because depending on the industry or where they've 382 00:18:48,800 --> 00:18:53,200 worked and, you know, even just their own relationship with HR 383 00:18:53,200 --> 00:18:56,640 in general, as from an employee to then a leader, those things 384 00:18:56,640 --> 00:19:03,400 can alter their own experiences. But fundamentally, when I, when 385 00:19:03,400 --> 00:19:05,880 I think about every single episode that I put out on this 386 00:19:05,880 --> 00:19:10,520 podcast, I want it to go toward HR leaders absolutely crushing 387 00:19:10,520 --> 00:19:12,120 it. You know, like people should be 388 00:19:12,120 --> 00:19:15,720 walking away from these episodes thinking, oh, this is how I can 389 00:19:15,720 --> 00:19:18,720 be better at my craft or if I don't. 390 00:19:19,320 --> 00:19:21,920 And it's not to say that everyone has to agree, but I 391 00:19:21,920 --> 00:19:24,720 think at some point there also has to be this internal 392 00:19:24,720 --> 00:19:27,640 reckoning that if like you are not the kind of person who 393 00:19:27,960 --> 00:19:31,560 really wants to live in this Gray between like the business 394 00:19:31,560 --> 00:19:35,320 needs and the employee needs and, and be able to balance 395 00:19:35,320 --> 00:19:38,840 those things out without feeling so conflicted that maybe it's 396 00:19:38,840 --> 00:19:40,320 just not the right career for them. 397 00:19:40,320 --> 00:19:44,360 Because it is a very difficult balance to strike that, you 398 00:19:44,360 --> 00:19:47,800 know, you have all of these business goals that you have to 399 00:19:47,800 --> 00:19:51,840 like drive people to achieve because most of the time, a lot 400 00:19:51,840 --> 00:19:54,200 of the time we're individual contributors or we're in 401 00:19:54,200 --> 00:19:57,280 operator positions and there's a lot of influence. 402 00:19:57,600 --> 00:20:00,160 And then there's this other element where you know you are 403 00:20:00,160 --> 00:20:03,160 people facing depending on your role is all of my roles have 404 00:20:03,160 --> 00:20:05,160 been primarily like business partner roles. 405 00:20:05,640 --> 00:20:10,400 And you have to be able to help those people understand their 406 00:20:10,400 --> 00:20:14,400 impact on people and you yourself have to have an impact 407 00:20:14,400 --> 00:20:17,360 on them and influence them. And it's, it can be, you know, 408 00:20:17,360 --> 00:20:21,480 unless you have like a really strong level of trust between 409 00:20:21,480 --> 00:20:24,320 all of your partners, which is a very critical part of being 410 00:20:24,320 --> 00:20:27,000 successful. I think in HR you're, you're 411 00:20:27,000 --> 00:20:29,880 going to, people are going to find that to be very 412 00:20:29,880 --> 00:20:31,680 conflicting. And I think it's going to be 413 00:20:31,680 --> 00:20:35,280 very difficult for them to find, you know, happiness in this 414 00:20:35,280 --> 00:20:37,400 career or fulfillment. Maybe it's not happiness, but 415 00:20:37,400 --> 00:20:39,320 really fulfillment in this career. 416 00:20:39,440 --> 00:20:42,360 And when I think about what you said, especially around, like, 417 00:20:42,360 --> 00:20:47,560 tenure and the future of work and how we all interact with, 418 00:20:47,720 --> 00:20:53,720 you know, A, being OK with this, the status quo, and, B, 419 00:20:53,920 --> 00:20:56,720 challenging the status quo and saying, OK, well, you know, 420 00:20:56,720 --> 00:20:59,120 maybe we don't expect more than three years of tenure, and 421 00:20:59,120 --> 00:21:00,440 that's OK. What are we going to do to make 422 00:21:00,440 --> 00:21:03,640 those three years the best that someone has ever had at this 423 00:21:03,640 --> 00:21:07,840 company then, You know, I think that's where when I think about 424 00:21:07,840 --> 00:21:11,480 the future of work, there has to be this agility really from 425 00:21:11,480 --> 00:21:15,160 everyone, not just HR leaders, but every leader in a business 426 00:21:15,480 --> 00:21:18,840 to challenge their own deeply held beliefs. 427 00:21:19,200 --> 00:21:23,520 And of course, a lot of a lot of thought leaders are talking 428 00:21:23,520 --> 00:21:26,840 about like the gig economy and how that has dramatically 429 00:21:26,840 --> 00:21:31,080 changed the way that people work and AI and all of these things, 430 00:21:31,080 --> 00:21:33,080 which is true. But sometimes I think that 431 00:21:33,800 --> 00:21:35,960 people are missing, you know, they're kind of just like 432 00:21:36,200 --> 00:21:38,680 surface floating. They're not really like getting 433 00:21:39,160 --> 00:21:42,640 deeper into what that actually means that people are looking 434 00:21:42,640 --> 00:21:44,600 for this like optimal flexibility. 435 00:21:44,600 --> 00:21:49,400 If they're in the gig economy, they want to essentially create 436 00:21:49,400 --> 00:21:52,960 their own income through all of these different streams without 437 00:21:52,960 --> 00:21:56,840 being reliant or beholden to a company. 438 00:21:57,040 --> 00:22:00,280 And then you have, you know, people like these engineers that 439 00:22:00,280 --> 00:22:03,200 you mentioned, software engineers in Silicon Valley, 440 00:22:03,680 --> 00:22:06,560 they're jumping around because it's beneficial for them to do 441 00:22:06,560 --> 00:22:09,000 that and it's beneficial for companies to have new talent. 442 00:22:09,240 --> 00:22:13,320 And so how do you, to your point, how do we reconcile the 443 00:22:13,320 --> 00:22:16,880 business needs for the continuity while also saying, 444 00:22:16,880 --> 00:22:19,280 OK, well, this is this is the status quo. 445 00:22:19,440 --> 00:22:22,560 Let's let's embrace it and figure out how we're going to 446 00:22:22,560 --> 00:22:25,960 continue to innovate even without that continuity. 447 00:22:26,440 --> 00:22:29,000 Yeah. And you know, we we really have 448 00:22:29,000 --> 00:22:31,800 an opportunity here to reshape the language of works. 449 00:22:31,800 --> 00:22:35,000 Couple of words that trigger me are things like engagement. 450 00:22:35,600 --> 00:22:37,920 Like there's more things affecting the engagement of your 451 00:22:37,920 --> 00:22:41,680 people out of your control as an organization than ever before. 452 00:22:42,040 --> 00:22:44,640 So why are you worried about engagement? 453 00:22:44,920 --> 00:22:47,640 I think I want to double click on something you said earlier, 454 00:22:47,640 --> 00:22:52,760 which is building trust. If I look at my career or I look 455 00:22:52,760 --> 00:22:56,560 at the Seminole moment I opportunity had at LinkedIn, why 456 00:22:56,560 --> 00:23:01,000 were we able to grow, you know, double in size every year I was 457 00:23:01,000 --> 00:23:03,880 at LinkedIn and double revenue every year when half the 458 00:23:03,880 --> 00:23:05,680 organization didn't even know where the restroom was because 459 00:23:05,680 --> 00:23:08,240 they just showed up yesterday. Like how can I don't think 460 00:23:08,240 --> 00:23:10,400 people appreciate how hard that is when you're doubling the 461 00:23:10,400 --> 00:23:13,360 size, you're quadrupling the number of countries where we 462 00:23:13,360 --> 00:23:15,400 have new people. So there's distance tax, there's 463 00:23:15,400 --> 00:23:17,800 language taxes, culture taxes, all kinds of new challenges. 464 00:23:17,800 --> 00:23:20,680 So your complexity bar, when you add people, that's challenge. 465 00:23:20,680 --> 00:23:23,880 When you add people in new countries, that's like 3X as 466 00:23:23,880 --> 00:23:26,680 hard as just adding a new person in the same location. 467 00:23:26,880 --> 00:23:28,800 Cuz now you got remote leadership and time distances 468 00:23:28,800 --> 00:23:31,720 and all these other things. And I think the way you weather 469 00:23:32,000 --> 00:23:35,040 inevitable confusion, complexity, disappointment, 470 00:23:35,040 --> 00:23:37,680 misunderstandings is a baseline of trust. 471 00:23:38,360 --> 00:23:42,560 And as an organization, one of the things we did really well at 472 00:23:42,560 --> 00:23:47,040 LinkedIn was we had a lot of town hall meetings we had. 473 00:23:47,280 --> 00:23:48,880 Let's talk about the elephant in the room. 474 00:23:49,000 --> 00:23:51,560 All those people working in Silicon Valley who have to 475 00:23:51,600 --> 00:23:54,280 commute from San Francisco are pissed off that we don't have a 476 00:23:54,280 --> 00:23:56,880 free shuttle for them because all the Googles and all the 477 00:23:56,880 --> 00:23:59,720 other companies have 1:00 and had to remind them, well, 478 00:23:59,720 --> 00:24:01,960 they're those companies are making more every day than we 479 00:24:01,960 --> 00:24:04,000 make in a whole year. So you know, when we make that 480 00:24:04,000 --> 00:24:06,920 revenue, I'll get you the bus. Right now, we just can't afford 481 00:24:06,920 --> 00:24:09,240 it. And by the way, you loud San 482 00:24:09,240 --> 00:24:12,280 Francisco people who are having to commute an hour each way 483 00:24:12,280 --> 00:24:15,840 twice a day, there's more people in other further locations than 484 00:24:15,840 --> 00:24:17,760 you. You want them to have a bus too. 485 00:24:17,760 --> 00:24:21,760 Like, you see how this is not as simple, we need a bus because 486 00:24:21,760 --> 00:24:24,600 someone else has a bus. And those layers and layers of, 487 00:24:24,760 --> 00:24:28,040 of, of challenges when you're growing are really hard. 488 00:24:28,080 --> 00:24:31,560 If you have a foundation of trust that's going to give you 489 00:24:31,560 --> 00:24:35,280 the benefit of the doubt when the sniper shot comes in or 490 00:24:35,280 --> 00:24:39,560 something slips up and someone makes a mistake or whatever, you 491 00:24:39,560 --> 00:24:42,400 have to have that. And for me personally, I think 492 00:24:42,400 --> 00:24:45,680 one of the reasons I've been able to do as well as I've done 493 00:24:45,680 --> 00:24:48,720 is I have, I don't know, it's because my dad was a minister or 494 00:24:48,720 --> 00:24:52,920 what. I have an ability to build trust 495 00:24:52,920 --> 00:24:55,680 really quickly. And you're one of the things 496 00:24:55,680 --> 00:25:00,840 I've always said in in HR is the fastest way to build trust is 497 00:25:00,840 --> 00:25:04,880 for something really scary ugly to happen and you get involved 498 00:25:05,040 --> 00:25:06,240 and people see what you're made of. 499 00:25:06,520 --> 00:25:09,400 Like, are you going to go, someone comes and just throws up 500 00:25:09,400 --> 00:25:11,600 all over you about how they hate the CEO and this company's 501 00:25:11,600 --> 00:25:14,120 screwed and they're like, OK, I'm going to see how you handle 502 00:25:14,120 --> 00:25:15,200 that. Now are you going to go run to 503 00:25:15,200 --> 00:25:17,440 the CEO so that I'm going to get fired? 504 00:25:17,600 --> 00:25:19,240 Or are you going to help me sort through this? 505 00:25:19,240 --> 00:25:23,080 Or how are you handling this really thorny, you know, turd I 506 00:25:23,080 --> 00:25:25,120 just put in your lap, you know, like, how are you going to deal 507 00:25:25,120 --> 00:25:27,480 with that? And I love those. 508 00:25:27,520 --> 00:25:29,880 You know, that's why I love acquisition work because there's 509 00:25:29,880 --> 00:25:32,840 stuff going wrong every day and people are going to see what 510 00:25:32,840 --> 00:25:35,080 you're made of. Are you going to do the ethical 511 00:25:35,080 --> 00:25:36,840 right thing? Or you going to, you know, 512 00:25:37,320 --> 00:25:40,600 whisper something to someone you probably that you swore that you 513 00:25:40,600 --> 00:25:42,440 would keep in confidence and you're going to betray the cop. 514 00:25:42,440 --> 00:25:43,520 Like, what are you going to do? Totally. 515 00:25:44,040 --> 00:25:46,800 And teachers really about two things that are very simple 516 00:25:46,800 --> 00:25:48,200 level. Having thought about this for 517 00:25:48,200 --> 00:25:50,520 years and years. It's about credibility and 518 00:25:50,520 --> 00:25:53,240 judgement. If you are not credible, no one 519 00:25:53,240 --> 00:25:55,440 cares about your judgement. And if you have poor judgement, 520 00:25:55,440 --> 00:25:58,720 you will not be credible. And every day you're, you're 521 00:25:58,720 --> 00:26:01,720 being given some precious materials that someone's live 522 00:26:01,920 --> 00:26:04,760 delivering to you. And how you handle that is going 523 00:26:04,760 --> 00:26:07,120 to build your credibility. It's going to build your, you 524 00:26:07,120 --> 00:26:08,840 know, capacity to show your judgement. 525 00:26:09,560 --> 00:26:13,600 And that is gold. And if you have that, you can 526 00:26:13,600 --> 00:26:17,000 get a lot done, you know, and more stuff will be shared with 527 00:26:17,000 --> 00:26:19,360 you. And that's, it's really hard 528 00:26:19,360 --> 00:26:21,280 when you're early in career and you're like, how am I going to, 529 00:26:21,640 --> 00:26:24,360 this is really scary stuff like how should I handle this? 530 00:26:24,360 --> 00:26:27,640 I can't say nothing, you know? And one of the things that I 531 00:26:27,640 --> 00:26:32,000 learned that's really helped me over the careers, sometimes some 532 00:26:32,080 --> 00:26:35,280 HR people will do everything to keep the leader from screwing 533 00:26:35,280 --> 00:26:37,520 up. And sometimes the best learning 534 00:26:37,520 --> 00:26:39,080 they have is they have to screw up. 535 00:26:39,080 --> 00:26:41,600 Like, hey, I'm thinking of promoting Jim. 536 00:26:41,600 --> 00:26:43,040 And you're like, really? Why? 537 00:26:43,400 --> 00:26:45,680 Because Susan and Sarah are way more qualified. 538 00:26:45,680 --> 00:26:48,360 And if you promote Jim, all the people on the team are gonna 539 00:26:48,360 --> 00:26:50,560 know that you've got a bias towards guys. 540 00:26:50,560 --> 00:26:53,280 I don't think it's gonna go. Yeah, but I'm gonna promote Jim. 541 00:26:54,360 --> 00:26:56,120 OK. I could have said no, I'm not 542 00:26:56,120 --> 00:26:58,600 gonna let you do it. Or I'm gonna say, OK, let's see 543 00:26:58,600 --> 00:27:00,080 how it goes. Promote Jim. 544 00:27:00,560 --> 00:27:02,440 There's insurrection. People are quitting. 545 00:27:03,120 --> 00:27:05,760 So how'd it go? How'd that promotion of Jim go? 546 00:27:05,760 --> 00:27:07,520 Yeah, not so good. And who told you it wasn't gonna 547 00:27:07,520 --> 00:27:08,760 go so good? Yeah, I did. 548 00:27:09,440 --> 00:27:14,520 So, so and so, yeah, having to sort of let them fall, let them 549 00:27:14,520 --> 00:27:17,400 slip, you know, obviously not something so egregious, right? 550 00:27:17,440 --> 00:27:19,320 Something really scary if you want to step in. 551 00:27:19,800 --> 00:27:21,840 But those kinds of things, like they have to learn. 552 00:27:21,880 --> 00:27:23,920 It's just like kids don't go into the ladder. 553 00:27:23,960 --> 00:27:26,000 Don't go into the oh, boom, hurt yourself, Boo, Boo. 554 00:27:26,000 --> 00:27:27,440 Right, Right. So. 555 00:27:28,160 --> 00:27:31,800 Yeah, it's so true. I had, I had another momentary 556 00:27:31,800 --> 00:27:34,040 flashback there because it's so true. 557 00:27:34,520 --> 00:27:38,720 You know, all we can really do is help to guide a lot of 558 00:27:38,720 --> 00:27:42,120 decisions. And I think that in 559 00:27:42,520 --> 00:27:46,160 organizations that have maybe a more positive outlook of HR 560 00:27:46,160 --> 00:27:52,560 partners or HR as a, as a field of practice, they're more open 561 00:27:52,560 --> 00:27:56,280 to the judgement calls that we have or the decisions that we, 562 00:27:56,520 --> 00:28:00,040 you know, help to make and certainly some decisions we 563 00:28:00,040 --> 00:28:01,480 don't make. Like, to your point, that 564 00:28:01,480 --> 00:28:05,200 example of Jim, Sarah and Susan, that's not our decision. 565 00:28:05,200 --> 00:28:10,000 But we, you know, we have this ability to, you know, share our 566 00:28:10,040 --> 00:28:12,480 opinion, share our thoughts and concerns. 567 00:28:12,800 --> 00:28:18,080 And then that leader then has the has kind of the the bull by 568 00:28:18,080 --> 00:28:21,040 the horns and they decide what their their ultimate decision 569 00:28:21,040 --> 00:28:23,880 is. And I've seen both sides where 570 00:28:23,880 --> 00:28:28,560 organizations are like, yeah, if HR says that, you know, this is 571 00:28:28,560 --> 00:28:30,200 a great idea, then let's go for it. 572 00:28:30,200 --> 00:28:33,320 If HR says it's a bad idea, let's listen to it seriously. 573 00:28:33,560 --> 00:28:35,360 And then I've been in organizations where they're 574 00:28:35,360 --> 00:28:38,320 like, you're, you're, you know, why are you here anyway? 575 00:28:38,400 --> 00:28:40,600 You know, I'm going to make the decision that I want to make. 576 00:28:40,920 --> 00:28:45,200 And you can give them, to your point, all of these incredible 577 00:28:45,200 --> 00:28:47,600 warnings that this is what's going to happen. 578 00:28:47,600 --> 00:28:49,600 This is the fallout that you should expect. 579 00:28:50,080 --> 00:28:52,040 And then they have to learn it for themselves. 580 00:28:52,040 --> 00:28:54,760 And whether right or wrong and how, no matter how frustrating 581 00:28:54,760 --> 00:28:58,360 that might be, there is value in that learning just as much as 582 00:28:58,360 --> 00:29:03,440 there is value in being so trusted as a field of practice 583 00:29:03,440 --> 00:29:08,560 and as a practitioner that, you know, your opinion is so deeply 584 00:29:08,560 --> 00:29:12,000 valued. And again, when I think about 585 00:29:12,120 --> 00:29:14,760 all the organizations that I've worked for that have kind of 586 00:29:14,760 --> 00:29:17,440 fallen mostly in one of those categories, maybe I can think of 587 00:29:17,440 --> 00:29:20,320 1 where it was kind of a mix of, of both. 588 00:29:20,960 --> 00:29:23,600 I think that there are pros and cons to both of those things 589 00:29:23,720 --> 00:29:25,600 because or both of those environments. 590 00:29:25,600 --> 00:29:29,520 Because when you're in a place where, you know, leaders have 591 00:29:29,520 --> 00:29:32,600 like such a positive outlook on HR, like which is amazing, 592 00:29:33,120 --> 00:29:36,360 sometimes there isn't as much of a challenge because you're not 593 00:29:36,640 --> 00:29:39,920 necessarily be being challenged on the things that you believe 594 00:29:40,160 --> 00:29:44,040 or that you want to influence. And it's, you know, it's hard to 595 00:29:44,040 --> 00:29:45,920 make these sweeping generalizations because 596 00:29:45,920 --> 00:29:48,880 obviously everyone and every organization is so different. 597 00:29:49,360 --> 00:29:52,480 But I do think that again, when I think about this, you know, 598 00:29:52,480 --> 00:29:58,440 idea of the future of work, it does put a lot of onus on us as 599 00:29:58,560 --> 00:30:02,800 practitioners in this field to I love what you said about 600 00:30:02,800 --> 00:30:06,080 credibility and judgement. So true to build up our 601 00:30:06,080 --> 00:30:08,320 credibility and practice better judgement. 602 00:30:08,520 --> 00:30:11,560 And I think that even when I think about some of the HR 603 00:30:11,560 --> 00:30:14,000 leaders who I learned from, because they were so terrible, 604 00:30:14,440 --> 00:30:18,760 they had really bad judgement. And so I felt that they were so 605 00:30:18,760 --> 00:30:21,520 terrible because they, they lacked credibility for me. 606 00:30:21,880 --> 00:30:24,480 And, and this is it. It's, I'm going to take that 607 00:30:24,480 --> 00:30:26,680 with me probably forever, the credibility and judgement. 608 00:30:26,680 --> 00:30:29,040 So thank you for that. I love that. 609 00:30:29,520 --> 00:30:32,720 And, you know, one of the things that adds to the complexity of 610 00:30:32,720 --> 00:30:36,400 our role is one day we're here coaching an executive on how to 611 00:30:36,400 --> 00:30:39,120 be better or coaching A-Team, and the next day we're having to 612 00:30:39,120 --> 00:30:43,440 investigate a complaint. And then that really is hard to 613 00:30:43,440 --> 00:30:47,560 build, you know, credibility and trust when you have to be the 614 00:30:47,560 --> 00:30:53,440 guardian of some regulations while you're also the guardian 615 00:30:53,440 --> 00:30:56,240 of everyone's development. You know, and that's, that's a 616 00:30:56,240 --> 00:30:59,760 really hard line to play. You know, and as you said 617 00:30:59,760 --> 00:31:03,680 earlier, we don't have organizational authority. 618 00:31:03,760 --> 00:31:07,920 We have influence, right? And you know, some of the worst 619 00:31:07,920 --> 00:31:11,560 HR leaders I worked for took an approach of, I'm going to build 620 00:31:11,560 --> 00:31:14,520 so much power that no one can mess with me, OK, because I 621 00:31:14,520 --> 00:31:17,600 control the budget for promotions and hiring and 622 00:31:17,600 --> 00:31:20,760 rewards. And I'm like, no, I took 623 00:31:20,760 --> 00:31:24,560 completely the opposite approach, which is I want you to 624 00:31:24,560 --> 00:31:26,800 not need me. I don't want to build 625 00:31:26,800 --> 00:31:29,800 dependencies on me because if you and I use this in my 626 00:31:29,800 --> 00:31:33,600 interviews with, you know, mid and early stage am HR talent, 627 00:31:34,640 --> 00:31:37,080 let's do a hypothetical. An employee brings you a 628 00:31:37,640 --> 00:31:39,240 complaint. Hey, my manager's mistreating 629 00:31:39,240 --> 00:31:40,520 me. I need you to fix it. 630 00:31:40,800 --> 00:31:42,720 What are you going to do? And just generally, right, 631 00:31:42,720 --> 00:31:44,280 they're going to, oh, I'm going to go talk to the manager. 632 00:31:44,600 --> 00:31:48,280 OK, So what did the employee learn there that they did not 633 00:31:48,280 --> 00:31:49,560 learn how to solve their problem? 634 00:31:49,920 --> 00:31:51,520 They learned that you're going to take it on. 635 00:31:51,520 --> 00:31:53,840 So now the organization needs you. 636 00:31:54,440 --> 00:31:56,840 If you help the employee solve the problem, then you've got 637 00:31:56,840 --> 00:32:00,040 less fires coming your way. You're just you're just creating 638 00:32:00,040 --> 00:32:02,440 more work for yourself and you're creating a dysfunctional 639 00:32:02,440 --> 00:32:04,440 relationship. That employee needs to solve the 640 00:32:04,440 --> 00:32:06,320 relationship with the manager. You can help coach them on how 641 00:32:06,320 --> 00:32:08,840 to talk about something really uncomfortable their manager, but 642 00:32:08,840 --> 00:32:11,600 you go into the manager not the right, not the right way. 643 00:32:11,600 --> 00:32:14,960 I want to be thinking about it. And the truth is there's so much 644 00:32:14,960 --> 00:32:17,440 crazy in the world of work that we will never be out of a job. 645 00:32:17,440 --> 00:32:20,920 So don't take me literally that I want to work myself out of a 646 00:32:20,920 --> 00:32:22,680 job. But the best work I ever did, 647 00:32:22,680 --> 00:32:26,000 Tracy, was not because I was the sharpest HR person or had the 648 00:32:26,000 --> 00:32:30,280 greatest HR team was because my leaders Co owned the talent 649 00:32:30,280 --> 00:32:32,760 agenda with me. And this was the biggest fight I 650 00:32:32,760 --> 00:32:35,200 ever had with the CEO at LinkedIn in the early days. 651 00:32:35,760 --> 00:32:38,280 He's like, tell me what the comp strategy is. 652 00:32:38,320 --> 00:32:41,320 I go, you want me to tell you CEO of the company with the com 653 00:32:41,320 --> 00:32:42,760 strategy? I can give you a recommendation, 654 00:32:42,760 --> 00:32:45,440 but this is your company and you got to feel how we're mixing 655 00:32:45,680 --> 00:32:50,560 incentives and stock and cash and signing bonuses serves a 656 00:32:50,560 --> 00:32:52,160 purpose. And here's why I think this 657 00:32:52,160 --> 00:32:54,080 makes sense. He goes, well, the finance 658 00:32:54,680 --> 00:32:56,920 director, you know, he wrote the finance plan like he wrote the 659 00:32:56,920 --> 00:32:59,480 business plan and the legal team, they wrote the legal plan 660 00:32:59,480 --> 00:33:01,520 like you need to write the comp strategy. 661 00:33:01,760 --> 00:33:03,600 I'm like, no, that's not how this works, man. 662 00:33:03,920 --> 00:33:06,800 It's different. We Co own this thing, you know, 663 00:33:06,800 --> 00:33:10,080 and yeah, I, I, I don't want to add more to your plate and I'll, 664 00:33:10,160 --> 00:33:13,600 I'll serve you pros and cons of different strategies, but it's 665 00:33:13,600 --> 00:33:16,160 not me owning, it's not good. Just like me owning the culture, 666 00:33:16,400 --> 00:33:19,760 me owning diversity. That's wrong because now someone 667 00:33:19,760 --> 00:33:23,000 thinks someone over there owns all that versus all the leaders 668 00:33:23,000 --> 00:33:25,000 need to share the ownership. The worst thing I think we've 669 00:33:25,000 --> 00:33:28,600 done in HR traditionally was say, oh, there's the head of 670 00:33:28,600 --> 00:33:29,600 diversity. What? 671 00:33:30,280 --> 00:33:31,720 No. Your wall are the heads of 672 00:33:31,720 --> 00:33:33,520 diversity. That person can help you learn 673 00:33:33,520 --> 00:33:36,640 how to lead diversity in your teams, but they don't own it. 674 00:33:36,800 --> 00:33:39,520 You own it. You understand in this and, and 675 00:33:39,520 --> 00:33:43,120 so it's a big shift and, and I'm sure listeners, you know, the 676 00:33:43,120 --> 00:33:45,520 leaders I'm talking about who want to own everything. 677 00:33:45,720 --> 00:33:48,240 I want to have the power and the leaders who like, no, no, no, 678 00:33:48,280 --> 00:33:49,960 we're all about you becoming better. 679 00:33:50,160 --> 00:33:53,200 And I really think there that that sort of we can serve 680 00:33:53,200 --> 00:33:55,680 ourselves better by looking at our work. 681 00:33:55,680 --> 00:33:58,480 Like how can I work myself out of a job by making other people 682 00:33:58,480 --> 00:34:00,640 greater, right? And that's going to make you 683 00:34:00,640 --> 00:34:03,720 more valuable and wanted more, you know, I really believe. 684 00:34:03,720 --> 00:34:06,360 Totally. I agree 100%. 685 00:34:06,680 --> 00:34:10,080 This idea of mutual ownership is something that I that surfaces a 686 00:34:10,080 --> 00:34:14,320 lot on my show because I feel very passionately about this. 687 00:34:14,320 --> 00:34:18,280 Like we cannot physically operate or operate well at that 688 00:34:18,960 --> 00:34:21,719 to, if we're the only ones owning things. 689 00:34:22,120 --> 00:34:25,080 I mean, even when it comes from to it comes to culture and, and 690 00:34:25,080 --> 00:34:28,639 to your point on engagement, it's, it's very easy. 691 00:34:28,679 --> 00:34:31,159 And I can tell you because my title is senior director of I'm 692 00:34:31,159 --> 00:34:32,840 playing engagement. And it's something that I 693 00:34:32,840 --> 00:34:35,960 actually really wish was different. 694 00:34:36,159 --> 00:34:40,239 I wish that it was true because I, I work, I, I do HR, you know, 695 00:34:40,440 --> 00:34:43,520 it's just that four years ago there was this like, oh, we got 696 00:34:43,520 --> 00:34:45,040 to, you know, really focus on the culture. 697 00:34:45,320 --> 00:34:49,440 But the reality is that every single person owns culture. 698 00:34:49,600 --> 00:34:53,639 Every single person owns whether someone feels fulfilled or 699 00:34:53,639 --> 00:34:56,920 unfulfilled at their job, including the individual, by the 700 00:34:56,920 --> 00:34:59,200 way. And you know, at some level, if 701 00:34:59,200 --> 00:35:01,520 you're not happy for, you know, a certain amount of time, you 702 00:35:01,520 --> 00:35:03,400 have to make the decision, no one's going to make that 703 00:35:03,400 --> 00:35:06,960 decision for you. And so this is something like, I 704 00:35:06,960 --> 00:35:10,920 have my own internal conflict because I'm like, I don't agree 705 00:35:10,920 --> 00:35:14,440 that my title makes any sense because all it does is 706 00:35:14,960 --> 00:35:18,600 essentially create a scapegoat for when things don't work, if 707 00:35:18,720 --> 00:35:22,360 things don't work. And fortunately that it's not so 708 00:35:22,360 --> 00:35:24,200 common, but you know, that's that's the thing. 709 00:35:24,200 --> 00:35:27,440 That's what happens when you have this head of diversity, 710 00:35:27,600 --> 00:35:31,240 head of culture, head of whatever, honestly, any roles 711 00:35:31,240 --> 00:35:32,960 within that doesn't even have to be had. 712 00:35:32,960 --> 00:35:35,680 You then are like, oh, good. So when there's a diversity 713 00:35:35,680 --> 00:35:37,960 issue, it's their problem. When there's a culture issue, 714 00:35:37,960 --> 00:35:44,400 it's their problem versus, hmm, how do we all contribute to the 715 00:35:44,400 --> 00:35:48,080 positive and the negative outcomes of this particular 716 00:35:48,080 --> 00:35:49,840 topic? And that's honestly true outside 717 00:35:49,840 --> 00:35:51,240 of HR too. We came up with that word 718 00:35:51,240 --> 00:35:53,920 engagement because we want we want our people energized. 719 00:35:53,920 --> 00:35:56,680 We want people like loving being here and that's a great 720 00:35:56,680 --> 00:35:59,360 aspiration. I want that too, right, yes, but 721 00:35:59,360 --> 00:36:01,520 I want I want to create an environment where people can 722 00:36:01,520 --> 00:36:05,640 self discover that, you know, one of the, you know, sarcastic 723 00:36:05,960 --> 00:36:08,520 perspectives on HR that I also have is you want to be sure 724 00:36:08,520 --> 00:36:10,120 something's going to not work in a company. 725 00:36:10,280 --> 00:36:13,000 Make it an HR program. Oh, Steve, we need we need to 726 00:36:13,000 --> 00:36:15,040 really, you know, the managers are really feeling down. 727 00:36:15,040 --> 00:36:16,920 We need HR program and get them really excited. 728 00:36:16,920 --> 00:36:19,120 I'm like, you know, don't look here you. 729 00:36:19,520 --> 00:36:21,520 Know don't look here. You know, like we need a 730 00:36:21,520 --> 00:36:23,360 mentoring program because we need more mentors to get. 731 00:36:23,440 --> 00:36:24,600 OK, well, what are you coming to me for? 732 00:36:24,600 --> 00:36:26,880 Like go, go make a mentoring program, you know? 733 00:36:26,960 --> 00:36:30,080 Yeah, go start mentoring people. You know, the totally for me. 734 00:36:30,640 --> 00:36:33,000 And so, and that's sort of like people like what well, I've got 735 00:36:33,000 --> 00:36:35,000 a day job just like, you know, this whole like, well, 736 00:36:35,000 --> 00:36:37,280 recruiting your job, your job's to recruit like, no, they're not 737 00:36:37,280 --> 00:36:38,600 working for me, they're working for you. 738 00:36:39,160 --> 00:36:41,400 So and the best recruiters will tell you the best hires they 739 00:36:41,400 --> 00:36:44,360 made are because the hiring manager was super engaged, you 740 00:36:44,360 --> 00:36:46,600 know, and so it really is a partnership. 741 00:36:46,600 --> 00:36:49,200 And, and I think we're in the spot because we have a lot of 742 00:36:49,200 --> 00:36:53,280 those fiefdom HR leaders that a lot of us have have have worked 743 00:36:53,280 --> 00:36:56,160 for in the past where we get to switch that to, you know, 744 00:36:56,160 --> 00:36:59,880 leading people, engaging your people leaders is what it's 745 00:36:59,880 --> 00:37:02,600 about. And I think the challenge is the 746 00:37:02,600 --> 00:37:05,240 world of work is just going so crazy and so fast right now. 747 00:37:05,240 --> 00:37:07,760 Managers are exhausted. You saw the Gallup survey came 748 00:37:07,760 --> 00:37:10,600 out last month, the lowest leadership engagement since 749 00:37:10,600 --> 00:37:12,640 they've been measuring it. And by the way, it's always been 750 00:37:12,880 --> 00:37:15,800 really crappy, really 30 and now it's below 30. 751 00:37:15,800 --> 00:37:17,320 So. It's really, really bad. 752 00:37:17,320 --> 00:37:19,760 Excuse me? It's been on fire for decades. 753 00:37:20,360 --> 00:37:21,920 Right and. That's a shame. 754 00:37:21,920 --> 00:37:24,560 You know, we don't, we don't invest enough, we don't help 755 00:37:24,560 --> 00:37:27,000 them enough. And that falls on us. 756 00:37:27,520 --> 00:37:31,600 To your point, Tracy, we get a lot of the, we're such an easy 757 00:37:31,680 --> 00:37:34,800 department to blame for stuff like so, so, so easy to, to 758 00:37:35,160 --> 00:37:37,800 target for being the problem. You know, you blocked me from 759 00:37:37,800 --> 00:37:38,360 promoting. Yeah. 760 00:37:38,360 --> 00:37:39,920 And it was the wrong decision, man. 761 00:37:40,920 --> 00:37:44,640 Yeah. And so that this pace of work is 762 00:37:44,640 --> 00:37:50,120 really exhausting people. And I did, I did a, a podcast, I 763 00:37:50,120 --> 00:37:53,280 got a just a very 5 minute podcast I release once a week. 764 00:37:53,280 --> 00:37:55,760 And the last week's topic was boredom. 765 00:37:56,240 --> 00:37:58,320 And these all these Harvard researchers have discovered the 766 00:37:58,320 --> 00:38:01,720 greatest moments of breakthrough thinking are not when you're in 767 00:38:01,880 --> 00:38:05,560 17 back to pack Zooms in a day. It's when you've got time to 768 00:38:05,560 --> 00:38:07,960 think, when you're driving, when you're in the shower, when 769 00:38:07,960 --> 00:38:10,840 you're sleeping, when you're waking up like and we're not 770 00:38:10,840 --> 00:38:12,560 creating space for those moments here. 771 00:38:12,640 --> 00:38:18,360 We're falling too far to the do more, faster, quicker, less 772 00:38:18,360 --> 00:38:20,880 money. Be productive is like poison 773 00:38:20,880 --> 00:38:23,240 right now. We need space to think and we 774 00:38:23,240 --> 00:38:25,080 have overwhelmed our people in e-mail. 775 00:38:25,080 --> 00:38:26,760 We still haven't figured out how to use e-mail. 776 00:38:26,800 --> 00:38:30,800 All we do is weaponize our our emails to make people more 777 00:38:30,800 --> 00:38:33,560 behind, you know, and this is yeah, you know, think about 778 00:38:33,560 --> 00:38:34,800 that. You know, as we think about the 779 00:38:34,800 --> 00:38:37,160 future work and sort of tying it to what we want to be talking 780 00:38:37,160 --> 00:38:40,120 about here, which is are you creating the right environment 781 00:38:40,120 --> 00:38:41,880 for people to do their best work? 782 00:38:42,280 --> 00:38:46,240 That's what I looked at like I if you're a sports, you know, 783 00:38:46,240 --> 00:38:49,960 coach, what are you doing to put the best people in the right 784 00:38:49,960 --> 00:38:51,960 chances for them to win in the team to win? 785 00:38:51,960 --> 00:38:55,040 Are you doing that not for today, but for tomorrow too? 786 00:38:55,440 --> 00:38:58,880 You know, and, and, and sometimes we don't have enough 787 00:38:58,880 --> 00:39:02,800 time to think, you know, and I remember seeking advice from 788 00:39:02,800 --> 00:39:04,600 mentor when I got my first head of HR role. 789 00:39:04,600 --> 00:39:05,760 I said, what advice do you have for me? 790 00:39:05,760 --> 00:39:08,440 She goes, you're going to have more stuff to worry about than 791 00:39:08,440 --> 00:39:10,160 you even know. You're going to have to find a 792 00:39:10,160 --> 00:39:12,160 way to deal with that. And I go, oh, how hard can it 793 00:39:12,160 --> 00:39:13,880 be? And a few months later, I'm just 794 00:39:13,880 --> 00:39:17,400 like, Oh my God, you know, and the ideal. 795 00:39:17,400 --> 00:39:19,280 And again, this is back to the days when we used to work in 796 00:39:19,280 --> 00:39:22,080 person and it's different now. But when you walk into the lunch 797 00:39:22,080 --> 00:39:25,720 room, you know, the back story on every single person in that 798 00:39:25,720 --> 00:39:28,280 lunch room, she's about to tell her boss that she's pregnant. 799 00:39:28,400 --> 00:39:30,680 He's about to be told that he's on a performance warning. 800 00:39:30,840 --> 00:39:33,360 She's going to tell her boss that her husband just got 801 00:39:33,360 --> 00:39:34,800 relocated and she might have to quit. 802 00:39:35,240 --> 00:39:37,520 She he's going to find out that his request for promotion is 803 00:39:37,520 --> 00:39:38,880 going to be done. Like, you just know, all this 804 00:39:38,880 --> 00:39:41,080 stuff's coming out and you're just like, Oh my gosh, Oh my 805 00:39:41,080 --> 00:39:43,920 gosh. And if you care, it's a really 806 00:39:43,920 --> 00:39:47,160 hard profession to be in, you know, because your heart is 807 00:39:47,160 --> 00:39:49,600 getting tugged a lot. And you got to find a way to 808 00:39:49,600 --> 00:39:51,960 sleep with that. Yeah, yeah. 809 00:39:51,960 --> 00:39:53,800 It's balancing. It's, it is. 810 00:39:53,800 --> 00:39:58,880 It's balancing the care with the logic in a way, you know, 811 00:39:58,880 --> 00:40:01,200 because it, I think it is important to care. 812 00:40:01,440 --> 00:40:06,160 And it's also important to know when to, you know, disallow the 813 00:40:06,160 --> 00:40:10,080 care from overtaking your entire, you know, person. 814 00:40:10,640 --> 00:40:14,720 I, I, I, one of my more recent leaders taught me something 815 00:40:14,720 --> 00:40:16,160 really invaluable, which is that. 816 00:40:16,560 --> 00:40:19,960 Yeah, You know, Tracy, you care a lot and that's great. 817 00:40:20,600 --> 00:40:22,000 And you also need to separate yourself. 818 00:40:22,320 --> 00:40:24,520 You need to separate yourself from the things that you care 819 00:40:24,520 --> 00:40:28,120 most deeply about. So it's not so draining when 820 00:40:28,120 --> 00:40:32,680 something isn't going the way that you know it should go, but 821 00:40:32,680 --> 00:40:35,080 it's just not going the way that you want it, that it that it 822 00:40:35,080 --> 00:40:37,320 needs to. And it was really invaluable 823 00:40:37,320 --> 00:40:40,400 advice because I think that's something that especially as 824 00:40:40,480 --> 00:40:44,920 people scale in their careers, you, you know, the answer, you 825 00:40:44,920 --> 00:40:46,840 might know. I mean, we just talked about 826 00:40:46,840 --> 00:40:49,240 this in terms of like, oh, this is going to be the fallout if 827 00:40:49,240 --> 00:40:52,040 you make if you promote Jim instead of Susan and Sarah, you 828 00:40:52,040 --> 00:40:56,480 know, you might know the answer. But that actually sometimes 829 00:40:56,600 --> 00:40:59,360 really doesn't matter because just as much as you know the 830 00:40:59,360 --> 00:41:02,920 answer and you care that you want to prevent all of the 831 00:41:03,080 --> 00:41:05,560 outcomes, all the negative outcomes that can come from the 832 00:41:05,560 --> 00:41:10,000 opposite decision, You have to be able to be like, OK, they 833 00:41:10,000 --> 00:41:11,720 decided something else. And that's that. 834 00:41:12,000 --> 00:41:14,200 And you just you walk away and you continue on with your day 835 00:41:14,200 --> 00:41:15,520 and you don't let it eat you up inside. 836 00:41:15,880 --> 00:41:20,760 And it's it's one of the more, I would say, invaluable learnings 837 00:41:20,760 --> 00:41:24,520 that I've had in the last five years because it's what has 838 00:41:24,840 --> 00:41:28,600 allowed me to transform not only as an individual contributor, 839 00:41:28,600 --> 00:41:31,800 but also as a manager of a team. Because I'm like, Oh yeah, I 840 00:41:31,800 --> 00:41:34,680 have to be able to let certain things go, which is really just 841 00:41:34,680 --> 00:41:38,200 very, very, very difficult. Yeah, I got the same feedback, 842 00:41:38,280 --> 00:41:41,480 Tracy. At one point I was really upset 843 00:41:41,480 --> 00:41:43,800 that the vibe of the company was really down. 844 00:41:43,800 --> 00:41:45,920 We're just getting slaughtered in employee surveys. 845 00:41:46,200 --> 00:41:50,440 We we're, it was the early 2000s afterthe.com bubble burst. 846 00:41:50,440 --> 00:41:53,200 And think of this, this whole company as like 1500 people. 847 00:41:53,200 --> 00:41:56,000 I was in Canada, about half our employees were in the States. 848 00:41:56,560 --> 00:41:59,840 The share price had been like over 100 and now it was sitting 849 00:41:59,840 --> 00:42:03,880 around $9. So everyone on paper had seen a, 850 00:42:04,160 --> 00:42:07,720 a pathway to financial freedom and it just evaporated 851 00:42:07,720 --> 00:42:09,560 overnight. And then that led them to 852 00:42:09,560 --> 00:42:12,560 question leadership, even though, you know, everyother.com 853 00:42:12,560 --> 00:42:14,040 company had been through the same thing. 854 00:42:14,920 --> 00:42:16,920 People were pissed. So I go to, I see I was like, 855 00:42:16,920 --> 00:42:17,840 listen, I think I'm going to resign. 856 00:42:17,840 --> 00:42:20,320 Like this is the most miserable environment I've ever worked in. 857 00:42:20,320 --> 00:42:23,080 And, and he was really a tough leader and people told me, don't 858 00:42:23,080 --> 00:42:25,200 work for that guy. He's really sharp edges. 859 00:42:25,680 --> 00:42:27,440 And I said, so I think I'm going to resign. 860 00:42:27,440 --> 00:42:29,720 He goes, let me take you to lunch before you quit. 861 00:42:29,720 --> 00:42:31,440 I want to have one more conversation with you. 862 00:42:31,600 --> 00:42:34,960 And I'd he'd relocated me from Asia to Canada for this role. 863 00:42:35,560 --> 00:42:38,600 He sat me down and he brought a book, Jack Welch's book called 864 00:42:38,600 --> 00:42:39,960 Winning. And he'd highlighted the whole 865 00:42:39,960 --> 00:42:42,480 book, which is basically an HR Bible. 866 00:42:42,480 --> 00:42:43,960 If you haven't read it, it's phenomenal. 867 00:42:43,960 --> 00:42:45,880 I haven't. It's phenomenal. 868 00:42:46,240 --> 00:42:50,840 And he said, listen, I can be, I have not been the best boss for 869 00:42:50,840 --> 00:42:54,200 you and I'm going to commit to be the best boss for you and 870 00:42:54,200 --> 00:42:55,760 make this the best job you ever had. 871 00:42:55,840 --> 00:42:57,240 And he made a bunch of other commitments. 872 00:42:57,240 --> 00:43:00,400 He goes and I need to give you some feedback. 873 00:43:01,440 --> 00:43:05,440 You're, you have too high expectations, you need to 874 00:43:05,440 --> 00:43:07,960 appreciate that we are going to have to make some hard decisions 875 00:43:07,960 --> 00:43:10,400 and making people happy is not in the plan right now. 876 00:43:10,680 --> 00:43:12,640 It's doing right for the shareholders and doing right for 877 00:43:12,640 --> 00:43:14,240 the company. And if we don't make these hard 878 00:43:14,240 --> 00:43:15,520 decisions, the whole company's gone. 879 00:43:15,840 --> 00:43:19,520 So it's going to be hard and you need to steal yourself for that. 880 00:43:19,520 --> 00:43:22,680 And I can help you with that. And it just LED me down this 881 00:43:22,680 --> 00:43:26,920 path of, no, we really, I think sell ourselves short if we over 882 00:43:26,920 --> 00:43:31,240 index on happiness because happiness leads to mediocrity. 883 00:43:31,240 --> 00:43:33,880 It leads to people not talking about the hard stuff or giving 884 00:43:33,880 --> 00:43:35,760 direct feedback or saying disagreeing. 885 00:43:36,120 --> 00:43:37,640 Like that's not a happy environment. 886 00:43:38,040 --> 00:43:41,200 I want a winning environment and I want people happy. 887 00:43:41,240 --> 00:43:42,960 But the goal isn't happy. The goal is winning. 888 00:43:43,080 --> 00:43:45,280 And winning means tough conversations, difficult 889 00:43:45,280 --> 00:43:47,840 conversations. And that's what we need to equip 890 00:43:47,960 --> 00:43:50,000 leaders with today. And that's where we do 891 00:43:50,000 --> 00:43:53,080 performance reviews, by the way, so that we build a muscle. 892 00:43:53,200 --> 00:43:56,960 And by the way, the greatest leverage for AI in HR is help me 893 00:43:56,960 --> 00:44:00,920 deliver a tough message. And you can get so many helpful 894 00:44:00,920 --> 00:44:04,200 hints on that, right? And so that that, you know, I, I 895 00:44:04,200 --> 00:44:07,880 share that story because I was, I was down and out and ready to, 896 00:44:07,920 --> 00:44:09,360 you know, take my family out of the. 897 00:44:09,480 --> 00:44:13,200 I was like a really hard decision and I decided to stay. 898 00:44:13,200 --> 00:44:16,640 I'm like, what leader spends a whole, reads the whole book for 899 00:44:16,640 --> 00:44:19,000 me, promises it's going to be the best I've ever had. 900 00:44:19,400 --> 00:44:23,280 And he was 100% right. That became the greatest job 901 00:44:23,560 --> 00:44:26,880 satisfaction moment for me. You know, it wasn't a company 902 00:44:26,880 --> 00:44:29,280 that anyone ever heard of and no one ever talks about it. 903 00:44:29,440 --> 00:44:31,360 And they've since been acquired and so their name is dissolved. 904 00:44:31,360 --> 00:44:34,240 But it was PMC Sierra, and that's CEO Bob Bailey. 905 00:44:34,240 --> 00:44:37,320 He changed my life. And he really, And that was 906 00:44:37,480 --> 00:44:39,360 invaluable. Like the feedback you said that 907 00:44:39,360 --> 00:44:41,520 you got like, hey, you know, we're going to have to do some 908 00:44:41,520 --> 00:44:44,040 hard stuff here. And if you keep hanging on to 909 00:44:44,040 --> 00:44:47,240 that and, and listen, we're in the service business, which 910 00:44:47,240 --> 00:44:49,480 means saying no doesn't feel like you're doing giving good 911 00:44:49,480 --> 00:44:51,480 service. But if you keep saying yes, you 912 00:44:51,480 --> 00:44:55,640 will drown, you know, And that's my biggest challenge my entire 913 00:44:55,640 --> 00:44:59,280 career is learning to say no. And also because I think I can 914 00:44:59,280 --> 00:45:00,760 do it better than anyone else. So why would I? 915 00:45:00,760 --> 00:45:02,800 Why would I have someone else do it, right? 916 00:45:02,800 --> 00:45:05,560 So like, if you're a perfectionist, it's even worse, 917 00:45:05,600 --> 00:45:08,120 right? It's like, I could do that. 918 00:45:08,120 --> 00:45:09,240 I could do that too. I could do that. 919 00:45:09,240 --> 00:45:10,320 I can keep doing that. And I could. 920 00:45:10,600 --> 00:45:12,320 Yeah. And then ultimately you do you 921 00:45:12,320 --> 00:45:14,680 do drown and you're like, oh crap, what have I done? 922 00:45:14,680 --> 00:45:17,040 You find yourself at home with your kids and you're not at home 923 00:45:17,040 --> 00:45:18,520 with your kids or thinking about that board deck. 924 00:45:18,520 --> 00:45:20,440 You gotta get ready that presentation for tomorrow, that 925 00:45:20,600 --> 00:45:22,560 big termination that the manager is gonna screw up and you're 926 00:45:22,560 --> 00:45:25,120 just like, well, and it's just not a good place. 927 00:45:25,240 --> 00:45:29,160 Not a good. Totally, totally, Steve, I have 928 00:45:29,400 --> 00:45:31,440 thoroughly enjoyed our conversation. 929 00:45:31,440 --> 00:45:34,560 I'm not ready to let you go, but I know that the listeners are 930 00:45:34,560 --> 00:45:37,600 probably like Tracy, what's the you know? 931 00:45:38,400 --> 00:45:39,960 We're gonna call this a double episode. 932 00:45:39,960 --> 00:45:43,480 How about that right now? 2 for one people. 2 for one, I'm 933 00:45:43,480 --> 00:45:46,040 not ready to let you go, but I know I know I need to and 934 00:45:46,040 --> 00:45:49,040 especially considering how valuable your time is and I 935 00:45:49,040 --> 00:45:50,640 would love to have you back on one day. 936 00:45:50,640 --> 00:45:53,520 I mean, I think please, all of the things that you've shared 937 00:45:53,520 --> 00:45:58,080 have been really, really profound, not only for me and 938 00:45:58,080 --> 00:45:59,680 I'm I'm sure also for the listeners. 939 00:45:59,680 --> 00:46:01,480 So thank you so much for your time. 940 00:46:01,480 --> 00:46:04,000 And I'd love to kind of just pass to you one more time to 941 00:46:04,080 --> 00:46:06,360 tell everyone where they can connect with you and maybe work 942 00:46:06,360 --> 00:46:07,520 with you. Read your book. 943 00:46:07,880 --> 00:46:09,120 Yeah, please. Yeah. 944 00:46:09,120 --> 00:46:11,800 My book is titled Work Quake. Please check it out anywhere 945 00:46:11,800 --> 00:46:14,400 books are sold. I have a podcast called Work 946 00:46:14,400 --> 00:46:20,000 Quake Weekly and it's very quick, 55 to 10 minutes and it's 947 00:46:20,000 --> 00:46:23,240 really fun for me. And I, you know, publish a 948 00:46:23,680 --> 00:46:25,560 prolifically on LinkedIn. I hear it's a pretty good 949 00:46:25,560 --> 00:46:28,000 platform. And so just find me on there, 950 00:46:28,000 --> 00:46:31,440 connect with me. You can like I've so many 951 00:46:31,440 --> 00:46:33,840 connections now. LinkedIn has not let me like 952 00:46:33,880 --> 00:46:35,920 easily connect with new people. Connect. 953 00:46:36,080 --> 00:46:39,760 Yeah, you can easily say follow, but if you hit the dot dot dot, 954 00:46:39,920 --> 00:46:43,520 you can still connect with me. So if that's of interest, you 955 00:46:43,520 --> 00:46:45,480 know, I'm pretty active there. I also have a TikTok channel 956 00:46:46,320 --> 00:46:48,280 where I have a series called True stories from Corporate 957 00:46:48,280 --> 00:46:52,520 America and if you want to hear about HR stories going crazy, I 958 00:46:52,520 --> 00:46:54,680 know I can match and raise you one. 959 00:46:55,080 --> 00:47:00,000 So check out that I've protected the innocent and but also some 960 00:47:00,000 --> 00:47:04,240 naughty HR leaders that I've outed some of the stories from 961 00:47:04,240 --> 00:47:05,680 that. So yeah, it's it's if you need 962 00:47:05,680 --> 00:47:07,120 some Comic Relief, please check it out. 963 00:47:07,480 --> 00:47:10,400 We always do, and we will make sure that everything is linked. 964 00:47:10,400 --> 00:47:12,840 And again, Steve, thank you so much for your time. 965 00:47:12,840 --> 00:47:14,400 Thanks for amazing. Yeah. 966 00:47:14,520 --> 00:47:17,800 Hey, just before you go, don't forget to subscribe to the show 967 00:47:17,800 --> 00:47:20,680 so that you are the first to hear when an episode drops each 968 00:47:20,680 --> 00:47:24,120 week and maybe leave a five star review and a comment about how 969 00:47:24,120 --> 00:47:26,920 much you loved this episode. Plus, if you have someone in 970 00:47:26,920 --> 00:47:29,400 mind who would really enjoy this episode, make sure you share it 971 00:47:29,400 --> 00:47:31,360 with them. Thank you so much for tuning in 972 00:47:31,360 --> 00:47:33,680 and I'll see you next week. Play song.