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Why Workplace Culture Isn't Optional – Here's How to Get It Right · Work It Like A Mum

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, I'm Elizabeth Willis, and I'm obsessed with helping as many women as possible achieve their boldest dreams after kids and helping you to navigate this messy and magical season of life.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a working mum with over 17 years of recruitment experience, and I'm the founder of the Investing in Women Job Board and Community.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: In this show, I'm honoured to be chatting with remarkable women, redefining our working world across all areas of business.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: They'll share their secrets on how they've achieved extraordinary success after children, their boundaries of balance, the challenges they faced, and how they've overcome them.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: Find their own version of success.
• 0:43
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• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: No way! Money, struggles, growth, loss, boundaries of balance.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_01: We cover it all.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: Think of this as coffee with your mates, mixed with an inspiring TED talk, sprinkled with the career advice you wish you'd really had at school.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: So grab a cup of coffee or a glass of wine, make sure you're cozy, and get ready to get inspired and chase your boldest dreams.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: Or just survive Mondays.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_01: This is the Work It Like a Mum podcast.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_01: This episode is brought to you by Investing in Women.
• 1:15
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• 1:27
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• 1:32
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• 1:39
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• 1:41
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• 1:50
  SPEAKER_01: Now we're back to the show.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_01: Hello and welcome to today's episode of the Work It Like a Mont Podcast.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: Today I am chatting with Paul Brockwell, and this is going to be a really interesting conversation.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: Paula is the founder and director of the employee experience project, and we're going to be talking today all about the culture and how um businesses can improve their culture and why they ensure to improve their culture.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: What's in it for businesses as well as what's in it for employees?
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: Because that's what um what your organization does, isn't it, Polly?
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: You help organizations um improve their culture.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: So um thank you so much for joining us today.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for having me.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: What is what is business culture?
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_01: You know, if you if someone said to you, what is it?
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: Can you put a word on it?
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, do you know?
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure I can give it a word, but I can give it a short description.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I would say that it isn't what most people say it is.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: I think we reduce it down to, um, it isn't just, should I say, we reduce it down to this idea.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: Do you probably hear the saying a lot, it's how our people feel on a Sunday night.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: So that vibes check thing is is what a lot of people reduce culture down to.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I would say that that is a tiny part of what it is, but we are massively reducing um and minimising its value because what it actually is, is the thing that prompts how our people behave on a day-by-day basis.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: So it's the thing that tells people how it's acceptable to show up, what will and won't be tolerated, and what they need to do to get by and be accepted every day.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: So it's a it's a system of nudges and permissions and conditions that that dictates how our people behave and what they do on a day-by-day basis.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: So it's massively important when it comes to performance and whether our business is going to succeed because actually it tells people what they need to do and how they need to behave.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_01: Is there such a thing as like a universal good culture, or do different organizations need different cultures to succeed?
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, again, a brilliant question, and I think one that doesn't get asked enough.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: I think a lot of people are in seek of this ideal culture, but when you actually look at all of the research, while there's loads of different um research to define different types of cultural models, actually, when you get into the big kind of um psychological research that looks at lots of different studies, what it indicates is there's no one good culture.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: Culture, great culture definition comes down to alignment to your operating context and goals.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: So creating a culture that fits with the context you're operating within and what you want to achieve, that's the best way to create a good culture for you.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: So there's no, there are some foundations which are critical to being able to build up that positive culture, but there is not one thing that you can say, if I just implant this, this will be the thing that makes a difference.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: So you mentioned there are different cultural models.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_01: What are some of the, you know, how many models are there and what do they look like?
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: Well, there's hundreds.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: There is, um, I, you know, I've I'm a I'm a chart psychologist.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: I've worked in this field for over 20 years, and I spent probably the first, I don't know, I would say even till a couple of years ago, actually, thinking, am I missing the point here?
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: There's so many models, and none of us give us the right answer for where the idea pieces.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I finally came, well, and none of us give uh none of the research seems to give us an indication of what we need to do to change our culture in a helpful way.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: And there was finally a big piece of like meta-analysis, and basically a study that takes lots of other studies that have happened over the last 20 years and says, What the hell are they saying?
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: And in 2022, there was one that was published that said, basically, with a big sigh, all of the research in this area has been on creating more and more models of what culture could be.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: So, all focused on describing cultures, with no work really about what drives a good culture or how you create a good culture.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: So I kind of took that and held it in my hands and thought, oh, thank God I've been just like feeling like I've been making this up as I've gone along with the past, um, as I as I built my revolution over the last 10 years, really, because there isn't a definition, there isn't a single piece of research, or there hasn't really been a focus in the research around what good looks like.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: But what's happened is in people seeking that single answer, they've anchored on to these kind of surface level descriptive models that say, oh, we need to be a clan culture or we need to be a meritocracy or whatever it may be, without really thinking, but what sort of business are we?
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: And what type of behavior do we need?
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: And what does that mean?
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: What does those outcomes mean in terms of the type of culture that we need to help us succeed in that context?
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: So there's no one right answer.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: The right answer is ask yourself that question.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: Who are we?
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: What do we want to achieve?
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: What do we have got to overcome to achieve that?
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: And then work back from there and you'll win.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: You'll definitely be able to create something.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_01: Do not all businesses though want to make a profit?
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: Is that not their ultimate?
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_01: And do they not then work back for us from that?
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: And is there not certain behaviors that are going to be universal, that are going to be have a positive impact on that business?
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um, well, so I I think uh probably ultimately all commercial businesses want to make a profit, but the way in which they want to do that is quite different.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: So things like our brand position, um the cut level of you know, the quality of customer experience they want to create, etc.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: So, for example, two cultures that will need to be fundamentally different is I don't know, you know, we we both professionally have grown up in recruitment, haven't we?
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: I I started my career in a recruitment business very many years ago.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: And the business model then for that business was about very high peace, high pressure, high efficiency.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: You knew exactly what the um the operating procedures were, and you followed those to drive sales and deliver what was required.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: And there was, there was, of course, an orientation around um around um quality of delivery, but it was you weren't, you never reinvented the wheel.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: You were asked to follow a process and keep following that.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: So that business is seeking profit, but it wants people to be quite compliant to systems and processes, follow tried and tested methods and leverage and be probably quite entrepreneurial in terms of finding new leads and new relationships on things.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: Compare that to a pharmaceutical business where the creation of new products and innovation is at its heart, the types of behaviours that you need to foster and encourage to get to the profit in that world with the types of competitors and the type of value that that needs to lever is fundamentally different from that within a recruitment business.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: So the end goal might be the same, but the mechanisms and the markets and the value that they're trying to, those businesses are trying to build to get to that profit are fundamentally different, which means the behaviors that you need to encourage in your people are quite different.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, there are some foundational stuff that we need to do, like making people feel safe and making them feel valued so that they can be bothered to turn up, but that's only part of the challenge.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: We've then got to think about well, once they're bothered to turn up, how do we encourage the mix and type of behaviors that we need from those people to allow our business to deliver in the way that it's set up to?
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: I love that.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_01: I was reading um a book and it used an example from NASA, and it was talking about when JFK visited the NASA headquarters.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_01: This is obviously a long time ago, and he saw a cleaner or a janitor and said, Oh, you know, what do you do here?
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: And he was so proud of his job and he was cleaning the floor.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: He said, Oh, I'm helping put a man on the moon.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_01: And that that's I think a really good example of how you know what sounds like in good culture, how everybody feels that they're contributing to a mission um, you know, that that's so important that you know you know, it's a collective mission that everyone's playing a part in.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm sure a lot of organisations, whatever they do, want people to feel like that about their business.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: So what are some of like the behaviours that a business can encourage to get everybody, no matter what level they are within the organization, bought into that mission?
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_00: Well, honestly, for me, that's about great leadership and group management.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I think a lot of the time we put the emphasis on that kind of sense of vibe and connection on people, you know, it's the new generation coming in that aren't as connected, it's hybrid working's fault that people don't care about what they're doing anymore.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_00: But actually, great leadership helps people see how what they're doing relates to the overall mission of the organization, but it also makes people feel valued and seen within that.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: So it's all well and good building those golden threads and telling people how they link to that thing.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: But if you're not continually valuing them, enabling them, supporting them to deliver on that goal and recognizing when they do that well, then they kind of forget that story.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: So, really, those elements are about good leadership.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I think the other piece as well is about ensuring that you keep hold of the mission and you keep people not just connected to getting people on the moon, but you keep them connected to this idea that I'm investing in and supporting this business to get people to the moon because that's uh something that backfires for organizations quite regularly, is they get very mission and purpose focused and they say we're gonna do this.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: And then people go a bit rogue because it's like, well, I connect to that mission and that purpose, but I'm not necessarily connected to helping this business get there.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: So they start to do stuff in spite of the business because they want to deliver the purpose rather than um in partnership with it.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: So it is an important piece of work to do, but we've got to make sure that we're creating an environment where people feel like they're part of and seen and valued in delivering that mission and that they buy into the way that our business is trying to help them do that so that they stay kind of in that, you know, mission critical and delivering to help our business succeed on that, not just getting obsessed with um getting obsessed with the end goal.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_00: And we we have quite a few kind of purpose-led organizations that we work with, and that's often something that we help them untangle, where you know, my my focus as a as a um as a housing manager within a social housing care provider is to look after my tenants.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I find I feel really quite disconnected from the complexity of cost management or political piece or working through systems and processes that this business expects me to do, you've got to make sure that you help people connect to the mission, but understand that their job is to do that through the organizational mechanisms and goals.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, each of these pieces are important, but I guess what I'm saying, and I don't want to overcomplicate it, but I think the nuance piece is important.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: If we just try to pick one of those things and cascade our mission and try and talk everyone into it, if we're not going to follow out in a more systemic way to make sure that that lives and stays real for them in a sustained period of time, then we can accidentally create consequences that um that deliver outcomes that we didn't mean to get, really.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_01: What makes a good leader?
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um, well, you know, I think it depends on the context of the team, really.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: But I think that capacity to understand the outcomes that you need to deliver, what you need from your team, and a good ability to focus on enablements, that's that piece around understanding that your job is to make it as easy as possible to create the conditions for your team to succeed.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: I think that that is that's the universal element for good leadership because then your behaviour adapts depending on the circumstances to help your team flourish, and you're also setting your team up to deliver the best results that you can.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: So it's just about being curious and connected to what your team's experience is and trying to support them to succeed in their jobs, I would say.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_01: Obviously, um before we hit record, we were talking there's obviously you know, the time of this recording, whenever people listen to, I'm sure.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um it's gonna be relevant for a long time.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_01: But there's a lot happening politically where you know DE and I, for example, is not as focused in certain countries as perhaps it was.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_01: How is that affecting how employers view culture?
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um well, I I think there's a really interesting thing happening at the moment, and I'm I'm sure you've experienced this through your career, you know, market conditions, and I think particularly the recruitment market, the availability of talent really affects how how the more performative organizations value um culture and how important it is to them because in their head, it's about vibes, it's about attracting people and making it feel nice around here.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_00: And um as the as the fight for talent reduces, as there's more people in the market, then generally those businesses who don't see culture as a strategic believer for performance will stop worrying about it as much because um they don't need to use it to attract people in.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: They're thinking, well, you know, they get I'd certainly um start to hear in boardrooms more often that, well, they should be grateful they have a job kind of freeze starts to appear.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you know what the economic circumstances are by how willing somebody is to say that out loud or not, really.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_00: I think the challenge is though that while the market is tricky, that's really when you need your people to be really leaning in on the behaviors that you need from them.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_00: So you'll notice there that I'm talking about behaviours rather than motivation.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: I think the motivation bit and the vibe bit is important.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: But when we're trying to do things like um drive sales in really difficult markets or maximise our profitability or pull out costs by doing things more efficiently, if we haven't got our people in a place where they're connected with our organization, they understand what good looks like and they feel valued around that, then it's gonna be much harder for our business to navigate that.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_00: So I think it's really silly for us to say actually, well, we we're able to fill whatever bums on seats we need to.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: We've got to also be thinking about but are those bums in those seats being directed, motivated, and supported to act in a way that's going to allow our business to navigate these challenging times.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, we're working with a couple of businesses at the minute who really understand that and they're in a period of significant kind of uh market shrinkage and um economic challenge, but they're actively focusing on how do we keep people in a place where they know what they need to do and we're we're helping them really harness great um performance to maximize the chance of us turning the business round and driving it into the model that we want to we want to drive through.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_00: So um if we don't see it as a lever of performance, we stop investing in it, but we lose the benefits of it.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: If we do see it as a lever of performance, then we can keep we can keep using that and getting that additional additional effort, energy, and targeted behaviours from our people to get through the challenges, really.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_01: What place do KPIs have in culture and creating a positive culture?
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_01: Do they create a positive culture?
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_01: Do they create a negative negative culture?
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_01: I know me and you obviously grew up in a recruitment business where there was a lot of KPIs and some weren't loved.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah in a nice way of putting it.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think I think it's less about the KPIs itself and it's more about the conversation around them.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: You know, um we we do we um we partner with a safety provider around some of this and talk about that difference between um cultures of compliance versus um or you know, kind of situations where people are performatively hitting KPIs without necessarily behaviourally delivering in the full spirit of those.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_00: So I think it depends how good your KPIs are, if they're going to actually work for you.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: But the other piece then is how how aligned, relevant, and useful are they to the critical behaviours that we need moving forward.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_00: So clarity of outcomes, clarity of responsibilities, and um setting a system up that allows people to deliver on those, those are great things, and KPIs can play a really positive role in those.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: But where we're just asking people to do ridiculous things that we're even perhaps with measures that are counter to each other, which is what we see in the safety space of a lot, where production target is this, safety target is this.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_00: And when you put those two things together, you can't meet the production target, you know, that's it's just insanity.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_00: You're just wasting effort and energy while people try and play the system so that they don't get in trouble.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because that isn't a positive culture, I wouldn't have thought.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: No, no.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_01: That's a culture where people feel they're not trusted and it's quite you know authoritarian.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_01: I can I'm just thinking back, you know, as well when you were we can't necessarily challenge the sensibility of it.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_00: It's the thing that you've got to hit every month because you know, if you hit that we've been told you've got to hit the and I told you so.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, culture, and yeah.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm just wondering how you know you get your head around that as well.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: Um it's really interesting what you said about you know what's happening in certain boardrooms and things like that regarding all people you know are lucky to have jobs.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_01: How have you noticed um AI creeping into the conversations as well?
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, you know, it's it's creating um it's creating instability, isn't it, within jobs?
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: We've definitely seen um we've definitely seen a tendency with some businesses to be focusing on how they can use that to strip cost out to drive automation.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, it's a useful application, isn't it, of AI?
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_00: But I think certainly my sense is that the conversations around true kind of AI adoption and leveraging within organizations over and above that surface level automation are really in their infancy.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I don't think organizations are properly talking about, and certainly the ones that that we're working with, aren't yet really talking about how do we create that human machine partnership?
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: How do we understand the types of skills and capabilities that our people need?
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_00: Either we need to be hiring for or um we need to be building in our people to allow us to become a truly kind of tech-enabled organization and take the true advantage of AI.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: And the other thing that I don't think we're talking about yet, and we need to, is about skills building and mastery of the next generations coming through.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I think AI is going to do a lot of that heavy lifting of um base level decision making and data collection and all certain I think about in my profession.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: I could easily never have a junior consultant again if I didn't want to and drive that through.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_00: But in 10 or 15 years, there will be no experienced psychologists who have gone through all of the stages that you need to to build the mastery, to be able to be a culture strategist or whatever piece you want to work within.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I think we aren't talking about that yet in terms of how do we ensure that in removing some of that heavy lifting through automation in the in the entry-level roles, we're still supporting our talent in building the experiences and having the setbacks and the nutbacks that you need to to allow you to build mastery over time.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: So there's a whole new world of development and um and kind of that um talent pipeline building that we're gonna have to consider at some point that just hasn't become part of the conversation.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you're seeing that yet.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's interesting, isn't it?
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, absolutely.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: And also um I'm not in the graduate recruitment space, so this is more anecdotally what I've read.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um, the graduate recruitment um vacancy is the lowest, I think.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: They've been since the financial crisis.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_00: I was at an event a couple of weeks ago, and somebody from one of the big assessment publishers was doing a talk about how um someone had um, so it was a tech development role, tech innovation role within one of the big assessment houses.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and um what they realized once the person had started the job, that the person had built a deep fake to do the technical test and the interview.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: So they literally built a real life version of themselves to do the whole thing.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_00: And then they totally automated their job.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so they weren't turning up to meetings, um, they weren't online during the day, but they were delivering all the performance that they needed to.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: And this person was kind of saying, Oh gosh, well, we're um, you know, we had to get rid of them because they were dishonest.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, okay.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, that's really impressive.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_00: So I was a really annoying person in the audience saying, I get it, the person was dishonest, but this is a tech innovation role, and this person has shown you like exceptional tech innovation skills.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: Is the problem not that the selection process has forced them to lie, to leverage their skills, you know, and it's it's probably a bit outdated if we're testing technical skills that you want the highest performers to be automating anyway.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_00: You know, for me, the game is just changing around this idea of how we measure performance and what we expect from people, and we've got to stop going, oh well, they didn't follow this process, because maybe, maybe capability for in in places like those, you know, in those sort of sectors, maybe capability has evolved way past what you're testing for anyway.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe that's out of D.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_00: And so both ends of the spectrum, isn't there?
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_00: There's what are we doing at the graduate or the entry level, but also what are we doing with these people who are really pushing the boundaries to make sure that we aren't demonizing them just because they've got too good for the system.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_00: But I was I was a bit like, can I have his details, please?
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_00: At the end, he sounds like a genius.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_00: I could do with a bit of tech development, please.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_00: That sounds amazing.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: It's interesting.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I guess I guess is the counterang that you could have kept him if you were that employer, but then you could have used him to use AI to remove some jobs, which obviously has a bigger impact on you know other individual society and things like that.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's interesting times, isn't it?
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_00: I think the world of work has never been so disrupted, whether it's you know the post-COVID, the move to hybrid, uh AI, you know, I suppose that's why we've been so kind of purposeful in our approach in our consultancy, not to do the same old, see them old vision, values, purpose cascaded, but really look at what is this business's operating context and goals, and how do we how do we help it really focus on why it harnesses its people's behavior to drive business results forward?
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_00: Because the the old stuff didn't work anyway.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: It didn't work in the 80s, it didn't work before COVID.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_00: And um, I just think there's there's a whole a lot of um in our in our kind of area and specialism, as with lots of areas, there's a need just to shake the trees a bit and say, but how do we do this in this world and how do we keep up with the the rate of change?
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's phenomenal, really, absolutely phenomenal.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: So, what do you think, I guess, are employers response?
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_01: How much are employers responsible for their employees?
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_01: You know, obviously they pay their bills, but I you know, there's obviously the counter-argument that employers are becoming, you know, quite parental, I guess, in their responsibility.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_01: And how much what responsibility should an employer take?
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's a really good question.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: Honestly, I I think post-COVID, a lot of organizations have got stuck in that parent-child dynamic because there well there was a need, wasn't there, to drive those higher degrees of care, control, support on things.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: What we're certainly seeing is a large proportion of our clients are working with us to recalibrate that, to build an adult-to-adult relationship.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: For me, truly high performance cultures, truly responsible employers, don't disempower their people into beloved child.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't allow your business to succeed.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: It creates bandwidth flexibility, adaptability, massive problems around those areas.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not fair on the individuals either because it de-skills them and it gets them trapped in this role of hoping that mum and dad are going to make things better for them.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_00: I think the best way to do it is focus on building that kind of enablement-based partnership where everyone is really clear on what their role is.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_00: And so some of the work that we do with clients is around deal development or resetting the psychological contract, which is basically articulating on that partnership base as an employer, this is what we'll give you, this is the type of experience you'll get, these are the types of resources, these are the types of challenges, development, etc., that'll come to you in return.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_00: This is what we need from you.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: And that really honest, clear, and dare I say, an adult deal allows employees to stretch, to be the best version of themselves, to feel supported, but also to make a really informed choice about is this the environment that I want to be within?
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_00: So when we really consciously express that deal, we allow people to say, well, no, it's not for me.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to go and find somewhere where a deal is one that works for me, or absolutely that works for me and it's fine.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I'd use the recruitment example again.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I think that is a really that's a really very specific type of culture to operate within, isn't it?
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I think for those of us who lasted in it for for a reasonable time, then um it was because you knew what the deal was.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_00: I certainly, you know, I I joined my um my first consultancy role in a recruitment business when I was straight out of university, and God was it hard work, but I knew that in the first year I would have had five or ten, well, five years worth of experience.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_00: By the time I was in the second year, I'd be at 10 years worth of experience compared to my peers in bigger consultancy businesses.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I was totally in for that deal, you know, I was totally in for doing what that business wanted me to do because I was getting that breadth and level of experience.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and that worked, you know, that I was I was um And the rewards were good.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_00: And also I could, I could, I could afford to pay for the the down payment from my first house as well.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that was that was uh that was a lightner too, for sure.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but nobody lied to me that I was going to be at the forefront of innovation or whatever.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it was fine because I was in the early stages of my career and everything was brand new.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_00: Will I want to do that job now?
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_00: No, but then I'm in a different stage of life, a different stage of my career, and I created a different deal for myself.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_00: So that idea of treating people with enough respect to show them what we're really offering them, and then trust that we will um attract the right people to live that deal, then that's how we create healthy workplaces.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_00: Where cultures get really toxic is if we promise one thing and we deliver something else, and then everybody gets really pissed off and disengaged, and either tries to get us to deliver on that deal or that creates two toxic camps who think everybody should be doing something different without playing their role to make it happen.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: This is such an interesting conversation.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_01: I've loved this.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_01: I feel like you know, I'm also getting my hat on as well.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_01: Something like you know, like you run a small company and then you're thinking, I'm thinking, oh my gosh, am I am I a good leader?
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_01: Am I creating the right culture?
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it's quite hard, I guess, you know, to know what culture is and how you create it, a positive one.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_01: Have you got any tips?
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_00: I think honestly start with that conversation, you know.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_00: I think um very much in in my business with my team, I do what I do with our clients, which is we have that conversation about how it's feeling.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_00: We do have the vibes conversation, but then it's about why, if it's not feeling quite right, why is that?
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_00: And we always come back to this piece around give and get.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_00: What is it that, you know, so this is what we need, this is what the business needs from you, from a behavioral expectation.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_00: This is how this is what I need you to deliver.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what do you need from me to allow you to feel able to do that?
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_00: So, this idea, I think, of servant leadership or enablement-based leadership is so critical to high performance, where we recognize that particularly in larger organizations, our boots on the ground, there are far more of those than there are of us as leaders.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_00: So, if we organise our business to be in service to our comfort, we're not going to get a huge amount done.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_00: If we organize our business to be setting those people up to succeed, we're much more likely to get more results because they're the people who are truly making the customers come in the door, getting the widgets out the door, or whatever it is.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_00: So, that conversation, I think, set clear expectations.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: This is what I need from you, but then round out the conversation with what do you need from me to make that happen?
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_00: Then you are creating the bones of a really great culture because you're meeting, you're you're meeting the needs of your business and the needs of your team at the same time.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna take that into to next.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_01: our next two meeting.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_01: So thank you, Bob.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_01: That's gonna fall on the basis of our next two meeting.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_01: So what sort of businesses do you work with?
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_01: What size?
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's it's a range really actually.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_00: Most of the businesses that we work with are I'm trying to think, probably probably around 1500 up to about 10,000 people.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_00: So because our approach focuses very much on building capability in organizations rather than just coming in and doing things for you.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_00: I find our approach works best whenever there is a leadership and a kind of HR infrastructure that we can support and build that capability with.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_00: So we generally work with slightly larger organizations but ones that are still nimble enough that they can influence their ways of working because they're you know they're not they're not huge conglomerates really business unit to reorientate it rather than trying it's culture isn't a a true concept across things of that size.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_00: It happens in regions or in business units and things.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_00: So so typically that's that that's the level that we work with um yeah and our focus is very much on this kind of pragmatic outcome based approach what are you trying to achieve what do you need your people do to to do to get you there and then how do you set how your business operates up to make sure that you're creating the conditions that people can do that stuff.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_01: Have you got any success stories?
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_01: You know what has been I guess an outcome a positive outcome for businesses that have gone worked with you you know where have they started and where have they finished?
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah so we work with really two different types of businesses and and the outcomes are different for them.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_00: So one is one where where the deal's gone a bit screwy really.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_00: So normally what's happened is we've just done this with a big um a big um UK retailer actually um where they got acquired by another business and they went through a huge period of integration as all of the systems and processes were realigned.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_00: And in that the business unit um kind of just lost its identity a bit because it was part of this thing but it was still its own brand and its own offering on things and it didn't quite know people didn't really know what it meant to be part of that anymore.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_00: So we did some work with them and what so what the business was trying to do the business leaders were driving themselves potty because everybody was just a bit dissatisfied and what the business leaders were trying to do was make it nice more perks more team days but nothing was sticking.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_00: So we did some work with them to step back and say well what is the deal now?
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_00: Given that you're now part of this entity and there's things influencing and pressuring let's help you reset that deal and understand really what it means to be part of this business moving forward.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_00: And that gave the organizational leadership the what they needed to go and have the conversations of saying is this is this what you want?
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_00: Are you in for this and can you do it?
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_00: And we find that they were able to lift then their energy and connection that they did move some people on from that because some people were like actually no that's not what I signed up for.
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_00: We were we were a small kind of UK retailer and now we're this and that's not where I want to be it's cool.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_00: But a lot of people were like oh I get it okay that bit's hard because we do this but we get this benefit instead.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: So we helped them connect the dots and come to terms I guess with that transition in a way that allowed them to move past the blockers and move on.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_00: So that's the type of work that we do either with businesses going through integration or even high growth businesses because fundamentally as the business matures you might not have access to the owner every day the way that you did before et cetera so helping people understand that is part of what we do.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_00: Or we work with businesses that have been around for a very long time and what they're doing to this point isn't going to get them to the next stage.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_00: So they want to grow or they want to evolve or they want to innovate and we'll help them reset from that parent-child high control relationship into one where people understand their role, feel supported and take responsibility that's a harder shift because often you're asking people to step up and take responsibility in areas that they haven't done but again the um the influence on that is is amazing.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact I've just um we we're kind of like Nanny McFe I was reflecting to a colleague today because I've just had an email from a client that we've been working with for the last 18 months and I've been in there pushing and supporting the reorientation.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's all felt really hard and really tricky because it does for a while because you're resetting the system and um we had a a kind of last meeting with their exec team last week where some things really clicked and moved like the culmination of things and I had an email from their HRD this morning just saying it's moving now you know we've got the they're confident they're clear and they're moving on this independently so you've done what you need to do and and that's what we seek to do actually is we're in there for the sticky bits we're in there for all the doubting moments and not being really sure what to do but our job is then as soon as we see that capability and understanding and will to move things lifting then we extract and just let the business get on with it because they are the best people to keep it living longer term.
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_00: So it's really that that's my favorite bit of the job because you're kind of you know it's a bit like when you teach your kid how to ride a bike you know when you push them off and your hands off the seat and they don't realize that they're riding yet and they just keep moving we get we get to have those moments which is pretty cool to be honest.
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_00: I love that love that analogy so if people are listening to this maybe they're working in HR maybe they run their own businesses um maybe they're um in leadership how do they contact you and learn more about your business yeah so um uh hit me up on LinkedIn if you want um I'm I'm always about there but also our website like this is a real mission thing for us you know we are we are trying not only are we doing culturally differently ourselves but we want other people to do it.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_00: So we've got a lovely free resource section on our website where you can get like a a quick dip test um audit of your own culture you can have a look at some stuff around what might be influencing that within the system etc so go and have a dig around there and sign up to our mealing list and we'll be happily send you loads of lovely free stuff to help you think about this as much as you want to really lovely well thank you so much Paula for joining me today I've really really enjoyed our conversation thank you for listening to another episode of the Work It Like a Mum podcast.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: If you enjoyed this episode please rate review and subscribe and don't forget to share the link with a friend.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_01: If you're on LinkedIn please send me a connection request at Elizabeth Willet and let me know your thoughts on this week's episode.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_01: You can also follow my recruitment site Investing in women on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_01: Until next time, keep on chasing your biggest dream