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Wednesday Mar 23, 2022
Wednesday Mar 23, 2022
No one likes to be faced with the idea that they are going to have to get a lawyer involved, but sometimes it becomes necessary. Michael and I get real about things still happening in the world of bad business and inappropriate actions.
Leighann Lovely 00:15
Let's Talk HR is a place for HR professionals, business owners and employees to come together and share experiences, to talk about what's working and what's not. How we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train and retain all generations of workers. We all know that there has been a huge shift in what people want. generations are coming together, more than ever, on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about how the economy has been impacted, and what needs to happen to find a balance. I'm your host Leighann. Lovely. So let's get this conversation started. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, follow us like us and share us.
Leighann Lovely 01:04
I am excited to have a great conversation with Michael Brown. He is an attorney who spends his time working with employees for employees' rights, contracts, and severance rights, as well as shareholders. This should prove to be an interesting conversation. So please join me. Michael Brown is the founding attorney of DVG Law Partners. Michael's legal practice focuses on employee rights, contract and severance rights and shareholder rights. He helps clients with negotiations, and when necessary litigation. Michael has been recognized as a rising star in this Super Lawyers publication, and has a superb rating from Avvo. With Michael's assistance, many clients have achieved highly successful legal and financial outcomes. Michael likes to spend his free time with his wife and three children. Together they enjoy travel, recreation, great Mexican food at certain favorite places and chasing their dog, whose name is Justice. Welcome, Michael. I am so excited to have you here today with me to you know, talk with me.
Michael Brown 02:24
Thank you. I'm excited to be here.
Leighann Lovely 02:26
So why don't we start off with you know, why don't you tell me a little bit about yourself and and the law that you practice? You know, what area that that you're in? Sure.
Michael Brown 02:37
Well, currently my law firm, which is a solo practice, I work with other attorneys often from other law firms and so on. But my my current legal practice mostly involves employee rights, or shareholder type rights. Most of my clients are individuals, you know, who are in the employment or the business context, then they had us stronger, wealthier opponent, however, you want to look at it do something, whether it was terminate their job, and from a seventh arrangement, or in the case of like a minority shareholder, there could be a group of majority shareholders who kind of gang up on the minority shareholder because they have more voting shares. And then sometimes that person's an employee as well, certainly employment law issues, as well as business or contract law issues and so on. But generally, I represent individuals for the most part who had any disputes, you know, whether it's in court, which I do a lot of court work and work in different legal forums, you know, like EEOC or Equal Rights Division, like agencies that enforce certain types of employment laws. But I do work in litigation, those different forums. And then I also do work in negotiations to try to help parties reach a settlement. And that that sometimes, I mean, a lot of times that occurs without litigation or before any litigation is necessary. But then cases in litigation are usually settled on average, if they don't lose, and then a lot of cases, the opponent tries to win the case, and they fail, and then they're open a settlement layer point, and so on. But yeah, that's most of the work I do is for individuals and disputes for those types. I also represent small businesses sometimes with like, a breach of contract issues, or, you know, the common denominators. Usually, my case is usually a larger opponent, you know, if I'm representing a company, it's usually against the larger company or organization. And my client is usually the plaintiff or the one you know, that had a financial loss or had something they allege was wrong, you know, like a job termination that was unlawful or whatever it is a breach contract by the other side. They had something that happened to him that they allege is legally wrong, and I agree with them, and that they lost money, usually a significant amount of money, case of job loss, obviously lose your income. And so a lot of the employment law, you know, recovery or potential awards or relief from the legal process involved paying someone for what they lost and lost income, you know, as a result of being improperly fired. But then on the business context, you know, it could be recovery of money related to profits or, you know, represent shareholders that were deprived of like dividends and employees who, like, had a big sale or sales person. And then the employer says, Oh, well, now that you made that sale, we don't want to pay you according to your commission formula, and you're fired, by the way, you know, like, that actually happens. Yeah.
Leighann Lovely 05:31
Wow, know that? I mean, is that happen frequently? Or is that kind of like a random every once in five year? I can't, I'm a sales person.
Michael Brown 05:47
I mean, it's hard for me to say if it's frequent, because I, you know, I only get the people calm either had something bad happen to the whole industry, but I'll definitely say it's not uncommon. And if there's a financial motivation for an employer save a lot of money, right. And then also, if they don't like the worker, or if there's an issue of discrimination there, they have a problem, workers age or race or whatever, like, there are a lot of different types of conflicts. And so some are more common than other others in my world. But yeah, it's it's it's not uncommon for the I mean, a lot of people shorted wages a lot of different ways. The kind of situation where if a sales not like a one salesman client that earn is a 1%, commission on revenue $100 million sale. So you're like over a million dollars he earned, you know, a guardians commission formula, Yorker, this employer for over like 15 years. But at the point he did that the employer is like, whoa, million dollars, a lot of money. And they tried to press him to take far less, which he refused. And then they fired him. And he wound up having to retain me after he tried with a business lawyer for a while to work things out and couldn't, and so on and so forth. But I mean, there's there are all these disputes, that kind of morphed out of human drama, and a lot of human drama. Someone does want to pay someone something else.
Leighann Lovely 07:08
And you would think that you know, the business, look at how much money the business is making. I mean, come on, pay your employee, what they're what they, but you're right. And, you know, it saddens me that you know, one, I'm sure you love what you do. Obviously, you wouldn't do what you do if you didn't love what you do. But you also are seeing, I guess, kind of the thieves of the world you're seeing the the negative side of society, you're seeing where people are coming to you because they're like, Yeah, I've been wronged in some way. Or allegedly, do I need to write? That's fine. I mean, yeah, they they're, they're coming to you, because you're so you're, you're really seeing the world from I guess, Hey, I've been wronged helped me write this situation, which is, I suppose the great side of your job is you get to help people. Right, what has been wrong, but you're also seeing really that side of the society, which is there are businesses or there are people or there are whatever it might be that do try to get away with this kind of stuff. Yeah. So yeah, yeah, that's, that's kind of I'm sure the downturn, the upside of your job is that I'm when you have your great successes, and you're like, Yep, I made this right for this person, and they walk away extremely grateful to you for being able to write that.
Michael Brown 08:40
Yeah, that's, that's all true. Yeah. You know, kind of a related thing that I enjoy with my legal practices, because I'm, you know, I have my own business. I'm my own boss, and I work for law firms, as well as some large companies like along the way of my legal career, but well, you know, the main reason I started my own firm had more to do with just practice expense and stuff, like I worked with really nice, good group of lawyers, I still work case with from time to time and really like them as people and lawyers, and so on. But the, like, it was just more much more cost effective for me because I didn't need a lot of things that certain other lawyers need need truly for their practice area and splitting those costs. And so as someone that can, like choose my own clients, I'm not forced to represent a corporation or forced by a law firm to work for this long term business client they have that I personally don't like or think is wrong, or like, I'm fortunate that I can choose my clients and only work for people who I believe are right, you know, legally and factually. Although that's 100%. You know, there are always times or evidence comes up surprise me on it wasn't right about that or so. But, you know, generally speaking if I think someone's credible after initially talking over their situation, reviewing their documents, and so on, usually at the end of the representation, there's no change in that, you know, like, you know, I try to represent people I think are credible, and all that. But what what? So while I'm mindful, like ways that I think workers, or you know, business people, so are legitimately hurt by the practices of large corporations or government employers on like large organizations, and I'm really attuned to, and I'll admit, I'm biased against large corporations and so on, because of all the experiences I have, whatever a big part of being a lawyer is, you're there for this whole process. And you're also dealing with opposing parties all the time. So you come to realize that there are people too, you know, just because people do bad things, Acts, you know, fire someone right in the middle of a surgery leave or something that is like, wow, that lacks compassion, like, you really want to cut this person off the income, and they work for yourself, like, these things that like, I really want to be judged, you know, and that's my job requires me to judge, predict what a real judge would say, and litigate all that. But even with all that said, when I truly believe the evidence shows the other side was wrong, and so on. In dealing with them, you recognize plenty of good things, plenty of things they do, right, you know how other people with good and bad things they've done in the full scope. But yeah, when you're in my practice area, and if you, if you talk to attorneys that work in individual rights, they're probably going to focus more on like how people get disadvantaged, you know, by the large companies and corporations and a lot of factors involved with that. And also, as a lawyer on that side of the fence, so to speak for the little guy, you, you find yourself talking about that stuff, in part, because of there's a lot of misinformation out there. From the corporate side, there's all this, it what it does is propaganda, but they call it public relations. So there's these, there's a multi billion dollar industry of these think tanks and media conduits they have, and so on that intentionally perpetuate these motions, like people looking to bring lawsuits or looking to win the lottery. And they're overwhelming the courts with frivolous lawsuits, and so on and so forth. And lawyers and individual rights practice are just like, No, that's not how the world is operated. And even think in terms of common sense. Like, lawyers don't take frivolous cases, because they're going to a lot of us are paid most of our income on contingency basis where we only paid if a case settles, which means there's merit to it, you know, if anything significant is paid, or if it wins, so we don't want to take frivolous cases or bring them to court. So as a result, there aren't a lot of at least in the courts. But when I try to be objective, I look from the employer or company standpoint, there are certain types of legal processes, like discrimination complaints, for example, where it's very easy for a worker who's wronged to or who truly believes they're wrong, for good reason, you know, they got fired, and that that hurts that big consequence. And then they like, call me and point out two things, I think, yeah, those are legitimately wrong things, and you can prove them and so on. But it's only a certain subset of wrong things are actually discriminatory. So people that were wronged in some way, filed the wrong type of complaint, where maybe a different legal complaints more appropriate, or no legal complaint could, you know, fix the situation like there's no law violated just the wrong thing. And common common sense sort of wrong or, right. But anyway, like that, those types of complaints where people can find on their own, I can sympathize with employers, in some cases, because a lot of those people, if they talked to me, I would have said, this isn't a good case for a discrimination complaint for one reason or another. So I don't know, I don't wanna say there's like, no big like, if, or if there's a small business employer, and they happen to fire like, one worker ever, and it was a bad employee. And it turns out that one worker filed a discrimination case of Honda, lasting three years and costing the employer you know, $36,000, in corporate defense, legal fees, I couldn't sit, you know, who might say they're wrong or whatever, without looking at that, or that their belief sets, you know, don't make sense. But as far as like the public systemic information about the state of Legal Affairs and the law system, it's a complete whitewash, from my perspective, like corporations and large organizations dominate, they have more money, they have more access to lawyer, they have more help and they played the game, they fight. Fire 1000s of people so they, they know how to document things. If they have an unlawful motive, they know how to hide it. They play games with withholding documents and information and the legal process discovery as it's called, you know, so there's, there's all sorts of systemic things. I'm very confident saying a lot of large companies do wrong. But I tried to unload everyone, I talked to you about that stuff, right. Like, just solve their problem.
Leighann Lovely 14:46
And there cases, and you know, you read about these there are there are a lot of cases where you have it's the human factor there. There are certain situations where you have somebody who is under threat in their position and they don't know any better, they make a mistake. They just don't know any better. You see this a lot in undertrained recruiters, when they are asking questions they shouldn't be asking when it during like a hiring process. You know, I hear about this all the time they ask simple questions like, will do have children, because they are trying to get to know somebody, well, you can't during an interview you, you can't ask them. You know, and I, again, somebody could turn around and go, Whoa, they didn't hire me. But you know, during the interview process, they did ask me, if I had children, they discriminated against me, because they didn't hire me, they found out that I have kids. And that's the reason that they didn't hire it. Sometimes it's about the person not being educated enough and making a mistake in a certain simple thing. Other times, it is a blatant, like, we're going to do this, we're going to cover it up, we're gonna, you know, some of the small companies out there, they're not educated enough, and they they make the mistake of, we're going to terminate this person. And sometimes the person firing them has no idea that somebody else in the company is aware that this person may have disclosed something about their background that would make them a protected class. And all of a sudden, that person goes well, I I just disclosed this information about myself. And now they're firing me. Wait a second that they just discriminated against? There's so many things and and again, yeah, you're you're on that side of weeding through Is this a frivolous case? Is there merit to this, and but you're right, the large the huge companies out there, who have been at it for ever, and know exactly what to do, how to do it properly, how to not put something in an employee file, because they know if they do that's going to, and again, I've been in the HR, you know, I've been in HR one way or another for over 17 years, I was taught early on, here's what you don't document, here's what you do not write down, here's what you do write down. And it's like, wow, these are, these are blatant things that the company is explaining, Hey, you can't put this in the file. Because if we ever get sued, that's gonna be a problem. And it's like, you're covering your butt from the very beginning, just in case this employer ever comes after you for anything?
Michael Brown 17:39
Yeah. Yeah, that's, that's all true. Although, I guess what I would say to on that point of not documenting things, like you're absolutely right. And I think the best way, like, if you're in, like, if you're working in HR, and you're in that specific context, you know, the work that we're talking about, you know, what they're telling you not to document, you can more readily tell, you know, if it's kind of a devious thing, versus what I'm about to talk about, but sometimes I'll just see, like, sometimes I give clients advice, not to document things, but not, but it's like, I'll say, Don't email anybody other than me about your legal case. But it's not because Oh, you're going to tell lies, and, but it's more that anything you email the other the opposing party can get. So it makes life a lot simpler, you know, if you just don't email anything that you don't need to write, or, and, and a lot of times just people want to vent to people that it doesn't really help them. And all it does is create risk, you know, through gossip them, get back to the lawyer or whatever. But yeah, you're right. Like, there, there are definitely tried and true methods, you know, that employers use, you know, like, administration wise in house and then also in the legal system, just common games, during depositions, common games, that opposing company, lawyers play, and so on. And those things are systemic, and they come up over and over and over again, from my standpoint. And, you know, it's, it's frustrating if I let it be, but, but you know, you just have to deal with it. Try to respond. The best he can
Leighann Lovely 19:12
Right, and it's also it is it truly comes down to two, you know, we are living in a technology world, anything. Absolutely anything that you put on your computer you put can be found. Once it hits the web, it exists, and it can't go away. I mean, it's just it's a simple fact. So if you want to say something, you want to just go vent and get something off your chest, don't email it. Right, have a have a face to face conversation with somebody. And trust me there are plenty of times where I'm like, I need to go invent I sit down. My dad is my go to person. My husband is my go to person, you know, and that's okay, I got it off my chest. I've said everything I need to say I'm over it, but I sure as hell I'm not gonna email along. Hey, I need to get this off my chest because God forbid I say something that in 10 years haunts me. And they're like, did you know that she?
Michael Brown 20:12
Yeah. Yeah. Is there interesting issues for sure. It reminded me when I was in law school, which is 20 years ago that I had a criminal law professor, like, I went to Madison, and it's a so called progressive or liberal environment, they call like, an independent politically, I don't think what they call liberal back then is, and they call liberal right now, or remotely the same thing, like, but But um, but anyway, like, Madison's what people would call like, a democratic, you know, pro individual in their mind, you know, institution that teaches, you know, quote, unquote, liberal and progressive values to help people and which, I argue is probably not the case on the whole nowadays, but But anyway, that's the reputation so on. And at the time, I went to school as much more that way than now. And the law professor I had, however, despite this liberal background, he went to Madison also on his his job, like his main job in the in the private sector was he was the head of Wisconsin's prison system, which is kind of the most institutional job you can imagine, you know, so as to the progressive stuff. But he said something I thought was super interesting to the class as class huge lectures, college students, including meanings he said, How many of us have committed felonies, and we all kind of thought we're living on, you know, a minute or whatever. But he said, all of us. And I was like, whoa. But then I gave a thought. And I was like, well, there's so many felonies and so many laws, I haven't thought like, the felony. Like, if you're 16 years old, you knock over a mailbox, which I've done to migrate and bears, you know, but like, but if you really give it a thought, and so on, like we all have done wrong and violate some law and other but this point was made greater by like mentioning the word felony. But So while most of us haven't, you know, committed murder, kidnapped, or done some of the so called horrible things that popped to mind first, with felonies right, you give it further thoughts, like, we all have some degree of guilt. And so like having that humility, at least in the back of your mind throughout any type of conflict, definitely how
Leighann Lovely 22:17
It's so interesting that you say that because I was I was actually at a networking event. And there was the the presenter was an attorney. And on the criminal side, and she stands up, and she started presenting, and the first thing that she says is, how many of you in this room have an OWI or DUI, and you go, and of course, nobody in the room raised their hand, like you're sitting in a room of professionals in your life. And she goes, you're sitting at a table, and these are tables of force? She goes, you're sitting at a table with somebody who does? And we're all like, really, we are like, Well, nobody's going to admit it. Now, how many people in this room have driven drunk? And we're just like, well, holy shit, probably everybody. Now, if you consider what the legal limit for drunk is, I mean, it's like, it's very low. Now. Did I know at the time that I was intoxicated, when I drove? Do I did I know that my, my alcohol levels would have if I would have blown that they would have been right at that threshold? I don't know. Should I have been driving? No, I absolutely. Um, this is not about, you know, gee, you can have a couple beers. I'm not. That's absolutely. I'm not advocating. But the point being, is that the same, it's the same premice is that, you know, you, you have to really realize what, you know, you can't sit there and point a finger at somebody and go, Oh, how dare you break the law. I mean, it's a reality that each and every one of us at one point in our lives have broken the law, especially living in the state of Wisconsin, where in college, majority of the college students, not everybody partook in some type of excessive of drinking, or, you know, we've all walked into a store, stolen a pack of gum, or whatever it might be somebody at some you've broken the law. Right? You use the felony example. But you know, you're sitting in a network, nobody is going to admit it openly. But yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's just it's, and so we need to stop pointing our fingers at people and go, Yeah, we are only human. And we make human mistakes. Which note so this leads me into my next question. So, you know, this is obviously a very interesting it's a very for me, I'm a geek, I'm an HR geek, you know, employee, right, geek. I'm all here to talk. How did you determine and choose the area of law that you decided to go into and I can imagine or maybe not, maybe it's just new tricks, you know, old dog new tricks kind of thing. Well, that It doesn't make sense anyways, you know, how did you choose the area of law? And has it changed over the last 510 years with the way that companies have treated employees? The the different things that people come to you for and need?
Michael Brown 25:18
Yeah, remind me of that second question, what thing? Because the first ones probably might take, like, a little bit longer to answer but like, because I as far as choosing my area lot, I feel like I didn't entirely choose it because it was like, a response of things. Like I saw job opening. And it was for employment law firm. I didn't know anything about her ever think really practicing employment law or employee rights.
Leighann Lovely 25:45
So it found you. Well, yeah, kinda,
Michael Brown 25:49
I mean, I had interest in it to apply. And I thought, Oh, this could be interesting. But like it early, my legal career, I actually started out law school doing privacy law stuff is right at the time that this HIPAA law was going into effect. So there's all sorts of compliance work that needs to be done, and so on. So I law clerk for the UW Hospital. And I my first legal job was working for a affiliate of the UW Hospital, clinical affiliate entity, and they want a merging with another affiliate. So I lost my job. Some other people that too, as part of that, I want to the corporation that that time called cobalt, which Blue Cross Blue Shield and, and, but But anyway, like that corporation, I got laid off as well after several years, and then they had a merger. And then so you know, me and other people were looking for work at that time, too. And then looking at the jobs I, you know, I can say I guess I picked employment law because I had offer like I had an offer to work for another corporation when kind of comparable. And then there are other types of law firms, a couple other law firms right offers in different practice areas, including I'll tell really quick story like criminal law, tort law, because it goes back to what you're mentioning, but on criminal lawyer interviewed with us, interesting guy to talk to. And he's he said, he said, Yeah, people always approached me and say, like, at cocktail parties, and they say, how can you represent guilty people? Or at least some of your clients, you know, are guilty? How can you do that? And then he goes, those same people line of commie later because they need me to represent them or their family member? Yeah. So it's like, it kind of goes back to your point, like, everyone has something guilty for, you know, at some point, whether or not you're caught or whatever, but a big part of is just owning up to it, and that in the art and consequential, you know, the penalties and so on. But also, it's I think the bigger relevance of that as the humility standpoint of our culture is does not promote humility, whatsoever. It's all about political infighting. I'm right, you're wrong, you fail, you know, Let's roast this person laugh. So. So it's like, all this stuff is geared towards this one loss mentality and not towards introspection, in my opinion, you know, or like, looking at one's own faults, or humility or forgiveness are a bunch of like not to get into my religion stuff. On my view, I'm a Christian, in my view of that is like, internal stuff yet, even in the Christian institutions, like, it seems like there's too much external force, if you judge, you judge, you're the center. And it's like, well, that's not what I get out of out of this. But still, I fall victim to kind of say, in outside of the religious kind of any context, like culturally, these lodges, I feel like promoting busting others and not introspecting not forgiving that being humble. And, and I think that really matters. Because if that attitude is kind of set in those bad ways, it's sabotage everything for everybody. But all that stuff aside, when I applied for the jobs, you know, I went, I want to take a job, this employment law firm, because I thought it might be interesting. And that law, they're good and bad things like about that law firm environment in a small business environment. And, and then I just want to work in a couple law firms and Waukee employee rights and like, I really liked the practice area, it's in terms of like, interest level, it's never boring, you know, it's always human karma, you know, so it's like it, you know, I'm not someone that watches soap operas, but it's still it's like, if something is, you know, sensationalistic or human drama, it's just like, human nature. It's more interesting than like reading some dried, you know, legalese thing, or, you know, and then just doing it purely on emotional exercise or puzzle solving sort of thing, you know, so it's engaging, and I believe, you know, on the client side representative, for the most part, even when I worked for firms where they might have certain clients I wouldn't have chosen or whatever. So generally, I identified like I felt the clients from the right and so that mattered, you know, like doing something I believe the person is actually right and enjoying the work and finding interesting and not getting bored so on something that was all good. I pretty much stuck with that and and and move on and in like years of that arc, because I don't look to change areas of law so much at certain times, I look to, you know, to change a law firm environment to like, I move back to the Fox Valley, because my has worked in Waukee for a number of years, Madison before that, but moved back home to Fox Valley area where my parents are, still are and my wife has a family that wound up congregating here as well. So just with our kids, very young, first child at very young age, you know, we moved back here mainly for those reasons. But also the employment law allows you flexibility, so I could practice representing clients still from Milwaukee or anywhere in the state, in fact, in other states under federal law, so I, I want to get involved in like, cases, you know, the federal court in California or Washington, DC, you know, labor thing, you know, where there's a Washington DC based administrative judge who's presiding over the matter, lineup traveling here and there for representing clients. But most legal work actually is remote, you know, just on your computer and phone and occasionally go to a lot of times record, you can hear by phone or video, you know, rather than having to travel as well. So,
Leighann Lovely 31:09
So employment law, you can actually practice is that nationally, I mean, each state is that what I'm understanding?
Michael Brown 31:21
Yeah, so there's the federal law that applies nationaly, you know, and so there's federal discrimination law, for example, is a big area. And so like, if, if an employee is fired because of a disability issue related to disability, because it doesn't matter? Yeah, Americans with Disability Act like that. So then that person, even if they're another state, I can represent them. And in fact, that more often than not, I can usually represent someone if they want me to, you know, that's inquiry from a different state. It's usually, but yeah, it can get if an issue is primarily state law, that contract law is a good example. Like if, if a doctor you know, has a kind of employment contract with the hospital, and that one of the parties alleges that contract was breached, because the doctor gets fire or whatever Doctor pay or something and they say, the doctor says a contracts breach, usually a straight contract. Issue, like that is usually a state law issue. And in fact, the contracts often say on the state laws of Wisconsin apply, and a lawsuit must be brought in Wisconsin state court or so. But even by default, like that's the case for certain issues that their state law specific. Okay, so now kind of matters to subject matter whether attorney can step out of state to represent or not
Leighann Lovely 32:41
Interesting. So it has Have things changed, you know, with, because, obviously, you know, we talked a little bit about employers have gotten smarter in the way that they do things, but have things changed with, especially now with a lot more employers or additions, employers employees being more open over the last year with their mental health, with more employees coming out and talking about, you know, their addiction, or so, has that had an impact people coming to you with the discrimination? Or? I mean, has that changed over the last 510 years?
Michael Brown 33:25
You know, it's a really good question. It's kind of hard for me to answer because there's, there have been so many things that I, I think have been going on, since I felt like I first started employee rights practice in 2004, sort of over that, you know, over 15 years. And in that time, there have been a number of things that I see as constants that are problematic from like the corporate standpoint and government standpoint. And also, like legal systems standpoint, like deficiencies and, like, personnel of the federal government, for example, it's just some of these agencies, it's just a joke. I mean, it's just like, you'd be amazed as a non lawyer, like, if you first think, honor, like, certain department of labor, personnel, you're like, Oh, my God, this person refuses to give me their name on the phone, and their government is in charge of investigating this case. And they tell me, they won't tell me their name. And they're supposed to issue a decision on this legal decision in writing. And they left it out, they claim they made the decision but left a voice message on my clients phone two years ago, like it's just like really mind blowing stuff for like, what you think is the law and what's supposed to happen is very different from the situation you actually deal with, with the government, employees and so on. But there's also just a huge problem like overload of cases on investigators desk and just insufficient resources and personnel allocated, and that's still going on. Since I started employment, you know, like, I'm sure before but but it's gotten worse, you know, far worse and I and that's part of it. One of the factors, many factors that drove me to political independence. But like at the time, back in the day, I was a Democrat. And I thought like democratic appointees like Obama's appointees and stuff would fix that situation or better. But over time, like their appointees were less and less individual rights are progressive oriented to amateur athletes is progressive or democratic, just like, but you know, do they care? Do they have a beating heart about individual rights? Like, will they ever decide to quit? Would they ever decide a case to employees favoring or like feeling employees wrong? And you actually have some judges and stuff, not the majority. But you have some, like Alito, for the Supreme Court, like he has made a thing during his confirmation process that he had never decided discrimination, summary judgment motion, in favor of the employees like, and those are pretty common motions in federal court. So like, my guess is he might have had hundreds of those types of options and always decided in favor of the employer. And he gave on that he gave some explanation like, Well, the good case is usually settled before they get to that point. And while that's true, like in part, it definitely is true at some of those cases. But there are all sorts of very strong employee rights cases that go to summary judgment stage, where the employer is not offered a dime of settlement. And in fact, some of them are aggressively like, bad mouthing us. So it's like, the strength of a case is not the employer never sees the case against them as strong. So it's like, Alito, his explanation does not explain that circumstance, you know, so Right. So as a like, as an app, politically act interested person, I've had worse and worse disappointment, seeing what the Democratic Party in particular has devolved or backtrack to like, in just everything's getting more and more corporate, you know, on the Republican appointees, in my mind report, pro corporate too. So it's heavy against the work, you know, you have judges that they're there, in the case of state judges, fifth campaign funds paid by large industries, or like companies or industry groups. And that's, that's a legitimate potential conflict of interest, at least, I'd like to take Pfizer in that situation, as a judge, I would be, say, look, I gotta be honest with myself, like, I'll feel indebted as a good human being to this company that gave me a lot of money, just as a matter of parent, like, I still remember someone like, let me 20 bucks five years ago, and I forgot to pay him back, you know. So it's like, it's a good thing, in some ways, like want to repay. But I think it's just a bad dynamic for that whole system. Right? Dominant.
Leighann Lovely 37:40
So it's, it's interesting, because it seems that it doesn't matter. It's political driven either way, is what I'm hearing is that, even though we as a society are continuing to accept people more, and we now have more protected classes, employers are now becoming aware and offering all of these different resources for, you know, employees and everything, it doesn't seem to matter, because it seems that these issues are still politically driven on decisions, regardless of acceptance within the workplace, and it really comes down to the employer.
Michael Brown 38:21
Um, yeah, I agree with most of what you said, I think, like individual court decisions, I guess, I don't usually observe to be like political per se. But But I do think that the whole, like, there are these orientations or mindsets or ideologies, we have. And I mean, I can speak to like, my own side, you know, like, starting out on plaintiff's employment practice, I was very involved with Democratic stuff, go to fundraisers contribute, you know, donations and stuff as an individual, you know, but like I would, I would, I would do that and try to get Democrats elected and, and so on to judge position, you know, and so I'm thinking, like, yeah, this judge is going to be more likely to give individually, I didn't think they'd be biased in favor of individuals more like this judge could is not is not necessarily going to side with a big company, just because they're, you know, that the logo and the name recognition or like, they'll actually consider the individual side and stuff without any sort of bias. Like that's how I like looked at it. People on the business side might look at it not how you play, the players just want judges that are gonna decide cases and favorite individual. No, I can't, that's irrational or whatever. But, but anyway, we all try to look at it our own way, what political person we support. But I think really reality is that over time, the legal system has done more and more like all systems, right? Governments and so on have been more and more corporations do better and better, the largest corporations do better and better whereas the small businesses do worse and worse. And so I don't want to lump the small businesses in like this bad behavior, I'm talking about this. Now, my view, it's usually the smaller an organization is you have more accountability, you have less leverage and wealth, you know, the hold over people, workers, even if they're even still unfair, and they don't have enough leverage is held more than in the large corporate setting so as to see like less problems like, or impactful, like society problems coming from small business isn't stuff. But what gets kind of weird like that when I'm in these networking contexts or whatever, sometimes, small business owners will look at me like, well, you're just looking to sue us or whatever, that's right. No, no, I, I know, I look like the skunk in the room, because I'm the employee rights guy. But like, a lot of what I think is most problematic in the world really starts with the ultra rich, and the politicians my view that they control and the systems of governance that they more than us everyday people influence, you know, and, and so that's in my mind, that's kind of like the problems really start up there. If you look back and been, you know, and then filter down to those that kind of, can't afford those same like, kind of readings of the system or gerrymandering, gerrymandering of the political district or whatever right? tricks they can afford to do.
Leighann Lovely 41:15
Yeah. So do you think that and, you know, my next question is, I think that it's kind of become a little bit less relevant because of, you know, where this conversation has, you know, kind of gone, but do you think, a society, we have definitely become more inclusive, and we've become more open to, you know, a wide variety of things. And so speaking from the employee rights side, do you think that employers will will try to be better? Do you think that there will be an emphasis on training and on understanding of employees rights more now, because of what has happened and transpired over the last, it's been more than a year, I was gonna say, in the last year, it's now been, you know, a year and a half, almost two years? Do you think that that employers are going to try to be better and do better, especially some of these larger employers? Or do you think that they're going to just continue down the same path of let's just continue to do the cover ups pay the expense too, because we've definitely shined a light on the fact that there are a lot of issues within our society that people need more from their employers, and they expect more from their employers, and they have the ability to leave, if they want to. And employers are now under the gun. So do you think that that employers will invest more in being better for their employees? And that you'll see, I guess, less employee claims against employers because they need to be better?
Michael Brown 42:50
That's a good question. And it's, I guess, it'd be hard for me to answer like, the one thing that's pretty new to me, and probably all of us is just the change in a number of employers having a shortage of workers COVID phenomenon. And that the fact you know, that that has been like a significant effect. I don't know, though, how that falls on. Like, in my mind, it falls more on the smaller employers having shown this in the larger ones, but I don't know that you know, like,
Leighann Lovely 43:23
It does. I mean, a lot of the smaller, the smaller employers, the employers are struggling more because they can't afford to pay as much as the larger employers, but the larger employers are struggling, just, you know, they're struggling the same. It's across the board. It is, Vince, you gave an example, one of the star salespeople sells a, I can't remember what that number was, but it was a huge sale, and they were gonna make a million dollar in commission, and they, you know, let's just let the employee go versus paying that. Well, in today's society, you may not be able to replace that, that employee, you may not be able to replace a star sales person because they just don't exist right now. And other you know, companies out there are willing to offer small employers not going to be able to pay a million dollar commission, but there the trade off is they're willing to do whatever they can to make that employer happy, that employee happy. So yeah, even the large corporations are under the gun to do better be better. And I just wonder if that if, and I guess I'm not asking you to foretell the future. But it's an interesting thought to think that employers need to clean up their act. And that doesn't just mean Hey, pay me better. That extends to hey, if you if you're doing some sneaky stuff behind the scenes of treating your employees, shitty in firing people because you find out that you know, he drinks too much at home and he might be an alcoholic. Let's get rid of before he becomes a problem, you know, that's, that's shady stuff.
Michael Brown 45:05
Yeah, I agree. Like, it's a really good issue in question to bring up, it's because like, part of me is thinking, well, there are certain individuals that, you know, just are looking to cheat people, for lack of a better ethics a minority people, and, you know, but just certain individuals, like whether it's an issue over 10 bucks, or it's an issue over a million dollar sale Commission, which, you know, if a small business salesman get some $100 million contract, it's, it is the same as you know, but it's like, but then, but then that same issue of greed confronts that small business owner that maybe as a small business they hadn't had experience with before or whatever. And so maybe they're greedier than they otherwise would have been, or whatever. But, but um, I think part of me is thinking, well, people that are inclined to kind of cheat or whatever, probably going to do that, or, you know, press or take from someone unfairly are probably going to do that, or at risk to do that no matter what environment they're in, whether it's large company, or small, or what year it is, or whatever. But then on the other hand, it's if with a worker shortage that leverages leverage, so to speak. And so if, if a worker it like a worker is going to be more valued, on average for doing their job, if they're doing it satisfactory, in that circumstance, than a work or in a situation where they're doing their job well, but there's a, you know, hundreds of job applicants waiting to take his or her job at any point, you know, so I think the leverage itself makes a difference. I will say, though, that as far as the mindset and emotions and I ideology, like all that, like wanting to do better for workers, I don't I think companies only gotten worse. But I think all all of society has gotten worse. I think a lot of that boils down to what I view as propaganda from the mute like mainstream what people think is normal mainstream media, I think is hate talk, like not not legally actionable hate speech. It's hate. It's like, I only pay attention. So I know who's gonna hate who including me, for what reason, I don't watch it, because I think there's anything constructive or useful as a citizen I can do or think about it, or any good can come from it. For the most part. Yeah. And along that lines, I think a lot of these things with, like, if you're talking about like the Civil Rights Act, or like Americans Disability Act, sitting on additional protections that like, there's been all sorts of very, you know, meaningful changes in the law in a more opening and inclusive direction of giving more people rights, and there's no doubt about it. And like, more means to contest situations if someone's been fired on basis, the race and so on. But with all that said, and like all that groundwork and stuff, which is still there, to an extent, I think like the the spirit a lot of that, behind it is gone, it's become more like the political landscape. It's more about this litmus test of like, how do I compare my race or my religion to someone else's, or, or even if it's not any of those factors of like, race, or identity, or sexuality, or if it's, if it's just like a factor of this person, the other political party here, or people in a different country, or whatever it is, I just think a lot of the function of politics is to kind of like, take some concepts that used to be good things like he caught, or there are good things, but the meaning behind them all was like equal opportunity, and like treating others with compassion and stuff. And then kind of taking those concepts of like race discrimination wherever but then kind of using them for the wrong context. Like when some Facebook debate with someone you know, so yeah, it's up to you. Like, I'll say, I have a problem with this politician selling arms to this to Saudi Arabia or whatever. Yeah, like, and they use the arms for bad reasons, in my opinion, and I have a problem with that, and then get a response that was just like a white male to say that, you know, okay, so you know, it but but that the other is I mentioned that, as I say, Oh, poor me on Unnai as a white male, like, I definitely have had it easy. You know, because of that, and a lot of ways throughout my whole life. But the reason why I noticed that reaction, because it happens more and more over time. In fact, I serve it more towards like others and stuff. But it's like, if we sit back and say like, what are we really doing here? If we're talking about something that has nothing to do with anybody's race or religion, and then it's just culturally acceptable to interject those things to like, win that argument, say they lose and they like that's the kind of finding the problem with and repeated observational, and this
Leighann Lovely 49:41
is why I try to stay away from just reading random social media because it drives me crazy when you look on a perfectly normal social media post and all of a sudden it digresses into some buddy bringing in something that has nothing to do with The original post but becomes this argument about politics, race or religion. We are coming to time. So this the question of the season. Okay, I've been asking everybody this question. So if you could pinpoint a time period in your career that made a huge difference in your life or career path. When would that be? And why?
Michael Brown 50:23
Yeah, that's a great question. For me, yeah, ties a little bit into being an employment lawyer and seeing things from that perspective, but also just I think it could have been something that happened me no matter what my profession or whatever, but, like there's a point in time in my career where I knew I want to do a play rights law but I also wasn't in a city I knew I didn't want to be in for long term because of my kid and so on work environment wasn't exactly what I wanted and so on. But that was like the first time where I was proactive, like my own destiny instead of just looking at job postings, you know, like an Appleton or Fox Valley where I want to move and seeing okay, what's available there. I actually thought to myself, Where do I want to work? So I knew the city what type of law firm environment do I want to have? How many hours you know, I roughly wanna work do I want to work in the type of legal practices a lot of hourly billing clients which has its own pressures and and and risks for clients and stuff but also just pressures an attorney you got to build a certain number of hours a year and incentives that can sometimes go bad with that and so on. But you know, I just give thought to like all these factors like once I had some experience and like I knew is generally what I wanted area law but I knew like more administratively and practice wise and lifestyle wise through experience kind of what I wanted. So at that point, so looking at the job postings and so on, I I call up someone I knew that was a connector but I can't remember how they like some person that was recommended by someone else I trust that worked in the Fox Valley where I'm from but I just didn't really know as high school and grew up and stuff but I didn't know any attorneys really at the time in the area so I found someone's an attorney was recommended by someone I trust that has told this person like here's here's I was looking for a job thanks for spending your time talking to me and you know, the local scene and so on but like, here's the type of legal work I do here's the type of law firm environment I'm looking for and the type of hours and thought so forth. And then telling him that he recommended someone he's like, Hey, there's there's a guy law firm I know and the guy the first name it was Peterson Bergen Crosse in Appleton But as John Peterson you only refer me to like the first name under the law firm. He's like, You should call John I just called up John randomly never having talked to him before like, hey, you know, I'm unfamiliar. It's for him Locky like alert, you might be interested, like having someone like you work for he's like, sure. They're just like, come on talk interview. Like, like, even talk to his other fighters and stuff. Yeah, I want like interviewing, I think a couple times, you know, all the lawyers there and stuff before I was hired. But it's just funny, like how that worked out. And it was a it was a great work environment, I still interact and talk with those folks and stuff. And, you know, good people, good attorneys. And, but so it but that was really the first job I had that I like truly felt I chose myself and chose wisely and chose, like educating myself in the right ways. But it was mainly because it was proactive on my part, you know, like you can get a job listing. So I'm do a good job research, like talk to people that know that people have done that, too, you know, and gotten saved from taking a couple bad job offers, you know, in the past, you know, from doing that, but I think being proactive is a big part of it. Well, that's
Leighann Lovely 53:45
awesome. And it is it's it's often about who you know, and and when you decide that you're going to take you know the direction or really take control of your of your destiny, asking the right people getting to know the right people asking for advice. That's usually when the bus things happen. And that's awesome. And thank you for sharing that. And I really appreciate you coming on and talking to me today. Um, this has been a very educational conversation for me, especially, you know, talking with somebody who, who really truly is in the in the thick of, you know, a side of society and business and has a background that is way beyond my understanding, and you know, the legal side of things. So I truly thank you Michael for talking with me today.
Michael Brown 54:35
Oh, no problem. And thank you for having me on as I really enjoyed it. And it was interesting for me as well. Well, you
Leighann Lovely 54:40
have a wonderful day.
Michael Brown 54:42
You too. Thank you.
Leighann Lovely 54:44
Thank you again for listening to Let's Talk HR. I appreciate your time and support. Without you the audience this would not be possible. So don't forget that if you enjoyed this episode to follow us like us or share us. Have a wonderful day.
Michael Brown Linkedin - linkedin.com/in/michaelfbrownemployeerights
Michael Brown E-mail Address - mbrown@dvglawpartner.com
Website, DVG Law Partners - dvglawpartner.com
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
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Wednesday Mar 16, 2022
Wednesday Mar 16, 2022
She is a hockey mom, cancer survivor, creative warrior, and badass ball of Canadian sunshine. Most importantly she is just one awesome person that makes me smile!
Leighann Lovely 00:15
Let's Talk HR is a place for HR professionals, business owners and employees to come together and share experiences, to talk about what's working and what's not. How we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train and retain all generations of workers. We all know that there has been a huge shift in what people want. generations are coming together, more than ever, on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about how the economy has been impacted and what needs to happen to find a balance. I'm your host Leighann Lovely. So let's get this conversation started. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, follow us like us and share us.
Leighann Lovely 01:05
Today's conversation is one that I'm very excited to have. She self proclaimed a badass ball of Canadian sunshine. She is a hockey mom cancer survivor creative warrior she is passionate about living life with purpose on purpose. She loves helping others do the same. Terry Kerr is an executive coach and empowerment strategist with the unstuck duck coaching. She helps smart, competent women entrepreneurs create a career and life that is both fulfilling and profitable by overcoming the self sabotage that keeps them stuck in the muck. Welcome, Terry. I am so excited to have you here today. I've had the opportunity to get to know you. And now I've got the opportunity to interview you. So welcome.
Teri Kerr 02:05
Thank you. I'm super excited to be here.
Leighann Lovely 02:07
Yeah, So why don't you start out by telling me first. What is the unstuck duck coaching and you got to tell me how you came up with the name for that? Because I mean, it's it's awesome.
Teri Kerr 02:22
Okay, perfect. So yes, I can start with that, because it's a really great introduction. So I am first of all, Terry Kerr. I'm an executive coach and empowerment strategist with the unstuck deck coaching. I work mostly with entrepreneurs, but I really will work with anybody that struggles with procrastination and self sabotage. When I was first, when my okay when my kids were little, their favorite book was called one duck stack. It was about a duck that got stuck in the muck, and no matter what she did, she could not get unstuck. It was a counting book. So it was like to Moose clump to the duck, no luck still stuck. And it became kind of this, this term, this No luck still stuck became a term in our family, you know, like, as the kids were growing up, like, so buddy, how's it going in there? No luck still stuck. So we, when I was when I decided to become a coach, which was back in 2018, I was meeting with a girlfriend of mine, and we were talking about brand. And I am not a boring person. And I just did not want it to be Terry Kerr coaching. Like it just didn't inspire me. So we were talking and she said, Tell me about your ideal client. Who do you want to work with? I said, You know what, I just want to help people get unstuck. And I had this light bulb go off in my head, saying no luck still stuck. And I was like, Oh, my gosh, this is so much fun. And it's a great opener for podcasts.
Leighann Lovely 03:58
Right? It's awesome, right? I mean, it's a great opener for any conversation. Really,
Teri Kerr 04:05
It is. And there's so many great analogies with ducks and ecosystems and Mach and the muck of self sabotage. And it's just also just a really funny word to say, you know, yeah, decks are funny, and people like them. And it's also really relatable. I was at the dog park last week, talking to another dog, Mom, no business cards, you know, obviously, we're standing in the middle of a field. And I said, you know, just look me up. I'm the unstuck duck. And sure enough, she said, she's like, I totally remember that. And my kids remembered the unstuck duck and it just became a thing. So absolutely. That's where that's how the unstuck duck was hatched.
Leighann Lovely 04:50
Yeah. And you know what, just from that name, I was like, I have to talk to her. Like I need to know what this is all about. And I remember that The very first time that I heard you speak, I wanted to know more. I wanted to know what it was all about. And that that in itself is the perfect marketing. tagline that's That in itself, I mean, having a name that that drives people to want to know more, even if it's just to know what do you do? Yeah, that's perfect.
Teri Kerr 05:20
I have, like a mantra in life that it doesn't have to be hard. It really doesn't. And if I was constantly having to spell my name out, because I have one R in my first name, it would just drive me up the wall. So it's simple, it's easy, it's relatable, it's memorable, and it fits. And it's fun, and it's quirky. And it's all the things that I am. So it works really well.
Leighann Lovely 05:47
Well, welcome to my world. You know, my parents wanted to torture me by spelling My name L e i g h a n n. I mean, yeah, everywhere I go. And usually it's Hey is leg han there. No, there is no.
Teri Kerr 06:04
My first name is actually Terry M. It's all one word. Okay. No, hyphen no e on the end of it. One R, t e r i a n n e all one word? And I? Yeah. My whole life, right. My whole life. It's been like that. Yep. So I get it.
Leighann Lovely 06:23
So when did you decide, you know, when was it that pivotal moment, I want to go out on my own because you were with Election BC for 16 years? And then one day it was? Yep. I'm going to I'm going to do this on my own.
Teri Kerr 06:41
Well, actually, to be fair, I still work with Elections BC and Elections, Canada, those are contracts that I do. But before I was a coach, I was actually a fundraiser at The University here where I live. I was the Athletics and Alumni Development Officer for the University of Victoria. I was the only fundraiser for the athletics department at the University. It was actually a great job when I started, and then it was really high. I wouldn't say high pressure, it was just a lot. You know, it was a lot. And I ended up being diagnosed with breast cancer in 2015. And at that point, I had just finished my master's while working full time, I had two kids in elite hockey at the same time ice hockey, I had a hosted to international students at my house at any given time, I was a My marriage was a very well oiled machine. It was like okay, so who's eating where? Who's eating? What? Who's driving? Who? Where? Who's going to what, what, you know, what tournament this weekend, and we live on an island. So it's like, who's on the ferry? Who's carpooling? Who all these things. And when the Christmas before I was diagnosed, we my husband and I had come to the decision that we were going to move, we were going to move to Saskatchewan. This was our grand adventure. So I'm in Victoria, British Columbia, Saskatchewan is the middle of the world right now. It's like center of Canada. And it is not somewhere that a lot of people move to a lot of people move away from Saskatchewan, okay. But my children wanted to play hockey there. They, my husband had gone to school there. It was a great place for kids to raise a family, it was gonna be, you know, an eighth of the price of living where I live. And so we've made this big decision to make a big life change and move. And part of that was I decided to go and get my deal with my benefits. So I had got my eyes done. My teeth, Jack had all these appointments. And I ended up with a stepping into a mobile mammogram clinic and finding out that I had a very aggressive form of breast cancer. So that changed everything. I had three years that I was off work. When I went back to work. I like to say that my perspective had changed. I no longer was interested in other people's definitions of success. I was no longer interested in working 24/7 I wasn't injured. I started asking questions. I started getting into trouble. I started you know, questioning authority. And and really, some people would say that the work was toxic. I don't believe that but it made me toxic. So I started looking into personal development type of ideas, and I fell in love with the coaching world. I got myself a coach, I decided to go back to school, I left my job and became an entrepreneur and I decided so I went back to school and got my executive coaching degree at well Rhodes search It was a certificate in graduate coaching at the Royal Roads, university, and everything. And then I left, I left my job where I was and haven't looked back, honestly, that's the best thing that could happen to me. And honestly, I do believe I was due for a break upside the head, I had been on autopilot in my life. And it was all about striving, it was all about being the best, it was all about perfection and excellence and all the things that were just just too much, I don't need that. And so now, I stand in ease and flow. And let's just, you know, everything happens for a reason. And I believe that cancer was the best gift I could have gotten.
Leighann Lovely 10:52
So there's a list of things that I want to say, first. Wow. I don't think that that even begins to say, what courage and strength you have, to one take something that most people struggle to overcome. Obviously, on on their best day, getting a diagnosis of you know, a an aggressive breast cancer is obviously life altering for not only you but everybody in your life. But you took that and you turned it into one obviously a fight I'm I'm sure that that was a horrific fight that you that you undertook, you clearly have a strong support system in place. But you turn that not only into what some would say, a tragedy, you turned it into a triumph for you and eventually came out. Obviously happy, successful and doing something that you clearly love to do, I can tell that just in the way that you talk about it and, and in knowing you a little bit and then the time that we have gotten to know each other i i know that you, you love what you do. So wow, I think that's amazing. And you know, if there's anybody out there listening, this is this is a story of triumph. And you know, few people would say that being given or getting a diagnosis like that as a gift. But to come out the other side and be a stronger person and be able to continue on your way in a better form is definitely a gift. And you're you're living it, you're you're taking every moment and in stride. And and that's what people do. Sometimes people do need that brick upside the head, as you said, to finally take a true look at who they are what they need to do, in order to change the path or the trajectory that they're on.
Teri Kerr 12:58
My oncologist said to me and I will never forget it, I will never forget it. And I and I pass it on as much as I can, is that she said often women, and probably everybody but she was speaking to me. Women in their 40s that have something like this, whether it's a diagnosis, a divorce, a trauma, you know, something could even be your children leaving and suddenly looking around and going what it gives you the opportunity to take a look at every rock in your riverbed, and pick it up and choose whether you want it in your life. And I totally did that there were relationships that fell by the wayside. The big one that fell for me was my career. I wanted something different than what I was doing. And I don't know that my place of work where I was was ready to have me different than I was when I started. They didn't hire me for how I am now. They hired me for how I was then. Right. And that growth, that growth period of, of knowing that it wasn't, it wasn't for me anymore. It was it was super empowering, to be able to say hey, you know what, this isn't working for me. I'm not happy, you're not happy? Why are we continuing to push this boulder up the hill?
Leighann Lovely 14:19
Right? You know, and, and it's interesting. Some people would say, if they were to look at that situation and not know you, and you were to say, well, I'm going to end this career and I'm going to do something else. I've often heard people say, well, she's having a midlife crisis or he's having a midlife crisis. They'll come to their senses. Well, let's, and it irritates me sometimes when I hear that and I go wait a second. Just because they're, you know, at a certain age, and they've decided that I don't want to do this anymore. And yeah, sometimes people go out and buy ridiculously expensive cars and do crazy I understand that but often they'll they'll tag that to drastic career moves that are well thought out. And they think, oh, they'll get over this. This is exactly why people do they do they, as you said, what go into their riverbed and turnover? What was how did you say that that was great.
Teri Kerr 15:20
Pick up every rock in your riverbed and take a look and choose whether you want it in your life.
Leighann Lovely 15:25
There you go. I mean that. And that happens more frequently than we know. But so often it's brushed away as Oh, he or she is going to get over that, it'll go back to the way it was. And often that happens, especially when it's unfortunately a divorce or something that's, that's going on. But it does, you have these moments of clarity, especially as you become an older man or an older woman. And, and I can only speak to obviously a woman's point of view, you and I are both women here talking. But you know, I've had friends who have gotten to that age and they go, Wait a second, I can be so much more, I don't want I can't see the next half of my life. And I hope this isn't the half of my life and hope. Anyways, it's not getting to that. But I don't want the next half of my life to be like the first half of my life, or the last 10 years of my career, 20 years of my career, I can be better, I can be happier. And I can give so much more. And sometimes it takes a divorce, sometimes it takes a diagnosis, the loss of a loved one, a grandparent, you know a child's getting ill
Teri Kerr 16:42
You knows this, I have this concept that my mentor told me about once that said, you know, everything happens gradually. And then suddenly, it so say for example, you have a drip, like a water drip in your house, or even at the top of your driveway. And so a drip years drip, drip, drip, and then suddenly your house slides down the hill. Or, you know, every day you wake up and you have you know, you're you go to McDonald's for breakfast because it's on the way and whatever. So you have say, you know, to hashbrowns every morning and an egg McMuffin. And, you know, we have double doubles up here, which is not a McDonald's reference. That's okay. Um, so you have these things that you do the same thing every day. And then suddenly you have a heart attack. Like gradually and then suddenly, and we see it everywhere. It can be, you know, nag, nag, nag, nag. And then suddenly you get a divorce. Right? Like it can be just these little undermining conversations. It can be underwater unrest, and then suddenly people are storming the White House, like people that are surprised by that, you know, and it shouldn't be because if they'd actually looked and said, Okay, for the past 20 years, I have been doing everything that my boss has told me. And now I have have an opinion that I want to do something differently. Why am I the crazy one?
Leighann Lovely 18:15
Yeah, absolutely. Because of what has happened with the pandemic right now. We're seeing this. So for years, everybody has, oh, I don't want to go to my job. I don't want to do this. They're complaining here and there. They're bringing things up here and there. They're not being heard. They're not being heard. Will all of the sudden, the world shuts down the world reopens? And now we have no workers. Because there's a ton of people who did not go back into the workforce for retirement, a variety of reasons. I'm not gonna rehash all of this. We've all heard it a million times. But now we have this great resignation happening, and everybody's going, what is going on? Everything what you just said, Everything happens slowly until it doesn't anymore, it happens. Suddenly, everybody's going, Holy crap. There's all these positions open. I've been complaining and unhappy for years. So everybody's just going and going, I quit. There's like five jobs that I can go and get today. In fact, that's, that's, there's 20 jobs that I can go and apply to today. So, I mean, it's no wonder that Well,
Teri Kerr 19:25
I think the best thing that's come out of this pandemic, to be honest, I think it's one of the best things is that people are choosing what's actually important to them. Absolutely. People are noticing the people that live in their house with them that they haven't really spent much time with. But while you're kind of cool, you know, you're kind of smelly, but I kind of like you. Right? Like, that's the thing and people are looking at their spouses and choosing. Are you really my person, maybe we don't know each other at all. Maybe we have just been a well-oiled machine, and really don't know each other in any way or they're choosing to be like, hey, you know what, I can work in this little zoom cube from anywhere in the world? Why would I work here? Why would I continue to be in this, you know, high rise in the middle of downtown when I can be, you know, have a garden and I can do the things like I'm just me or the other way around. I mean, why am I continually mowing the lawn when I could be? I could be living on a boat in the ocean. Yeah. So I think that this introspection and, and taking of the time, and I know a lot of people wanted it to be way faster, but some people learn slower. You know, like, this is an opportunity for people to really do. There was a, there was an article right at the very, I'd say probably maybe four or five months into the pandemic. And it was titled The Great reset. And it was about like, ships and tankers into the ocean, and the whales come back. And suddenly the, you know, the trees are growing again. And there's like, this is the world resetting. Let's just stop everything. And for me, my cancer diagnosis was that for me, it was that it was that, wow, okay. I, I want to encourage this relationship, and not this one that I've had to be in, for whatever reason, are not chosen to make a choice in that relationship. Like toxic people, it made it all about them, like I had, I had a cousin, and she's not with us anymore. But she actually, we'd set up a date, and she was gonna come for a visit. And she's like, Oh, I just, I just can't see you like this. So I'm like, really? You think it's easy for me to be like this? Like, I'm sorry, I didn't realize it was all about you. You know, and those type of narcissistic conversations, like, wow, I didn't see that one. But I'm going to what I'm going to do with it, right?
Leighann Lovely 21:57
There's no room in this world anymore. For that, there are people like you or me
Teri Kerr 22:03
THere is certantly not room here for that no, in and I'm the only one that I'm in control of my own self and my own sphere. You know, there's no room for that here.
Leighann Lovely 22:14
No, people are starting to push back. I don't want people who are not real in my life. If you're going to if you're going to put on a show, if you're going to do a little dance, and you're going to pretend, I don't want you in my life. I want to be real. I want to be who I am. If you want to be that, come and have a conversation with me. If you want to be your authentic self. You want. And you know what? I'm a very accepting person.
Teri Kerr 22:42
Yeah, that's it when the world's moving. I had a conversation earlier this morning, I was on networking call. And a girl was a lady, a woman was talking about how she was overwhelmed. It's a classic entrepreneur thing. I'm overwhelmed with way too much going on. I got that. And how do I delegate was her big question. I'm like, You know what, fall in love, fall in love with the feeling of what it will be like to be free of all that stuff. Because if you fall in love with what that input impact will be on yourself, your business, and you're like, Wow, this is amazing. I don't have to worry about all this stuff. That needs to be that that is not my zone of genius. That is not my space. That is I have no business doing. Like fall in love with that ceiling, even if you have to create it at the beginning. But falling in love with who you want to be helps you create that experience for yourself. Because you get a litmus test, I always ask the question for my clients. So you know, how are you creating the experience that you want for your life right now? Because if you don't have what you want, that's the first question. But the second question is, are what is what you're doing in alignment with that? And if not, then why are you doing it? What can you do? What do you have the opportunity to do to change your experience that you have in this life? We, and its not proven by any stretch, but we have one chance we want chance here? Why are we not taking the bet? I don't want to be 80 years old and choosing to finally travel the world. Sorry, right. I don't feel like that's going to be the best experience for me. Yeah, I would rather do it when I can enjoy it and be mobile and do the things that I want to do.
Leighann Lovely 24:38
100% agree. And it's it's interesting I have that I talk to people all the time about not in a coaching level just on a hey, I'd love to know like, are you happy? Do you enjoy what you do for a living out of pure curiosity? Not to mention I'm also on you know, my my real job is In the recruiting realm, you know, I, I help companies find employees, I help people find jobs, you know, and so often I have, you know, conversations with people, do you like what you do? You don't? Why are you doing it? Change it, you're the only one that can.
Teri Kerr 25:22
you don't necessarily need to like what you do, but you like the effects of what you do. Right? Like, my husband, for example, has a great job, it from the outside, everybody would be like, Wow, he's got a great job, you know, his pension, he's got all the different, you know, he has the freedom to do what he wants to do. That's what he loves. He loves that he can go to work. And then when he comes home, he can let it go and do what he loves them. And I speak a lot. We I have clients that are like, trying to build their side hustle so that they can leave their full time job. One friend in particular, she calls you know, I'm just on my way to my soul sucking job. I was like, Well, you know, what you speak about comes about? So how about we talk about it as your sugar daddy, that's gonna pay for your hustle, right? Like, it's, let's this is this is what is providing for right now. Maybe not forever. But for right now, this is providing you the funds to build what you want. So shifting that shifting how you talk about it, shifting what you what you the energy you bring to it. Like, if I'm thinking of going to a soul sucking job, I'm waking up with dread, right. But if I'm thinking like, Wow, if I just go and put in eight hours powering through, I might even be able to get as much work done as I can in four hours, then I get to do what I want to do. I can spend the rest of my day doing what I want to do mindset. And go to Users, people underestimate the words that we use. Yep. Very much so. And some of them some of the words we use, like I even think about, you know, kids, these kids these days, totally dating myself to like, wow, that's sick, isn't it? I feel like that's not a very good connotation for a really good thing. Because, you know, or even like, wow, you killed it. I'm just reading everyday.
Leighann Lovely 27:26
Should I be should I be callings, as you know, fascinating to come and pick up the carcass?
Teri Kerr 27:32
Right. But I mean, even things like narrowing it down the top three that I'm always working on with my clients, or I want you know, I have to, if you're saying you have to, you're standing in a victim mindset, because that means your circumstances are in charge of what's going on for you. If you have to do it, we have a choice, no matter what, I have to pay my mortgage, I don't have to pay my mortgage, I like to pay my mortgage, because I would rather have a roof over my head. I choose to pay my mortgage because it's going to get me what I want in, like, where I live, right? I don't have to, I don't have to, I get to, I choose to. And the other one is I need to, like the word need literally has lack in it. Like it's like, it's like I need is coming from a sense of of lack. It's coming from a sense of I don't have that thing. So I need that thing. Nice thing. I mean, it's different when you're like, wow, I really need to I need to take an Advil, well, I you can go take an Advil, right like it means it basically it means that I have a situation that needs remedy. Right? Right. And if we switch up those just those two words and and should I mean I should is not allowed in mine in my entire repertoire. But to I get to I have I want to I'm choosing to because if I say I want to do something, there's a little voice inside my head that says do you want to wow you know what, I really don't want to make a make a choice here and do something different. That I actually want. So that's where I always start with my clients. Like do you need to you have to know you either get to you should you sorry not should you get to you want to you choose to you are going to whatever it is it just takes the power back it's all about empowerment that in right there is empowerment to me being able to say you know what, it's totally my choice. Whatever happens. I didn't choose to get cancer, but I have a choice what I make out of it
Leighann Lovely 29:51
Right.
Teri Kerr 29:51
I chose to get treatment I chose to get all you know I had a say in it.
Leighann Lovely 29:58
Very interesting
Teri Kerr 29:59
You don't have a choice. In what moment you keel over and die? That's the only thing you don't have a choice. Well, some people take that choice into their own hands. But generally,
Leighann Lovely 30:10
and all of the everything you said is so interesting, because there are so many times where I'm like, Oh, I have to do this. And you're right. When you say that,
Teri Kerr 30:18
Like even looking at your shoulders, you're like, oh, I have to do this. Like, it's just this like, Ah, I like to try to like characterize and like, really? How does that feeling make you like, if you were to act that out? But did you ever do in province in school and drama class or something? Did you ever do anything like that?
Leighann Lovely 30:36
Yeah, I hate it.
Teri Kerr 30:39
When you're, when you're on stage, they're like, Okay, look angry. Your whole body goes into that, like, because somebody at the back of the auditorium needs to be able to see that you're angry and not just be like, you know, grumpy face. Oh,
Leighann Lovely 30:56
I wish people could see us right now.
Teri Kerr 31:00
I'm trying to like put words into what my facial expressions. But like, if you if you actually were the owner of I have to, or I need to, like he like excuse. Listen to this back. But anyway, so good.
Leighann Lovely 31:21
Yeah, I mean, yeah, you're right. You the words, the words you say, Give feeling to you, as you're saying them, like, I have to do this or I have. But when you say, Oh, you and I do this with my daughter perfect example. Guess what? It's your party, you get to have a party. And I'm using that reference because it was her birthday. Just this yesterday. You know, you get to have a party. And you know, it's she's so exciting. excited about it. But when I say you need to go potty, you have to go potty right now. Her reaction, you can see her her whole entire again, for those of you don't know, she's four. So I'm not not saying this to my 15 year old. She's four. So reminding her, you can see her entire body language change, because it's. So I realized that and I stopped using those words. And I just say to her, go potty. And she gets up and she goes, but as soon as they use certain key words, you have, to she refuses? I mean, it's absolutely she digs in. I don't have to. Very interesting.
Teri Kerr 32:31
Yeah, it's the thing. Like it's like the mortgage analogy, right, like, right. Well, you choose not to. But we're not stopping
Leighann Lovely 32:40
you. You can Yeah, you don't have to, but you're going to have an eviction notice very soon. And then you do have to leave.
Teri Kerr 32:52
Right? Yes. So yeah. Even like I think about the people that I work with are mostly entrepreneurs who said that at the beginning, yeah. And, you know, we choose generally to become an entrepreneur, like, it's a choice that we have literally made that we are not willing to work for somebody else. We want to work for ourselves. Yep. And so many people are like, Oh, my God, I just don't want to do that, sir, I have to do this, or I have to post on social media every day. It's like, No, you don't you get to choose. When you do that, if you want the consequence of having profit, you might need to have a sales call, you might choose to have a sales call, right? So you don't want that. That's okay. You can choose different things. That's the beauty of being an entrepreneur is you get to be in choice all the time. But our go to is when we are feeling up against the wall, or when we're feeling stuck. Our go to is to be like, Oh, the world is against me, you know, or I have way too much to do I have too many ideas. Or, you know, I like to I always say there's four different types of procrastinators, okay. But when it comes to self sabotage, as an entrepreneur, procrastination is just one piece. But every single one of them has a different thing. That is the path to that comes out. Right? So for example, if I'm over committer, you know, I can't let anybody else down. I have to do all the things for all the people because then they'll love me in the light be and I get to be, you know, the people person. Right? And what the consequence of that is, overwhelm way too much going on, trying to make up people pleasing trying to make everybody happy. Right. That's one example. Another would be an over analyzer. So somebody who's you know, analyzes everything right, but they love to have all the information before they make a decision. They lack spontaneity. They like to be like Okay, they're gonna save face whenever they can. So there'll be like, I can't get it wrong, like, God forbid I get it wrong. So I'm not gonna make a decision at all. I'm just gonna, you know, a couple people like that, who were analyze all things up me I'm a squirrel chaser. I have way too many ideas. Yeah, I don't actually believe is actually a thing, I don't believe there's ever a place in the world that there's not enough ideas or that there's too many ideas. But for me, I have all the ideas, and then I'm afraid of committing to the wrong one. Right? So then I don't do anything, because I have all the ideas and everything is shiny. And if I just, you know, go do this, it'll be way more fun. And that's my squirrel chaser type of behavior. And my procrastination, like I really lacked focus, right? So focusing on one thing, that's probably you can probably tell, because I feel like this interview is kind of going like this.
Leighann Lovely 35:55
I know I have to rein you in in a little bit.
Teri Kerr 36:00
Just because I started on four, there's four, right? You know, the fourth one would be a control freak. So somebody that really would would benefit from time blocking to me, time blocking sounds like jail, but some people love it and need it and want to have control of other things. Right? And then the and so time, so those this time walking will be a strategy, I'd have a different strategy for each type of person. Right. But you know, it's funny, because we all assume that we all procrastinate and self sabotage. The same, we don't know. And I theres a different stategy for every person.
Leighann Lovely 36:38
I know some people where I can put them in those different categories. I know that I have some of those characteristics, but I know also know myself well enough to know that I'm a highly focused individual. And a very action oriented individual. If you tell me hey, do this, I will absolutely do it. But to my detriment to the point where sometimes I'll be working on a project and somebody says, hey, this needs to get done. And I'll go, Okay, let me go do it. And then I drop what I'm doing and go, Oh, shit, I need to get back to that other one. Because now I've just gone and done this. And now I need to, which drives my husband crazy, by the way, because I'll be working on a project. And then he's like, you know, we have to do this. And I'm like, Okay, let me get to it. And he's like, Well, wait, you got to finish this first. And I'm like, Yeah, but that one's really fun. I'll come back to this one. Yeah, right. If something needs to get done, I want to get it done. Right. The second so it's off my plate. So it's done. Yeah. Anyways, that that's enough. Okay, so we are running close on time. But I do want to, first you, I want to bring this up. Because this is this is pretty awesome. You are the Managing Director of the Ewomen network and have been for over a year and a half. Tell me about that.
Teri Kerr 37:55
So first of all, I stepped down as Managing Director in September, I am the managing director for the women network,
Leighann Lovely 38:01
you stepped down. It did.
Teri Kerr 38:05
But tell you about that. So I went COVID hit. I was I've been a member of the women since I became an entrepreneur, I love it. Great organization, great place to be. I love that it's a values based organization. I love the community. And I love the learning and the growth and all the different things that I've gotten out of elimine when COVID hit, I knew that as an extrovert, I felt that as an extrovert, that being locked in my house would I would literally wither and die. That was that was I could not survive without other human interaction. So I started offering out these time to rise calls. And they were first thing in the morning like, well, first thing, I'm not a morning person, they were at nine o'clock every morning. And that's first thing for me. You know, it was one of those things, that was a reason for people to get up and have a shower and present themselves. Right, and just show up and I did it for free. I was like whoever wants to come I'm gonna be on Zoom everyday at nine o'clock. So if you want to have some accountability of what you want to get done in a day, if you want some community and just need, you know, virtual hug, whatever it might happen to be. And during that time, the managing director ended up with a position with our government with our public health office. So that was kind of important during the pandemic. So I decided to step in, she asked me if I would take over managing director and I did and it's been great. It was really great. Why did I leave? I ended up getting a contract, facilitating a youth entrepreneurship program. And I couldn't take something I didn't feel like I could take something on without letting something else go. Right. So I chose to let go Have a woman. And then what ended up happening was, after six weeks of the entrepreneurship program, they didn't have enough kids for the next round. So that ended too. So then I was like, okay, so it is just me. I am the only one and I am going to be the unstuck completely. Totally.
Leighann Lovely 40:23
You got some free time?
Teri Kerr 40:25
Yeah. Because I really sat down and went, Okay, what do I want? What do I want for my business? And I get to choose. So, you know, I didn't have a choice in that contract ending. But it's worked out. Mavis, the universal shipping clerk, provided for me. That's what I call the universe providing, right God? didn't know I needed that. But thank you.
Leighann Lovely 40:54
Yeah, Well, excellence, you know, life, life has tendency to throw us a curveball. So get your baseball mitt out. Right. So the question of the season, I'm asking everybody this, and, you know, I kind of have an idea of what you might say to this, but I would never presume to, you know, assume, but the question of the season, if you could pinpoint a time period in your career that made a huge difference in your life or career path? When would that be and why?
Teri Kerr 41:29
The most recent moment for me was when that contract ended. And I got to say, Okay, I'm on my own. What do I want? Because I got to take everything up until that point, and assess and decide and choose and sit and go, What is it that I want from this point forward, and really created the way that I wanted instead of somebody else? How they wanted my business to be. Now, yes, I'm sure you were expecting it to be about my cancer diagnosis. But I did not have an idea of that and becoming an entrepreneur until probably four years after my cancer diagnosis.
Leighann Lovely 42:13
Well, and again, it, we all have pivotal moments in our life in our career that drive us to the point where we are right now, as I would have, if somebody would have said, Leanne one day you'll, you'll have a podcast, I would have laughed, and completely been like, you're totally insane. You know, two years ago, I didn't listen to podcast two years ago, I didn't even really know what they were all about. And, and then I had the opportunity to start one. And I mean, again, those pivotal, pivotal moments or those. Sometimes they're quiet whispers that come to us. Sometimes they're major curveballs that are thrown at us. But they they, like you said they change. And they force us to make decisions about what we want. And then we get to choose.
Teri Kerr 43:17
I almost corrected you on the forcing us because I don't think that anything forces us to do anything except for sit and do nothing. And that's always a choice. sitting and doing nothing with the choice with the, with the gifts that the universe gives us is absolutely a choice. And I'm going to even venture to guess that 75% of the people out there are sitting there bypassing gifts.
Leighann Lovely 43:42
Yep. No, I know, I agree.
Teri Kerr 43:44
Or it's safe, or I've made this choice. And I'm gonna stick to it. Whether just because I have to be right. Yeah, like I and I not going to do anything different than what has been what is expected of me. There's full cultures that it's about what other people's expected expectations are. And, you know, it's an it's really a gift to be able to say, Okay, this isn't what I want. What do I want? I'm going to choose to do things differently. Yeah.
Leighann Lovely 44:17
Opportunity Knocks constantly, but it takes a special individual to open the door. And there are so many people out there who don't even see the door. And it's it's unfortunate, but not everybody is cut out for entrepreneurship, not everybody and that's a good thing because we do need people to to do all different types of roles and so but okay, so we are at time, Terry, if somebody wants to reach out to you to, you know, contact you, how are they able to do that? And of course, it will also be in the show notes, but how are they able to do that?
Teri Kerr 44:57
The best way is probably through social media. At unstuck, duck, that's going to be the easiest way for everybody to remember. My website is unstuckduck.ca Because I'm Canadian on Facebook on Instagram. It's at unstuckduck, and otherwise it's Teri, which has won our teri@unstuckduck.ca If you want to send me an email.
Leighann Lovely 45:20
Wonderful again, thank you so much. This has been such a fun conversation with you today.
Teri Kerr 45:26
Always, always. Thank you, Leighann.
Leighann Lovely 45:31
Thank you again for listening to Let's Talk HR. I appreciate your time and support. Without you the audience this would not be possible. So don't forget that if you enjoyed this episode, to follow us, like us or share us. Have a wonderful day.
Teri Kerr
Linkedin - linkedin.com/in/unstuckduck
E-mail – teri@unstuckduck.ca
You can learn more about her a unstuckduck.ca or follow her on IG or FB @unstuckduck.
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Transcribed by https://otter.ai
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Wednesday Mar 09, 2022
Wednesday Mar 09, 2022
The conversation with these two amazing women is one for the books, they are fun-loving, kind-hearted, and brilliant businesswomen.
Kathy Miller and Shannon Karels Co-founders and Authors
Leighann Lovely 00:15
Let's talk HR is a place for HR professionals, business owners and employees to come together and share experiences, to talk about what's working and what's not. How we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train and retain all generations of workers. We all know that there has been a huge shift in what people want. generations are coming together, more than ever, on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about how the economy has been impacted, and what needs to happen to find a balance. I'm your host Leighann Lovely. So let's get this conversation started. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, follow us like us and share us. This should be an amazing conversation with two brilliant women. Shannon Karels is a senior operations manager who has led multiple lean transformations, and ran operations for two large publicly traded corporations across multiple industries and business models. She started her career in supply chain management and progressed through Lean and operation leadership roles. Through this journey, Shannon has improved cultures in numerous manufacturing facilities by leading employees empowerment and engagement, and building highly successful teams with a focus on business results. Shannon is known for leading accountable organizations built on trusting relationships that improve the company's profitability and customer experience. Shannon holds a bachelor's degree in supply chain management from Western Michigan University. Other amazing guest is Kathy Miller. Kathy Miller is the senior operations executive who has held numerous global vice president and director roles both in manufacturing Lean Enterprise leadership, Kathy is a Shingo Prize recipient for large businesses as a plant manager. She started her career in operations as a 17 year old Co Op student at a vehicle assembly plant and progress through the engineering marketing, lean manufacturing and operation leadership roles working for four large publicly traded corporations in executive roles. Kathy is a transformational leader who constantly delivers impressive business results through team development, process disciplines and continuous improvement. Kathy is known for creation of inclusive culture based on a trust, respect and accountability. Kathy holds a Bachelors of Science degree in industrial and System Engineering from the Kettering University formerly GMI Engineering and Management Institute, a master's degree of Business Administration from Ball State University, and a Master's Degree in Applied positive psychology from the University of Pennsylvania, Kathy was inducted into the women in manufacturing Hall of Fame in 2021. welcome Kathy and Shannon, it is amazing to talk with you today. I've not have the opportunity to read your book. But I am very excited to have this conversation. I just I'm thrilled that two women come together and write such an amazing book about an industry that I'm sure has been an interesting ride for both of you to break into and really shine. And so thanks for being here. Thanks for having me. So why don't you start off by just telling me a little bit about yourself. So, Shannon, why don't you go first?
Shannon Karels 04:06
Sure. Hi, I'm Shannon Karels. I am the co founder and co author with Kathy Miller, of sisters and Steal Toes and Stilettos, which is a true story of two women manufacturing leaders and Lean Transformation success. I actually started my career in manufacturing in supply chain. So I spent quite a few years moving up through different supply chain functions. And then I found my passion in Lean transformations when I was doing that, and one of my plants. And so I spent quite a few years working in different facilities, transforming plants using mean lean methodologies, and then started to run my own plants which was really what I enjoy doing the most and developing positive work cultures so that all people who work there could thrive and contribute to the business.
Leighann Lovely 04:56
Excellent. So Kathy, why don't you introduce yourself?
Kathy Miller 05:00
Thanks, Leighann, Thanks, Shannon. So I'm Kathy Miller and I have been in in around manufacturing operations for a very long time, I literally started my career at the age of 17 years old as a co-op student in a vehicle assembly plants. So I went to a school called GMI, or Kettering University, and all five years of your undergraduate program, you work half the time in a real business. So I grew up very, very quickly. I always say that if I can't be a rock star, I'd love to run a vehicle assembly plant. And I think it's just because that's where my roots started. I think it's so amazing that every 60 seconds, a functioning vehicle comes off the end of that line. So I went from there to work in automotive electronics, and I worked in engineering and marketing. And after a while, I really found my way back to operations. I just really missed the whole soul of manufacturing, I would say, so went back, became a superintendent ran a number of pressure sensor departments, the got a call. And the manufacturing. the superintendent said Kathy, we're gonna put you on a lien team in a special assignment. I was very upset because I thought I was doing a good job. And I thought, you know, why are you sidelining me, but it actually changed the trajectory of my career. So I was able to learn from the very early practitioners of lean manufacturing themselves, Jim Womack, John Shook Rick Harris. And since then, I've led operations and led lean manufacturing and operating systems for for major companies. So that's what I've been doing. And it was in one of those assignments where I met Shannon.
Leighann Lovely 06:54
Excellent. And I was just gonna ask, you know, how did the two of you, you know, come together? Where did your paths cross?
Kathy Miller 07:03
Well, that's a great story. And it's actually in the book. But in a nutshell, I was in charge of lean and quality for a company, and was touring the globe, going to the different plants checking out their quality systems in their progress in lean manufacturing. And I was really learning how to do Lane packing, and did not bring my safety shoes, because they take up half of a carry-on piece of luggage. And I showed up at Shannon's plant, and they said, No problem, Kathy, we have extra safety shoes for you. They were all men sizes, or those little like, I call them duck boot things, you know, those little attachments you put on that you really can't walk around the plants in. So Shannon, very graciously overheard this conversation as I was, you know, distraught looking at these shelves of shoes and attachments that would not help me and came up and asked what my shoe size was, coincidentally, we were the exact same size of shoes. And she offered me her so I could go on the plant tour. And that's how she became shoe-sharing Shannon.
Shannon Karels 08:13
Right. And we still share shoes, too.
Kathy Miller 08:15
That's so true.
Leighann Lovely 08:20
How strange is, you know, I have being that I come from a you know, a background where I've toured many, many manufacturing companies. I too, have experienced where I've walked into a company and I went, Oh my gosh, I don't have my safety shoes. And how often is it that they don't have a size those the duck shoe, the cap that goes on that wraps around, and then you're walking around, and it's actually more unsafe, because now you're flipping around, and you're practically tripping over your own feet, because it's half falling off because they're not made for women. They're there or I shouldn't say they're not made for women. They're not made small enough for my tiny six-and-a-half-size shoe. And then there was actually one time where one of the HR people said don't worry, I have another I have another pair of shoes and I went really, you're gonna let me wear your shoe. She goes yeah, it's way better than wearing those. And I went, Wow, okay. Yeah, I would much prefer to do that. So, that is that is an awesome story. I mean, because I guarantee that there are other women out there which guessing which is why you have been, you know, so successful and understanding those pains. There are a ton of other women out there who have experienced the exact same thing. So yeah. So you I mean, you obviously you wrote a book you you reference, you know the story of how you met is in the book, so When did you start talking about the idea of writing your book? And you know, what inspired you originally to even start having this conversation?
Shannon Karels 10:11
Yeah, it's another great story, actually, Kathy are full of stories by the way. Three, you you'll, when you read the book, you'll learn that our relationship grew from this, you know, initial interaction to a subordinate boss relationship to a friendship to now it's more of like a sister, sister like friendship that we have. So we spend a lot of time with our families. And one weekend, almost two years ago, we were reminiscing, hanging out reminiscing about our time together. And at that time, Kathy and I were both running other businesses and having those challenges in itself. And we said, Gosh, you know, we did some really great stuff. And we were together, what made it so different, how come it doesn't work the same in these other places, and we were just reminiscing and comparing. And then we really started to think about, and we really did some really great things, not just great business results, which we got not just great lean implementation, but then also the culture pieces that we instilled. And then we just looked at each other, we're like, you know, maybe we have a story to tell. And then we just kind of kept just chatting about it. And then I went home that day, and the next day, we had the title for the book, and we started writing it, and we had a manuscript written in less than a year. And here we are,
Leighann Lovely 11:37
that's awesome. It takes some people, many, many, many years to come up with an idea come up with a manuscript come up with, I mean, that's, that's amazing, the two of you, obviously, together are a power to be reckoned with. And that's I mean, it's, it shows just an, obviously people cannot see you, but the lights that I see just coming from both of you is is is amazing, and to foster that friendship, based on you know, common interest and, and, you know, that just that commonality, and passion for something is, is awesome. That's so great. So now you obviously you work in a predominantly male environment, which by the way, is it's changing. And, you know, if you can inspire, you know, the women, the young, the young girls out there to, to see that there is a place in the world for them in these environments, in the manufacturing environment, it doesn't have to be, you know, a male environment anymore. And that's slowly changing. You can be whatever you want to be when you grow up nowadays, but did it feel that you had to work harder to be respected for your efforts? In working in the manufacturing industry?
Kathy Miller 12:51
I think that's a really great question. And we do really hope to inspire the next generation of manufacturing leaders and inspire them to know that they can be themselves, you don't have to adapt to, you know, a male stereotype or any of the other types of stereotypes you would have when you picture a manufacturing environment. But I would say, we didn't necessarily have to work harder, we did have to find our own way. Because there were times that we may have felt excluded. You know, even in the last decade here, there were still places where meetings were held that women weren't allowed, which is so interesting, in this day and age. So there were, there were some environments where we weren't necessarily always included. So those were some challenges that we had. But I think that we both always worked very hard. But there were times when we were singled out because of our gender. We didn't focus on it, you know, when we would walk into a room, we just considered ourselves people who had earned a seat at the table, right or, or a place to tour and to teach and, and contribute. But there are a lot of people who make statements sometimes very well-intentioned about, oh, a female plant manager, oh, a female vice president of operations. And, like I said, most of the time, probably very well-intentioned, but it makes you feel a little bit minimized to, you know, think about that one aspect of your identity, which we're very proud of. But there's a lot of credentials beyond, you know, the fact that we're female. So we didn't necessarily have role models, too many role models to follow in this function, and that's what we're hoping to be. But we've always just worked hard and not considered gender a barrier. We've never made issues of it unless other people did. And generally the issues that people made were, you know, comments
Leighann Lovely 15:00
Right. It's interesting that you, you'd mentioned that you earned your seat at the table, which is what we all need to do is we need to earn our seat at the table regardless of what we're doing. But it shouldn't have to be above and beyond in any way that you earn that seat. But you also had mentioned that there were some places or environments that you, you weren't welcome. Or that it didn't seem like you were welcome.
Kathy Miller 15:23
Yeah, mostly Country Club environments. So I had, when I was a executive, it came with a country club membership, because you were supposed to go and take clients golfing, or entertain them, you know, and form those relationships that lead to good, strong, you know, pipelines for sales and growth for your organization and strong relationships with your customers. And one of the ones and in all fairness, they have changed their policy now, but I went and to see the new country club I was at, and I was asked to leave a room that had, you know, a popcorn machine in it and TVs, because it was a room for men only. And you know, this was in the 2010s. So, unfortunately, about that my daughter, who was going to college was super offended and left and didn't go back for a number of years. But they changed the policy after that. But it really did leave an impression, you know, here I'm leading a business. And, you know, I was like, What am I supposed to do? Just go to the lemonade room and send notes back and forth? To the my male customers. So you know,
Leighann Lovely 16:47
the door? Yeah, I
Kathy Miller 16:48
mean, what's kind of funny about it is when men read the story now, and a lot of them are right, just because they want to understand it. And you can read the book as a lean manufacturing guide to right. So it's not just for women. But that's the most shocking comment we get back is that, you know, they're still, like, within the last 10 - 15 years, places that don't allow women to conduct business in them.
Leighann Lovely 17:17
Right. And I was gonna say this was 2010. I mean, I was thinking, Okay, could this have been like in the early 90s, or the 80s, but you're not old enough to have?
Kathy Miller 17:28
So are publishers asked if it was 1970?
Leighann Lovely 17:33
Right. I mean, it's, it's, and I understand that, yeah, there are some people who are like, well, I want to go to I want to go somewhere where I can just hang out with the boys, I want to, but to make a place a business or a place where that it's that's just, I would think that there's not a place where you're going to conduct mutual business that would attempt to do that anymore now. Yeah, I mean,
Kathy Miller 18:02
I haven't experienced it since then, necessarily. But it was still written not that long ago.
Leighann Lovely 18:09
Right. No, that really is not that long ago at all. I mean, yeah, I have no comment for that, to be perfectly honest. They, they should be ashamed of themselves that they were even in that day and age. And again, I can understand. There are people who want to go and just hang out with the boys, but then make it known that here's a boy's room, here's a girl's room. If you want to conduct business, however, here's where you go, you know, and they should call them locker rooms that that's the voice
Kathy Miller 18:44
Well, the good news is, the good news about being the only female in most situations was you know, during the meeting breaks, I didn't have a line at the restroom. Right? There you go. There were certainly advantages, right?
Leighann Lovely 19:00
Oh, yeah, what cars nowadays you wonder as our locker rooms gonna become just one gigantic room. I you know, I have your, again, nobody can see this, but I can see the faces that are being made at this point. I you know, and 10 years from now, everybody's gonna go oh, you remember when locker rooms were separated? Oh, no. I mean,
Kathy Miller 19:25
I think the thing the thing is about Shannon and myself. We don't tend to dwell on the obstacles. A lot of people ask about it. There were some hurt feelings about that, you know. And, and sometimes, you know, there's big meetings where there's recreation and almost always the activities offered are golfing, skeet shooting and fishing, you know, and many women do enjoy that. I don't, you know, so. You asked about working harder. Not really. But there were certain situations where you had to try to fit in. Yeah. So
Leighann Lovely 20:06
yeah, absolutely there. I mean, still to this day regular golf outings, the nice thing that I see a golf outings today is that it's it's not so much about the golf as it is about the community. And you see a lot of women walking on the course, with a foursome. And they're like, I shot a couple holes. Now I'm just hanging out with the team. And it's become more of, hey, if you're going to a golf outing, you have to accept that this isn't going to be a serious, serious game, or yeah,
Kathy Miller 20:37
there's lots of ways to make things inclusive, you can play best ball. And there's lots of amazing women golfers I don't want to say that, you know, there's not at all. But I think the main thing, especially in a world where we are striving to be more diverse to drive diversity of thought and more inclusive. You know, we just need to give a little bit more thought to those types of things. Yep.
Leighann Lovely 20:59
No. Now, you had mentioned a little bit Shannon, especially you and you had mentioned a little bit about being very successful at driving that cultural change. Mm hmm. Tell me a little bit more about that.
Shannon Karels 21:14
Yeah, I think it's, I think it's something I definitely learned a lot of this from Kathy and our time together, too. But, you know, a lot of what she taught me was the importance of listening, the importance of building relationships, and, and I knew, I knew that was always important to me early on in my career, I knew that it wasn't going to be me getting it all done, it was all about the people around you, that help. And so when I started leading plants, I just, my team was so important to me. And I wanted them to be successful. And so I spent a lot of time doing little things that would bring us together and we would always have each other's backs. And, you know, I would get we would get to know each other. Every quarter, we would do a an ops luncheon. And I would force them to play some game where we all got to know each other, you know, tell something about yourself. Nobody knows. Or we did one where they had a draw out a piece of paper a bunch of questions and in answer the question, and just silly things like that. But I felt it really important that the more we know each other as people and less as our jobs, the more successful we will be. And driving that type of culture change is really the first and final step of driving any type of business transformation. It's all about trust and respect for each other.
Leighann Lovely 22:32
You're, you're so right. And it's funny that you use the word I would force them to. Because in the beginning, it's always they walk in, gotta know, you got to play this game. But at the end of it, everybody always walks out with a smile on their face. Yeah. And as you see that cultural change. And again, I'm not speaking of somebody who's driven that cultural change, I'm speaking from somebody who's experienced that cultural change happening around me and being one of the people who's seeing it, you know, with my co workers and going, Wow, I'm feeling so much happier, because people are really starting to get along, and I'm getting along with people. But you know, you walk in going, Oh, another one of these games. Yeah, I have to do this. You know, guess who this is with these deep. But as it happens, you're going this is this is fun, that I'm enjoying this I in you know, and you do you get to know people you get to. And the more you get to know people, the more you like people, the more you want to do better at the company, the more you're invested in the company, and the harder it is to leave the company. And I always bring it back to retention because I'm a recruiter, I'm in HR. You know, companies always ask how, you know, hey, how do I hire somebody? How do I train somebody? How do I get these people to stay? And it always for me comes back to retention. And what you said is, is that's it culture happy? retained?
Shannon Karels 24:01
Yeah, that's, and that's not to say, Leighann, that it's all you know, I say this a lot. But it's not all rainbows and unicorns every day, right? Like, Oh, of course. You know, Kathy, and I drive a high level of accountability and high expectations of our teams. You know, we set those we set, we set that up front, it's not a moving target. It's, here's here's the expectations, I expect you to meet them if you can't, let's have a discussion about it. It's not, you know, this dictatorship, but it is, it's a very fine combination of that structure of accountability and relationships that drive performance.
Leighann Lovely 24:35
Right, happier employees stay. And if you create genuine relationships with your employees, even the worst company will keep employees and I'm not saying that you are have bad companies, but employees follow great leaders. They I mean, and if you can be a great leader and you leave that company Many employees will start going, I wonder if they have an open position where she went. I mean, it's, it's just human nature to want to follow the light. And if you, if you are the light, then you will be followed because you have a tendency to create and spread your light around. It's just that's, that's human nature.
Kathy Miller 25:23
So positive relationships are so powerful. Yes, they are everywhere in life, including the workplace.
Leighann Lovely 25:29
Yep, absolutely. And, and it's, it's interesting what one negative person can do in an environment, and how quickly that can spread. So it's, you know, sorry, um, I like I have a tendency to go off on tangents.
Shannon Karels 25:47
Like, you're okay.
Leighann Lovely 25:49
I am a complete and total nerd when it comes to talking about HR and culture and all that good stuff. Okay. So tell me about ops sisters, you know, I don't want to spoil the book, I want people to, you know, read the book, I'm excited to read the book. So tell me a little bit of the the key highlights and what people are going to get out of this, not only from learning more about you, but you know, you talk about it being kind of a lean manufacturing guide. So tell me a little bit more about it.
Shannon Karels 26:19
Yeah, and ancestors is really, the book is really a subset of ancestors. So Kathy, and I found it off sisters, actually, after we wrote the book. And the name really signifies us. I mean, we really are, you know, sisters at heart and these operational leaders. So we wanted to inspire other up sisters to come up through this industry. So that's how that all started. And, and app sisters in itself is, you know, we wanted to expand on the book, and take our learnings really, from what we went through whether it was through lean methodology, cultural change, being women in leadership, coaching people, we wanted to take all of that and expand that to continue to teach outside of just the book. So we, that's really a lot of what we do. And our and everything is listed on our website. So we'll do anything from we're doing training on meaningful lean transformations, we offer coaching from any leaders in manufacturing, from team leaders all the way up to VPS. And we really just want to work with companies that need help and a transformation in terms of you using meet lean methodologies and implementing inclusive cultures. So that's what ops Sisters is about, in the book touches on all of those things in some way as part of the story. So we're really pulling from our experience in a real world situation, and trying to transfer that out and expand that to more people in the world.
Kathy Miller 27:49
It's not a real prescriptive book, you know how most business books are, these are the three things you must do, or the five things you must do. It's, it's our story, and there's a lot of learnings in it. But stories are so powerful, right? Because people can see themselves in the characters. So I got an email the other night from a lady who tracked me down who I don't know, and she said, I got your book as a gift. And I'm a quality manager at a plant. And I just laughed and cried through the whole book, because I could really feel those experiences, many of which are similar, you know, to what I've had, so just thanking us. And so, you know, we really want to teach through touching people's hearts, right, and letting them know that by having meaningful relationships and creating vision and mission and purpose for people beyond their own individual goals is really what gets results and, you know, makes the experience so much worth having.
Shannon Karels 28:53
Well, and people can learn from some of our mistakes, maybe to
Kathy Miller 28:57
accelerate the journey for others.
Leighann Lovely 29:01
That's great. You know, the best way to learn is through that of other people well, or from your own mistakes, but why learn from your own mistakes when you can learn from that of other people. And, you know, you're offering such an amazing life story, life journey, in so many ways. That's amazing.
Shannon Karels 29:25
Thank you.
Leighann Lovely 29:27
So we are almost at time. And before we get there, I would love to ask you this the question of the season. So if you could pinpoint a time period in your career that made a huge difference in your life or career path. When would that be and why? Kathy, why don't you go first
Kathy Miller 29:48
So it's that point that I already told you. You know, if we separate the being a working mom, right and working through all of those things that that was is a big deal as well. But from a purely career standpoint, it was when I got called in and was put on a special assignment. And like I said, I really did not want to go on a special assignment, I wanted to go the traditional path. And here I had the opportunity to learn from giants in the industry. And it changed the whole trajectory of my career. So that was my pivotal moment was being open and saying, Okay, I'm going to do this non traditional thing you're asking me to do. And, you know, this book wouldn't be here had it not been for that moment, and someone taking a chance on me to try something different and non traditional.
Leighann Lovely 30:39
And sometimes fate steps in and makes decisions. Yep. Makes your decision for you. Yeah, yes. And what about you, Shannon?
Shannon Karels 30:50
I was a, that was a little bit different. And and I say this, with all honesty, not just because Cathy's, you know, my friend and business partner, but mine was when I started working with Kathy and our sensei, Rick Harris, and I had already been exposed to lean a little bit and really believed it was the way to run these manufacturing businesses, if you can do it, right. And it wasn't it yes, they taught me the lean methodology and the Lean tools, which I then took on to be able to successfully run other manufacturing facilities. But they taught me about what it is to be a true leader. And, you know, I was pretty young in my career. And I had, I would say, I was relatively high, strong and very high demand type of an individual with very high expectations for myself and everybody around me. But I learned how to be you know, take that and not be an individual contributor and really be the leader, I wanted to be in that moment where I was allowed to participate on that team and help drive that transformation is what changed my career for me.
Leighann Lovely 31:54
And that's awesome. That's and to continue to work with, you know, somebody who you feel has been a pivotal, you know, person in your in your life is is a gift. Absolutely. Yeah. So thank you very much for sharing that. I thank you both for coming on and talking with me today. You You both have truly an amazing story. And an obviously it is a gift that the the two of you came into each other's lives at the time that you did, because you have obviously lifted each other up to make each other more successful throughout your careers and you continue to be well, like sisters. That's right. So again, thank you so much for your time today.
Kathy Miller 32:36
Thank you, Leighann
Leighann Lovely 32:38
Thank you again for listening to Let's Talk HR. I appreciate your time and support. Without you the audience this would not be possible. So don't forget that if you enjoyed this episode to follow us like us or share us. Have a wonderful day.
Kathy Miller
Linkedin - linkedin.com/in/kathy-miller-mapp-mba-b32a2839
Personal Website - lnkd.in/efKVZEDw
Shannon Karels
Linkedin - linkedin.com/in/shannon-karels-00a7782
Co-Authored - Steel Toe and Stilettos
Website - opsisters.com
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Music from Uppbeat (free for Creators!): https://uppbeat.io/t/cruen/family-time License code: 2330NZD3BLNDKPYI
Wednesday Mar 02, 2022
Wednesday Mar 02, 2022
Not only is this guest an amazing inspiration, a brilliant and beautiful soul, she also has an amazing story of how she ended up at a great company helping others find their voice to inspire others.
Hanna Paul of Ideawake, joins us for a great conversation!
Leighann Lovely 00:15
Let's Talk HR is a place for HR professionals, business owners and employees to come together and share experiences, to talk about what's working and what's not. How we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train and retain all generations of workers. We all know that there has been a huge shift in what people want. generations are coming together, more than ever, on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about how the economy has been impacted, and what needs to happen to find a balance. I'm your host Leighann. Lovely. So let's get this conversation started. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, follow us like us and share us. We have an amazing guest with me today, Hanna Paul. She has made a career change going from the healthcare industry, to tech startup company. So I'm thrilled to talk with her today. Hanna Paul is a trained occupational therapist who jumped into a startup industry after exposure in the tech scene in the San Francisco Bay Area. Hannah saw how technology was being used to solve problems and disrupt the status quo of how services and products are accessed and experience. She has worked at a variety of startups leading clinical research trials for a VR company to serving as the Director of Customer happiness in telemedicine a catalyst and lover of change. Hannah currently serves as the customer success and implementation manager at a Milwaukee based startup idea week, who is focused on innovation idea week is essentially an online suggestion box on steroids. Change is the only constant in life. And companies have to be open and evolving and growing in order to make it in this day and age. Welcome, Hannah, I am so excited to have you here and talk with me today. Why don't you tell me a little bit about yourself.
Hanna Paul 02:28
Be glad to and thank you so much for having me. My name is Hanna. I'm the Customer Success and Implementation Manager at Ideawake by day and by night I'm Hanna banana having a good time on the town in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. My day job, I'm really much actively involved in working with different companies that choose to work with Ideawake and powering their innovation programs. So I work to consult with them to figure out best practices for them to be able to tap into the creative mindset of their already existing work workforce, either on the frontlines or in manager positions, we really want to utilize the individuals that are closest to their products to see ways that have strategies and solutions for bridging gaps and improving employee engagement and returning costs and revenue. So I get to be that person that shows them how to use the product, and use it to their advantage that they can get the most out of it and make innovation and innovative changes to their existing products or creating new ones.
Leighann Lovely 03:32
That's fun to be able to actually help the people see how those tools work. And yeah, that's a fun position to be in. But Hanna, you you actually have your Bachelor's of Science in Occupational Science and a Masters of Science in Occupational Therapy. So tell me, you know, the journey of how you found the role that you're in now, you know, at Ideawake it's very much of a industry change.
Hanna Paul 04:05
Yeah, absolutely, nothing in life is linear and get ready for a loop de loop ride because that is my journey. So I graduated from the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee in occupational therapy in 2016. And there's five ot schools within the Milwaukee area. And that means that there's a lot of saturation when it comes to OT's being here, and I knew it would be difficult for me to get a job at a location in which I felt fulfilled in being in setting wise. And so I chose to do a travel therapy contract. And that led me to getting a state license in California and in Oregon. And the plan was to travel the whole West Coast and do three month contracts at different cities and just kind of go along with it. I ended up having my first interview with a travel staffing company and landed on In a town called San Rafael, which is about 40 miles south of San Francisco. And so in April of 2017, I made the journey across the United States from Wisconsin to San Francisco. Found a sublet with a married couple there and moved there knowing absolutely nobody. But I was just ready for a change a culture shock, culture shock for myself, even within the United States and started my occupational therapy career in San Francisco.
Leighann Lovely 05:32
Small town girl moving and well, you know, small town, I suppose. Compared to San Francisco. Definitely. Yeah.
Hanna Paul 05:39
Yeah, absolutely. Definitely a different scene. Then Milwaukee, grew up in Appleton originally and then was on an often Milwaukee for for school, from 2011 to 2017 16. But yeah, San Francisco was calling my name. And little did I know, it was the place I needed to be to discover these these wings that I have. And I started to really see while I was working as an occupational therapist there, that the health care system is a model that is a mean machine and making money on sick people. And the day to day was was tough. I was involved in a lot of situations where I was being pressured to be involved in Medicare fraud. And I didn't see that as being fulfilling for myself, I loved my patients, but I didn't love the productivity. I didn't love the documentation side of things. I didn't go to school to become a documentation just I came to went to school to change people's lives and get them feeling better, and not make decisions based on what their insurance was and got the best reimbursement. So being there, I, specifically in the Bay Area, got exposed to the tech scene. And I saw the innovation happening there. I saw how the different companies were treating their employees so well and meeting their hierarchy of needs that they could get the most productivity out of them and creativity. And I wasn't getting that in health care. I wasn't getting mental health support. I wasn't getting reimbursements for my travel costs, and having just different things like buying meals and just life balance. And so I wanted to be on the innovative side of healthcare, I wanted to be on the preventative side of healthcare. And so I while I was still an OT, I switched to part time and dipped my toe and working in some startups, one being a virtual reality company called corona Labs, which uses virtual reality to use the visual system to help people combat chronic pain. And I ran the clinical research trials there. And then I did product demonstration for another startup called a site, which was a CCTV set of glasses that allows people with visual impairments to be able to see different things from a distance do contrast, hyper zoom, things like that. So I began sort of industry journey, then, wow,
Leighann Lovely 08:02
that's those are really amazing, different, different tools that that can people can utilize and use for. Well, health. I mean, yeah, simple. So from there, you know, you've obviously made your way back here to the greatest city in the world.
Hanna Paul 08:23
Yes, the greater mafia. How did tell how Did someone get you back from California to Milwaukee? Is the real question, right? Yes, well, that was an offer to go back to school for a PhD and my goodness, my program chair, he can spell excuse my French shit on a stick. And he was like, well send you to Switzerland. And you can do part of your doctoral program there. And so I didn't know what I wanted to do. Because I knew the OT job, I was burnt out. And I done it for two years. And I wanted to be in tech. And this was the next next best thing. And so I said yes to it, and eventually gave that nine months. And so that that also was that point, I felt that feeling I thought with ot were just I didn't light up in the morning, I felt dread going to work. And I didn't want to spend four years of my life writing a 400 page paper to prove a point. I can prove a point pretty easily without having to do that. We need people to be in those roles. But that's just not who I am. Right. So I quit the Ph. D program didn't know what I wanted to do, and started networking in Milwaukee area. And this is a story I do love to tell it's been a huge catalyst into what led me to where I'm at now, is I went to a networking event with new Waukee and the shift and they had a speaker there who asked the room, how many people here are doing anything with their degree? And 10% of the room raised their hand. And I had been telling myself this story that I couldn't be anything but an occupational therapist for my whole life and that there's no way I'm gonna be able to get another job other than ot I knew that's not where I'm going to be able to change healthcare was on the current model, I needed to be on the preventative side, I need to change the status quo. And so that was when I realized my skill set went way beyond just what occupational therapy was. And so I landed a job at a local startup here and virtual care for telemedicine. And in customer success, I did that for two years, when a lot of great things learn, I did not want to become a software engineer, I learned I not want to be a social media, individual content strategist, I knew I love customers, I knew I loved leadership. And I knew I loved being on the strategy side of a company. And so got an invitation to check out idea awake. And that is the long winded story of how I ended up at my current role.
Leighann Lovely 10:42
And that's, awesome. And you're so right, the amount of people that I talk with, that have have a degree in specific industry that they're in unless they are accountants, unless they are doctors, unless they are, you know, very specific to something that they have to have in order to do what they're doing. And that being those very niche industries, those doctors were you can't be a brain surgeon unless you went to school to be a cure, oh, my God, I hope somebody doesn't work on my brain if they don't have education and know how to do surgery on my brain. Same with my accountant, I'm not going to go to, you know, an accountant, if they don't have a lot of years and or an education in accounting. But when it comes to those transferable skills from those degrees, if you want to do something else, we're from so many other degrees, who decided or who said that an 18 year old coming out of high school has to make a decision for the rest of their life on what they want to be when they're in their 20s, their 30s, their 40s their 50s? Mm hmm. It's interesting that at that young age, we have to make a decision. What do you want to be when you grow up?
Hanna Paul 11:56
Yeah, what and no one ever tells you like, you hear that you hear that statistic of the average career change number for people is seven, but no one tells you hey, that might be when you're 19, that might be when you're 20, that might be might do six career changes in your 20s No one tells you when those things are gonna come, it's more of this metaphorical idea outside of ourselves, when the time comes, that we're actually not happy with what we're doing. Right. We don't think this is the right time. And then we have different factors that come in when it comes to families and moving and children and, and I don't have those different limitations. And I actually don't want to use one limitation just was different gifts in life that I have to use as navigate. But yeah, it's a it's an interesting mindset that we have in America that we make you at 18 have to decide on a career and then think you have to be in that the rest of your life.
Leighann Lovely 12:49
Right? And what really, what is the most important aspect of what we learn in each career? Is it the technical skills? Or is it the soft skills that you gain? And again, everybody that I talked to is like, well, it's the soft skills, because those are things that you learn over time. Whereas the technical skills they can they can be taught if you have the capacity to learn. And there are very few people that I have ever met in my entire life that don't have the capacity to learn. I would say that, I mean, there's almost nobody, everybody, no matter. And it's different. I mean, obviously, it's different for everybody and the capacity in which they learn. But everybody has the capacity to learn technical skills, soft skills are a little bit more difficult to learn if you struggle with certain things. If you are scared to death to talk in front of people, that's going to be a major thing to overcome. You're probably never be a public speaker. Then again, I'm sure somebody out there is going nope, nope, that's that. I became a public speaker and I was, you know, anyways, there's always there's always one out there saying no by overcame anyways. Yeah, it's the thing that, you know, when you're at that age, when you're 18, you're 19 Nobody ever complains that oh, they're not, they can't do this job because we're not capable of training them on the technical skills. It's always they're so young, they're so green. They're a little rougher on the edges when it comes to the politics in the office. That's just a matter of, they need exposure. And as you've gotten exposure to the world, you get better at that stuff. Which is what you can't be you can't be an elected official. You can't be president until you're like What 45 or something like that. Part of the reason is because of life experience. They want somebody who's been around the block. And I may be wrong on the age of that but so don't quote me on that. Anyways, so you made your way back to the Milwaukee market. Now you you are now with Ideawake So let's really get into what does idea week do? What is the the the nuts and bolts of the company? What do they do for? You know, for other organizations?
Hanna Paul 15:12
Yeah. So idea week is an idea management software platform. It's a platform that collects ideas. And we work with 14 different verticals, from manufacturing, to health care to insurance finance. And what we want to do is is to empower companies to have innovation programs. Evolution, as you said in the intro is so important when it comes to companies making it in this day and age. And so what we do is we give a voice to the employees and make it a fun process where they are being recognized for their ideas. We have five main reasons why people stop, we did a survey and last year that looked at what are the main reasons why somebody stops contributing ideas. And it's because the ideas fall in the black hole, they don't get recognition, they don't know where to share, they don't know how to share, and then fear of retribution from management for submitting those ideas. You know, we have a lot of us have that story, we had an idea and someone takes it. So where does the recognition get tracked. And so what our platform does is it has timestamps, it has proof of ownership, it has communication systems to let somebody know that their idea is being looked at that it's being evaluated that that the steering committees are being allowed to put a scorecard with it and rate it. And so what the whole system pretty much does is and I can kind of go from the customer journey is is each company will select challenges that they want to set up for their company, and we recommend to them might be how do we improve the patient discharge experience. And then the employees are given access to the platform. And it's very much like Facebook, where you submit an idea you can like you can vote, you can comment, you can take individuals and go, Hey, Jill, did you see this idea? What would be an awesome, we're just talking about this, let's add to this idea. And so you have this collaboration happening of employee engagement improving, you have different things coming to the table that you're not going to have in hire, hire an outside consultant come in and spend a year learning your product, when you've got people who know it right now what the needs are, and we're so close to it. And so what that does is it allows for camaraderie to build within a company, it allows people's voices to be heard to feel seen. And then what happens when the ideas go through the challenge. And you can put time, you can keep it open and have it be open all the time, like a box sitting in the office and you put a card in and they check it every once in a while. Or you can do timed challenges, which you're going to get much more engagement and ideas when it's timed. And so then once the challenge closes, different review teams, different stakeholders, decision makers will look at those ideas, they'll be able to sort them using our system with simple clicks of the button. Rather than having to sort them through and excel sheets and slack and Microsoft Teams and email and things being lost in the sauce. They're able to score those things and then select which ones are going to have the best ROI, which ones are going to be quick wins with big impacts that they can do what's going to be Low risk, low costs, and not much time to have to implement. But then they also can take the person who submitted that idea and go, Hey, we really liked this idea. We would love to give you time in your workday for you to implement this. And so they can go through three stages, we have a second service of ours called idea box, where it's an innovative, it's an accelerator, and that individually committed the idea if they want to, or a team can create a team that will go ahead and test that idea out how to pilot it, and then how to implement it and then show and demonstrate the value and actually putting that idea out there. But it also could be the regular departments, the business unit managers implementing those ideas. That's the great thing is personalized to each business. And so at the end of the day, it's a really awesome tool for collecting ideas, continuous improvement, continuous improvement, hackathons, different things like that we're able to power on our platform.
Leighann Lovely 19:26
That's, that's great. And I would assume that this has to help with obviously employee engagement. But you know, that employee that sits back and thinks, Well, you know, I have a solution for this or I have an idea. And that person that that never gets heard and then gets frustrated and eventually leaves because they feel like they're just never been heard. So the overall employee retention at companies, when a company implements something like this, because now all of a sudden you feel more valued As an employee, because you have a voice for the first time, and the company's actually taking, you know, an interest in what the employees are actually saying. And I've been at companies plenty of times where you know, as an employee, you can see what's broken, where maybe upper management or stakeholders or who, people who are not on the ground level, they, they don't see that every day, because they're not in it every day. And it's not that they're, they're not trying to pay attention. It's just that they don't, they're not walking the floor on a regular basis, noticing the things that as an employee, you do notice. And when you go to a manager and say, hey, you know, I noticed this, that manager, that mid level manager may not also also doesn't have the authority to go up and say, hey, you know, we think this done gives everybody that equal. And in my right, the equal playing field to be, hey, I have an idea, or I noticed this, and I think that this might work in order to fix this idea. That I mean, is that equal playing field? Everybody has the same right to be able from the janitor to the reception to the manager to anybody?
Hanna Paul 21:20
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I love that you said janitor, because we have a blog about how Flaming Hot Cheetos was pitched by a janitor that worked at the Cheeto ended, or lilies industry. I don't know what the parent company name is. But it was a janitor that came up with Flaming Hot Cheetos, he went and made an in recipe and made the Cheetos had people try it. And that's how we have Flaming Hot Cheetos, you know, it can be anybody.
Leighann Lovely 21:45
Right. And that's, that's great. And you never know where that diamond in the rough will come from. Because, you know, for so long, we assume that the position title that you hold is where you are in the hierarchy of the company. And that I think that's wrong. Every position at a company is vitally important. And sometimes the people who are the quietest are the people who are the smartest, they just may be introverts and aren't comfortable with a public forum, or aren't comfortable with the idea or coming forward with that. By giving them a platform like this, they can do it quietly,
Hanna Paul 22:28
They can be loudly at the same time to because they can write and do research and show supplemental materials as to why their idea has meaning. Yeah, and I love that I love the idea of you sharing, you know, for the people that are quiet, that they just aren't ones to speak up, we all have different gifts. And I think back when I was in health care, when I was seeing all these issues, I didn't even think to even I didn't even waste my time as I would actually put it, it felt like a waste of time to put ideas together to take down a healthcare system where there's clearly so many issues, what I'm gonna write an email and then send it to them. Whereas this, it's actually being shown that they want to hear ideas and a huge thing we briefed them on is we want them to tie their challenges towards business unit goals. And so then you can use the business unit goals as a reason for why this idea is so important, because it's going to lead to the strategic goals of our company. And I can't tell you based on my whole career, I don't know what the business goals were all of all the other places I've worked at, I have no idea. But if I had known that, and then given an opportunity to engage in something, and I feel like I could have improved the lives of my co workers the lives of my patients, mostly, but also administrators too. But I never felt like my voice was ever going to be heard within the game of labels of who gets to have a seat at the table here. Like you said, everyone gets a seat at the table or an opportunity to try to sit there.
Leighann Lovely 24:02
Right. And that's great. It is because especially at the larger organizations where people sometimes feel like numbers, and they feel like their voice is drowned out by hundreds of other employees, or you have a company that's got multiple locations, and you have no idea of tracking what is happening from one place to the other. This is a great way to create collaboration and create communication among everybody, everybody who wants to participate. So it's I mean, this is just an amazing so without giving obviously any confidential information away. Can you tell me anything about you know, one of the most exciting things that you've worked on other than the Flaming Hot Cheetos? That one would have been awesome to work?
Hanna Paul 24:57
Well, I mean, that wasn't us, but just like, right In general, but yeah, I mean, I would love to take, like, you guys. Yeah, again, it's cool. So I've been with Ideawake since November. So still fairly new. But I can tell you about a few different companies we're working with, you know, top ones Epson on Sirius XM, HP, and then some health care one Sanford Health, OSF, advocate Aurora, here based in the Milwaukee area. And I think what the most, the project that I personally am really excited about right now is specific to COVID. And it's trying to find ways to save time for the nurses in their day, that with ideas so that they don't have as much of burnout, and that they can provide the care that they need to, to the patients that they're taking care of. So that's one where it's, you know, there's human engaged challenges here, where we're trying to impact lives beyond just let's try to improve this product, let's try to improve this productivity line or save on scrap metal, you know, it's impacting people's lives is the main thing here. So that's been one of my favorite challenges to be a part of, and, and talking about creative solutions for trying to do team building exercises, and, and things like that. So I love the idea of building culture through innovation as well.
Leighann Lovely 26:17
Right? Yeah. And that's, that's awesome. You know, I we go on about the cool thing, like the Flaming Hot Cheetos, but you forget that there's amazing other projects like that of, you know, the human side, the figuring out the culture, the that that's an awesome project, I mean, that you should be thrilled to working to be working on something like that. So typically, the size of companies, I mean, are you working on? You listed off some pretty large organizations? Are you usually engaging very large companies? Do you have some smaller companies that come in and say, Hey, we've got, you know, 30 employees? And we'd like to, you know, put this out there to see if we can get them engaged, you know, what, what typically is the size?
Hanna Paul 27:03
Yeah, that's a great question. So, we range from as little as about 100 employees upwards to I think our most is 165,000, there is no maximum on it, it's how many users you want to have engaged on the platform. But we usually have the minimum be 100. And then it can be separated out into departments and locations. So when you get to those really big enterprises, you know, maybe you want to focus specifically on HR, you want to focus specifically on it, you can segment them out within a community. So you can have multiple different groups so that you can be gaining ideas in different areas, because let's be real, there's so many different parts to a well run machine, that it's not just, you know, one big thing, and if we have too many ideas, and then the bandwidth of being able to get really selective and targeted about what we're trying to get out of the challenge can get lost. And so the beautiful thing is, is that we're able to do that we're able to provide a system that the entire enterprise, if its massive, can, you know, take it as an undertaking, or we can go as small as 100. And look at all those users and participants from that, and that company to be able to contribute to the challenge statements and innovation program.
Leighann Lovely 28:15
Great. So I want to talk a little bit about the employee side of that, you know, I would assume that employees are, you know, after they understand, after they understand how it works. And after they understand what's you know, what it's all about? I would assume that there's some pretty reasonable buy in some pretty good buy in with this platform. Do you follow up? And kind of do a little bit of study, I guess, on what the employees feedback is what they feel, you know, how they feel it went? And if they felt that there was value in it?
Hanna Paul 28:50
Yeah, absolutely. Recently, just this week, we had a meeting with one of our customers, and they did a survey with their employees to see how they enjoyed the the platform and things like that. And they shared how they really, really enjoyed being able to feel like their voices were heard, and that they could be a part of something bigger than themselves. There's different things when it comes to you know, software and how we can make the user experience improved. And we're always making those software we'll never be obese, I think anybody battles so that user experience is so important for us. So we want to know where we need feedback to improve it so that it's simple and very easy for you to be able to engage in it and, and want that continued engagement, you know, it can become one of those things where you get maybe not as excited by it, you know, a year down the road, not something we've experienced, but just more so we want to continue to have people be actively involved in the challenges and one of the ways we do that is by offering prizes and gamification in our system. So prizes could be anything from monetary or non-monetary work could be an Amazon gift card for submitting an idea. Or it could be vacation days or lunch with the boss or lunch with the CEO or extra time to work on a Project and implement it, we really want to have people be inspired by the opportunity to contribute to something like I said, bigger than themselves. And we can do that through prizes, both with recognition of just simply a shout out, or like I said, the monetary stuff, too, we know that everyone's got different tax brackets that they got to be in. So we have different suggestions for things like that. But from the employee side, they really do enjoy the fact that they have a voice and they're being heard, and that their employers are taking the time to want to, to learn from them. That's another really big thing. And it makes it be from this hierarchical, you know, system to more of this wheel where we're kind of dancing in different spinning spaces. Whereas you may never have been able to talk to this person, because you're here and they're way up here. And now all of a sudden, you're in a lunchroom with them and talking through your idea. And all of a sudden you have this creativity and his passion pouring out of you that you didn't maybe even know had within you. And that's one of the coolest things I think that we get to see.
Leighann Lovely 31:08
You know, it's interesting that you, you mentioned prizes, that when when you could walk up to somebody and give them a gift. And they're like, well, thank you, thank you. But when you label it as a prize, all of a sudden, it becomes much more like, Oh, yes, I get a prize for this. And I, it's so weird. I don't know why as humans, if you dangle a carrot on the end of a string and say, Hey, if you do x, you get this. And for some reason, people just get really, really excited at the idea that, hey, if I participate, and then once you get them engaged, I'm assuming that they see what a great opportunity this is. And it doesn't have to be monetary value. Yeah, it a cup of coffee. Again, I know in my younger days of when I was entering into the workforce, the idea of sitting down with the CEO of a company, the CEO of my company was extremely thrilling. At the same time, it made me so nervous, I thought that it was gonna lose my stomach. I mean, it's just those those things are very exciting opportunities for people to one be involved, but at the same time be heard. Because there's so many people out there that are so unbelievably brilliant, but they haven't had the opportunity to, to show that yet. Like the janitor, and the and I keep going back to that, because I just think it's awesome. Great example. It really is. It really is. You know, that's it's like the movie, what was the movie Good Will Hunting. I mean, he was what put it trying to put himself through school, you know, being a being a janitor at a at a college, and there you are a diamond in the rough. There are hundreds of 1000s of them out there that will never be discovered, because they're not given the opportunity, or, you know, a voice to be heard. And it sounds like this is the mechanism for those voices to be heard.
Hanna Paul 33:16
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. It is. And that's, that's the great, greatest part of this. And there's there's this shift going on in our society, in our culture, when it comes to what, what leads to a job. You, you go to Google, you go to LinkedIn, you go to Twitter, they're hiring people without degrees. They they're looking at your experience and looking at what are you good at What lights your soul on fire? What pours out of you, when you can't, you can't stop? It's changing. And at the end of the day, it's coming down to who are you as a person? What are your soft skills? What are your hard skills, but what is it that is your unique gift, and it doesn't need to be that you have a four year degree on you and grant it education is great. I'm not here to say that education isn't something you know, for, you know, worthwhile, but you can go to a software boot camp for six months at the age of 19 now, and go get trained as a software engineer and end up with a six figure salary at the age of 19. It's getting much more like trade school in the sense of training where we're getting really specific to what people want to learn. And that pressuring them into this one specific funnel of how is it to be successful in life? Oh, it's a degree. No, it's different now. And and that was one of the things that was hard. The hardest thing for me when I left San Francisco was what do I want to do? I have all these choices. And I my mom said to me, she goes Hang on. You have no idea how much of a gift that is for you to be able to say that as a woman that you have so many options to choose from. And that was a way for me to get the cup You know, half full and not half empty at all, there's so many choices, I don't know what to do, it's, I'm standing on the successes of so many other women that fought for these rights to be able to say I can be anything I want to be, and I have no limitations, and I have a ceiling that I can break if I want to, I definitely am the type of individual, I'm the type of woman that 20 years ago, I wouldn't have made it, people wouldn't have been ready for me. But everyone's you know, shifting and moving around. And I love to see that people are in this great resignation that we're seeing already in, in the United States happening, they're going for what they want to do COVID made them look back on themselves and go, What is it that I want to do with my life, you know, it's an employee's market now, and people are really getting clear on where they want to spend my time. And companies have to think about that. And that's where ideas like is a great way for them to look at employee rent retention, that's the thing that they're really gonna have to consider, they're got to consider benefits, they're gonna have to consider allowing for new things to be done and given to improve the happiness of their employees. Because at the end of the day, life's about, you know, really enjoying being in the present moment. And, you know, the cultures that you're around and, and the stress and do situations where you're meeting these deadlines, and, and for what, you know, I always ask myself this question of if this role, you know, something were to happen to me, and I couldn't do my job, could somebody fill it? For me? The answer is, yes, we all get stuck in this mindset that if I'm not doing this, I'm not here, the world's gonna stop spinning, it's gonna keep spinning. So make sure you're spending it in a place where you feel supported, seen heard, and that you have somebody who sees your gifts and wants you to use them in your day to day
Leighann Lovely 36:52
You gave me goosebumps, everything that you were saying, because there has been an absolute shift, it excites me that there has been so much of a shift in the world to see and talk to people every day who will come to me, you know, obviously, I'm in in the staffing industry, my day job, night, you know, podcaster by night. But people come to me all the time and say, Listen, I don't I don't want to do this job anymore. I'm done with it. I'm, I'm burnt out. But I don't know what I want to be when I grow up. And I always ask them, Well, what skills do you have? What do you like to do? What gets your blood pumping in the morning at the idea of, well, if I could just do with that? And they're like, Wow, but I don't have the I've never done that before. I don't have the skills, you know, I technical skills to do that. And I look at them and go, have you ever applied or talk to somebody in that industry? Have you ever started networking with people who are in that industry, because tackling you know, the technical skills can be trained. Again, I go back to unless you want to be a brain surgeon, okay, you can't just one day wake up and say I'm going to be a brain surgeon. But there are so many skills that are transferable. And there are so many people right now who are saying, I will hire somebody who has the soft skills, and is willing to put in the effort, if they will just simply come in every day, put forth the effort, and they have the soft skills there. I will train them on everything else. Because there are so many jobs open and so many companies suffering right now, to just get people to show up. This is the time to anybody out there listening, if you're not happy in the job that you currently have, you have the ability to be happy. You just have to take the initiative and figure out what it is that you want to be when you start adulting.
Hanna Paul 38:55
Yeah. And adulting is never ending, right?
Leighann Lovely 38:59
If you if you're going to a job that you hate every day, right now is the time to figure out okay, what do I love? Or if if it's that you do love what you do, but you hate the culture, then you need to find a new job in that area. Because if a company right now has got that bad of culture and they're not fixing it, they're never going to
Hanna Paul 39:21
And that's an enablement on your part as well for the status quo to that way. That's a huge thing. I see so many people so many of my friends, they're spending their times and their evening hours complaining about work and I just sat by it because that's not how it should be.
Leighann Lovely 39:36
No. And right I mean, there are in companies right now are paying for quality people. They are it's an employee market. You said it, we could all say it until we're blue in the face. You can go in as long as you are not demanding the world. You can't go in and say hey, I was making, you know, 20 bucks down the street. Now I want 30 Okay, it's unreasonable. You can't go in and gouge an employee, you go in and you tell them this is how many years of experience I have. This is what I'm able to do for you. I just want to be paid fair.
Hanna Paul 40:08
I actually disagree a little bit here. And I'll just go, yes,
Leighann Lovely 40:12
no, I know. I know. But no, if you were severely underpaid at a company, yes, I totally agree. There are some circumstances where people are being severely underpaid. But when I limit, especially women, I'm just saying that, you know, if you're, you shouldn't be, you know, basically gouging. You know, an employer on purpose, because you know, you can, it's, it's about fair, all around. Because what's going to happen is, if you do that, there is going to be, there's going to be a shift, there's going to be a balance, and unfortunately, it's going to come back around. And if you are being way overpaid for a job, because they have to hire you right now. It could come back to bite you. One day, I'll just yeah, definitely
Hanna Paul 41:01
increase in salary doesn't always mean an increase in happiness, you got to look at the benefits, you got to look at the culture, you got to look at how they treat every single employee, if they give you benefits for hybrid working, travel, PTO, all of it, and leading by example, look at looking at the leaders. That's that's really important to see how do they live their lives? And are they understanding that there's different types of people because each company needs people that work to live and people who also live to work? It's just it's a beautiful balance,
Leighann Lovely 41:29
right? Yep. Well, we are almost at time. But I have one more question the question of the season. And you probably have actually a couple of examples of these just from talking to talking. But I have a lot to say, if you could pinpoint a time period in your career that made a huge difference in your life or career path. When would that be and why?
Hanna Paul 41:55
Yes, it was meeting a patient of mine, and I can't use her first name. So we'll call her Jen. I met Jen and California. And Jen story changed my entire life, not just my career. And it made me see the world not through rose colored glasses, that I have a purpose here. And it is to spread light, and to also spread light and shine light, where people are lacking in putting humans first. And that their systems and processes in place that are keeping things the way that they are where people are hurting. And so this patient made me see that I'm here to make change. And I'm here to do it in a graceful way. I'm not here to take a you know, grenade and throw it and boom, let's see what catastrophe we can throw up here. But how can we work together, all of us with systems we already have in place to make the world a better place. And I think it's a great place. You know, there's a lot of beautiful things happening in this day and age. But that patient without going into it changed my life. And what I wanted to do, and I'm just felt this inner power, inner drive is intuition. screaming at me and going, you are not here to be at the bottom, you are here to be with people that are influencers and here to make change and and make people feel safe with change, excited about change. And so I would say that was it. And that's when I was being around the tech scene, I knew I needed to step out of my current position. Because I wasn't able to have a voice there specifically, where I wanted to impact people in all industries, not just one.
Leighann Lovely 43:50
May I ask you a simple question? Yes, I'll try to get a simple answer. Was it something she said? Or was it something she did?
Hanna Paul 43:58
It was the way it was her story of how she grew up. And what happened to her as a child and as a teenager, and her not having the right support and love from her family. And hearing that whole story and how it played impacted the rest of her life where she was then disabled at the age of 30 for the rest of her life when she could have lived a life much more fully, much more healthy, and actually lost her this week. But I'm so glad she's not in pain anymore. And she's not suffering and her family. And I've remained very close. And I told her the last thing I said to her was, you changed my life. And we said we loved each other and that goodbye. And I always called her girly. And that's how I said goodbye. I'll miss you girly.
Leighann Lovely 44:49
Thank you very much for sharing that. It's amazing how, as humans, a simple story can impact us in such a profound way. Yeah, obviously was beyond words. But that is the human connection, isn't it?
Hanna Paul 45:04
Yeah, we're here for a certain amount of years. And I find so many people getting caught up in the the to dues the, the number the comparisons, and I just want to remind them, we're here to smile every once in a while and, and have fun. And I love to inspire the inner child and children, everybody, especially adults, and if I can remind one person to smile on a day, that's my mission, you know, I love what I do at Ideawake. But I use it as my channel to be able to impact as many lives as I can through positivity. And so it's, it's that patient that I wish I could give her that world, I wish I could have given that world to her, but I couldn't, it was too late. And so I'm wanting to prevent and save others from a potential life like that. And that they can empower be feel empowered to make life whatever they want it to be.
Leighann Lovely 45:57
Well, that's beautiful. Thank you so much for coming on today. And if somebody wants to reach out to you, how would they go about doing that?
Hanna Paul 46:07
Yeah, I would love to hear from you. A few different ways you can email me Hanna at ideawake, I do not have an h on the end of my name. So it's H A N N A @ ideawake.com. You can also find me on LinkedIn for Hanna, Hanna Paul. And then just another thing too is if you are looking for help with, you know career changes and things like that I love to help people with developing the personal brand and getting to that core of what is your purpose and what is your passion. So please reach out. I'd love to hear from you. And I hope you all have a beautiful, beautiful day wherever you are.
Leighann Lovely 46:42
Thank you so much. Thank you.
Leighann Lovely 46:45
Thank you again for listening to Let's Talk HR. I appreciate your time and support without you the audience this would not be possible. So don't forget that if you enjoyed this episode to follow us like us or share us. Have a wonderful day.
Contact Hanna Paul
E-mail – hanna@ideawake.com
LinkedIN - linkedin.com/in/hannapaul
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Music from Uppbeat (free for Creators!): https://uppbeat.io/t/cruen/family-time License code: 2330NZD3BLNDKPYI
Wednesday Feb 23, 2022
Wednesday Feb 23, 2022
Growing Pains are hard, they don't get easier the bigger you get just more complex. So understanding your focus and what's most important is something that this guest can differently help with.
Andrew Bartlow, to put it simply, is wildly brilliant!
Leighann Lovely 00:15
Let's talk. HR is a place for HR professionals, business owners and employees to come together and share experiences, to talk about what's working and what's not. How we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train and retain all generations of workers. We all know that there has been a huge shift in what people want. generations are coming together, more than ever, on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about how the economy has been impacted, and what needs to happen to find a balance. I'm your host Leighann. Lovely. So let's get this conversation started. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, follow us like us and share us. Andrew Bartlow has 25 years of human resource and talent management experience at organizations across a wide spectrum of sizes, maturity stages and industries. He is the co author of scaling for success people priorities for high growth organizations. He has a master's degree from a top program in his field and has been CECP, SPHR, Six Sigma and Executive Coaching certified. Andrew leads Series B Consulting, which helps businesses to articulate their people strategy and accelerate their growth while navigating rapid change. He also founded People Leader Accelerator, which is the preeminent development program for startup HR leaders.
Leighann Lovely 01:56
Welcome Andrew, I am so glad that you agreed to talk with me today.
Andrew Bartlow 02:01
Leighann really happy to be with you.
Leighann Lovely 02:03
So tell me a little bit about your background. And a little bit about your book that you released in January of 2021. I'm excited to hear about this. (Correction to - Book Released in July 2021)
Andrew Bartlow 02:15
Oh, yeah, well, thanks a lot. I have about 25 years of Human Resources experience at companies very large to very small and everything in between and a bunch of places that you have probably heard of, and a bunch of places you probably haven't. I was really fortunate, lucky, successful exit from the last company where I was the head of HR as they went public and went through a number of different mergers and acquisitions and pulled my parachute a few years ago, started consulting and advising private equity backed companies venture backed companies doing some independent work. As I was getting started with that, I wrote my bucket list book that Columbia University published. So I was just really pleased with their support. And the topic of the book is well the name of it is scaling for success, people priorities for high growth organizations. So that's, that's pretty self-explanatory, but it's really about people and management practices. At high growth companies, you don't have to be a VC backed tech company for this stuff to be relevant. But there just isn't enough useful practical material out there. For smaller companies, it all tends to be the giant fortune five hundreds and that the good degrades. And the these big stories of big successful Googles and Netflix, how about the other 99.9% companies that that's what I was trying to speak to and help their HR leaders. So it's out in the world now it's on. It's in print, it's an audio, there's a Kindle version. The guy reading it wasn't me. But I'm thankful that, that it got turned into an audio book.
Leighann Lovely 04:17
That's awesome. And you you're so you're so completely right. You know, we all hear the great stories of these amazingly huge companies being so amazing and doing such amazing things. But that's not the main population of companies that are out there. The little guys need just as much attention and well, there's a heck of a lot more little guys or midsize guys than there are monsters of companies out there. So awesome. I have admittedly not gotten the opportunity to read it. But I have definitely I'm excited to read it and you know, take a look at it. So it's great. You work with companies and their leaders to help with some of the the growing pains that happen with growth in organizations? What are some of the main challenges that you see with those organizations you work with? And how does that vary from different sized companies that you do work with?
Andrew Bartlow 05:15
I think there's actually a lot of consistency across size. But across geography across industry, I mean that the management challenges are not super unique, it's really more how you deal with those management challenges and the resources that you have to deal with them. So that the common theme that I see may be stronger than anything, but the so what one theme may be stronger than anything, is lack of focus, lack of clarity. Too many people at too many organizations are trying to take on too much. And when you do take that on, so this is maybe you know, number two of what I what I see a lot of is lifting and shifting, I see a lot of application of somebody else's best practices, or whatever some leader heard about, in an article they read over the weekend, or a founder group that they're a part of, or whatever company they worked at last, it's a lot of lifting and shifting, with without really thinking through what's what's right for them.
Leighann Lovely 06:24
That completely makes sense. A, somebody reads a book and you know, small company, and they hear oh, this really worked at this company. But what works, that's everybody's different. And when you have such vastly different cultures, from one organization to the next organization, trying to take a, you know, round peg and shove it into a square hole is just not, it's not feasible, it's not effective. And you know, I've talked about this, with many other guests, just you trying to figure out the right solution to your particular problem, there's, there's typically not just some pre packaged, and that's again, why somebody like you coming in being able to identify what that is, work with somebody. And then you mentioned that, you know, one person trying to take on so many different things that at the same time, or you know, shifting from one role to another. And I've mentioned this to other people, HR people right now are so they're spread so thin, that it seems like often things get dumped on them. And then all of a sudden, it's like, oh, I completely forgot about that, I have to take care of that. And it's not just HR professionals. Right now we were at a we're at a threshold of having the least amount of employees at almost every company trying to do the most amount of work right now. So it's very interesting. And I'm assuming that you're dealing with that on a regular basis.
Andrew Bartlow 07:55
Well, heck come on, I'm a founder myself, of a couple of different enterprises. So I, I see this, and I feel this and I, I need to take more my own medicine, frankly. Yeah, have have more focus, have a clear plan. I might have coined this, I'm going to say it, you can move 30 things an inch, or three things a mile. Right? In most cases, it's it's more helpful that move those three things mile, right? And then like, what should you work on what best practice is best for you. Somebody else said this context is king. So you really have to understand your own unique situation to figure out what to do about it. And so you're buying somebody's book, or boy, I used to hate Mondays, because the CEOs that I would work for would come in on Mondays with all these brand new ideas of stuff that we had to do that they heard about over the weekend. And then it was up to me to try to figure out how to talk him out of it, or how to make it work at an organization that it was never really designed to work at.
Leighann Lovely 09:02
Right? I had similar experience. One of the sales leaders would come in with, oh, I have this new idea on how we can be better salespeople. And then the next week, it was the next flavor of I have the greatest idea of and it was like, Can we just get through one training session and figure one thing out before we've moved on to the next thing? Because Can we just master one skill and become really good at that one thing before we try to become semi good at everything,
Andrew Bartlow 09:36
Which comes back to focus, right? Right. And in a lot of small businesses just can't think of anywhere this isn't true. There's a lot of stuff that has to get done. Right and some and some of those things can be done just okay. You don't have to be great at everything. But but if you're trying to get if you're trying to help a business be successful, you should probably pick Few lanes, and really, I'm gonna make some metaphors here. But you should have the express lane, where certain really important strategic things, you make sure that those get happen, that those happen, and that those happen on a timeline and don't get pushed to the side when when emergencies come up.
Leighann Lovely 10:17
So as a founder of People Leader Accelerator, I am sure that leaders come to you with all different challenges small, large, has the complexity of this changed over time with the increase, you know, visibility into people's lives because of technology? Or is it you know, relative to the times that we're in,
Andrew Bartlow 10:37
I say that the noise and the risk of distraction has definitely increased, right across all all sorts of different companies, there's still this need to ruthlessly prioritize. So it's really easy to get caught up and all the stuff that we're able to hear about with our Apple news feed or whatever is popping up in our notifications, and that the availability of information can be really distracting. And it's an it's easy to fall in love with bright, shiny objects and keeping up with the Joneses and that sort of thing. But, you know, beyond beyond that sort of increased potential for distraction, I think they're I don't know that some of the common needs, some of the common themes are, you know, leaders transitioning in their role from doer, to manager to leader, I try to help HR people elevate from service provider to designer, from like, bringing the burger to designing the menu in the experience of the restaurant, and help leaders, whether they're a CEO of a investor backed company, or whether they're an HR leader, trying to figure out a founder relationship, help them navigate relationships with their stakeholders. So has has the complexity of the world around us changed that in a in a big way? I don't know. It's it's easier to be distracted. But it's all the same problem. It's, it's different flavors of ice cream, but it's all still ice cream.
Leighann Lovely 12:20
Right. So have you seen a change in what leaders need? And do you think that it's directly related, you know, possibly to the pandemic? I mean, obviously, as there's been a shift with people working from home, there's been a shift with the different things that employees need from those leaders. Have you seen that those leaders are needing more guidance from from you? I mean, I would assume that this is a whole new world for so many people.
Andrew Bartlow 12:58
Oh, yeah. Well, for for everybody, like there have been a whole lot of global pandemics. I guess the Spanish flu was 100 years ago, or, like that. And remote work is at this level is something new, and I highlight pay transparency as being one of the drivers of the great resignation. There's, there's a lot going on. That said, I'll key in on on the word that you use need, need versus want. And I talked earlier about the distractions and the the volume of information coming at us. So like, yes, there. There's a lot going on with pandemic compliance requirements, well, who can be tested and who can come to the office or not returned to the office and remote work and comp rates and great resignations, skilled skilled labor is impossible to find, or recruit or retain nowadays. So lots of talk about all that. But I encourage leaders to think hard about what they need. What should you be working on? What is most important for you right now, and less about getting, you know, tied up and again, that that flavor of the day, or the bright shiny object? So what's really critical for your business to figure out and then don't overcomplicate it. So with that in mind with you know, I'll I guess I'll give that as a long preamble and try to answer the question around like, what didn't leaders need? I think leaders need some reflection time. I think leaders need some headspace to get re grounded in what they're trying to accomplish. And their role and their goals and their purpose and try to avoid all that noise and distraction of ping we've got a new law about you know, pandemic stuff or paying somebody new resigned or like, okay, what are we trying to do? What are the handful of most important things We need to do to accomplish that. Let's get after it. But that's what leaders need. They need more focus more focus time.
Leighann Lovely 15:07
So how do you, I guess, do you assist them with? how that looks? That focus time? Do you guide them in? How does that focus time? become easier? How do you create and what do you focus on in order to hone in on the things that you need for your business?
Andrew Bartlow 15:31
Yeah, well, I hate to be clear, I am not a guided meditation yogi. Alright, to be clear, that's not my jam.
Leighann Lovely 15:40
Deep breathing now. Okay, now put your hands. No, yeah,
Andrew Bartlow 15:44
I do live in the Bay area of San Francisco. Metro. Like there's definitely a lot. Yeah. And hey, the whole mindfulness thing and meditation like that really works for some people, and some leaders and great Go, Go do what works for you, right? What, what I what I help with is pointing out some of those obvious things. Right? Pick out your three things, you're going to move for a while. I, you know, have have the freedom be able to be able to give the straight talk to the HR leaders and CEOs and investor groups that I work with to say like, where's the list of things that are most important? How about we write it down together? Oh, look, it's 47 items. But what's most important about it out of those things, there's a really nice model by Patrick Lencioni, prolific author, Five Dysfunctions of a Team. It's got a bunch of other books out there. The latest, I think, is the advantage, where he uses the six questions for clarity. How do we behave? What what is our purpose? What's most important right now? I won't list them. All right. That feels too much like a quiz that I walked myself into. But the the point is clarity. And so how do I help leaders? I am, I'm holding their hand walking with them. Doing org planning, doing prioritization. I help a lot of my HR clients build a people plan. What are the three most important things for however many most important things for your HR organization to deliver? And how closely aligned are those things to what's most important for your company? That's often a missed connection. And then do you have the right resources, vendors dollars headcount lined up to deliver against it? So it's, it's honestly not rocket science, it's just the the ultimate collection of a lot of stubbed toes and, you know, accidents through a 25 year career of working with a bunch of different companies. And, you know, doing some of that organizational planning, a lot of organizations, nobody's really tasked with doing that. And, and it fell to me over the years. And there are a couple different models out there, there's Eos, there's gazelles, there's a bunch of different consultants that will apply their framework. But I, you know, really focus pretty practically on, let's find a short priority list. And, you know, just walk through what execution looks like.
Leighann Lovely 18:25
And it's great that you, you know, kind of clarify that because, you know, you walk into somebody's office and half the time you see, either stacks of Oh, that's my to do pile, that's my done pile. And that is half the battle is figuring out what is the priority, what needs to get done now, what can I push off to later. And even when those lists are made, it's, it's never ending lists. So to help somebody in a senior role to even just to help HR personnel, me who constantly is looking at the next shiny object going, Oh, I can't wait to get to that when I haven't finished the project that I'm working on. You know, previously, it my husband yells at me about that all the time. You know, hey, what about you know, the, the crap that's laying on the table that you were supposed to finish two weeks ago? And I'm like, oh, yeah, but this one looks way much more fun. And he's like, Yeah, but um, to have somebody be able to say, Okay, wait, what's the most important thing to you? What's the most important thing to the business to grow the business to make sure everybody that's creating the product for your business is being provided for that. That's half the battle to keep that going. And then obviously, growing, and there's a lot of companies out there that maybe keep it going, but don't understand what that looks like. If you are growing, and what those growing pains look like, you know, as you want to scale up and as you and you hear it all the time of companies who hit maybe a million dollar mark and then they just can't they just Just can't level up because they don't have the tools in place. And once or if they hit that 5 million mark, they don't know how to, you know, go on beat beyond that.
Andrew Bartlow 20:11
It's a it's at all sizes and stages I have a client working with right now, that $600 million, and they're trying to get to a billion, like, those are big numbers, right. But it's different. Like it's, I saw, actually somebody who went through my People Leader Accelerator program, just put a really thoughtful article out on LinkedIn today. And he refers to organizations like potted plants. I loved it, I heard Yeah. Alright, so here's a connection. If the, if the organization is growing, it's going to need to be repotted into a different pot over time. Otherwise, it'll die. It'll, you know, it'll outgrow the framework that it's in. And so, you know, things are different at different sizes and stages and complexity, and just knowing that, and maybe moving into the bigger pot before you absolutely need it, but not too early. Don't drop your little cactus into a giant bathtub. You know, be aware of that natural transition.
Leighann Lovely 21:21
Right. And wow, that's a great analogy. I When you first said that I went I don't understand. But right now, as soon as he started walking through that I went, but I also kill every plant that's in my house. So maybe I learned something from that.
Andrew Bartlow 21:34
I need I need to credit the author on that, Daniel Illis, VP of People Vinted, Yeah,
Leighann Lovely 21:39
Okay. Well, yeah, that's that's absolutely great. A great analogy. And again, yeah, I kill every plant in my house. So maybe I should read that, you know, also helped me in business, right. Okay, so many people that I have spoken with have said that the problems that we are experiencing now with everything that's going on the world would eventually have become issues for businesses, that it's it's, it would have just happened at a slower pace that the pandemic has just basically accelerated. What we are seeing in businesses, what we're seeing in will a lot of things. Furthermore, they've said that this could be a good thing, because now we're seeing a lot of the issues that would have eventually come out. A light is being shined on them with, you know, a lot of things that we haven't talked about whether that be, you know, issues in the way that HR or the issues in whatever it might be in businesses that they weren't addressing before. Do you agree that it could be a good thing that we're kind of shining a light on some of the things that would eventually have been addressed? And that?
Andrew Bartlow 22:50
Yeah, well, is it? Is it a good thing or a bad thing? I don't know, that's kind of a value judgment, it's definitely a thing. Like, it's, it's definitely accelerated. And that means that organizations should adapt to it, and deal with it, and try to be tried to try to move up on the curve. So you're not, you know, reactionary, and dealing with a lack of available workforce. So you know, a value judgment of good or bad, I think it kind of depends where you stand. But, you know, to give a little bit more detail on what what I'm seeing happening in the, in the workplace, I deal with a bunch of different employers through my various plates spinning. With technology, we have dramatically increased the visibility of pay rates. So you can find out what different jobs make at different places. And it's no longer just professional workers that can figure that stuff out. Right, like, you know, our early industrial manufacturing service workers that are, you know, some of the lowest paid workers in the United States, they can find out that they can make more somewhere else. And they didn't used to be able to do that before the rise of technology and, and information that way. They can also get better and more information on the quality of a workplace like think of Glassdoor and indeed an employer reviews. So they can figure out hey, is this a good place to work or not? And that, you know, so. So technology has increased transparency in the workplace. And so he, whether that's related to the pandemic or not, I think it's accelerated people looking around, looking up and trying to figure out is this the right situation? For me? I think the pandemic has been a point of reflection. For a lot of workers. Whether you're working in a cafe or you're the CEO of a big organization, you look up and you look around you say what things are different. What what do I want my situation to be? And those moments when you reflect and look around, you're frankly more likely to make a move. than you are when you're not looking around when you're just doing the work. The other big area is, is remote work. So technology certainly enabled remote work. But those core tools have been around for a long time. They just really accelerated the adoption, you know, forced by some of the stay at home orders. So, yeah, it was it was a trend. But you know, it was it was nothing like it has been over the past year or two, and maybe the years ahead. So will more employers become more purposefully hybrid, or intentionally fully distributed and let go of their commercial office leases? Yeah, well, I think the percentages will move. I mean, we'll see what that eventually looks like. But I'm certain that that movement will move faster as a result of this pandemic than it would have otherwise. So there's just lots of lots of implications that touch the world of human resources management, that brought on by this by the pandemic and technology, it affects productivity effects, performance management, learning, compensation, attraction, and retention. There's a lot going on in the HR world, related to this confluence of events and technology.
Leighann Lovely 26:25
Yeah, absolutely. And an interesting fact that I read was that remote workers that were polled are 22%, happier than people that are not working at home, because of the fact that they are able to do and have a higher work life balance, they're happier, but they're putting in over 40 hours, 43% more of the time than their counterparts who are working on site. And the reason that they said that they were were doing this was because one, there's no commute. So instead of having to get up and leave the house at 7:30, to make it to work, and that's been, you know, depending on where you live, you may have to leave at seven to get there at eight, you may have to leave at 7:30 to get there at eight, whatever your commute is, but no longer do they have that commute, they can get out of bed, they can have breakfast with their family, if their families there, they can drop the kids off at school, and then be in for most cases, your children are within your school district, which is usually within a certain radius of your home, they're back at home, you know, getting to work by eight o'clock is quite easy. And if you don't have to leave your house at all, getting to work by eight o'clock is very easy. So they're gaining all of this time. So all of a sudden, putting in that extra half hour extra hour extra two hours of work doesn't feel like you're putting in that extra hour or two hours of work, because you're really not. I mean, you're you would have otherwise been sitting in your car on your way to work. So having those in those individuals who are putting in that extra time is all of a sudden not not a big deal to them, because and they're 22% happier.
Andrew Bartlow 28:14
Yeah. Well, and maybe it has impact. This is speculation. Maybe it's impacted the number of meetings that occur because meetings now need to be scheduled over whatever platform you're using. We're using Zoom today, rather than walking around the office and collecting everybody to move into a conference room to talk about whatever. Because some thought and planning needs to be put into it. It maybe it happens less. And so people actually have more time to do the work versus talking about the work.
Leighann Lovely 28:45
Correct. You also don't have employees hanging out in the lunch room talking for 25 minutes about their weekend or about how their kid did this are, you know, and I was one of those employees that you know, you get me on a conversation. You? Gee, I wonder how I ended up doing a podcast. You know, I was one of those employees who would sit in chit chats about you know, how are you? How are you, you know what's going on. And I mean, think about the hours. Again, it's a natural thing you want to know your coworkers but think about the amount of hours wasted at work of coworkers just making small talk. So think about how much more productive you are. When you're at home. Even if you get up to do laundry, even if you get up to do all of these different things. And again, I'm not arguing one way or another. Okay. There are a ton of them lawyers out there who are still dug in and say we will never go remote. It just won't work for us. And again, essential employees they can't most of the essential employees, healthcare workers, police officers we can't believe be a police officer and work at home. You have to be out there. We we need you out there. We need fire men out there. We need our healthcare workers out there, and fewer, any of those, thank you for your service. Thank you for doing that. But there are a ton of positions that can be done at home. And some employers are still saying, No, we won't do that. But the technology is now available. And to say that you're disconnected from the world, we are very much connected right now having a conversation, you're in San Francisco, I'm in Wisconsin. And yet, we are still finding a way to connect through a platform. And I don't know how I went off on this tangent, but I do have a tendency to do that.
Andrew Bartlow 30:37
Well, hey, I'd love to, I'd love to follow up on a couple of those comments. And that is that with remote work, there's still a value in building relationships. Most thing still get done in organizations through relationships, and who knows who, versus a really clear process flow, or list of instructions. And so, you know, knowing who you're working with, and you know, having a connection with people that gives you more meaning that gives you more purpose, those are all kind of fluffy things that are hard, they're hard to pin down to hard economic value, I'd suggest that there's the Yeah, as more organizations move to more distributed environments, there will be more intentional gatherings rather than the drop ends. So that that's probably useful, and probably money better spent than fancy office space. And in one particular geography, I'd also we're making predictions now. Alright, so here, we're doing this in 2022, I think there's going to be an increased focus on worker productivity, and performance. So all these people that are working somewhere where their managers can't see what they're doing. Yes, maybe they're working more hours, yes, maybe they are more productive. But there's very little right now to ascertain whether that's true or not. And so I think there will be a rise of tools and technologies and hopefully not like nanny cams and people's home offices. Right, it has areas that but I think there'll be a lot of interest in figuring out are my workers is my team working on the right stuff, to ensure that we get stuff done if we're not all together where we can follow up with each other?
Leighann Lovely 32:32
Yeah, and, you know, right now, I know that when one of my close friends, she's in accounting, and I know that when she is her computer is idle, her company knows. So I mean, there are some form of that. Now, there is some way didn't. I mean, I have teams, I have teams on my work computer. And when I'm away from my desk, it goes to an idle mode and my boss, well, my boss knows if I'm now I don't have a boss who's like, Hey, where are you? You know, not that I have a problem, hey, I'm at a meeting, you know, I'm in. For my day job. I'm in sales. So I'm all over the place today. I was taking meetings in my car. I mean, it's, it's the way of the world when you have the ability to do technology that way. Now, I've been in a sales role for many years of my career. So I'm used to being out on the road. I'm used to being you know, half the time, not in the office anyways. So, but yes, what you just said about technology, being able to, I hope it doesn't get to a point where it's a nanny cam type thing where it's watching me sit at my desk, that would make me wildly uncomfortable. But but you never know.
Andrew Bartlow 33:54
Screenshots there are technologies that will take screenshots of your of your computer and, and flag if it looks like you're on a YouTube site or whatever, doing something you're not supposed to be doing. Yeah, I am in no way advocating for these things. Please, please don't take that audience as my recommendation. This is more of a prediction as as remote work and distributed work, increase. And, you know, that becomes the expectation of the workforce, you'll have a tougher time recruiting people and retaining people if you don't allow more of that. I mean, there will still be companies that are fully together that that's fine. But there'll be an increased focus on on managing that distributed workforce.
Leighann Lovely 34:43
Yeah, no, I completely agree. And maybe you just came up with the next brilliant idea. Open up a company create the technology to be able to No, I'm no, I wouldn't want to do that.
Andrew Bartlow 34:54
Not that hard. I'm in I'm just outside Silicon Valley. I had a call with a Ukrainian product. design engineering firm just before this call, it's not that hard. Everybody's doing it.
Leighann Lovely 35:06
Yep. Yeah, technology popping up everywhere new platforms, new recruiting platforms popping up everywhere. I hear that one all the time. Yeah, it's, uh, you know, and people ask me, How do you beat the bottom when you apply to a position? I don't know it, you end up in a virtual stack of resumes. That's why I send you to a live recruiter who then sends you to companies. Okay. Anyways, now, we are pretty much at time. So this is the final question, this question that I'm asking everybody. If you could pinpoint a time period in your career that made a huge difference in your life or career path? When would that be and why?
Andrew Bartlow 35:48
Yeah, so I had a really major formative experience early in my career. It was my second job out of grad school, I left Pepsi to become head of HR at some tiny technology professional services company. So I was head of HR at a startup at 24-23 years old. And we took that company, I was hired number 20. We took it to about 120 employees globally in less than a year. And then I mean, this, this definitely dates me. But then the.com crash happened, and completely went out of business. They went from 120 to zero. So talk about a tremendous formative experience lasted a year, we went from 20 to 120, we went from local to national to global, and then we went out of business. So during that time, I, I learned how to partner with finance. So we were doing all the workforce planning, we figured out we couldn't make payroll, had to talk to the CEO founder about that, I've learned how to interact with a business leader, a co founder, which is a very different animal than a air, quote, professional founder that grew up inside of a of a company that somebody else started, I learned prioritization at that small company, because everything needed to be done and everything was on fire. And by the bottom line, I just had received a lot of hard knocks and stubbed toes along the way. And it makes a story that I'm telling 20 years later, so that that was a really formative experience for me that that helped accelerate my career path through some of those hard knocks.
Leighann Lovely 37:39
Wow. 23 You were 23 when you were the director of HR? Wow, that is an experience. And I'm sure one that really launched you into, you know, a whole lot of new understanding of things. So thank you for sharing that. And Andrew, thank you so very much for coming on today. If somebody wants to get a hold of you or reach out to you about, you know, well, your book or your services, how would they go about doing that?
Andrew Bartlow 38:11
Great. Well, thanks for the underhanded pitch. I'll try to hit it out of the park. LinkedIn is a great place to find me there are not that many Andrew Barlow's. I also have a website for the development program for HR leaders. People Leader Accelerator I'm sure it'll be in the show notes. And then I have my own personal single shingle consulting firm and it's called Series B is in boy or Bartlow. Consulting Series B. consulting.com.
Leighann Lovely 38:44
Perfect. Well, thank you again. It's been awesome. Thank you. Thank you again for listening to Let's Talk HR. I appreciate your time and support. Without you the audience this would not be possible. So don't forget that if you enjoyed this episode, to follow us, like us or share us. Have a wonderful day.
TO contact Andrew Bartlow,
Linkedin - linkedin.com/in/bartlow
Website for the Development Program for HR Leaders People Leader Accelerator and B Series Consulting -
seriesBconsulting.com
wisegrowth.net
Direct e-mail- andrew.bartlow@seriesbconsulting.com
Huge Thank you to Irene for connecting Andrew with Leighann
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Music from Uppbeat (free for Creators!): https://uppbeat.io/t/cruen/family-time License code: 2330NZD3BLNDKPYI
Wednesday Feb 16, 2022
Wednesday Feb 16, 2022
Understanding people and the way they think is an art form that many take a lifetime to achieve. Others have a natural ability, still, others learn through experience (trial and error). Jamar may be a natural or a combination, but he sure has an ability.
Jamar Jones, Business Owner, Speaker, and Author of Changer Your Circle, Change Your Life
Leighann Lovely 00:15
Let's Talk HR is a place for HR professionals, business owners and employees to come together and share experiences, to talk about what's working and what's not. How we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train and retain all generations of workers. We all know that there has been a huge shift in what people want. generations are coming together more than ever, on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about how the economy has been impacted and what needs to happen to find a balance. I'm your host Leighann Lovely. So let's get this conversation started. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, follow us like us and share us.
Leighann Lovely 01:04
I am so excited to have my next guest join me today. He has forced me outside my comfort zone, I look up to him. He is a natural leader and has created his own success and continues to do that. Jamar Jones business owners speaker and author of the book Change Your Circle, Change Your Life is a visionary who believes in leadership and subscribes to the notion that we can all connect with each other in a relatable way from a thriving music career performing for thousands to managing IT professionals. Jim Mars experience inspired him to establish his own branding and media agency, forever media. Now six years later, and 11 employees strong Jamar models consistency and a strong work ethic to his team. His desire to surround himself with good people who challenge him to excel every day is what excites and empowers him. Jamar is proud to serve others as a beacon for excellence. His philosophies and intentional action have changed the landscape of his life and the lives of others. Jamar thank you so much for coming and talking with me today. I'm really excited to have you here.
Jamar Jones 02:27
Yeah, it's I'm super, I'm super excited to have to be on this podcast, to talk about some HR talk about life. Talk about people, because that's what HR is all about.
Leighann Lovely 02:38
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. It's the human factor, right? I think so many people forget that HR is human resources. So yes, yes. Well, tell me a little bit, you know, about yourself and your business Foureva Media.
Jamar Jones 02:56
Yeah, uh, Foureva Media is really becoming a source for branded entertainment. That's the best way to put it for blurring the lines between advertising and entertainment. And how do you do that? So Foureva Media is a firm that really focuses on things that have a cause or a mission. And really teaching people and working with people how to market like an entertainer. So the the company itself, I have about 13 people who work for the company here in Brookfield and yeah, we really are focused on branding, podcasting, social media events, and in design is really our focus.
Leighann Lovely 03:43
That's awesome. And you started the organization, you started the company. So you are kind of the everything of you know, owner, human resources and author now you, definitely wrote a book, which, yeah, so often, I have interviewed authors. And I've said, Sorry, I didn't get a chance to read your book, your book I read. And it was yeah, it was awesome. I loved it. So tell me a little bit about changer circle change your life?
Jamar Jones 04:18
Yeah, Change Your Circle, Change Your Life is all about how to evaluate your current circle, and then how to get into nuance. And too many people are they live in their own bubble. And they don't know. First of all, they don't know how to be self-aware enough to know that they're just comfortable in their own bubble. And then also they don't know how to get into new circles to expand their mind, their mindsets, their connections, relationships and opportunities. So the book is really focused on mindset and action at the same time and things that you can actually apply it to your life to ultimately change it. And you know, people A circle as really, it almost the the ability to change the circle really defines growth that defines opportunity and where you're going. And in your life, if you stay in the same circle, you're so limited to beliefs and also to opportunity.
Leighann Lovely 05:21
And, while I without giving away too much on the book there was there was you talked a little bit about some of the the negatives that the vampires in the shepherd's, which really resonated with me, because, you know, I've had a lot of conversations with people have, you know, you get to a point in your life where you realize there are certain people that you have to, you have to walk away with, or walk away from. And I think that you have a little bit of a personal experience that you share. And that it really, you know, I've experienced that I think many people have experienced that where you cannot continue to grow personally, if you are allowing some people in your life to continue to just drag you down. And so yeah, there. I mean, it was just amazing to read it. Not only was I reading it and hearing your voice in my head I think this is so weird, you know, but it's definitely a different feeling when you know, somebody that you know, the right right wrote the book, and then I feel like wow, I am hearing Jabbar in my head when
Jamar Jones 06:29
it's literally like my speak in it too, because I drove my editor crazy, because he's like, you can't say this, you you technically shouldn't have this, they're like, just keep it just keep it I needed to be me.
Leighann Lovely 06:40
Hey, write your authentic self. You gotta it's got to be. And I'm sure that the people who know you and have have read it, have said something to you similar like, wow, I felt like Jamal was sitting in my bedroom while I was reading this book that probably got creepy away for a second in the bedroom. Chillin in the bedroom? Yes. But no, there were a lot of things that really, you know, resignated with, with me from, you know, just being able to hear your personal story and your personal growth. So, you know, anybody listening, definitely check out the book, it's, it's great. To be able to hear somebody else's story, and then identify in certain ways, whatever that might be, with your own personal story. So, yeah, I loved it. It was great. Yeah. So I would love to, to know a little bit more about it. When did you decide that, hey, I want to write a book. And I want to tell the story.
Jamar Jones 07:43
Um, I didn't know it was gonna be in a while I've always wanted to write something. So I knew that I had I knew something was there, the changes circle, change your life. philosophy was all it was with me, you know, five, six years ago, I actually have an old video, that's like five and a half years ago, and I was sitting on this couch, and I was like, change your circle, change your life, you know, something like that some live stream was doing on Facebook or so. So the concept has always been there. But as I started to evolve as a person, I started to get more clear that, okay, this is what I want the book to be about. Because it's something that I've lived personally. And I'm going to continue to live. And so that it just, it just keeps it keeps, you know, something that's fresh, it's new, it's exciting. I'm living in it. So I wanted to share that story. And I felt let you know, I didn't need to wait for all the credentials, you know, I I know through the book, you know, I can have part two, part three, part four, Part Five as I can seem to change my circle, and my life is inevitably going to change. So I'm like, let me just get this out. Now. Let me just do it now. And that was the whole The whole purpose and I want something that's a staple to something that I can pass on to somebody else. That's more than just a business card. It's like, Hey, this is this is me, you can get to learn and, you know, know how my mind works. And it's just, uh, that extra step.
Leighann Lovely 09:21
That's great. You know, and a lot of people and I like what you said about, like, let's get it out. There's so many people out there who you started. And then it takes them 10 years because they're like, I just let's make it perfect. Let's make but there is no, there is no, right. There's no form of there's no, there's no perfect. Oh, but you know, yours was great. Your book is great. So,
Jamar Jones 09:48
notice the words in that one. I read I read it back and I'm like, oh, there's a period missing, right?
Leighann Lovely 09:55
Like, oh, you know what, though? I am, grammar is that's so insignificant when it comes to the content. Oh, content 100%. Now I know that there are some, you know, grammar majors out there. There are some in there like, nope, absent. But you know, really come on. I don't think that's yeah, yeah. I, you know, and I used to my brother is a major in his major in creative writing. And, you know, he used to be an editor and I used to every time I wrote something, I would send it to him and be like, can you edit this? And I got to a point in my life where I'm like, No, it's just not worth it like. And now people text in order to communicate like, yeah, using abbreviations that sometimes I have to Google. I'm like, I don't even know what this abbreviation
Jamar Jones 10:50
I'm having to do it. That means we get and we get in there. Now we got to start Googling it, you get what is this?
Leighann Lovely 11:01
Yeah, you know, that you're, you're Yeah, I'm dating myself. Oh, god. Oh. So let's go back to Fourever Media, you know, you. You talk a little bit in the book about, you know, starting a business and your journey to that. Tell me, you know, in your own words of just, you know, how did you decide one day, I'm going to start my own company, and now responsible for use 13? Employees? Yeah, yeah. I'd love to hear a little bit more about that. What I mean, and why. I shouldn't say why. I shouldn't ask, why did you start your own business? But, you know, when when did you say, Hey, I'm gonna, I'm gonna do this. This is this is my path.
Jamar Jones 11:53
Yeah, um, I was talking to my dad the other day about this. And, you know, I'm naturally a risk taker. You know, like, it's just, it's just in me, I'm about to take a gigantic risk in a couple weeks. And it's, it's something that you when I was doing music, like, I always had this entrepreneur mindset of doing something for myself. So I never was in this, like, I got to get the degree, I got to get the, you know, like the pathway was never appealing to me. And I'm like, I'd rather bet on myself and bet on a system, you know, so let me let me do it. You know, so, through music, I think I developed an entrepreneur spirit. And so by time I got laid off from the IT company I was working at, or the financial company, I, you know, it's like getting back into the workforce. It's let me tell you how my mind works. It doesn't make sense. So I, you know, after I got laid off, there's some severance pay that happened, you know, very short, I think was like, probably like a month wasn't much. And then after that, I'm supposed to, you know, get collect unemployment. I have so much pride of myself are doing my own thing. I only collected unemployment for two weeks. And then I just said, like, I don't need you, I don't need you. Stupid, I shouldn't just took the money. But I just was like, I didn't want to turn in false interviews of what I'm doing. Because I'm like, I'm not gonna go find a job, I'm not going to, I'm going to decide to do this myself. And that was kind of that moment where I'm like, No, I'm gonna, like, I don't want to lean on these other things that are gonna dictate my future. So I wanted to take that upon myself. So that I was like, Hey, I'm just gonna open something that anything I'm kind of good at, is what I want to start at. So I had like, 20 services, anything I'm kind of good at, put it out there. And then slowly, the things that correlated with me just took off, you know, the video and the photography side more video than anything started to take off. And I started to develop that. And I feel like throughout the years now I've, I'm finally getting in that sweet spot of, you know, really the essence of myself now breathing through the company, and I'm able to offer a lot of value.
Leighann Lovely 14:28
That's great. And it takes some people well, some people never find that sweet spot of what they want to do. Some people dream about it their entire lives and and never find that and it also takes somebody who is willing to take that risk, and there are a lot of risk adverse individuals out there you are you're, you know, a very small percentage of the population who is willing to take a chance on themselves and willing to take a leap of faith and then be able to build it and be successful at it. So I yeah, I applaud you. That's, that's amazing. And you also are very involved in in other avenues. Other things, something coming up. What is it? Is it next week? Young Guns?
Jamar Jones 15:20
Yeah, two weeks, two weeks ago. Young Guns, they have another summit that they're doing. So yeah, we're and we're in the cool thing about getting involved with the Young Guns Movement is that now that I'm involved, I'm trying to elevate the events every single time to slowly each one, just trying to do something different, to add that little extra character to it. So I'm involved a lot of different groups, I'm on the board of climb, as well, which is a nonprofit organization all about financial literacy for the youth and young adults, just getting access to Financial Literacy, part of a group called Ford 48. So it's Emerging Leaders of Milwaukee, kind of come together and communicate and networks to help the community as well. And I'm about you know, probably involved with a lot of other things that are too long to list. But,
Leighann Lovely 16:18
but you know, you also you also try to take on mentors when you when you can, yes,
Jamar Jones 16:24
yes, so I personally mentor five people each year. So I get my phone number. And it's I have some youth, you know, some you know, young adults, so some people in high school, college, and then I have some, some older adults that are just trying to figure it out, you know, like, what, what's the next step? What do they do and have one guy that's, you know, around things like 38-39? Then he's just, you know, he's just trying to figure out how does he change his circle? How does he do it?
Leighann Lovely 16:53
And that's great, because for some people, it's it's difficult to reach out, and it's difficult to find somebody, but to have that lifeline, when you're when you have questions. Yeah, you know, I've had multiple mentors throughout my career, I'm in, I'm in the market for a mentor, Hey anyone out there. But I, you know, it's every mentor I've had has always happened naturally, I've never had to search for one before. And I just kind of, I'm kind of hanging out there right now. Like, I wonder, but anyways, but I, you know, having having a solid mentor that you can look up to, and that you respect, and that just, it's an amazing thing to have, especially as a young adult coming in and looking up to somebody who's built their own thing. I mean, you truly have built this from from scratch taking the risks that you've taken to build what you have built. That's, I mean, it's, that's awesome. Yeah, that's great.
Jamar Jones 17:59
It's, I have to pinch myself every time, you know, about being here, but I would say that the key to to doing what I'm doing is, is people, you know, you want to, you want to put your belief into people, even when they don't see it. And you can't do this alone. So people that maybe have an ego or pride, they're never going to build something bigger than themselves. Because you can't get past that one person, it's you need to empower other people, you need to have belief in them and, and give them room to to grow and to expand their own efforts. And I think through forever media, that's, that's what I'm, you know, I just want to unlock people's superpower. And, and let them let them go, you know, with it and run in and grow through it. And that's really the key, you know, you have to know, you know, this is an HR podcast, but that people is, if your culture is not there, you can't scale. You know, there's, there's no way to do it, and people will find something better, you know, so I'm trying to create that culture that is all about belief and growth and opportunity, unlocking superpowers, and, you know, just putting people in their own creative genius.
Leighann Lovely 19:29
And that's, you said culture. That is the number one reason anybody leaves a company, it 100% I mean, you're not happy at a company and people I have on a regular basis. I have people call me and say, I've been at this company 20 years, but I've noticed a cultural shift and it's becoming it's becoming a hostile work environment. I'm, I need to be out of here yesterday. But the managers and the owners to think like you, who empower their employees to be themselves, who empower their employees to do the best they can, by allowing them to do a variety of things, whether that be encouraging a side hustle, whether that be encouraging their own creativity, encouraging them to come forward with their own ideas. Yeah, those are things that will take your company to the next level. But there are so a lot of companies out there operating under the idea that, no, my employees have to be 100%, only about me and my company. And it's like, wait, wait. But people inherently want to do things for themselves and feel good for themselves, and know that they're being valued as individuals. It's not just about you. So get off your pedistal
Jamar Jones 20:57
Yeah, that the, I like to sum up all of that into into this, if, as a business owner or manager, you are in charge of selling the company in the brand. If what you what you want, is to start getting partners and stakeholders within what you're selling. So you have to provide equity. So if if your team and you're the other people that work for the organization, if they don't have equity, then what why are they there? They're just collecting a paycheck. And they're just they're just doing doing the task. There's no, there's no, they have nothing attached to it. So you have to provide and I'm not saying like literal equity of percentage, what I'm saying is that you have to give them some some type of buy in, you know, that, why are they here. So you have to, like you said, promote those ideas, promote those side hustles, those other things that can say, you can have something that says this is yours, too, this is yours are doing this together. It's not just me riding the wave and getting all the accolades. You know, this is a team effort. And we took that idea that you had and now look at it, boom, right? You know, so that's equity within your employees and within your team is so crucial for success.
Leighann Lovely 22:26
Yeah, absolutely. And I've, again, like I said, I've seen it, not only have I seen it from the outside, looking in at a company, because I've talked with the employees that work there, but I've experienced it myself, where I'm like, Wow, I'm literally just a number, another representative that's painted the color of the company, and right, being told that I need to blend in and just be the company. We're not an individual. That's just not the way the world works anymore. Everybody wants to have their own individuality. And if people like you, they buy from you, and you are the company. So it's just yeah, 100. Right. And as an owner who encourages your, you know, your employees to, to be themselves too. You know, and I'm going on a tangent, I have a tendency to do. I'm an HR geek,
Jamar Jones 23:22
Natural, it's your podcast, you can do whatever you want, when you gotta go on a tangent,
Leighann Lovely 23:27
and then three hours, you'd be like, okay, Leighann, I have other things to get to. I do appreciate the time, but I gotta go. Anyways, I know. That's, that's Yeah. So you know what I love about you. And you the first time I met you, I remember I actually saw you at the, when you were introduced at Young Guns, as you're joining the Young Guns. You walked in, and I was like, Who is this guy? Like, is he famous or something? Because you walked in? And you had? Who was it that was following you with? Like a camera? Or was it? Yeah, okay. Yeah. Right. I'm like, what does he do? Like, he must be famous. They're like, they have like cameras around him. And they're like, some, like, kind of, like watching you and then they introduced you. And I'm like, Okay, so he's, he's somebody important because, you know, they're filming all of this and, and then I briefly had the opportunity to talk with you and then we scheduled a one on one and I walked into your office, I had no idea what to expect. And then what we talked for, like two and a half an hour or two and like, walked out, I'm like, holy crap, like I've never done. I've never walked into a meeting and expecting it to be like, an hour and then leave and I'm like, Oh, my God. But it was like one of the greatest conversations like that I ever had, like on the first meeting. And I remember you said to me, oh, later on, if you're gonna hang out with me, you better get comfortable being in front of cameras. And since that day, the one thing that I'm not comfortable with and the reason that I'm I do a podcast where it's not doesn't show a picture of me is because I'm not. But every time I've seen you, you're like, Here, get in front of that camera. And you do you encourage, and you push people to do things that are outside, and not enough. Not in a uncomfortable way, but you encourage that, that limit that line, you kind of push that envelope of, but you can do this, you could and I love that about you. It's just you have a natural ability to talk people into doing things that maybe it's just that you're just a great sales guy.
Jamar Jones 25:57
Hey, people, you know, it's it's just people i That's amazing. That's amazing feedback. I always like to I'm always interested on hearing the outside looking in, you know, cuz like I'm always seeing it from one lens. And I some time I like this, you know, that kind of feedback. It's just people like it's a, I can quickly adapt to personalities for people and depending on if you're like, Andy Weins or you're very loud, and you know, and just like Dalio, but I can I can, I can get to that level with him. Or I can go calm and somebody that's more reserved. And so I have the ability to kind of, and that's what I kind of learned through the years, it's like, this is something that is not normal that now a lot of people have, you know, that kind of ability to connect with all types of individuals, they can only connect with only certain groups. And I think just how I carry myself and how I'm doing this stuff is is really interesting. And I just naturally always want to push people I just, I don't know, it's just in me, I always want to do it. And that's why I tell people at work here. I'm like, if you don't, if you don't want to be pushed this the wrong place. The Wrong place, because I'm gonna do it naturally. I'm not even gonna, I'm not even gonna, like do it intentionally. It's just gonna be like, No, you're gonna watch you got this like stuff get over there. Or, you know, I'm gonna push the boundaries of, of, you know, because I want to see greatness. I think we're, we all have greatness within us. We just have to unlock it. And that's, and I think you getting in front of those cameras. It just boosts a little bit a little bit of confidence. I did that I did that phone. Okay, let's go to the next day.
Leighann Lovely 27:39
Yeah, it No, it's to have that natural, that natural ability that you have to just, and it's subtle. You're just like, Oh, you just grabbed me. Okay, you're gonna go over here and you're gonna do this. And I'm like, no, no, I'm no, I'm not. No, yeah, yeah, yeah, you got this. You got this land. You got this? I guess I got this tomorrow. It's great. It's absolute. You are, you're a natural leader. You're you. You're a natural born leader. You're confident you. Yeah, you you are the kind of person who should be owning their own business and whatever you have in the hopper, and I'm, I'm so curious, I'm not going to ask you. But whatever it is, I'm sure that it's going to be a great success. I'm your cheering section over here.
Jamar Jones 28:26
Oh, my God. Well, once I announced that I will be hitting you up. I'm hitting actually everybody up. Okay. It's gonna happen this year, in the fall. And it's,
Leighann Lovely 28:39
is it required me to get in front of any cameras?
Leighann Lovely 28:46
Oh, of course. Okay. So, we are coming to time, but the question of the season. So of asking everybody, if you could pinpoint a time period in your career that made a huge difference in your life, or your career path? When would that be and why?
Jamar Jones 29:11
You know, I kind of I for myself, I have I have too many to name. I would say one of the I want to give you a really good concise answer. I one of the times that I say it in my book, so I have a mentor. And I don't think he knows on how much he did for me. It's, it's, I was in a period where I was, you know, deep into music, you know, trying to work an IT job at the same time. I was young and learning a lot of stuff didn't understand the corporate world at all. And I just felt like his patients in cander And the opportunities he was giving me the forgiveness that He gave me through that process of me evolving and learning and growing, I will never take that for granted of what he was able to do. And the mentorship and just the the late nights at the office, just give me some, you know, tips and tricks on some stuff or, you know, just that further belief. And, because I feel like it made me who I am today, because I had the, the entertainment, you know, the ambition side of me, but now I learned how to hone that in and deliver that in a way of in all different aspects. In really dove into more of personalities learning on how to communicate better with people how to listen, I was just a knucklehead, just you know, I would never listen. And it's helped me to listen first and then respond, just to so many things. That it it, I feel like that position in my life when I was about 23-24 It just really helped me become who I am today and be able to change my circle multiple times to get to this position.
Leighann Lovely 31:20
That's awesome. So this was when you were in your early 20s.
Jamar Jones 31:26
Yeah, early 23-24. Yeah, it was, because I, you know, he was basically like, hey, you know, cuz there's a training budget, and then he was like, go to, you know, you, you got to find the events and seminars and stuff to go to. But you know, whatever you find, as long as it's not astronomical, I'll prove it, and you got to go, and you got to take your notes, but you got to give me the notes after you get back. So it was like this thing. So I just, like went to all these different seminars, all these different kind of trainings and stuff, and it just really helped me, but then also the personal connection with him, you know, helping me through it, and dealing with real life situations, like crappy bosses, and, you know, just dealing with stupid stuff in the corporate world. I, I had to learn through that. And I could actually apply what I was learning right then in there. So it's just, it was a fast pace of kind of growth. That happened within like, a, like, a three year period. From,
Leighann Lovely 32:24
Yeah, that's great. And, you know, and I've said this before, and I'm gonna say it all the time. It's, it's, it's always when we need it most that the greatest people come into our lives and they offer the, it's, it's when we ask for the advice. And that, that we get, you know, what we need? And sometimes those people just fall into our lives at the right time.
Jamar Jones 32:51
Oh, 100% 100%. But you got to ask, yep, pick what is asked. Because if you don't ask, you know, get, right.
Leighann Lovely 33:01
You? Yeah, it's it's 100% You have to take the initiative, and you have to ask, so. Yeah, that's awesome. That's, that's great. Again, mentors, career mentors, have been, for me just made the world of difference. Because, like, so many, the number one thing that I was incapable of understanding when I entered into the workforce was the politics behind. Right. I know and, you know, we all say Oh, well, you just go to work and do your job Keep your head down. You it's impossible to avoid some of the politics that go on in an office and for a young you know, young individual entering into the the corporate world. It is a jungle it's it's sometimes hard to understand what is really happening on a day to day basis when it comes to the Yeah, I am, right. I am guilty of being one of the worst. People when I was younger, I mean, I would come home and my dad's like, you're gonna get yourself fired. And sure enough. I'm better now. I you know, yeah. Yeah. I have not gotten myself fired in a very, very, very long time.
Jamar Jones 34:27
There you go. That's progress. That's progress, progress.
Leighann Lovely 34:33
I just, you know, I've always had the mouth on me and I just never knew when to not talk so. Well, hey, Jamar, this has been an awesome conversation. I really appreciate you coming on and talking with me today. I'm so excited to hear what comes next with you. I know that you always have some amazing things in the hopper and I look forward to seeing you in a couple of weeks at the Young Guns Movement or the Young Guns Summit. And yeah, I will put in the show notes how you can reach out to Fourever Media if you are interested in Jamar's book, Change Your Circle, Change Your Life. That'll also be in the show notes. But if somebody wants to reach out directly to you, is there another way that you would prefer that they do that?
Jamar Jones 35:19
Um, LinkedIn is by the best way or JJones@fourevermedia.com You know, email me, you know, I am reachable. I'm busy but reachable.
Leighann Lovely 35:35
Well, again, thank you so very much.
Jamar Jones 35:38
Yeah, thank you.
Leighann Lovely 35:40
Thank you again for listening to Let's Talk HR. I appreciate your time and support without you the audience this would not be possible. So don't forget that if you enjoyed this episode, to follow us, like us or share us. Have a wonderful day.
Jamar Jones
LinkedIN - linkedin.com/in/relatablejamar
E-mail - JJones@fourevermedia.com
Website - fourevamedia.com
Author - Change Your Circle, Change Your Life
Young Guns Movement - https://www.younggunsevent.com/
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Music from Uppbeat (free for Creators!): https://uppbeat.io/t/cruen/family-time License code: 2330NZD3BLNDKPYI
Wednesday Feb 09, 2022
Wednesday Feb 09, 2022
Non-discriminatory, silent, and sometimes deadly... Addiction. So many of us face challenges and many don't know that those around us are facing them still. This is the reality of life, but it doesn't have to be, Kevin an amazingly strong and open soul joins me to talk about healing.
Leighann Lovely 00:15
Let's talk HR is a place for HR professionals, business owners, and Employees to come together to share experience, talking about what's working, what's not how we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train and retain all generations of workers. We all know that there has been a huge shift and what people want generations are coming together more than ever, on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about how the economy has been impacted, and what needs to happen to find a balance. I'm your host Leighann Lovely. So let's get this conversation started. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, follow us like us and share us like to welcome my guest this week, Kevin White, he is a high stakes business therapist for the white group. As a high stakes business therapist Kevin thrives in situations where there is a lot on the line, and specializes in one on one work for business owners struggling with addiction. When the business needs additional support Jamie, Kevin's wife, and he worked together to navigate these situations as a team. They are uniquely positioned to support small business owners and their spouses and the leadership teams who navigate the opportunities and challenges that come when the stakes are high. Having been through many of those critical moments, himself, Kevin has been thankful for those that have been in his corner during those times. After 20 years of marriage and riding the roller coaster that comes with the struggles of overcoming addiction. He really believes in the power of empathy and love based therapies for people side of business. Kevin, I am so excited that you have joined me today. And I'm really excited to learn a little bit about your background and kind of find out, you know, the direction that you're going today. Because you and I talked prior to this show. And there's there's so many things, you know, on your plate right now. So why don't you tell me a little bit about yourself? And again, welcome to the show.
Kevin White 02:08
All right. Well, thank you. Yes, I've been looking forward to this conversation as well. So starting back at the beginning, I grew up in Iowa, very rural area. I met my wife, who was from Wisconsin and moved to Wisconsin, I started out of high school in it. And I spent 20 years in IT. I still am working out of some IT roles, finishing up some projects, and am transitioning into doing more coaching with people around addiction around business around some more completely different topics that I learned along the way. Really my journey in IT started as like a network person, setting up computers, setting up networks and all of that. And then I was fortunate through the family businesses that I was a part of to grow into several different roles, ending up doing more and more database work. And looking back, I found out that what I really liked about it was the relationships and the people that I was working with. So as I got into more like business intelligence roles, what I was really looking for, and what I really liked was the conversations and the people I was meeting, right, so I'm not an analytical person even though I work on data warehouses today and I do all this, you know, very analytical work I'm usually involved in the front end of that, or the like, I guess I don't know what the right term is, but the front end of that work, meaning I'm working with the clients on the end product and on giving them what they need to conduct their business. And so I think the common thread in my life between my first career and what is turning out to be my second career is that I'm a real people person, I love what people present. I love the story of of who you are and and what you bring to the world and and how you can contribute and how we contribute to each other. And so I think that's, the gist of who I am.
Leighann Lovely 05:05
You know, it's so, so completely interesting that you what you just said, Because long, long ago, I, I went to school for computer programming, and a class and an internship short of my degree. I went, I don't, I don't really want to do this for everything you just said, which is I love people. I wanted to be in front of people, and I didn't see a career in computer programming, having that exposure to to people, but you have found a way to have a career in IT, and still have that exposure by working with people. But now you are, you're kind of entering into with what you have been doing with your current role and doing a little bit of coaching and, and what you're, you're going into with the white group, you've been doing some coaching, and while your wife has been doing some coaching with businesses, you do some individualized coaching, and now you're kind of launching your own thing, where you're going to get to do a lot more individualized help and things like that, correct?
Kevin White 06:23
Yeah. So along the journey, so I worked with, let's see, or small businesses. Okay, so the first two are family businesses. And I say that because there was more than one family member working in them. And then the second two were pretty much single proprietors. And they didn't really have a family that was involved at all in the business. I remember, I worked for a consultant, nada, Madison, and he, I got really close with him. And he had a very successful business that went from when I started around 15 people to when I left around 60 In a seven year period, I remember him asking me as I was switching roles, because I was involved in sales, and I was involved in implementation. And then I was involved in this data stuff. And he's like, Kevin, what do you really want to do? Like, I'm confused about what it is that you want to focus on. And I was having trouble answering that at the time. I think that, for me, it's kind of a story of late maturity. Like, my dad and my grandpa, were like computers. And my dad told me when I was young, that let's do something you love, and you're gonna find your way that way. And so I took that to heart, I did that. And I did, like, I liked the part about computers I liked is the seeking of knowledge, the figuring it out the challenge, the A, the ability to help others through that medium through that technology. And so that, that was part of my journey, and certainly is the part that I love. But I think that now that I've been through a little bit more of life, and I've dealt with some of the my own issues, that I've gotten to a state now where I really see a way that I can help people directly, you know, and, and it still might be business related, but a lot of the work is around the person.
Leighann Lovely 08:28
What's amazing that in each one of us are defined by the journeys that we take, you've had an interesting journey, not only with the career that you've that you've had the career that you're leaving, and I shouldn't say leaving, but you're, you know, in the IT world or to IT realm. It has been obviously an amazing career, because you're still you're still doing that. But on the flip side of that you've also been involved with The White Group and tell me a little bit more about, you know, the idea and the concepts behind how that developed and came to fruition. And then, you know, tell me where things are with that right now and your involvement in that
Kevin White 09:14
About in 2017. My wife started working with a coach named Mark King, who is in the Milwaukee area. He works in Chicago and Milwaukee. Somewhere along her journey with him. He was helping with her family business. She works for her dad's so he was helping them with their communication and stuff like that. And I had had some questions about something I can't remember. And she said maybe you should talk to Mark about it. So I started working with him and that has been that's been almost a four year journey now. Coming up on four years, where I've been working with Mark on the company I was I'm currently transitioning out of, as well as just myself and my own fears that come out in my communication, that kind of stuff. So what that work uncovered, is just how much along with like half the world that seems like that's turning into coaches like how much opportunity we have inside of us, when we talk about HR, I think that there's just the whole idea of humans as resources, how are resources for each other? How how much potential we have, that's, I guess, the journey that has been there for me in the last four years. As far as like, how, where I'm taking that I think that I've, originally I just thought, Alright, I'm gonna work with teams of people, and try to uncover some of how they're making, we're making everything so stressful when it doesn't have to be. As a consultant, I've been involved in huge projects, some projects, this isn't talked a lot a lot, some projects that are really big, actually completely fail. I was involved in, you know, like, a half a million dollar failure, and part of my career. And so when you go through some of those situations, especially in bigger companies, you want to figure out, how do we actually succeed at this? How do we do something big and completely make it work? Right. And so that was my original focus for the business for The White Group. Since then, as we better define what we're doing, I've focused a little bit more on addiction, specifically, which is my story and where I came from, so we're doing kind of same thing, but with an approach of like, supporting business people that are dealing with addiction, if that makes sense. It's niching. down to, you know, getting into a small area of helping people instead of that broad area of well, I'm going to help IT teams, you know, right. And that, you know,
Leighann Lovely 12:14
You said something that that resonated with me niching down into that small area, which is I think that what we all need to do, you know, businesses out there used to say, Okay, we're gonna have every service in the world so that we can try to help everybody. That's no longer I think what people want, they want to be able to call one company that is the absolute expert, on whatever, that that that thing that they need is so because yeah, if I call, you know, if I call my doctor's office, and I have, you know, a broken finger, and they say, well, we specialize on toes, you know, I don't want to talk to them. I want to talk to the finger guy. Yes. So that mean, that's great. That's, that's awesome. And there are so many things happening in the world today. One being, addiction, mental health, whether that be related to addiction, whether that be related to what's happened with the pandemic. I mean, the list could go on. But that's amazing for not only to take that from kind of that life coach standpoint, but from the business standpoint, because people forget that just because you may be a successful business person, doesn't mean that you don't have some demons or skeletons in your closet. I think I said this to you, you know, the first time we talked, the more money you have, doesn't necessarily mean that problems go away. It typically means the bigger the problem, get. Yeah, yeah, yes. So I mean that I commend you on that. Tell me a little bit if you're open to it, about your story.
Kevin White 14:06
Yeah, so behind everything I told you, is the story of my addiction. Right. So starting when I was a kid, so I was, and I can confidently say now, but like, basically, it was a long journey. In the last, I would say six years away from addiction, but with different stages that I could identify for you. But so I was a porn addict that started when I was a kid. And something happened to me that was fairly similar. A lot of guys that I've talked to have been exposed to that type of material. Very young. No big deal, right? Like it's like part of life. So why was I interested in it? Well, when you dig in, and kind of the work that I've done in the healing process, is I was exposed. I was vulnerable to it because I just moved to a new school. I think I'm naturally curious, I'm possibly a little more have a more open to dicted personality than other people possibly. I think we find that among addicts that we have a certain we have certain traits that maybe make us more open to it, right. But really what it comes down to is like the rejection I was feeling in my new school. You know, even with living on a block with, like, 40 kids like all the dynamics of what was happening in my neighborhood, and, and you know, I wasn't dealing with that very well. And so I was looking for over the period of the rest of my school life. When I was exposed to that type of thing, I was using that as a, as a cover up for the pain I was feeling. And I think that we would probably say that this is similar for almost all addictions, there's a, there's a commonality here and that it's a coping thing, right. It's, it's, we don't want to address pain, we don't want to end it. But we get new problems, right? We haven't shamed now and all these new things. So right, it's behind. So behind everything we talked about, I was dealing with that in my relationship I was married, my wife was dealing with most of the problems with those what was going on? So I know how much you want to get into all of the specifics around this, because it's a big story. But like, yes, that's my that's my journey. And part of the reason why I think it's so important in business to support people's mental health, because, of course, no, no owner, no manager that I had knew that that was there. And I'm not saying that it's always appropriate for managers to know this. But I think one reason why coaching is a thing is because, like, and coaching in business, even life coaching in businesses, the thing is, because I started working like my, my journey, more recently has been working with a coach on business things, right? Getting with the team, how, how can I serve my team members better, how can I understand them better, all of those things, that's a really safe place to work on some of these things that are impacting us internally. Okay. And so then, but then we can extend it beyond that, we can take it into our personal life, into our relationships into our relationships with our kids. And so that's what I'm seeing with, I would say, a very broad community that's focused across many needs. One thing that I'm focused on and I see some other coaches focused on is this concept of, hey, business is a great area where we can work on ourselves, we can work together, we can work on how we communicate better, how we leverage each other better, how we support each other better. And then those things that we learn at work, we can bring home,
Leighann Lovely 17:59
Correct. And we spend so much time at work, that if if we're able to work on ourselves at work, and be able to work on ourselves at home, whether that if we need additional help through a mental health provider, or through a doctor, we're able to hone in on that when we're on our personal time. But if we're working with somebody at work as well, on trying to figure out areas of need there, I mean, think about how powerful that can be. I mean, putting those two things together is is that's an extremely strong thing. And to have people who are brave enough to come in and talk about their addictions, in a public forum, is just it's an amazing thing to do. Because, again, very much like all of the other conversations that are happening out there around mental health and around, you know, neurodiversity, and around again, the list goes on. These are the conversations that need to happen so that people no longer think of oh my gosh, that's such a bad horrible thing. I mean, we need to, we need to have those conversations in order to make people you know, realize that this is happening. It could be happening to you, it could be happening to a family member, your neighbor, it could be happening to your co worker, and you may have no idea. You know, your best friends could be, you know, hiding booze all over their house. And you may have no idea, you know, and some people may be laughing at that, but I know somebody who, you know, hey, I had absolutely no idea that they were drinking from the time they woke up in the morning until the time that they went to bed. I mean, I've experienced myself where I had no idea that a very close friend of mine was a severe alcoholic until one day I found the booze. And I went, I had no idea. I had no idea. Yes, no. And those are those are things that need to be addressed not just at home, but at work at on a, on a whole person level. Yes, it's not just now, I want to go back a little bit. You know, and I don't want to dig in too much to anything that you don't want to talk about. But you know, you were telling your story, and then you kind of jumped into the business sense of it. Obviously, your story, you know, has had a huge impact on, on you. And at some point, you had that aha moment where you went, I want to, I want to beat this. And I don't know if that started with you working with a coach and thinking I can overcome this or I can work through and I don't know that I'm using the right terminology. So forgive me if I'm being naive here. But you know, I don't know if it's, if you're a recovering if you're, I don't know what how you use those terms. So again, at some point, you had to have had an aha moment and go, Okay, I I want to do better. I want to be better for the people I work with. And for my family. Do you have a moment that it kind of happened for you, when you when you dug in and decided? I'm gonna, you know, and how was that affecting? Was it affecting your work? Was it affecting your family?
Kevin White 21:36
Wow. So those are that's a lot of questions. Sorry, I'm sorry, I do that a lot, where I asked like eight questions at the same time. Let me think so. Yes, there, there's, there was more than one, but for sure. My wife is pretty much all of them. Okay. So if you were just imagine for a second, the person who's listening, right? Having, especially if you're a woman having a relationship with an addict, that where they're not available to you really mentally. Okay. So, because addicts are, in our minds, you know, we're thinking about way too many things that have nothing to do with reality, how we're going to look, find other people how we're going to cope, especially with me with her. Since this type of addiction affects our relationship. As a married couple, there was a lot that certainly I didn't understand. And she didn't understand either about the ins and outs of our relationship. So the big awakening points were when she was like, even though she was aware of what was going on to a certain extent, where she would just be like, Okay, I'm not accepting this type of behavior, this selfish behavior, let's just call it that I'm not accepting this selfish behavior. I think, I think I would probably go with two points that made a difference. And they were both related to her. One is when she committed to me that she wasn't going to leave the relationship. But two, when she said, I'm not going to tolerate emotional abuse, or anything that has to do with you being selfish, right, because this is about us having healthy relationships. Right. So he things were the main points that led to healing, if that makes sense.
Leighann Lovely 23:36
It absolutely does. And I would assume that at that point, you kind of were scrambling around saying okay, now what, how do I, how do I do better?
Kevin White 23:47
Oh, for sure. And like, and especially in one particular moment that I remember, although, this really didn't I think there was more than one right? But anyway, there's a couple times where I had to choose Okay, I want to be I can be, I can say go live in my brother's house who's a is an alcoholic, or I can choose my family. I have six boys. I didn't through all of this. We have a two year old and all the way up to 19. But um, I had to basically work through those. Well, it's a very extensive process that we can't obviously get into just because of time but. I had to choose between two I just want to be a bachelor living or you know, with my brother and just have very unhealthy relationships or do I want a future with my soulmate? You know, with someone that I really appreciate and, and love to have in my life along with my kids. What do I want us? What do I want them to see? Do I want to see them? Or what I do I want them to see me give up or do I want to be there for them if they're having to dress them like that? And so, I mean, as simple as it sounds like, there's an obvious answer here, right? In those moments, it was actually hard. Because of how messed up I was right, in my mind, but, um, but I do think it wasn't like all the excuses I had about how I was actually fine and didn't have a problem or the things that held me back, right. So, I don't know if that answers all your questions.
Leighann Lovely 25:38
It does. I mean, it paints a picture to where you're headed now.
Kevin White 25:45
Yes.
Leighann Lovely 25:46
So tell me about that.
Kevin White 25:49
Yeah, so I've been working with my friends. And actually, I've been doing some life coaching for addicts. And then I've been working with business people who are my friends. Originally, I was thinking that I would work with business and like, with teams, with leadership teams, with business owners, and support them, and like, kind of what you talked about. Whereas they don't always understand where their employees are coming from. And they get into a situation where there is a conflict, or there is something that they don't completely understand. And I'd be there to support both sides. But the goal is to support the business, right, because it's greater than any one party. However, along the journey, I had, I definitely had success with other addicts. In particular, one man, that man, he just kind of had the same thing happened, where his wife's like, I've had enough of this. And our wives knew each other. And we started working. And like a year and a half later, he was completely different. He changed his career. He was just awesome. And I was so much fun. I was like, Man, I'd love to do more of this. But I didn't think I could put both of them together. But as I've been talking with people about business, people that are addicts, it's like everyone's coming to me and saying, Yes, this is the thing. I'm not planning to go around and tell a bunch of people about the people I'm working with in the future, right, because this is a private thing. And that's, they have to do that they have to tell you, but I mean, what we're really dealing with here with a lot of this mental stuff is the shame of what's going on in our lives, you know, the things that the dirty part of our lives that we don't want to share with people. And what that what that does in the workplace, is it's, it's making us have fake relationships, right? Because we're not being vulnerable about who we really are. And as soon as we start, we flip the switch, and we start really telling people about whatever it is, that is a problem in our life, or at least a struggle in our life. Okay? The more that we find connections with people that can help us to be the best version of ourselves. And the more we can support each other,
Leighann Lovely 28:25
Right? Once you humanize somebody, once you become vulnerable, and they become human in your eyes, and no longer this shell of a person or the ideal human, you take them off the pedestal of being perfect. All of the sudden, all of the the fakeness gets washed away. And I will tell you that there are many people who in my career that I've looked at and went wow, that he has to be perfect, because he's so successful and he's so and I idolized. And instead of, you know, having, and then when you find out like, Oh, he's got, you know, this or he's getting a divorce or you, you go oh, well, he's, he's just human and you humanize these people, and all of the sudden the fear of well, what if I screw up in front of them? Or what if I, you know, it washes away and people can actually then build genuine connections with each other. It's an amazing thing. Yes, it absolutely is an amazing thing. And it needs to happen more. And I'm not again, I'm not saying that everybody should go and dump their bag of laundry out on the conference room table. You know, again, it just it needs to happen naturally. People can build more genuine relationships, by being more human with who they truly are by being authentic. And I think that we all have seen that over this last 20 months, 22 months, whatever, whatever it is now. And this is just another step in that, the world, the world needs help right now.
Kevin White 30:14
You know, we all have. I mean life is is a challenge, it's also a great opportunity. I think there's, I think that there's a huge benefit to what's happening. I shouldn't say a benefit. It's a potential benefit. What's happening with all of this change in the work place? And where we're working in that the hybrid working and all of those things? I think it gives us an opportunity to provide new tools for employees and for for business people. I don't know, I don't have the answers. Right. And what that looks like I have, I think coaching is one tool that could be helpful, but I think that the answer is probably different for most businesses, like there's, you know, like, maybe your HR team is already well situated and has good relationships with the company, and can offer more around mental support, you would probably know more about that kind of stuff than I would. Or maybe you need. Maybe there's like having someone that has that role in the business around mental health or? I don't know, I don't know what it looks like. Like, that's, I think that's the beauty of what we get to explore together in the business community is how do we, we have the opportunity? How do we take that opportunity? And turn it into something?
Leighann Lovely 31:41
Yeah, no, I, it's, it's a scary thought. It's a scary thought to think, one, let me back up. It's, it's amazing to think that we could have somebody who's specifically hired at a company to handle mental health or handle employee wellness or, and it's also a scary thought, because I don't know that if they're employed by the company, a lot of employees wouldn't be completely honest at this at this time in the world, because they'd be like, Well, I'm not going to go in and tell them about my whatever it might be my addiction to this, I'm going to get fired. But maybe at some point in the world, we'll be able to get to that point where, where that would never happen, where a company truly cares enough that they'll say, there is you know, whatever you say to this person cannot be, you know, disclosed cannot go. But then you always run that fine line, if if a company is aware that somebody is addicted to heroin, and they're responsible for driving a forklift, or, Yeah, where's the liability fall? You know, there's always there's always something so that and that's why a lot of employees are so scared of, you know, I'm an alcoholic, but I have a job that requires me to use equipment of some kind. And that's that fear will always stay or resonate with them? And who do they go to? How do they get help? If it's through a company?
Kevin White 33:25
That's a good point? Was I live in this alternative universe?
Leighann Lovely 33:30
No. Again, this is my HR hat going on, you know, saying,you know, the legal aspect of things where sometimes I hate that it rears its ugly head.
Kevin White 33:41
Yeah, I think there's, I think there's a couple things in the small business, you're gonna you, you can do, it doesn't have to be public support, right? Like this can be even just people that are mentors within the business, that are the under like, especially people that have gone through something, and can from the sponsorship of the business, but from a more private approach, right, like, they don't even necessarily have to know the details, they could just encourage you to get help in certain way, like, or talk to this person. Right. So I think there's a lot of more informal ways we can, we can work together. But I also think I want to acknowledge some CEOs of companies, you know, not necessarily your fortune 500, but that are out there making products and running businesses that are coming out. Right, and I think that some of those employees are then gonna under have an opportunity to say, Oh, the leader is acknowledging his problem. And this comes down to a question you said earlier, which is, you know, from an attic standpoint, is it recovering? Is it healing? Is it healed? I believe that we can heal. Okay, so I know that there's some differences, and especially the addict community around us like because the 12 step says, you know, you're recovering for the rest of your life. I truly believe in healing. That's been my experience, I've had a lot of help. I've had a lot of people that have been involved. But what I'm saying is, is that, mainly, the main point is that if more people come out, then it doesn't always have to be like, we're standing in the conference room and everyone, we all share our work. That's not appropriate. That's right. We can create groups subgroups, that aren't necessarily maybe even the liability of the company, sponsor some of the more popular issues that we could support each other in. And maybe that's just not appropriate in certain companies. Right, like, right. I don't know that this is for everyone. I'm not sure what the answers are.
Leighann Lovely 35:54
So I'm not just I'm not saying that this has to be publicly acknowledged at a company, nor am I saying that you can't help a company heal, if there is multiple people that you want to work with. Or if you're going into work with a company coaching around this subject, it's, again, when my you know, my comment about liability and everything else that was if you are an employee of a company addressing that, as Yeah, as an outside person going in, you're not obligated to the company to report anything. You don't work for that company. But I think that what, what you're talking about having a having people be able to come to you and work with you. And have it be a service that a company offers to their employees. That's an that's an amazing service that that could be provided. Because some people, they're not comfortable walking into an AA meeting, or an NA meeting or an I don't know, all the acronyms for all of the different addictions that are out there any, you know, at this time, but some people that's not that's not their jam. Some people don't like group meetings like that some people, you know, just won't do that type of work. Some people may prefer having a private individual coach. And I have to be honest, I've talked to a lot of people about going and getting individual counseling through a mental health professional. And there's a waiting list right now. Yes, to become a new patient months and months out. Yeah. I mean, the world needs more people, like you who are willing to have the conversations about it, because you've experienced it. What better way to learn, what better way to heal than through and with somebody who has gone through it. I would rather sit down and talk with somebody who has experienced what I'm going through than somebody who's read a book about what I've gone through.
Kevin White 38:14
Yeah, I mean, I definitely don't want to discourage or like, like, sometimes therapy is appropriate. Okay. Especially when it's but I'm, like, I'm not trying to. I'm just thinking like, people are unique. I think that what I really want to underscore about what you just said is for me, and I think a lot of certain types of addictions, there's like a lot of shame. Some are more inch. A, like it's more common that well, I'm addicted to cigarettes, big deal, right? Oh, I lifted the food. Big deal. Alcohol is a little more shameful. But, you know, there's some addictions like definitely pornography addiction, is there's a lot of shame related to it. Okay, it's, we're embarrassed about that we're doing that and who in the world wants to talk about it? So I think that, for me as an introvert, my journey has been with not just my coach who was other there I had someone at several people that were helping me, okay. I, yes, I think that having a more one on one work is a thing and can be done in mainly, if I want if I can just speak to the addicts for a second, if anyone's listening or if you know other than that. Our main problem is shame about coming out and saying, Hey, I'm an addict, right? And that's why I don't want to get help. So the biggest thing is if you can tell someone and if you can tell someone that already knows what you're going through, that's great as well. But if you want to make a change in your life, life and I'm speaking to someone that that is affected by addiction. Tell someone, all right, just get the courage to tell someone, what you find is, we're all human, we all make mistakes. And most of the time, people want to be there for you, it might not be that they can help you, but there might not someone that can. So I think it's important to just get over that it's gonna hurt. It's painful, shameful thing. But you're gonna feel so much better when you start to heal from it.
Leighann Lovely 40:34
Thank you. I mean, and I encourage anybody who is listening to this, who is interested in getting help, and I want to, I want to make sure that my comment was not misunderstood. I am not discouraging, going to a psychiatrist or therapist in any way, shape or form. Something like this is an amazing thing that you're doing it, it truly is. And, you know, I'm going to flip this over to you to do a little self-promotion. You know, if somebody is interested in reaching out to you, and wants to have a conversation about this, how can they reach out to you? How can they, you know, learn more about you?
Kevin White 41:12
Sure, you can email me, it's probably the easiest. I'm on LinkedIn, Kevin White. But email me directly is maybe the easiest way to get to me. My email address is Kevin, at the White group.us. So Kevin@thewhitegroup.us
Leighann Lovely 41:30
Excellent. Now we're at time, but I have one more question. This is the question of the season. If you could pinpoint a time period in your career, that made a huge difference in your life or career paths. When would that be and why?
Kevin White 41:48
My biggest impact was I spoke earlier about this consultant that I worked with for in consultancy I worked for in Madison, Wisconsin. And I that was the biggest impact in my career. And it was really, because in that business, they were completely open, from top to bottom. I'll just say it in this way. I had a client that I worked for, that I was a friend with before I started at this business. And two years later, I moved on to a different job. And he asked me, So did you sell the company you were working for. And I'm like, I didn't own that company. I just worked for that company. And so this company that I worked for, really established a very strong vision. They, they were open with everything from all the financials to what their goals were, everything was open. And we had so much fun together. I saw the business owner that believes in people that believed in what he was providing to the community, and was clear on his vision and what he wanted to create. And he was he was kind of like an economist, so it was his thing. The money you know, was was something that he could project and think about and yeah, anyway, so that was the biggest impact on me is like a business owner that really believed in people really invested in his people and invested in his business and really invested in his client relationships.
Leighann Lovely 43:34
That's awesome. And isn't it funny how we all, you know, this so far this season, every person I've talked to it always comes back to somebody who just truly honestly, cares genuinely about people. It's I mean, that's what it's all about.
Leighann Lovely 43:56
Well, Kevin, I have truly enjoyed this conversation. And I have to really commend you on being so open and vulnerable and honest with us today. So thank you so very much.
Kevin White 44:09
Yeah, thank you for having me on. And I knew we would have a great conversation.
Leighann Lovely 44:15
Yeah, that'd be that's been awesome.
Kevin White 44:18
All right.
Leighann Lovely 44:20
Thank you again for listening to Let's Talk HR. I appreciate your time and support without you the audience this would not be possible. So don't forget that if you enjoyed this episode, too, follow us like us or share us. Have a wonderful day.
Kevin White Linkedin - linkedin.com/in/kevin-g-white
Kevin White E-mail Adress - Kevin@thewhitegroup.us
Website, The White Group - https://www.kevingwhite.com/
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
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Wednesday Feb 02, 2022
Wednesday Feb 02, 2022
What is happening in a virtual world with staffing companies and how are they pivoting to keep up with the ever-changing times. What's next and how do they stay on the cutting edge?
Amy Bingham, President of Bingham Consulting Professionals
Leighann Lovely 0:15 Let's talk HR is a place for HR professionals, business owners, and employees to come together and share experiences, to talk about what's working and what's not. How we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train and retain all generations of workers. We all know that there has been a huge shift in what people want. Generations are coming together, more than ever, on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about how the economy has been impacted and what needs to happen to find a balance. I'm your host Leighann lovely. So let's get this conversation started. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, follow us, like us, and share us
Leighann Lovely 1:04 I'm very excited to welcome my guest today, Amy Bingham. With a career spanning over 25 years in the staffing industry, including 15 years consulting to staffing firms of all sizes and sectors. Amy Bingham works with owners and executives to increase sales effectiveness, positioning them for success to build value in their company's strategic planning, standardizing processes in alignment with their latest best practices of high growth firms, training, sales and recruitment teams, and coaching staffing leaders are key competencies of Bingham Consulting. It is Amy's broad exposure to best practices of high-performance staffing firms that her clients value most. Early in her career working for a global firm provided the foundation for achieving excellence as one of seven elite performers today continual research on emerging industry trends and process enhancements equipped Amy to help her consulting clients differentiate and stay ahead of the competition. Passionate about supporting and success of staffing leaders, Amy launched the Millennial Mentors program for staffing leaders in 2018. By working one on one and in group settings with high potential managers and executives. Amy transfers her knowledge to equip them to effectively lead staffing teams to drive optimal business results and migrate the risk of costly turnover. Amy is an active member of the American Staffing Association and sits on the women in leadership counselor. She is a highly rated past presenter at the AASA staffing world and many other national state and regional conferences. In addition to her responsibilities, Amy is a leadership coach to MBA students at Rollins Crummer Graduate School of Business where she enjoys setting future leaders up for success in the corporate world.
Leighann Lovely 3:03 Amy, thank you so much for taking the time out of your busy schedule to talk with me today. I'm very excited to have this conversation.
Amy Bingham 3:12 Thanks, Leighann. I'm happy to be here.
Leighann Lovely 3:15 So why don't you start off by telling me a little bit about yourself.
Amy Bingham 3:21 Okay, so I have had a long career in the staffing industry. I started my run at a national firm way back when over 25 years ago and have been consulting to primarily small to midsize firms for the last 15 years.
Leighann Lovely 3:36 Excellent. So you've had quite a run in really in the staffing industry. So you've been in it for years.
Amy Bingham 3:45 Absolutely, My practice focuses on advisory services. I do a lot of leadership coaching. It's something that's sorely needed in the industry. So I'm having a lot of fun with that. But you know, your typical strategic planning, I do some training. It's just been great to have the variety of working with a lot of different firms and learning new perspectives.
Leighann Lovely 4:09 Great. So what's your, and you kind of touched on this a little bit, but what are the types of staffing companies that you typically work with?
Amy Bingham 4:20 Yeah, so there is a type there are what some 39,000 staffing offices in the US. There's a lot of people that help but that what we call the Mom and Pop sector needs a lot of help. These are typically recruiters or salespeople that work for bigger firms and decided they wanted to do something entrepreneurial. You know this is the, I'm just going to have a shingle outside of a door and start recruiting. And so their business grows to maybe it's even a million, two million or five million and beyond and they start to realize I need some structure. I need some help with this. Now I have a business. It's not just me and the pilot team. So I work across all sectors staffing, light industrial ministry, active health care, engineering, I've got legal, I've got clients all over the board. But primarily, I work with some startups, but usually firms under 5 million and then all the way up to we'll see my largest client is right around 100 million, but the sweet spot is probably 10 to 25 million. So you know, that $10 million for that wants to get to 25. And the 25 want to get to 50 and beyond. And that's what I like to do. I'm a sales effectiveness consultant. So totally front office girl. I'm all about let's get revenue in the door and gross profit.
Leighann Lovely 5:53 Yes. And you and I actually had the opportunity to work together many years ago, which was very exciting and very beneficial. And I truly enjoyed that. So there has been, so much that has changed over obviously the last 20 months, or how has your job changed? Because of that, and has there been a shift in the needs of some of your clients that you work with?
Amy Bingham 6:19 Good question, Yeah. So the interesting thing is, I had made a strategic decision to travel less. So long story short, I got introduced to zoom back in 2019, early 2019. And I embraced the technology. And I said You know what, I can work effectively, I can certainly do coaching calls, I can even do training in bite-sized segments, right from my home office. So I had already made that transition, I moved my clients to a virtual environment. And when the pandemic hit, my life didn't really change that much at all, because I was already operating this way. That said, the needs of my clients obviously changed. A lot of people were trying to cope with remote work and how to manage a remote team. And I think that was very challenging for leadership to understand. If they can't see, in this industry, we're used to having people in a bullpen and have an eye on him, for the most part. And so a lot of the owners and executives had a real hard time with the fact that their staff was not under one roof where they could see them. And we're surprised to see, pleasantly surprised to see that not only did productivity not suffer it, actually. So that was a radical shift for the industry. I mean, I remember the days where absolutely no one I mean, most of my clients are no one works from home. That's just not how we operate. We're all in the office together, we collaborate. So it was forced, and they learn that, but that brought new challenges.
Leighann Lovely 8:06 Right. Absolutely. Are you still seeing that there are companies out there that are still really struggling with moving to a remote workforce? I mean, obviously, I've come from manufacturing. A lot of the candidates or a lot of those industries rely on people to walk in the door
Amy Bingham 8:29 They do so it's harder for a light industrial firm that relies on walk-in traffic where there's a lot of go to work immediately. No interview required types of orders, right, high volume orders, that can be a challenge. It can be done. I have clients doing it. But there was a lot of reluctance in the LI sector, particularly for that reason now not so much in professional staffing. In professional staff. It was a pretty easy transition in employee base in professional staffing really embraced that because they were already these folks in the industry, in recruiter seasons and salespeople. These are this is young millennials and Gen Z now entering the workforce, and they're all about flexibility. So they're actually less inclined, far less inclined to take a job where there is no option to work remotely. Right. and actually, I had to have a lot of conversations with clients who were still having a problem getting there. We still wanted people in the office. I said, Listen, it's a candidates market anyway. You're going to take already narrowed people down further by requiring them to come to the office five days a week. Not a good idea. So that is still evolving, but yeah, in the industrial sector, it can be challenged. There's no doubt about that.
Leighann Lovely 9:58 Yeah, absolutely. And you kind of, answered a little bit about what my next question was, what do you see for the future of general labor staffing versus the professional staffing side? You know, how are you overcoming some of those challenges with the people that you work with? And I think you kind of answered a little bit of that.
Amy Bingham 10:18 You know, I did, but there is a huge push to the digitization of staffing, as you're probably aware, right? We're using artificial intelligence more, we're automating redundant tasks. I mean, on the candidate side, the closer that we can get to one-click apply, the better. Right? Now it's right for a staffing firm. And then you've got so you have to re-engineer your application flow your workforce, and then you've got abandon rates that are exceptionally high, but people are very impatient, they encountered any challenge at all applying for a job, they're just going to abandon and go somewhere else. Right? So staffing firms that have been historically high touch and not embrace technology are really struggling with this. And I'm doing a lot of work in this area with them. So you've probably heard a lot of people looking at their tech stack, right? How are they set up? From a technology perspective? What integrates with what is it smooth, it's cumbersome. But I think for light industrial staffing companies, that's a game of speed, though very often the first that first company, if there are all these multiple companies were done these job orders, the first company fills the order, that's a business. So if you are, if you have a cumbersome application process that slows you down, you're going to be more likely to be beaten by the competition that has embraced technology. But that said, there's a lot of recruiting technologies. There's a lot of help in the industry to get people through that. But it is overwhelming. I just had an email earlier today, actually from clients that is completely overwhelming. They're converting from one ATS to another and she knows that's overwhelming enough anyway. But the integrations piece is just mind-boggling. Right? So the grappling with that change.
Leighann Lovely 12:25 I've seen so many apps popping up of you know, new apps popping up of this is an app where they can do a one-touch apply all their information is there and it's expediting these processes. It's very interesting, everything that's popping up now.
Amy Bingham 12:40 Yes, so it's great for the candidate. But for those running and working in a staffing company, you've got to evolve, right? Your processes if you don't, like I said to use on Steam,
Leighann Lovely 12:53 Right. Very interesting, very interesting stuff. What do you think the greatest need of some of the people that you are working with right now, a lot of your clients, what do you think that you know, or what are they engaging you for?
Amy Bingham 13:09 So usually, I will be working with an owner that is sort of living on an island, right? That's what they describe to me. The typical call that I'll get is, hey, I built my firm, 5 million, 10 million, even 25 million. And I've figured it out along the way. But I don't know what I don't know. So I want to work with an advisor who's plugged into all the latest best practices so that I'm not, I don't feel like I'm living, you know, in a vacuum here or on an island. Right. So it's a lot of advisory work. And I have a very flexible plan where we've talked a couple of times a month, my client brings the agenda. So whatever's on his or her mind is what we're going to talk about. I have more structured plans where let's run hard and run fast. For three months, we're going to talk every week I'm going to give you work to do in between, it'll say you have a major initiative to standardize the process, right. So my scope of work may be to help them with that initiative and hold them accountable to getting that done. So I have a three-month plan. And then I have there is a great need, like I said earlier for leadership training, leadership development. As we've got baby boomers retiring, they've got to have successors to their firms. So that's the reason I built the millennial mentors program or staffing leaders. I initially built it as a one-to-one T program for usually the children of an owner. That was the intended successors get them and I worked with them for a year to get them up to speed get them ready to run the business. But it took it from one to one to one to many, I still do one on one coaching but I do far more good. Coaching, open enrollment. My next class starts on January 13. People can literally click and register and I end up in with 15 people in the class from all staff and verticals, all levels of leadership, from owners to brand new managers. And everybody learns, they learn from me, they learn from each other. So it's really a great program. I've been very excited to launch that. Yeah.
Leighann Lovely 15:26 And I was gonna ask you about that too. Tell me a little bit more about that. So specifically, what is that you know, based on, or what is that about?
Amy Bingham 15:37 I have, when I built millennial mentors, it was on five, the Bible nine, I call them nine disciplines of a great staffing industry leader. And so in my one on one coaching, I'm working through all nine, over the course of a year, I pulled out for the group program, the three most critical leading people, leading process and leading results. And over an 11 week period of time, on a one-hour zoom call every week, we all get on the phone, I teach them something in that discipline. I give them an assignment, they go do it. It's all experiential learning. They come back the following week, we debrief as a group, it's open mic. That's where the real learning comes in. How did you do on your assignment? What did you learn that I teach them something else, and I give them another assignment. So that goes on for 11 weeks.
Leighann Lovely 16:38 That's awesome. Because I like the idea that it's at all levels, because somebody who's, just coming in talking with people who have been in the industry for years can learn something from them, at the same time that they're learning something from you. And people who have been in the industry for years, who sometimes get set in their ways can learn new ideas from somebody who may be coming in with fresh ideas. That's such a that's such an amazing way to, you know, bounce ideas up, you know, back and forth. I mean, it's just, it's great. And I mean, the best way to create a great environment is to train the leaders.
Amy Bingham 17:20 Yeah, it starts with leader. Absolutely. People leave bad managers. They'll even stay in a bad job. Right? If they're fiercely loyal to their manager. Yeah. So it really does start with the leaders. And you made a good point. I just got an email earlier. I'm wrapping up my q4 class right now. From I got an email from an EVP who's in the class. And she said, You know, every single week, there have been great takeaways, she said, some are good reminders. But many are new things, or new ways of doing things that I've really never thought through. This is an executive vice president of a midsize firm. Right? So I have I have that person. And then I have somebody just promoted into a recruiting manager job and now has six recruiters reporting there. So and everything in between all levels in between, right
Leighann Lovely 18:11 That's awesome. That's amazing. It's, well, it's a lot of somebody listening who wants to check that out. I know that you are promoting it on LinkedIn. I'm sure they also find it on your website.
Amy Bingham 18:24 website - https://binghamcp.com/ click Services and look at leadership development. And you can download the agenda and the program overview.
Leighann Lovely 18:37 Excellent, So here's my final question. I'm going to be asking everybody this season, this question. So I'm excited to hear you know what your answer is, if you could pinpoint a time period in your career that made a huge difference in your life or career path? When would that be and why?
Amy Bingham 18:58 So I'm in the way back to actually pre staffing career when I was in retail management. I had a boss who was just as almost gypsy like, she came from outside the the industry, industry being retail, but she came in with a lot of fresh ideas. I remember my first one on one with me she sat down, and she said, Okay, so Amy, you're a department manager in cosmetics. How do you like it? Love it. I'm going on and on. She said, What do you want to do next? And I said, I don't know. No one's ever asked me that before. Now I'm in my early 20s at the time. She said, How about my job? Do you want my job? You want to be a group manager? And I said, I would love to be in your job. I don't have the slightest idea how to get there. She said we will get you there and I'll be darned if she didn't mentor me. And a year later, I got her job. She got promoted to store manager. So this is for Macy's store, right. So what I learned from that why that was so pivotal is I really learned. First of all, if you have a great mentor who will invest time and energy in you, you can go places. And I think we've got to start that dialogue with very junior people. To help them understand this isn't it for you, you can do a whole lot more. So then, when I was ready to leave retail behind, I did the same thing. At then Sperion all that interim services, pre Sperion was on Ranstad. Same thing started as a seven branch manager and up the track and found sought out good mentors talked about what I wanted to do next. So that but that foundation came from that one, group manager in retail.
Leighann Lovely 20:54 That's awesome. That's amazing. And that's, really a learning experience. For every single person who's listening to this, no matter what level they're at. You cannot get to a point in your career, that you can't ask for a mentor. And you can get to a point in your career, where you can offer to mentor somebody. I mean, that should really be the true takeaway from what you just said, because we all have so much to offer to other people. And we still all have something new to learn at any point in our lives or careers. So that's amazing. And you truly, you obviously took great advantage of that, because you've now run your own consulting firm. You know, I've, like I mentioned earlier had the opportunity to learn from you take a training course from you, eventually work under you, many years ago, but it is. Yes, you are a brilliant woman. And I really, really appreciate you taking the time to talk with me today.
Amy Bingham 22:03 Oh, yeah, you're so nice. Thank you so much for inviting me, and all the best to you and your career. I see you just climbing and climbing so really excited for you.
Amy Bingham 22:15 Thank you so much. Thank you again for listening to Let's Talk HR. I appreciate your time and support. Without you the audience this would not be possible. So don't forget that if you enjoyed this episode to follow us like us or share us. Have a wonderful day.
Show notes
Amy Bingham
LinkedIn - linkedin.com/in/amybingham
Website - https://binghamcp.com/
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
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Wednesday Jan 26, 2022
Wednesday Jan 26, 2022
This is the time to make a change, but here is one story you have to hear! Alejandra Frago and her roommate moved halfway across the country with no jobs. Goodnews, they had no trouble finding them. Tune in to hear her story and get some great do's and don't when you are interviewing.
Leighann Lovely 0:15 Let's talk. HR is a place for HR business owners to share experience, talking about what's working, what's not how we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train and retain all generations of workers. We all know that there has been a huge shift and what people want generations are coming together more than ever, on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about how the economy has been impacted and what needs to happen to find a balance. I'm your host Leighann lovely. So let's get this conversation started. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, follow us like us and share us and we're very excited to have my guest on today.
Leighann Lovely 1:07 Alejandra Fraga moved in September of 2021. From California to Wisconsin, her and her roommate decided that it was time to make a change and without a job she made a move halfway across the country. You're going to hear her tell her story of what it was like to look for a job, how she found an amazing position. Alejandra is now a member of Rogue Wave Marketing where she is the Executive Assistant to the CEO. Alejandra is a can-do person who specializes in creative content including iMovie and storytelling. She pays attention to detail and doesn't miss a beat. She is fluent in English and Spanish. Alejandra is extremely passionate about helping others when she is away from work. She enjoys writing poetry and loves music. So I'm very excited to have her on today.
Leighann Lovely 1:57 Welcome, Alejandra. It's so nice to have you here talking with me today. Why don't you start off with telling me a little bit about yourself?
Alejandra Fraga 2:05 Yeah, well. Hi, Leighann. Thank you for having me here today. My name is Alejandra Fraga like you mentioned earlier, I am from San Diego, California. I was living there. I mean, I've lived there my whole life. But I traveled up north for college. And then I moved to the Bay Area for a year. And then once the pandemic hit, I ended up moving back down to Southern California. And then I suddenly realized that I wanted a drastic change in my life. So I moved over to Wisconsin. Now I am living in Milwaukee and I am currently working for a marketing company. And that's just a little bit about myself and my background and where I come from.
Leighann Lovely 2:52 So from California to Wisconsin, and yes, when did you make that move?
Alejandra Fraga 2:59 So I made that move in late September. Okay. So late September, I decided to make the move on over to Wisconsin. One of my previous roommates/friends from college had actually brought up the idea of moving to Milwaukee many years ago when we were in college. And at first I thought she was crazy, because I had never heard of Milwaukee. So she kind of started bringing it up year after year. It kind of started growing on me a little and I started looking into it. And I was like, Okay, this isn't too bad. Eventually, I made my way over here to visit and check it out. And I honestly ended up really, really liking it. And so now we're both here in Milwaukee. And it's been a wonderful. I want to say three months. Is it? Yeah, a little bit. Almost. It's about to be three months. So it's been great. The Winter hasn't hit us yet. So I'm looking forward to that. But we'll see how that goes.
Leighann Lovely 4:02 Right. You haven't experienced what it's like to truly live in Wisconsin. Yeah. Oh, no. So had you visited here and experienced, you know, the Wisconsin life? What really drove that decision to move across country?
Alejandra Fraga 4:19 Yeah, so one, it's way cheaper than San Diego. And two, I really, really liked how you still have the big city feel with a slower pace. I feel when I was living back home in California, I was living in the Bay Area, Silicon Valley. And then I was living in, in San Diego, California. So those were very much more fast-paced environments. And I think I was personally at a point in my life where I wanted to slow down a little bit and just grab a hold of myself first and then be able to get to that point in my life. And so that's what drew me here honestly, now being here, me and my roommate, we're just talking about this, but we love how much personality this place has. It honestly blows my mind every time, I'm living in downtown area, So when I walk out, I kind of feel like I'm walking through like a Hallmark movie. So it's honestly been treating us very well. That's kind of what drew me over here to Milwaukee.
Leighann Lovely 5:26 Excellent. And so when you came down, when you move, did you have a job? Or? Did you just make the move and decide, hey, we're gonna see what happens.
Alejandra Fraga 5:38 Yeah, so I actually had no job lined up. And I just kind of had to honestly have some faith in myself and be like, Okay, let's do it. Because it's now or never. And I had saved up some money from my previous job that I was working at in San Diego. So I had that to back me up for a little bit. But I eventually knew that I needed to get on it. Because money just goes. So yeah, I came here with absolutely no job, I kind of had an open mind as to what jobs I wanted to get. I wasn't very specific, or I didn't have a specific job in mind. But like I said, no job, no family just kind of made the move over, very spontaneously.
Leighann Lovely 6:22 Right. And well, this is the time period in which you're able to do that, there are so many jobs available. And I guess taking that leap of faith right now would be the best time because we definitely have jobs, we are lacking people, good people. And so tell me, how did you start looking for work? Where do you even begin?
Alejandra Fraga 6:46 Yeah, so I started I want to say it was my second week living here in Milwaukee. My first week, I was just focused on getting settled into my apartment, and getting everything just just ready for myself. And then during that second week, I was like, Okay, it's time to go. I was like, I need to find a job. So indeed was the website where I was constantly on looking for jobs. Yeah, I was I was constantly on Indeed, just looking for jobs applying. I had previous teaching experience. So I knew that teaching. I mean, it's kind of a high-demand job, anywhere. So I was applying to a couple of teaching jobs. But I, in the back of my head, I kind of knew that I didn't want to go that route. I enjoy teaching, but it wasn't necessarily my passion or what drove me. And so I would apply for those jobs. But like I said, I already had the idea in the back of my head that those weren't necessarily the jobs that I wanted, ideally, but they were there just in case to back me up. And so yeah, I was, like I said constantly on Indeed, just applying my way through through the week. And like I said, it was pretty much a full time job having to find a job.
Leighann Lovely 7:58 Right. And everybody that I talked to when you're looking for work, it is a full-time job. I remember back in the day and was starting off my mentor, then actually my dad had said to me, he goes you know, it can get hard when you're especially if you're sitting in your apartment, you're sitting he goes, change the scenery, go to a coffee shop, sit in a coffee shop. And at that time I was looking in one ads. I was I was it was newspapers that I was looking at. I don't know if some people will go Oh, yeah, I remember that other people go, what does that mean? Right. But yeah, it is a full-time job. I'm just trying to get in touch with the right people get your resume in front of the right people. Exactly. So what was the next step from there? When you truly you know, started to get those interviews? You know, what were some of your, your non-negotiables for, you know, position some of the negotiables? And how did you really start to narrow that list down for what you wanted, and the perfect position for you?
Alejandra Fraga 9:02 Well, I'll back up just a little bit. But after applying for jobs, I think it was after the first week, I had not heard back from one job. And I was honestly terrified. I was like, Oh my gosh, did I make the wrong decision? Why did I move over here? I honestly had so many thoughts running through my head. And it wasn't until I think the second week that the ball kind of started rolling and we started hearing back a little bit more from employers just to answer your question that you asked earlier. I honestly wasn't I wouldn't say I'm too picky. I wasn't necessarily looking for something specific. Of course, I wanted, you know, a job that or employer who really valued their employees and who had a strong mission and who held that mission very close to that to themselves, but I wasn't very specific. I know there's some people who are very specific for in looking for benefits where I think in my roll as to where I was, like I said, I was a little scared. I wasn't hearing back. So I was like, Okay, let's just, you know, let's just apply, apply, apply. I'm in a new state, I moved across the country, I can't not have a job. So I wasn't necessarily too picky with that. But I guess that that's my answer for that.
Leighann Lovely 10:17 Okay. But I mean, and as far as what, and when I say non-negotiables, there had to have been a certain threshold as far as I have to make X amount. Oh, yeah. You know, I have to be passionate about Yeah, the work that I'm doing, whether that be, you know, XYZ, so there had to have been something that that drove you to have interest in certain things. And you said, I was applying to some childcare I was applying to or, I'm sorry, not child. My apologies. So, you know, what, what were those? What interested you or what drove you to apply to the jobs that you were applying to,
Alejandra Fraga 10:57 Like you said, a pay was definitely a huge one. So I wasn't applying to anything under like 18. And below, I wanted, definitely something above that pay range. So that was a huge factor. Aside from that, let me think I was looking for a, I want to say hybrid position, or more so of a more remote position, just because I am newer to the area. So I wasn't very familiar with, you know, my surroundings. And I know I've heard from many people here that winter gets very, very tough. So I was like, Okay, if that's the case, then I think I want to work from home. I mean, initially, the job that I have now is a hybrid, and I am extremely thankful for that. Because getting out of the house has been so so helpful to my well being and just my mental state. And, in general, when I first came into the office, I honestly was a little taken back, because I hadn't socialized that much in so long, to the point where when I would come home, my social battery was like a 2%. And I was done for the day. And so that was definitely I mean, it was it was a drastic change for me, especially just being at home all day. And you know, just applying to jobs, applying to jobs, and just literally being with myself and my roommate. But now looking back, I am extremely thankful that I took on that hybrid position. But yeah, that's that's one of the things that I was looking for when applying for jobs. I know my roommate, she was very specific for him looking for a specific pay range. Aside from also looking at benefit packages. I know that she was very specific with with what she wanted in that sense, where I wasn't necessarily as picky. I think specifically as well. Because the jobs that I was applying to, I think I was a little I would say, Well, I don't I don't want to like bring myself down, but I was a little under qualified for those positions. And so because of that I wasn't too too picky in that sense. Because I was working for I mean, back in the day, I was teaching and I was taking on those kinds of roles where as to the new jobs that I was applying to sure I had teaching positions, but I was also applying to a lot of job positions that were not within my scope. And when I when I refer to that, I mean, like marketing manager or or things like that, that I honestly hadn't necessarily gotten a lot of experience. And and so that's why, like I said, I wasn't necessarily too picky with that.
Leighann Lovely 13:23 And it's interesting that you say that, you know, you said I don't want to bring myself down. But you know, I've talked with a lot of people who are coming from like a teaching background or were teachers, there are so many of the skills that you learn from that, that are so transferable because, I mean, honestly, teachers have to have so many qualities that so many people are I mean, patients, there are a lot of people out there that I mean, that is really just something that I I struggle with on a daily basis to have a level of patience that you have to have a lot of those skills are extremely transferable. And I've talked with a lot of people who have said, I'm, I've been a teacher for many years, what can I do? Like, okay, well write down all the skills that you have, because Oh, my God, there's a ton of soft skills in that. There are a ton of technical skills in that. So don't ever sell yourself short on that one.
Alejandra Fraga 14:17 Yeah, that's something I'm definitely learning how to do. I think it's just valuing myself as not just a human being because I feel like I'm very good at in that aspect. But when it comes to valuing myself as an employee and learning what I bring to the table, I think these past two months by working at rogue wave marketing, I've honestly been so impressed with myself. I was just looking back today and I was like, Oh my gosh, like I'm really doing all of this with like I said, you know, very minimal experience, but it's all those transferable skills, like you mentioned, that do transfer on over so it's something that I'm kind of just learning how to reflect on and analyze and like I said just kind of barely myself a little bit more than that sense
Leighann Lovely 15:00 Well, that's great you're working for, you know, I know the company a little bit I've met the the CEO that you're that you support. She's an amazing person. So I think that you're, you're in the right spot. But so, you know, you talked a little bit about when, you know, the second week when you hadn't, hadn't quite heard heard back, you started to hear back, you kind of were like, in that emotional state, you know, walk me through kind of what that felt like, and you know, how how, I guess the end result, which is, wow, I'm now in a job that, that you're seeing so many, you know, things, awesome things come from yourself, you're obviously proud of yourself.
Alejandra Fraga 15:38 Yeah, it was funny because me and my roommate joke about it. But we say it was the longest month of our lives, where we kind of sort of felt like we were just on hold for a second. But I think something that was so helpful, was having her with me, and we were literally on the same boat. At that very same moment, we had moved across the country, we were looking for jobs together. And so just knowing that we had each other was extremely helpful. So on the days where we did feel down, we just be like, you know, what, we just moved across the country, we did that, let's just, you know, Let's applaud ourselves for that and keep on going, let's not get down on ourselves. And although there were days where we felt a little helpless and a little anxious, in a sense, where it's like, okay, we were not familiar with what's going to come our way, but just having, I guess, some faith in ourselves, and, and not losing hope, in the fact that what was coming our way was exactly what was meant for us. And so, you know, I think it was having each other that really helped us out at the end of the day there.
Leighann Lovely 16:40 That's excellent. And, you know, it's great that you had somebody and, you know, to be able to support you. And there's a lot of people out there that that don't necessarily have that roommate, but there are so many groups out there that that, that do offer that type of support. So anybody who's listening to this, you know, I urge them to seek out support in that, you know, in that sense, there are of people who are in the same situation where they can go and talk about those types of things. So, definitely, so where other people can learn where you can help educate employers, you've obviously just recently been through interview processes you've been, you know, through the applying and all of that, through this process. Were there things that certain companies did really well, that were there things that companies did, you were like, Oh, my gosh, here's, you know, this is was just done poorly, or feedback or whatever it might be. And, and I'm not asking you to name any employers, just asking, Hey, is there any constructive criticism that you can give to employers out there that might be looking to hire and how they can do it better?
Alejandra Fraga 17:48 Yeah. So personally, for me, I was in about I want to say four or five interviews. And I would say when employers just come prepared to the interviewer, and they know what they bring to the table, it's extremely intriguing to the employee, or to the potential employee, when they they're prepared. And they come in with their whatever it is their mission, their values, they kind of showcasing what they provide their employees with. I love that sense of culture within the company. And so that is a big, big plus, for me, making sure that there is that culture within a business or within a company it's huge, it's honestly a game changer for me. Another thing that I would say as well, a sense of professionalism. I feel like there's been plenty of interviews where there is just maybe, I don't know, they asked me about one or two questions. And the I don't know, I just feel like there there has to be some type of sense of professionalism within the the interview itself. Another one, I would say, so I had a couple of zoom interviews, and I had a couple in person interviews. And in person interviews are 10 times better than the Zoom interviews, I think. I mean, there's, you know, there's so much psychology or psychology studies behind the Zoom aspect of interviews and what goes on behind that, but it's just a game changer when you're in person, and you're able to see that person's body language and you're able to see, you know, body language with their words, whatever, just everything that comes together is definitely a different provides a different sense of safety, if that makes sense. And then so those were two things I know, for my roommate, and this is, you know, stuff that I'm talking about just because I did live this through with her but she had an employer who she had applied for sorry, yes, an employer that she had applied to and she was extremely extremely so my roommate had applied to this company that she was really, really looking forward to She got her first interview in extremely excited, they called her in for a second interview, she was like, Okay, this will work I can do this second interview, after they asked her to come in for a third interview, she was like, What's going on here? She's like, okay, she's like, I'll come into the third interview. But by this point, her excitement had already gone all the way down. And then she was also waiting to hear back from another company at that moment. And so she was kind of stuck in between, do I keep waiting for this company to probably lead me on to the fifth interview? Or do I just take this job that I have right here that has only interviewed me about two times. And so her excitement, like I said, had totally, totally gone down by the time that that company that she was extremely excited about to begin with, had already asked her for about the fourth interview. So she ended up going with the other employer. So one thing that I would definitely say is, don't how do I say this? Don't extend the process? If it doesn't need to be? I think, I mean, I've been on the other side, where I've been interviewing, interviewing people. And I can probably tell within the second interview that okay, you're a good fit for this company. Let's get you in. So I've been on that side. So I know what that's like. So I would say just don't extend the process of it doesn't need to be extended that long. Because by the time that they're on to that fifth interview, the employees, potential employees, excitement has already gone all the way down.
Leighann Lovely 21:28 Right. And I've I have heard that more times than trust me, this is not the 10th time, it's probably the 15th or maybe 30 of time that I have heard that said, Yeah, companies, typically, especially as the employee who is going through that process, you're right, they get really excited about something, then they interview somewhere else, they get really excited about that. And they go oh, wait, did the other interview was I really excited about that, then they hear from them again, they get really excited again, and then they hear, I'll have to go through another interview. And you're right, there's that up and down excitement. And eventually, it slowly starts to fizzle out when they're going through the process of other organizations. And eventually, the one that keeps pushing them through more and more and more and more trust, I just recently experienced this, I had a job change as well. And you're, you're completely right. And I am an advocate of if you if you want multiple people to interview this person at a company, then book it for a 90 minute interview panel interview of, hey, we need to have this many people come in, meet them, do a 20 minute meet and greet, and make a decision. Because now in this job market, you just can't You can't bring them back for five interviews, you can't bring it back for even three interviews at this point. Yeah, and I get it, the first interview, if you want to do a quick pre screen over zoom, bring them in second interview, you're making a decision, or that person's going to go somewhere else. And again, that's it. I'm not trying to slam any companies. And I do understand if we're getting up to the extremely high level here, I'm making a decision on my C suite employees, it might be a very different situation. Definitely, if we're talking about somebody who's on the, you know, entry level management, I had, I had one interview with somebody. And within that one interview, I knew this was the company I was going to work for. He called me and said, after we talked, I knew I was going to offer you the position. And he was I was just waiting to hear what you thought of it. And that's where I work today. Nice. Yeah, it's a rough. It's it's a rough world. But connections if it's a true true connection, and it's the right person at the company doing that interview. So it's there. Yeah. What about the company that you're working at? Now? How did that? I mean, what was the feeling there?
Alejandra Fraga 23:55 Yeah, so it's actually really funny, because I don't think the CEO even saw my resume. I don't know if till this day, if she seen I actually Yes, I did send it to her after I received the job, but she had not seen my resume. So let me backtrack to the very beginning. So ideally, I was applying for nonprofit jobs. I've always been super into nonprofits. I love the idea of just being part of something bigger and leaving a legacy, all that fun stuff. And so I had applied to a company. Originally, I had actually applied to a nonprofit organization called good friend, and they had actually called me in for a second interview, and I was extremely excited about this job really looking forward to it. And at my second interview, one of the founders ended up giving me a tour of the office and so there's different office spaces within the building. And while we were walking through she actually had shown me an office that was Is roadway marketing. And I was like, Oh my gosh, you know what I've actually seen their ad on Indeed, I believe she's like, You know what, yeah, they're looking actually looking for an assistant at the moment. If you're looking for, you know, another job because I was looking for another job at the moments and some good friend would only be part time. She said, You know, you can definitely come in, I believe they're having a seminar tonight. So it was that same day of my second interview. And within two hours, I was back at the same building, I ended up joining it was a group interview, which I actually it was like a presentation and a part group interview. And so I joined that I was there for about an hour, I met the see Oh, and she started talking to us about, you know, the company, how it started, the mission, their values, all of that fun stuff. And I was like, okay, you know, this was really intriguing. They even ended up having us read this, I want to say it was like a 10 page article on going the extra mile. So even just little things like that really grabbed my attention. I was like, Wow, I'm a very deep person. So I like, you know, reading deep articles, or any, any kind of any type of material that relates to that. And so, I was really intrigued automatically. Sarah had this very infectious energy to her. I really, I really go, how do I say this? I really am drawn towards energy. And so after that, I I ended up coming back home. And I was like, Yeah, I'm not getting that job. I it was a group interview with a another young lady and she had assistant experience, I had no assistant experience, other than being a nanny. So I came back and I was like, Yeah, I don't I don't think I'm going to get that job. But it's okay. You know, I at least I went, I tried, it's all good. gave it my all. And I actually ended up hearing back from, from the CEO, I want to say a couple of days after that interview, she pulled me in for a second interview, and actually offered me the position they're on on the spot at our second interview. And so that's kind of how it came to be. Yeah,
Leighann Lovely 27:14 That's great. And that's the way that it's supposed to happen, where, you know, she obviously saw something in you, you obviously connected with her. And and it happened it happened the way it was supposed to happen. Exactly. Yeah. And typically those are the the jobs or the best ways to get, you know, a position because yeah, you guys connected in some way on a deeper level where she, you know, she's interested, she saw something in you.
Alejandra Fraga 27:40 Yeah. And it's funny, because I still see good friend around all the time. And we're, I love them. So in a way, I still get to be a part of that family, which I'm very, very happy about. And it's it's funny, because I actually reflected on this the other day, and we ended up attending a conference named growth club up Amina and good friend was there as well. And we had this raffle. I was actually the first person to win a raffle prize at the event and go figure it was from good friend. And I kind of stepped back after that. And I was like, Oh my gosh, they literally and figuratively gifted me a gift. They gifted me the gift, you know, that I won there at the raffle. But they also gifted me the gift of being able to work for roadway marketing. And so it was kind of like, Uh huh. Like, this is where I'm supposed to be kind of moment.
Leighann Lovely 28:32 Right? Yeah, yeah. Things things always shake out the way they're supposed to. Exactly. Yeah. So I have one final question. This is the question that I'm asking everybody of the season. If you could pinpoint a time period in your career that made a huge difference in your life or career path. One would that be and why?
Alejandra Fraga 28:53 That is a great question. And for me, this is definitely a no brainer. I had a mentor back in college, he was actually my boss as well. I worked for a calling center. And this was my second job ever. So I was very fresh. I was very new to the job world, I was going to have to call strangers and ask them for their money. And that was really scary to me. And so I got the job. And I remember it was, I believe my second week there and I ended up calling someone and they were just like the rudest people ever. It was just like, why are you calling me right now? Da da da and I broke down. I broke down. I was like, I can't do this. I remember I walked out of my little booth. And I you know, walk out and my boss pulls me into his office and I'm just I'm just like, I can't do this anymore. I'm sorry. I you know, this job just isn't for me. You and he looked at me and he told me one thing that I will forever remember, and he told me whether you believe you can or you can't, either way you are right. And after that moment, and I swear to you, I have lived by this every time that I believe I can do something, I do it. And every time that I believe I can't do something, I don't do it. And so it's just that that's, you know, mental reminder to myself that whether you believe you can or you can't, either way, you are so right. And so that was a game changer. Within my, my personal experience, my career experience, it's something that I've kept with me, honestly, ever since then. So that is, that is what has stuck with me for a very long time.
Leighann Lovely 30:51 That's amazing, you know, and when, throughout my career, I have had multiple mentors. And it is, it is the greatest thing that I've ever experienced to be able to have somebody who takes interest in you who will sit down when you are either at your lowest, and be able to raise you up, or somebody who will sit down with you when you are at your highest, and continue to encourage you to even do better. And one day, hopefully, you'll be able to pay that forward. And when somebody is struggling, you'll be able to walk up to him and say, Hey, how can I help you? In business, that's what we all need, right? We all need to continue to, to help each other in, you know, in whatever way we can. There's always, you know, ways that we can continue to learn and always ways that we can continue to help people. And that's, and that's what business, that's what friendship, that's what life is all about. So that's an amazing story. I'm glad that you shared that.
Alejandra Fraga 31:42 That's the ultimate goal, just being able to help each other, build each other up and help each other grow at the end of the day. And that's something that I totally did it mentioned earlier on in our interview, but growth opportunities within a job is extremely, extremely huge. That is something that I really, really look into when applying to a job, how can I grow within this fits within this business? And how can I help others? So sorry, I didn't bring that up earlier. But that was a huge factor as well, that just popped into my head.
Leighann Lovely 32:12 Yeah. Well, it sounds like you, you're a very determined person. And I think that you've found your way into an awesome opportunity and awesome job. And I really, thank you so much for taking the opportunity to talk with me and tell me your story today. And hopefully somebody who's listening will you know, get a gold nugget out of this. Hopefully an employer or somebody who's interviewing will be able to take something away from it. So thank you so much.
Alejandra Fraga 32:37 I really hope so, thank you for having me here
Leighann Lovely 32:45 Thank you again for listening to Let's Talk HR. I appreciate your time and support. Without you the audience this would not be possible. So don't forget that if you enjoyed this episode to follow us like us or share us. Have a wonderful day.
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Wednesday Jan 19, 2022
Wednesday Jan 19, 2022
For so long there has been a major issue with how we as a society help or handle those reentering society after time spent incarcerated, many people are given limited resources and very limited time to accomplish what they need to do to become what is deemed productive members of society. Meet Eli and Ruben, they are on a mission to change this!
Eli Rivera, CEO & Co-Founder, The Way Out
Ruben Gaona, COO & Co-Founder, The Way Out
Leighann Lovely 0:15 Let's Talk HR is a place for HR professionals, business owners and employees to come together and share experiences, to talk about what's working and what's not. How we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train and retain all generations of workers. We all know that there has been a huge shift in what people want. generations are coming together, more than ever, on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about how the economy has been impacted, and what needs to happen to find a balance. I'm your host Leighann Lovely. So let's get this conversation started. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, follow us like us and share us.
Leighann Lovely 1:04 Welcome to another episode of Let's Talk HR - Humanizing the Conversation. Today, I am excited to have a conversation with two very amazing men that I've had the opportunity to meet on a couple of occasions, invited them to come on and talk with me today. Eli Rivera and Ruben Gaona. Eli was first the first person in Puerto his Puerto Rican family born and raised in the United States Midland. He grew up on 32nd and brown on Milwaukee's west side and he experienced firsthand extreme gang violence and the onset of the crack cocaine and AIDS epidemic in his neighborhood. These experiences heavily influenced Eli's life and his subsequent decisions, eventually landed him in prison in his late 20s. As an ex-felon, Eli experienced firsthand the changes associated with seeking employment with a felony conviction. Upon his release in 2000. Ali utilized various leadership positions to employ mentor and coach formerly incarcerated individuals within the hospitality industry. In 2018, Eli created shift fly a pre shyft and training app for hospitality industries and in 2019, co-founded the way out a comprehensive anti biased employment platform and mobile support app. Ruben was born in El Paso, Texas, and moved to Milwaukee Southside at the age of 15. In 2017, Reuben completed seven years of his 10 year sentence, and in 2019, he founded Second Chance Wisconsin and began providing guidance through motivational speaking to formerly incarcerated people and others facing barriers. Ruben is a US Navy veteran, a former employee of the Department of Defense, navy, and an ex-felon. Ruben is currently a senior at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, Helen Bader School of Social Welfare Reubens experience working in the reentry with the state of Wisconsin inspired him to co-found the way out where he currently is the COO Ruben has had the privilege of speaking at several reentry engagements throughout Wisconsin to discuss the merits of Second Chance employment, these two men have had amazing lives. And I'm very excited to welcome them and talk with them about what they are now doing to give back to society and help others with their second chance. So welcome, Eli and Ruben, I am so glad that you agreed to talk with me today.
Eli Rivera 3:38 Thanks for having us.
Ruben Gaona 3:39 Thank you. Thank you for inviting us.
Leighann Lovely 3:41 Yes, it is so great to have you both here. So I would love to jump right in and talk to you a little bit about how you came to create or come up with the idea for The Way Out.
Ruben Gaona 3:54 Oh, in the fall of 2019 Am fam and generator G beta was hosting an event as chairman feedings. And it was pretty much they were asking a question of with a group of panel panelists that were there of how can we reduce recidivism. So I attended that event le attended as well. Even though we didn't get to meet each other at that event. We both I believe present their ideas to each group that we were at we were in different groups. So once I presented my idea to my group, but what I wanted to do, I kind of didn't get the idea didn't resonate pretty well with the group. So it was a couple of days later about a week later or two that at their party have a mutual friend actually reached out for my information to the generator and they asked if he could contact me it's like giving my phone number. He jumped on the phone call me and kind of told me you know, this idea that's why me and Eli right are thinking of doing I wouldn't we would like to hear your idea and I share my ideas of You know how we like to connect employers and justice-involved individuals, but not only connected by hopefully provide continuous support services to make the employer understand that they're not alone. There are a people that is there's a group of people that's vested in them to be successful. And he's like, you know, he, like, you know what, I think we got something here, how about, all three of us just meet up and have coffee. So we ended up meeting up with a couple of days later to sit down and have coffee. And that's where I ended up meeting, Eli Rivera. And, you know, we both shares stories. And I think that's where we're the way I pretty much started.
Leighann Lovely 5:36 That's awesome. So let's, let's back up here and talk a little bit, let's dive a little bit into, you know, what the way out is, and why you were passionate, or why you were where you were at that moment in time, to even be able to pitch the ideas that you originally had. And to be at that, you know, I guess kind of pivotal moment where you had the opportunity to come together and create now, what you have today,
Ruben Gaona 6:07 I was passionate for the fact that I have been released out of prison, and I came home on March 1 of 2017. of essential 10 years in federal prison. Out of the 10 years, I ended up doing seven years. And coming into the home, into the halfway house. Within a week, I went that that I had to find employment, and any kind of performance, it didn't matter what type of employment, but I had to get a job. If I didn't get a job within 30 days, I was able to go back to prison. So I knew what I wanted to be a case manager already. So I struggled the first half the first week trying to find a job, you know, and a lot of people don't know that I am a Navy veteran. So often, it would mean being a navy, Navy veteran and skill that I will be able to provide will get overlooked by the fact that I checked the box I was formerly incarcerated. So they're like, You know what, no, get your background, we can give you a job. And I was successful in 45 Finding a job. So but working out the case manager year later, I got a job with the state of Wisconsin, working with the Wisconsin reentry pipeline program. And I saw the pamphlet constantly of that we would help people place them in a job. But then within 60 or 90 days after we were done providing support services, it would be back to square one. And we will lose you know, they will be looking for another job again, because is there a transcript you can shall carry issues, housing issues. So that resonated with me. And I thought You know what, there's got to be more that we could do. That has to be more. So that became real personal to me and trying to find a way to if I was struggling with someone that was a Navy veteran honorably served to find a job, then I could only imagine those who didn't have the same skills that I have, how much more they're struggling. So I mean, Eli with yours.
Eli Rivera 7:56 Yeah, you know, my, reason for being at that event on, you know, in 2019 was, although I had been in hospitality my entire life, even prior to incarceration. I had just gotten busy. Once I came out of prison, I was fortunate enough to be one of the few who had something lined up for me, even prior to my release. But while I was in the halfway house, I saw so many people that weren't as fortunate as I was, I saw grown men crying, because Rubin said, If you don't find a job, I believe at that time, it was within four weeks, you would be revoked my time having been served over 20 years ago, I had, as I mentioned, just gotten back into hospitality, you know, working, owning, operating, doing doing many, many things in hospitality, but it also included being sensitive to the needs of folks coming out of incarceration. So I often hired myself, Justice impacted individuals, both personally as well as when I was given an opportunity to work with a great restaurant group here in the city. And and it always showed and retention, it always showed in, you know, the the outcomes in regards to customer satisfaction and increasing revenue and all of that stuff. So I knew, you know, that that that it was a great core people to to work with. But again, you know, I hadn't started thinking about my impact in this space and being in this space, until I met my second wife, who was a professor at UW Milwaukee, who had ironically mentioned to me that she had this great student that I had to meet one day, and lo and behold, it ended up being Reuben. And so through that third party, I was introduced to Rubin who was, you know, someone my wife hadn't handed me to meet him. So I knew immediately being at that event in 2019, was where I needed to be to make that shift away from hospitality and into this space of, you know, really this social impact space. And it was validated when my ideas were in harmony with Rubin at the time, we had a friend Craig, who was part of this, but he got pulled away for something else that he was very passionate about. So Rubin and I stayed together. And really, you know, with the guidance and support of generator and American families, corporate Institute for corporate responsibility and social impact, we've managed to come along way in a very short period of time supporting folks, but that was really how I ended up at that event. I knew when I saw that, advertise on LinkedIn, that was going to be the turning point. And once Ruben and I met, and we committed I, I, you know, sold hospitality app that I had previously created, and have been all in since really since the winter of 2019. And through our launch at the end of 2020. And to where we are today,
Leighann Lovely 11:20 Wow, you would set something said 20 years ago, you had what, four weeks to find a job and then keep that job. I mean, is that still is that still the rule of thumb nowadays with individuals who are coming back into society is that they have four weeks to find a job or is that changed, because it seems I understand the principle behind it of you know, you come out of you're transitioning back into to society, they obviously want, you know, individuals to be active members of society contributing in some way, but four weeks is not a lot of time to, especially if you've spent years inside, that's not a lot of time to get your life in order, and to be working at a job. And so I'm guessing that this app is a huge, you know, help to those individuals being able to, I guess help in many different ways want tell me about how this helps those individuals?
Eli Rivera 12:18 So you know, to your point, and I think Ruben is it still four weeks, I know you came out more recent than I was that still an expectation at four weeks?
Ruben Gaona 12:28 Well, with COVID. I don't know what changes that they've made, right. But part of COVID, like I said, I knew I had 30 days to to find any Anika and that causes an individual a lot of times to just go apply for a staffing agency. And you know, and start earning 7.50, 8.50, $10 an hour. But a lot of times not taking into consideration that out of whatever we're earning. 25% is going to the highway house, so we got to pay so so that $10 to our family. And if you'd have to pay fees or child support, you're left with breadcrumbs to try to try to make it still. So but yeah, 30 days is what the policy was.
Eli Rivera 13:12 Yeah, yeah. And so you know, so to that point, what what our app does, you know, it, I mean, so many different things to kind of change that model that the first part of it is, you know, we do bring onboard employers who are going to be paying a minimum of $15 an hour. So we consider that a living wage job, we don't want. We don't feel that our services, these additional holistic wraparound services that we provide through the platform are of any value to somebody if at the end of the day, they're still not earning enough money to sustain themselves. So so that's, you know, really kind of part one of what we offer is we offer a pool of employers that aren't just saying they will hire a second chance because it's it's the the right PR move to make these days because everyone's talking about, you know, hiring second chance. And it's, it's such a wonderful social impact thing we say, okay, not only are you willing to hire justice impacted, tell us how many jobs you you have available for them, because we're going to fill those roles. It's not if the perfect candidate if the moon and the stars aligned, it's, it literally shows us that, that you're committed to this and we will bring you the right person, right. And so so that's really what it comes down to is how can we really crass craft a holistic reentry plan for somebody that then allows them to bring their best self to work and really produce for the employer at a level, maybe even beyond those of the folks who aren't just as impacted that are working there.
Leighann Lovely 14:52 Right, and it makes, you know, offering these other services and I want to talk a little bit about some of these other services. allowing these individuals to be able to go to work and be productive while at work, not worrying about what's happening at home. And I've, you know, I've talked about this, you know, with other individuals I talk about this a lot, is that, you know, we can't always walk in and leave our baggage at the door, we can't, it's we're humans. But this allows you to set set up these individuals to be successful, as successful as possible to be able to walk in the door, and be ready to do the job without having to worry about whatever life is happening around them. And that's, that's so important. Not to mention that if somebody is working through this app, you would think that an employer that has come talk to you, you would think that an employer would go wow, this is this is amazing, because not only are they coming to work for me, I know that they really are in it for the long haul. Because, one, they're taking the effort to go through and work with somebody like you, and then they're utilizing whatever services you're also offering. So now tell me what some of those other services that you offer are.
Ruben Gaona 16:11 So one of the big questions when we onboard, someone is asking them, how do they envision their way out to be like, what is their actual my way out? You know, I believe that gives them that feeling of taking ownership back of their life, once again, instead of always being told what to do now you're able to take ownership and say, Well, this is what I want to do. So we'll ask what supportive services do you need, whether it be transportation, assistance to obtain your driver's license, AODA counseling, entrepreneurship, how seen shall care pretty much anything that someone could have struggled to reenter society that we might think we might take for granted because we already have it, but they don't have it. So we try to provide connect them with reentry service providers that provide those supportive services, so we could help them and assist them to further on longer their career and their pathway to reentry into society. The second thing we offer is personal goals. So we asked them, you know, what, what personal goals do you want to shift within 30 days, 60 days, 90 days. So we'll drop down tracks of their own choices of what they have chosen, that they want to do, whether they want to start going to the gym, we had individuals that wanted to connect back to their family members, then after 17 years, I believe or they've connected back to them. We had individuals that wanted to open their own barber shop, and they opened own barber shops. So and with the employer, we actually worked with the employer le as a competition with employers and on asking the employer, you know, what do you want to see the individual accomplish in 30 days, 60 days, 90 days while they're working with you? What tracks do you have for them? Is there training they have to do and you want them completing them. So once all those tracks are taken into consideration and drop into the app, as they're completing each single one of their tracks, we we provide incentives for them. We've been able to give out bugs she gives Brewer chiggers, entrepreneurship scholarships to so that someone could learn how to run their businesses. So you know, at that set of back satisfaction that they get like, oh, wow,
Leighann Lovely 18:19 Right, we all love the carrot that's, you know, hanging at the end of the stick, we everybody, at least I do. You know, my boss says, Hey, if you do this, you get this. And I'm like, Okay, I want to get that. And it's a cup of coffee. And I'm like, Oh, I got a cup of coffee. I, everybody loves you know, that tiny little reward, or at least the feeling of being rewarded for something, my I always joke, I get all these gifts from my parents. But then after we've opened our gifts, we play games for prizes, and these prizes are all like $1 A little prizes. And I say, you know, it's really funny, I get more excited about getting a prize worth like two bucks, then the $40 pair of shoes or, or scarf that you bought me and we laugh about it, because it's a sense of, ooh, I won something. It really is just another, you know, gift or another little that is the human in us. We want to feel like we have accomplished or won or done something great or amazing. And that's, that's, that's awesome. Now, do these, these things that you give away? Are these donated? How do you get these these little incentives?
Eli Rivera 19:29 Yeah, Well, you know, as Ruben mentioned, sometimes they're little incentives. Sometimes they're big incentives. But, you know, part of our model to that point is, you know, we're really supporting this person's unique journey that that they themselves have crafted. And so basically, what we're saying to them is, look, we value your opinion, you're the expert in your life, you're going to tell us what you want to do and how you want to do it and we're just going to hold you accountable to that. But But I say that because they really understand that this is a team effort, right. And because of that, we treat this as an investment in all of us. And so, you know, the client success then becomes our success then becomes the ability to bring more employers into the loop. And so we see this is an opportunity for us personally to invest in this individual. And so we take the the part of the revenues that are driven by this direct hire model, to pay for these things. So so we're investing our own money back into this cycle with this individual, to make sure that they see, hey, guess what, we all have skin in the game here, we're all vested in you together. And that creates what we believe this, it brings to the surface what we believe already exists, you know, Ruben and I come from from the streets, right? And there's this high level of loyalty and and, you know, dedication to folks who who have helped us, right, who have been part of our crew. And and so, you know, we kind of continue to foster that, like, hey, no, this is, you know, this is about you and us together doing this. And we believe that really contributes to a level of commitment, that that perhaps typical, you know, staffing models or otherwise, don't have that opportunity. And again, you know, Rubin can speak to, you know, how many folks will have said to him, I want to talk to you, you're the guy with the lived experience, you know, what the prior to the way out in creating this platform, in those spaces, and we really value our lived experience, and so does the community that we're serving?
Leighann Lovely 21:41 Excellent. So it's 100% you, You're, you fund all of this? Oh, well,
Eli Rivera 21:47 I do want to clarify, you know, a AmFan has been our greatest sponsor to get things off the ground, to give us runway to do what we're doing. But yes, we take we take revenue from the direct hire model, and wrap that into incentivizing our clients.
Leighann Lovely 22:04 Excellent, wonderful. I mean, and that's, that's amazing, you are the incentive for your own employees to do well. And that's, you know, that's the best business model for companies to to incentivize their own employees, it makes them feel special, and makes them feel important. That's awesome. So what are some of the company sizes that you typically are going after? What are some of the types of positions that you typically are, are looking to work with or fill?
Eli Rivera 22:37 Yeah, our sweet spot tends to be, you know, smaller and midsize businesses that don't have an entire, you know, HR and legal gauntlet to get through, in order to create a relationship with them. So, you know, typically, our best results have been, you know, local businesses that maybe have, you know, four to 10, you know, facilities within their organization. In hospitality in retail, we have a major manufacturing partnership we're working with, with other organizations, with their they're our biggest employer, and they've been really the kindest and most open and, you know, organization as it relates to CNC and robotics training and positions within their organization. But but, you know, we have, we've learned through trial and error that this is our sweet spot, some of these mid size or smaller, local organizations, because, you know, we try to keep this simple, we have a, you know, three page four page with signature page contract that we work with organizations, and we've had major employers come back at us with a 30 page document, you know, in response to what we've proposed, and we're like, No, thank you, we can't afford to jump through all of these hoops to get you in. And at the end of the day, that speaks to us, these people aren't really in it for the person, they're in it just to fill the roles and, you know, they got to have every eye you know, dotted and T crossed and it at the end of the day isn't worth it. Now, as we're getting more and more success stories, as we're getting more and more people to see the the validated program that we have, you know, we are looking at 2022 a pilot program here in Wisconsin, potentially, with Koch Industries, and you know, a few of their facilities and different a few of their different facilities and businesses in Wisconsin and looking to see how that that goes. But really, you know, we find that the relationships, you know, speaking directly with an owner or a partner, you know, within an organization really allows us to really have a really strong connection with that organization. And that's been working best. But but we'll see, we'll see what some of these larger organizations will bring to the table in 2022. Yeah.
Leighann Lovely 25:13 Now, if an organization wanted to reach out to you, they wanted to work with you, how would they go about doing that?
Eli Rivera 25:19 Yeah, well, they can go to our website, which is TWOUT.org. So twout.org, and they can drop us an email there. And, you know, we'll respond directly to them, they can certainly, you know, email Ruben and I directly through our LinkedIn profiles. Otherwise, you know, the best way is definitely that twout.org TWOUT.org. And, and then we can kind of take it from there, believe me, you know, we do our own vetting, we want to make sure that the employers are truly committed to Second Chance hiring and all of the, you know, all of the considerations that that in knowledge, one should have this, they're going to go down that road. And so, yeah, that's, that's really the first step for us.
Leighann Lovely 26:10 Right? No, that's important. Yeah, you don't want an employer to just be using you as a government tax write off. So now, if individuals wanted to find you, they were interested in utilizing this app? How are they going to find you? Is it the same way? How are you reaching these individuals to let them know that you're here that you're here to help them?
Ruben Gaona 26:30 Yes, the same way, you know, an individual report allows often we reach individuals by word of mouth, you know, no, I've already told them that, that we tell someone that they will have one of their friends, often we are reaching out to reach nachos, because of reentry service providers, you know, that they're working with, and they connect them with us, they'll might see us on Facebook, on LinkedIn. So opt in is just, you know, it's as simple as going to our website, like Ellie said, and shooting an email, or often getting a Facebook message and a you know, so it's real simple to connect with her.
Leighann Lovely 27:05 Yeah. And I encourage any listeners to check out your website, some great success stories on there. Definitely worth checking out. If you're interested in learning more about The Way Out. It's, you guys are great. You're amazing. Okay, I have one final question of the season that I'm asking everybody this season, if you could pinpoint a time period in your career, or life that made a huge difference in your life or career path? When would that be and why? Eli, why don't you go first?
Eli Rivera 27:35 Oh, wow. Um, as it relates to, you know, why we're here today, speaking in regards to the way out, I would say it was really there two moments, but the first moment being that first opportunity that I was given by this local restaurant group upon, you know, after having been convicted and done my time and decided to kind of go another route and just go work for an organization, I literally applied for a dishwashing position, it was at the, you know, after I had first come out, I jumped into another venture with my then wife, it ended up in divorce. I was like in this like terrible headspace, and just wanted to work in a restaurant and do dishes. That's all I wanted to do. And I went and I applied at this local restaurant group, and the director of operations at the time, had looked at my resume, and said, Are you crazy, like, there's no way I'm going to put you in the kitchen, washing dishes, like, I need you, I understand, you know, your past experience and all of that, that you know, the history of incarceration, but you're a leader, you're going to, you know, I need you to go into management with this organization. And then lo and behold, spent over a decade with this organization to travel all over the world. I mean, it was just just a mind blowing experience to have someone validate me at my lowest point. And so, you know, that was really a big turning point, to be accepted into that space and be given the opportunity to bring other people on board with this organization. And then the other piece that really tied all this together, as I mentioned was, you know, when my wife started asking me to speak about my upbringing, and my subsequent incarceration, and all of that at her for her classes, that's really tied in like, this is how I want to give back in this space. And so those are really the turning points that have put me hear before you and with Ruben, as it relates to my turning points.
Leighann Lovely 29:54 You know, it's funny, even sometimes when we don't know that we need help or We don't know, you know that we want help sometimes when we want to hide as a dishwasher and just want to go to work, it's usually that and that's the the shining star or the mentor or the whomever comes out of the woodwork and kind of just lifts us up at that moment when you most need it and, and tells you exactly what you need to hear or does exactly what you need them to do to either set you straight or to put you, you know, point you in the right direction. You know, that's, that's an awesome story. Thank you for sharing that. It's I'm always, you know, so excited to hear these, these stories, because they're, they're always filled with such interesting turns and twists of positive energy that that comes out of sometimes tragedy, divorce or, but thank you, Ruben, why don't you?
Ruben Gaona 30:56 You know, I've often say, you know, my turning a big turning point in life was in 2015, I'd already been five years into my incarceration. And one day I was walking, you know, out in the yard, or in, we call it the rec outside the yard. And I had a friend of mine just put me to the side and he called me like, everybody, let me talk to you. And I say, yeah, so we went, we started talking and, and he asked me one simple question. It was like, What do you have to show for? Like, you were just big drug dealer. But what do you have to show for? Like, how many businesses do you own? How many properties houses? And my response was, I have nothing to show for. I've never ran a business. I never own my business. I never even know my own house. Of like, like, yeah, like, they don't have nothing. And on top of that, they took everything that I had, the cards that I had, that you get, they got confiscated, like I was left with nothing. And, and he he looked at me like I just don't understand it. Like you're so smart. Like you're a veteran, you have a college, college behind you. He's like, I have a ninth grade education level, I dropped out of high school when I was going to 10th grade, like, but I run a million dollar manufacturing company. I was like, like, I don't understand how a guy's tools work. And you're smarter than me, doesn't have nothing to show for it. Your friends. A lot of a lot of them are here because they entry legally into this country. They're getting deported. But they have houses, they have restaurants, but you don't have anything to show for. And that right there. I think later on that night was the first time I actually cry while I was in prison. I went and I was laying in my bunk and tears just start rolling on my eyes. Because it was like, why am I here? Like, I didn't get raised like this. And I asked myself, like, why don't why? Why? You know, and that. And I just came to the conclusion that, you know, all my life, I was told I couldn't do stuff. Because I grew up, I grew up with a single mom had we had, she had five kids, my older brother was mentally handicapped, grew up in the ghetto, and the worst neighborhood and no Pelto, Texas, we barely often had food to eat, but there was always love. But so but I was I was told I couldn't do something. So I told myself that I will never again, allow anyone to tell me that I couldn't do something. And that's when I wrote like my first chord that to remind me that I can decide is this, it is an excuse, we challenged ourselves to not reach our true potential. There's nothing you know, it might take me longer to get somewhere because maybe I might not learn as quick. But I'll eventually get there. If doing the right things I will get there. And and that was the first major turning point in my life when I said, you know, I wrote down that code. And I said, You know what, I want to be a case manager. When I get out. I want to show people that our mistakes do not define who we are. But what we do after them, I want to show them that, you know, this is not us, there's more choice. And we still give more. And the second than me to get involved more was in 2008, by law, had been working with the state for about 11 months, as an Employment Training Specialist as the dean in the Wisconsin reentry pipeline program. And I remember, I had a friend that was having a panel discussion board of the entry into the workforce. So she was like, You know what, Rubin I would love for you to come and speak, you know, to justice involved. Individuals are what it is, how do we enter back into the workforce? You've been told assessable you've been on for three years, you have a job already. And I remember asking my supervisor if I could, if I could do the panel discussion. Like, hey, I want to know, you know, they asked me what I would be able to do right for me to go because I was an employee, I had to request permission. And he was like, Ruben, like, I don't think Madison my approve of this, you know, because of the organization that's doing the panel discussion board is not a like organization. So I was like, What have politics got to do with us helping people and he was like Ruben, but you know, at the state employee, really that's what it is. And it's like So there's certain things that you can and can't do. And I was like, You know what? I looked at him. And I said, well, then if that's the case, like, if I was like, if I can help people, and that's what I want to do, like, and when I feel that my values are being compromised, here's my 45 day notice. And he looked at me like, are you joking? I was like, no, like, I'm giving you a 45 day notice, like, and he was like, what are you gonna do, I just had a baby, he's like, group and you just had a baby in insurance, like, I was like, You know what, I'll figure it out, I was like, I'll open my own company, like, I'm gonna take a leap of faith and get involved. And, like, I don't want no restrictions, I don't want anyone to telling me that I cannot help justice evolve individuals, and I'm not able to provide them the tools so they can be successful. So he's like, Well, if you want to make it official, send me an email, like authentic to you right away when to my death, and send him a 45 day notice. So
Leighann Lovely 35:56 That's, that's amazing. You have to, you know, your those light bulb moments where you kind of you sit back and you go, Oh, my gosh, you know, and I've, I've had those in my life where I, you know, you sit back and you just you, it hits you like a ton of bricks, those realizations of, what am I doing, you know, I can do better, I can be better, I can help people. And, you know, in my, in my, in my life, I you know, I have an HR background, I got my degree in HR, because I wanted to help people corporate HR, not ripping on them. But they're governed by laws, you can't necessarily go and become friends with all the employees at the company, you may have to fire them one day, which is why I do what I do now. Because I want the ability to help people and ruin you, you definitely, you know, have those aha moments, and you did something that so many people are incapable or not capable of doing because of fear. And I applaud you for that. I am not going to say I encourage it, otherwise, you're going to have a whole bunch of people running around. But you, you you were the brave one, you know, I'm I'm a little bit risk, you know, adverse. I grew up with, you know, very risk adverse, you know, family, but that that's, that's awesome. It's absolutely amazing, you know, to be able to, on the drop of a hat, decide that I want to do better and do better. And you have, so I applaud you. Yeah, I applaud you. I applaud you both. And I thank you both for taking the time out of your busy schedules to come here and talk with me and tell me about about yourselves about the way out and I really appreciate it. So
Ruben Gaona 37:45 Thank you. We appreciate it, too.
Eli Rivera 37:47 Yeah, Thank you for the opportunity. Really appreciate it.
Leighann Lovely 37:51 Yes. And you. You both have a wonderful day. And yeah, take care.
Eli Rivera 37:58 You too. Thank you, bye bye
Leighann Lovely 38:00 Thank you again for listening to Let's Talk HR. I appreciate your time and support without you the audience this would not be possible. So don't forget that if you enjoyed this episode, to follow us, like us or share us. Have a wonderful day.
Eli Rivera - linkedin.com/in/elirivera
Ruben Gaona - linkedin.com/in/rubengaona
Website - https://www.twout.org/
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Music by Cruen - Family Time
Wednesday Jan 12, 2022
Wednesday Jan 12, 2022
Wouldn't it be nice if we all had jobs that were driven by a deeper passion from within? Today I talk with an amazing person that inspires me to do better and be better, simply because I can feel the passion that he has for the work he does without compromise to his personal life, AJ Kruse, The Concept Illustrator at humanworks.
Leighann Lovely 0:15 Let's Talk HR is a place for HR professionals, business owners and employees to come together and share experiences, to talk about what's working and what's not. How we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train and retain all generations of workers. We all know that there has been a huge shift in what people want, generations are coming together, more than ever, on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about how the economy has been impacted, and what needs to happen to find a balance. I'm your host, Leighann. Lovely. So let's get this conversation started. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, follow us like us and share us.
Leighann Lovely 1:05 I am so excited to have you here with me today. AJ, why don't you tell me a little bit about your background, you know, personally and with humanworks?
AJ Kruse 1:17 Sure. Well, I'm really excited and grateful to be here talking with Leighann I really appreciated getting to know you just a little bit since we've met but my background, I always tell people, when it comes right down to it, I'm just I'm a teacher. I'm an educator, that's really kind of where I come from, in a way. It's where I've been sort of professionally since I got started. So my career started in the classroom with kids. So that's proof of being an educator right there a little bit. And I grew up around it. My mom was a teacher, my dad, my dad is a teacher. Now he's sort of teaching, you know what he did for his life. So I grew up and I've continued to sort of grow up around education. And that's what I've gotten to do started in the classroom with kids. But then I sort of made this jumper transition, I got involved with some teacher training, helping some other teachers be better teachers. And I got really excited and interested in working with grownups, I guess. So I made that jump over into the corporate world and corporate training. That was the path that I took into being a teacher not just for students in a classroom, but for grownups at work, and then human works happens. So that was a really exciting evolution in my career.
Leighann Lovely 2:29 AJ Kruse is The Concept Illustrator at humanworks. AJ needs to make things make sense not only for himself but for you as well. This quality along with his knack for joining backstage design and front stage presentation has guided him through his dynamic professional career that began in elementary education and has continued in organizational development. After making the leap to corporate education. He led Learning and Development at two Milwaukee area businesses before embarking with three remarkable colleagues to launch humanworks, what else makes AJ tick, Faith family and Friday night pizzas. humanworks is a Milwaukee based consultancy, that elevates organizations through a people-focused lens, crafting custom-tailored solutions around core values and people touchpoints strategic planning and leadership development,
AJ Kruse 3:25 I think human works really started with a lot of success that happened at a company that I was working with. So 25 years of success working with people at the company that I was working for, in Milwaukee, really all began with the founder of humanwork, who led human resources there for about 25 years, slowly but surely, he built a team and built-in people practices into that business with that team that helped that company be really, really successful. So when I tell people, humanworks really came from success, you know, I don't know, if every company starts that way. Sometimes I think companies might start because something isn't working or something's broken, and they want to make it better. Well, humanworks really came from a collection of learning a lot of really excellent approaches to what you know, what people need at work. And those approaches were so helpful are so successful, that company positioned really well and was was merged and purchased. And after that, the question became sort of a now what for Shawn, who leads our team? And then for a handful of us who are looking in the future sort of going, I'm not sure now what Shawn sort of said, I want to go over here and keep doing what we've been doing with people and invited a handful of us to go with them. So that's sort of where humanworks came from. In a nutshell.
Leighann Lovely 4:39 Wow. And in humanwork started, right before the pandemic, correct?
AJ Kruse 4:45 We did, yes, in October, officially October of 2019. So that's where human works began. And let me tell you a lot changed since October of 2019. Right? As we all know, right. So It's kind of a, it's kind of incredible timing, if you really think about it, at least to me, the timing is kind of incredible, because I feel like everything that happens since October 2019, in the last two years, for me personally, it feels like everything that's taken place has accelerated or sped up some things. So I don't care what it could be work, you know, the working from home and working remotely and, you know, flexibility that sped up pretty dramatically. So I don't know, if two years ago, I could have pictured, you know, working and doing almost everything I'm doing from home. But I, I can now of course. But the other thing that got sped up so quickly, to me, was this kind of focus that I'm seeing from business leaders and companies that we work with this focus on people in their relationship to work to me the thinking around that, the attention on it, that all got accelerated and sped up, you know, tenfold I think we were started, we were sort of starting down that path. There was a conversation going, but it really it really, I mean, it accelerated so quickly over the last two years, that everybody reevaluating so much about that relationship that they have with work, right, I mean, but employers in that spot to go, oh, my gosh, we have to be part of that conversation, too. We have, we have to really look at our relationship with the people that we employ and their relationship with work. So that's I guess why I would say timings kind of been incredible, in a way, because that's what human works is so focused on is the relationship that people have to work.
Leighann Lovely 6:28 Wow, right before the pandemic, you come out with a business who is that is focused on the people. And all of the sudden there is a massive shift in the world of people focusing on what do I want to do? How do I want to how do I want to work? How do I What is my relationship with my employer, my job really my life? So you talked a little bit about the concept of this coming from success of doing this with businesses already. So the the founder, invited your your team in and explained to me how each one of you kind of fit into the different roles at your at your company? Yeah, absolutely.
AJ Kruse 7:10 So you know what, like I said, we were all part of the same team once internally, you know, at a business in the Milwaukee area that was enjoying, when I say enjoying a lot of success, how do you quantify that the business was doing really, really well. And, and, you know, that's what position did so well for its its merger and acquisition. The people at the business were doing well, and the culture was really doing well. There were workplace awards, you know, top workplace, etc. So there was some good unquantifiable things that I feel like can say, Yeah, we were in a really good position and spot there, I don't think those things would have come together the way they did. If the team that I'm still working with now hadn't have cut wouldn't have come together the way that we did. So the way that you know, the way that we all came together, I sort of think of it as putting together a team of the right abilities, the right strengths, the right needs that way. So there are four of us who make up human works. Founder, Shawn, his role is the thought catalyst for humanworks. But what Shawn really does so so well is is really challenges the, you know, the thinking the actions of people around him gets people thinking differently, that among all of his other many strengths, that's really what Shawn did so well for the company. And he really did a fantastic job of bringing in the right people. So the other people on my team, Rebecca, and Sarah, each bring their own sort of unique strength of their own set of skills to what we do, Rebecca really, really is fantastic at finding the right people. And putting those right people together, her sort of groundwork strength is that subject matter expertise, if you will, is around talent acquisition there, his background, is really more in sort of that marketing communication sort of round. So that's what Sarah did for the team there. And that's what Sarah does. Now, for human works. It's kind of funny, all four of us, we really, were really quite different. And none of us has a traditional human resources background, yet, we all came together and sort of had the same beliefs and focus around people. And that's what really helped sort of those strengths come together to build the team that we have.
Leighann Lovely 9:10 Right? You all complement each other and maybe build each other up in your own strengths.
AJ Kruse 9:15 Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And that's sort of the I mean, that sort of goes to one of the beliefs we have just around teams in general is that you don't want carbon copies of it. You need those different strengths, different perspectives, different abilities sort of come together. And that's definitely what we have with human works big time.
Leighann Lovely 9:30 Well, that's excellent. So tell me a little bit about some of the challenges or the things that you work with when it comes to the clients and the companies that you that call you for assistance,
AJ Kruse 9:43 for sure. So um, I think when people when people connect with human works, or when people are reaching out for support there, there's a there's a handful of things that they're really looking for some of the people who reach out. They're really motivated to breathe life into their culture. That's what they're looking to do. So they're looking at the culture They're saying it feels there's a field here that we're missing something. That's one thing that sometimes people reach out looking to human works for support with how do we do that? Well, something else that I think leaders reach out to humanworks for is, I think sometimes they're, they're saying, you know, I know that we need to get everyone in this business, rowing in the same direction, we really need to get some alignment and some clarity around, you know, not just our purpose, not just why we're here. But what we're here to do and how we're going to do that. What's the plan? What are the, you know, not just what the goal is, but how are we going to execute that goal. So they're, they're trying to get their arms around everything. They know that that's not helping, as well as maybe it should be more visibility, just across all the teams departments here in the company, sort of like strategic planning and finding our way kind of thing. I also think people reach out to human work, sometimes when they've pinpointed something or they've identified something that it connects directly to their people directly to their workforce somehow or their employees, and they're saying, this piece just needs to be better. So to us, we call those human touchpoints, a human touchpoint could be a good example of that might be performance management and new engagement get started that a couple of weeks ago around performance management sort of tis the season, so sort of an end of the year, a burst of energy for that company, but they were looking at how they did that human touchpoint how they did performance measurement, they said, This just needs to be better to last thing, I think people really people being companies, the last thing I think companies really think about or reach out to human works for is they're looking to elevate or strengthen their leaders. So they sort of have this understanding that, you know, that's where the rubber hits the road. It's the people leaders in this business that make all these things possible as far as what we have to accomplish hitting our goals reaching our customers. So they're looking to strengthen or provide something to those people, leaders are the leaders within their organization, they're looking to strengthen, build them up, give them confidence somehow. So they're looking for some leadership development, or help creating a leadership model for their business. Those are the sorts of things that we get connected with business leaders about
Leighann Lovely 12:06 Leaders are typically company when they're looking to strengthen or they're looking to up their game, they're they're going to look at the leaders ultimately, because pour or lack of leadership, ultimately, you can usually pinpoint that if they're lacking in something, yeah,
AJ Kruse 12:24 it's sometimes I think of it sort of like an hourglass, I just feel like people leaders are sort of at that bottleneck, or that middle point of the hourglass where they have the pressure and expectations of you know, a senior leadership team who, you know, they've set a vision, they've set a goal, they've set a path, and they said, This is what we have to accomplish, we're counting on you to do it. And then on the other end of that hourglass, the other side of that there's their team, their team who has all kinds of unique individual needs, strengths, goals, aspirations, who are showing up to work every day saying, you know, hey, I'm giving, giving my time, my energy to what you're trying to accomplish here. I'm trying to get it done for you. But you know, I need something back from you, I need some direction leader, I need some clarity leader. So I feel like the people leaders, sometimes people even call that middle management, but I feel like those people are sort of at that center point of the hourglass, they get a lot of attention and for good reason. Because they really are sort of to me where the rubber hits the road for so much of what happens in a business, that's where it's at. So humanworks definitely, definitely has a focus there around, you know, what is the model of leaders for leadership, you know, at a given business, how it how does that play out? And how do you teach it and reinforce it with your leadership team?
Leighann Lovely 13:42 Right? And, and has there been bigger challenges or different challenges, because of what has transpired with the pandemic, and, you know, over the last 20 months, and I kinda feel like it should be like, 22 months now, that number just keeps increasing, you know, obviously, as we're, we're moving forward, and I wish there was an end in sight, but we continue to see different challenges. You know, as months go by, fortunately, we are starting to finally catch on to new ways of communication. We're getting better at it. But what I've been some of those, you know, shifts and challenges, what have been some of the positives that have come out of, I don't know, Zoom calls or the different ways that we've kind of pivoted in order to continue to be productive and do business.
AJ Kruse 14:33 Yeah, I think the quick I mean, the two quick things that come to my mind, as far as you know, challenges and positive certainly challenges right now. There's a lot of conversation going on around keeping people. The great resignation is maybe a term we're all tired of hearing about and maybe it'll phase out but it's keeping people in to me, a couple things come in with that. For sure. Keeping people kind of boils down to what are we doing the right thing for people? Are we doing the right things for Are employees? Are we making this a place they want to be? Because when I, when I look at the whole great resignation, when I think about that big picture of that, to me, it sort of boils down to this crisis of values sort of that at least the way I look at, it comes down to a crisis of values. So from, from a human perspective, from an individual perspective, I think, the last 2020 months, whatever, 20 months, 24 months, whatever it's been, that's sort of shaken people down to their core. And I focus on that word core a little bit on purpose, because when you get shaken down to your core, you circle back to your core. And that's where your core values are, it's what's most important to me. And as people have gotten shaken, they've looked around, they've said, Okay, what is it that I really value? What are my core values? And do they line up with the actions that I'm taking with the routines that I'm committed to with the sort of with with this path that I'm on? And if they, if they found a no there, when they asked that question, they started looking at it a lot more carefully, and saying, Well, what am I going to change? What has to change about this routine, this path of these actions that I've committed to? So they're looking around and they're saying, If my employer really doesn't carry or live or hold the values that I hold, dear? Why would I keep doing that? So that's sort of the way that I look at the great resignation, I heard an interesting perspective yesterday listening to someone speak and they were sort of saying maybe this great resignations, a good thing, maybe the shakeups a good thing, because it's gonna, it's gonna force some hands so that they're back to that idea of accelerating things. It's gonna force employers to care a little bit more about asking that question. What do we need to be doing for our people? And when I think about that question, the answers to me, they're kind of clear. You know, they're there probably a lot of ways to answer that question. But the kinds of things that I focus on would be what do people need? Well, you need to give employers that is you need to give people consistency, you need to be who your values say you are, that word consistency goes a long way for me. So it's, you know, it's not just about being who your values say you are as a company, that has to be evident, lived and experienced in the employee experience, for sure. But, you know, there's more to that consistency word. That means giving people a way of working that works, you know, being clear about this is how things are done here at our business. This is how we set goals. This is how your daily work attaches to those goals that connects and fulfills those goals. You know, so there's a lot behind that consistency work. But I think people need that. I also think people need challenges and opportunity. So they're, to go back to those goals, they need to be challenged, they need to have the opportunity to take on something that's a little bit bigger than what they've taken on before. They need leaders who care about them. And they need to free the freedom to use their strengths, their strengths and their abilities. Those are the kinds of things that people need. And if if employers are asking that question and sort of saying, what do we need to be doing for people? That's a challenge that they're faced with right now. I hope they are looking at that question more deeply. I hope they are sort of challenging that selves to look at the way they've answered that question in the past, and maybe find a better way to answer it in the future, if they don't feel confident that they're doing that well for their people, or if they're struggling with keeping, you know, the people that they want to keep at their business that they need to fulfill what their business is there to do. You also asked about positives, I think that you
Leighann Lovely 18:19 hold on, before you get into positive this is how much of a geek I am. You just, I got goosebumps, because I am 100%, Everything that you just said 100% on board. I know you said somebody had mentioned that maybe this was a good thing. I don't necessarily think you know, oh, going through a pandemic and everything is a good thing. But maybe it is a good thing for employers to finally have to look and see. You know, and realize, like we need to treat people like people reevaluate what you're doing, and how you're treating these people. I you know, this is everything that I've been, you know, saying and everything that I've been the people that I talked to, again, you know, this is going back to the, you know, my core values, the things that I truly believe and, and you know, I could talk about this for the next three hours, you'd probably be like, okay, Leighann, let me can I get back to my life?
AJ Kruse 19:12 I wouldn't go with you on that journey. Right.
Leighann Lovely 19:16 But you know, so I just I wanted to intervene and just say like, I mean, that is, that is 100% awesome. I and this really comes down to you know, the whole health and wellness piece of you know, what I am all about, of, you know, you can't, and I'm going to everybody who's going to be listening to me, they're going to hear this a million times you can't leave your emotional baggage at the door when you walk into work. If you're truly you're a human person. You walk into work, you're human and you're gonna bring your real self there and employers have to accept it. We this is no longer in the you know, the the 60s the 70s. When you drop your bag at the door come in Then you become a worker bee. And it's all 100% business. No, I'm sorry, life happens. And it's messy. So
AJ Kruse 20:07 Yeah, I completely agree. I'm going to stay on that with you though, because, you know, I talked a little bit about human works being, you know, being the result of 25 years of successful sort of ideas being put together with how to, you know, how to create an environment for people at work. And I don't know if I did. I don't know if I did true justice to really all the, you know, all the thinking that was behind sort of the start of what we did, or what we're doing with humanworks and what we're we're working to build. You reminded me of taglines something that we were saying to each other when we were drawing up the foundational beliefs of humanworks. And the thing we said back and forth to each other a lot is working life aren't mutually exclusive. So everything you just said, There, that's something that we were saying to each other, it turned into a tagline for us Leanna turned into work brought to life brought to work that's sort of the tagline that that got attached to him and works. But the thinking that came behind that it really went back to, there are 7.7 Give or take billion people in the world. That's a lot of people. And here's sort of the amazing thing. All 7.7 billion people share eight things, at least, that's what we believe we're all completely different. We're all completely unique. We all have different needs, the list goes on and on and on. But at the same time, when we're talking about what people need, at work. And in life, it's it's not different between in work and in life, but what people need, we found these eight things that sort of unite all people. So eight things can sort of bringing everybody together, these eight things that we all share. And those are really where we were we start with everything that we do with a business or everything that we do with a leader or with a team within a business, from a service and from a work perspective. We start our thinking there. What are those eight things? Well, I'll share him cricket. That's okay. Yeah, um, the eight things that we believe, you know, these, these are amazing qualities that unite all people. Everyone's unique, it starts there, I know I said 7.7 billion people, we're all different. But everyone's truly unique. That means we each have a uniquely different, you know, grouping of strengths, abilities, drivers, you get the idea, each one of us is truly unique. Everyone is unique and needs to be treated that way. Everyone believes to us all around the values that we just talked about the vision that you know, that each of us has, but that organizations have when they connect to people. So everyone's unique. And everyone believes that the first two after that everyone connects, which is about relationships, relationships, and teamwork, everyone contributes, which is about our ability to question challenge and communicate with each other. Everyone rises, which is really about leadership and the systems that we create, to empower people and leaders that everyone learns, which of course is about growth, everyone thrives, it's about well being which you just brought up. And then everyone matters, which is really about the belonging that I think we're sort of leaving, our conversation is sort of leading us there a little bit. It's that idea that you said don't drop your bags at the door and become a different human being when you walk through the doors at work, because you can't, No you won't. There might be things you want to keep private I, I totally get that there are things about your life, you might not want to bring into every conversation, you, we all get that. But your strengths are going to change your needs are going to change who you are isn't going to change when you walk through. It is about bringing work to life and life to work by expecting people to be human by expecting leaders to lead that way and help leaders understand how to do that. So that's that last piece everyone matters is really about creating belonging, and within the teams regardless of our differences, regardless of our uniqueness, creating belonging within teams, so that we, we can, when we're at work, we can get together and we can accomplish everything together better. That's really what it's about.
Leighann Lovely 24:04 Right? And that's, I agree with everything that you said it we have to be it is it is far too much work. And it's far too exhausting to create two personalities to be one person at home, and one person at work. It's exhausting, that plain and simple. I cannot go to work and pretend that I don't have a life, that I don't have a child at home that I don't have a husband that you know, at home, and I'm sorry, but I am who I am. And I'm going to be my authentic self wherever I am. And you know what? When I finally decided that I wasn't going to play a role at work anymore. And I was going to be myself people liked me to help you know a hell of a lot more. Because it was just it was so much easier. It was so much easier to break down that wall and just say enough is enough. And I think that the world is finally ready for that they're finally Ready for people just to just be themselves. And the only reason I tried to put up that wall was because for so long I lived under that shame of people are going to find out that I have bipolar disorder, people are going to find out that I, you know, suffer from a mental health, and I'm not going to be able to work here anymore. But you know, enough is enough. And yeah,
AJ Kruse 25:23 Yeah, well, you know, it's funny, what I heard you say just now was the difference between you trying to sort of take that piece of your life and quiet it down or park it somewhere else at the door, or leave it in the car in the parking lot? And the difference that happened for you when you said, No, I'm, I've just got to be me. I just, I just need to be authentic to you. I need to, I need to walk through the door with everything I've got. And just be me and be open and honest about that. The difference I heard was the confidence to me, I'm guessing, and you can answer for sure and but to me, when you started sort of being who all of you at work. I'm guessing you've got more, you are more confident. I'm also guessing your work, you got better results. I'm guessing you did better work than I'm guessing that you I don't know. You tell me what do you think?
Leighann Lovely 26:12 Absolutely. Because I removed the fear. I removed that fear of people aren't going to like me, because they know this piece about me. And once you remove that fear that that shame or whatever it is, that you're holding back because of and there's always a reason. There's it even if you don't understand what that reason is, you're holding something back and people, people know it. And I removed that fear of people aren't going to like me if they know this, and don't get me wrong, I wasn't running through the hall screaming I have bipolar disorder. I just know. Right? No, I just I just, you know, instead of, you know, trying to dumb down the, you know, the parts of me that I thought people aren't going to accept this, you know, I just, I just stopped I just started, you know, what, I'm just going to be myself. And by removing that fear that people weren't going to like me, I became more myself than I've ever been in my life. And that confidence came out, removing that fear, you know, allowed me to be more productive. It allowed me to talk to people more authentically, it allowed them to see who my true self was, and that personality that I truly have was, and when I saw that happening, I went wow, I don't have to live under that, that cloud of shame for who I am. And that's what it's all about. And, and again, now I'm taking over here, this is not about me. But, and I love that you know you that you're an advocate for this in, in so many ways, and what you do in your business is training people on these things and talking with, you know, business leaders, you know, about how to learn and, but it's this is a self discovery thing that people have to, you know, they, they have to discover this on their own or working with somebody.
AJ Kruse 28:14 And sometimes they need some permission. Leighann, I think to your point there I you know, I, I appreciate your story so much, you know, I because I think especially when it comes to challenges that come with, you know, mental health, those are, those are the challenges you can't see, you know, it's, it's one thing to say, Well, I was walking into the building at work, and I noticed someone coming who, you know, had a physical handicap was in a wheelchair, you know, maybe had a very visible challenge, right. And, you know, it was my opportunity to hold the door to offer support, that sometimes people people have a challenge that's really clear, it's really evident, it can be seen, mental health challenges aren't aren't and, and they aren't things you can see they, they aren't things anyone would otherwise know. They might know your they could they may have known your land, you might have had co-workers that knew you were struggling to a certain degree before you made that, you know, shared or known, and they could see something was wrong or challenging you to get up but maybe they were afraid to ask maybe they weren't sure what to do. So you know, they gave a little space or something like that. What I think it really comes down to for employees is working within an environment within a team to go back to those eight things where everyone does matter and and they know that there's some belonging there it's safe to share where that challenge is coming from. They're supported and sharing that and and that helps them get at their best work. It helps when you go back to that idea of competence and you getting to your best work. It can help them get their best work by being who they are at work being open about you know, what they choose to share and being an environment where they feel supported. They know their leader welcomes that wants to hear about their life wants to know how they're doing cares about them. Right and wants to find ways to support them in doing their work. So I've had the privilege to sit in a lot of strategic planning meetings, that's something that, you know, human works, does as a service, you know, we're there, sometimes with leadership teams at those at those points in the year where they're sitting down with a senior leadership team putting heads together and saying, Alright, how are we going to execute the vision, you know, this quarter this year, they're having those important conversations. It's something that it's sort of a privilege to be part of those conversations fun. It's always exciting. It's always entertaining. It's always fun to challenge those groups. And, you know, more and more and more people make the list. Isn't that exciting. So, you know, to rewind the clock back to, you know, talking about the challenges that companies are facing, but even talking about some of the positives that are coming from the challenge of the last, you know, give or take 20 months, people are making the list more and more and more in those strategic planning conversations, that tells me, more and more senior leaders are saying, I can't ignore this. You know, I often tell people this, I often say most reasonable people, if you start talking about employees and work and some of the things that you and I are having an exchange about right now, the most reasonable people, when you say, you know, doesn't it really all come down to people, we're called human works as a business. So I feel like I can throw that out there doesn't really all come back to people. It doesn't all come down at the end of the day. Some people don't like that phrase, but at the end of the day, doesn't come down to people. Most everybody. In fact, I don't know, I don't know if I've ever met any leader who could honestly not say yes, I'm privileged to work with leaders who say yes to that question. But most people go, you know, yeah, but the difference there is not, there are very few leaders who are confident about how to answer the rest of the question, which is, well, well, then what? Well, so what? So if it all comes down to people? What are you going to do about it in your business? What are you going to do about it for your workforce? What are you going to do about your employee experience all the words that we attached to this, this thing we call life and work? You know, what are you going to do about it leader at work? If it really all does come down to people finding agreement on the answer to that question. That's where we don't get so much agreement, or that's where it's hard. That's where I'm not sure what the right answer is. What do you think? So that's where the door opens, fortunately, for for human works, or my team to have that conversation and to, and to share some of our beliefs about Well, here's, here's what you can think about. How do you do that at your company, based on who you are? And what you do? You know, what should you be doing? That I think, to me, is one of the greatest positives to go back to that silver lining of all the challenges we face in the last 20 months. There's the silver lining, it's that more and more senior leadership teams, more and more people are asking the question, what should I be doing for my people? Because, you know, you're right, it really does all come back to people. We have to let people bring work to life and like to work, we have to do those things. So so how do I answer that question, you know, helped me answer that question. And so that's a silver lining to me, what comes from that? Well, when an employer commits to that when it's on the strategic plan, when they've said yes to that, and it's they they've dedicated themselves to some actions that support that. That's where the confidence comes in. That's where that silver lining comes in. You know, we talked about your confidence, I was just talking with a leader just a couple of weeks ago, who had the she had the guts to say to the rest of the leadership team. I don't know about all of you. But I can tell I'm different as a leader, because I'm afraid of losing people. I'm not at all confident anymore. I'm scared to call out things that I don't like, because I don't want to upset or frustrate someone because they're gonna walk and I don't know how to replace them. I don't know if we can find somebody quick enough. And I and we need to keep the lights on the doors open. We need to keep this this this business running. That was a leader with very little confidence. Scared, you talked about fear, right? So what comes in when we start doing the right things with our team and our people? When we start answering that question, what do we need to be doing for people confidence comes back. Because what comes in behind that our actions around those core values we talked about, when a company starts being who they are, and being who they say they are and living their values. There's a lot of confidence that comes back when that happens when they've got a clear strategic plan. So clear. So communicated that the you know, the everyday entry level employee who walks to the door or signs on at home says I know how what I'm doing today. I know how that impacts the 10 year goal for my company, this big, huge, audacious vision of my company. I know how I add to that. I think I just think that's amazing. You know, I think confidence come comes back when there's a model for leadership when When when leaders leadership on the team says no, this is how we lead, this is how we hold accountable. This is how all the leaders that are business do that. And when there are talent practices, and when those human touch points of the business are really clearly defined, really supported, you know, talent practices that you know, that lean into individual strength and accountability. I think when those things are there, that leader who's at the table saying, I'm scared, I'm scared to lead. Their competence comes back. So I'm not scared to lead. I know what we're doing is right. I know, we are who we say we are. I know. I know. We've got the plan and the vision. I know how we lead.
Leighann Lovely 35:35 Yeah. Well, we are coming to our time. And I have one last question. I'm asking everybody this question this season. So if you could pinpoint a time period in your career that made a huge difference in your life or career path? When would that be and why?
AJ Kruse 35:55 The moment in my career that maybe made the biggest difference, I can kind of pinpoint a really interesting conversation. So I think I told you, I made the leap from elementary education, teaching schoolchildren into corporate development, corporate learning organizational development, it wasn't really a smooth transition, it's sort of have a couple of stops along the way, for a little while I was working in retail management. And Retail Management taught me a lot about people taught me a lot about managing and leading people. But what I was really hunting for what I was really searching for was something in corporate education, working in education with with, with a with a company, and, and I had an interview with the individual who would become my boss, the individual who become my leader, the individual who would invite me to join this new startup humanworks, that they were starting to be a key contributor there. So at the end of that interview, Sean asked me, this person said, what's something that I really ought to know about you? That I don't know? Yes. You know, tell me something that I really ought to know if I'm going to work with you. So I had to think for just a second. And you know, the answer that I gave this exchange that we had, it stands out as a pretty critical moment in my life, I had convinced myself walking through those doors, you know, I'm in a job now I can support my family, but it's not what I'm really looking for. So I'm just going to be 100%. Me, I'm going to be as honest as I possibly can be, even if I don't think that's the answer they want to hear. So bland back to what you were saying about just bringing your full self to wherever you are, I had I had promised myself, I would do that. So after a little bit of thought, I told them, Look, this job is never going to be the most important thing in my life. But I want to love it, I want to do great at it. And I want to be the absolute best I can be at it if you give me the opportunity. But you need to know, this job is never going to be the most important thing in my life. But I will give you everything I've got if you give me the shot. So that conversation, it ended well makes me It chokes me up just a little bit, because it was pretty pivotal. Because I think it was where that relationship really started the relationship. You know, what's resulted in a lot of learning, it's resulted in a lot of opportunity. But to your point, I would say to anybody who's struggling with maybe doing what you were talking about earlier, being who they really are at work sort of being open, being honest, being themselves. I think I would just say you're going to be really happy, if you do.
Leighann Lovely 38:39 That's amazing. So he accepted you. You were honest. And he hired you.
AJ Kruse 38:47 Yeah, um, and it wasn't, it wasn't. It wasn't a quick smooth hire I ran into, I had an injury that happened at my other job shortly after that interview. It took me a long time to recover. I had a lot of challenges following it is really an interesting part of life. And I know you might not have time for all of that, other than to say, you know, right after that interview, yeah, I had that injury at work. Something tripped me up. And and not only did they hire me, they waited six months to do it. So
Leighann Lovely 39:17 and you wrote an he wrote an article about this.
AJ Kruse 39:20 Yeah, I did. I did. And it's something that it's something obviously, kind of a kind of an important piece of life for me, right. So when you asked me what's something that made a huge difference is the first question that came to mind. But yeah, I did write an article about it. There was a you know, there was part of the injury. It was really physical. I was I was stopping a shoplifter and the shoplifter shot me so they pulled out a gun. They didn't want to stop that day. They shot me. I mean, thank goodness, I'm okay. I survived. You know that injury came with a lot of physical pain, a lot of physical challenges. It also came with a lot of emotional challenges. A lot of a lot of emotional Fallout and psychological challenges and PTSD. And working through that, that part was harder than the physical part. So, um, so yeah, the injury that took six months to, to get me ready to go even try going back to the work that happened the day after that interview that I mentioned. So, it when it comes to, you know, how employers look at people how they think about people, and, you know, getting the right person there for the right job and things like that, those moments were, you know, incredibly impactful in my, in my life, in my experience, my story, and reinforced so much of what we we talk about it human works, what we believe in it, human works, where all those beliefs came from. So I'm in a unique position right now, where I get to work with companies to instill the kind of values that made a very profound difference for me,
Leighann Lovely 41:01 That's awesome. And, you know, people like you and me, we're driven by something that has impacted our lives, which makes it that much more important and impactful in the way that we that we do things, and I applaud you for sharing that. And, you know, I will, I will put a link to your article. So if somebody is interested in reading more about that they can find that article.
AJ Kruse 41:31 Thanks. While I appreciate you taking on the story, receiving it from me, yeah, I it's, it's always kind of a wild, kind of a wild story to share, as I'm sure you've learned with your own personal story. But, um, like I said, the opportunity to the opportunity to instill the values, share the values and live the values that made a profound difference in my life. That's valuable, and sort of a cherished thing for me. So I would hope that everyone who hears this, everyone who who listens and gets connected to the kinds of things you're talking about, Leighann just sort of stays on the path of learning as much as they can about that. And has competence and a little bit of bravery. It takes I think, to to be who they are at work to live their own values and find find situations not only in their work life, but in their personal life that support the those values that they carry on hold. So dear.
Leighann Lovely 42:32 Well said, AJ, thank you so much for coming and talking with me today, today, and, you know, sharing your story and talking about human works. It's, it's been an amazing conversation. And thank you for being so authentic. And yeah, telling your story. So if somebody is wanting to reach out to you to learn more about humanworks, how would they go about doing that?
AJ Kruse 43:00 Oh, boy, So humanworks. We're on LinkedIn, you can go to humanworks8.com and learn a lot about us there. That's human works with the number eight.com otherwise, yeah, I just I invite people to connect directly with me on LinkedIn AJ Kruse K R U S E, look me up, find me connect with me. Or, you know, reach out by email and those are really easy to it's just A J at humanworks 8 .com
Leighann Lovely 43:30 Excellent. Thank you and you have a wonderful day.
AJ Kruse 43:34 Thanks, Leighann. Appreciate the opportunity.
Leighann Lovely 43:37 Thank you again for listening to Let's Talk HR. I appreciate your time and support without you the audience this would not be possible. So don't forget that if you enjoyed this episode, to follow us, like us or share us. Have a wonderful day.
AJ Kruse - LinkedIn - linkedin.com/in/aj-kruse
Humanworks website - https://humanworks8.com/
The article referenced in this conversation - Bursting Bubbles - Injuries, by AJ Kruse https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/bursting-bubbles-injuries-aj-kruse/
Music by Cruen - Family Time
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Wednesday Jan 05, 2022
Wednesday Jan 05, 2022
Join me and Robb Conlon as he takes the reigns to interview me about Let's Talk HR - Humanizing the Conversation.
Leighann Lovely 0:15 Let's talk HR is a place for HR professionals, business owners, and employees to come together and share experiences, to talk about what's working and what's not. How we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train and retain all generations of workers. We all know that there has been a huge shift in what people want. Generations are coming together more than ever, on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about how the economy has been impacted and what needs to happen to find a balance. I'm your host, Leighann Lovely. So let's get this conversation started. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, follow us like us and share us.
Leighann Lovely 1:04 Welcome to my first episode of Let's Talk HR humanizing the conversation. I am so excited to have a friend and a fellow podcast host helped me launch this episode as a co-host, Rob Conlon, whether he is recording audiobooks, advertisements, building and hiring for multimillion-dollar clients service departments, or creating Stevie's award-winning social media experience for millions of customers or producing one of the dozens of podcasts he's been involved in. Robb has been at the forefront of building great jobs for others for nearly 15 years, using his unique blend of sales, marketing hiring, know-how and radio voice, Robb is your guide to navigating the fires of recruiting hell, Robb lives with his wonderful wife and three sweet rabbits in beautiful Port Washington, Wisconsin. And I am just thrilled that I have him with me today to launch the new podcast that I'm thrilled to get started. So without further ado, welcome, Rob, I am so glad that you agreed to help me launch my podcast. And before you flip the script on me and kind of interview me, I would love to hear what's happening in your world, because I know that you've had some pretty amazing milestones over the last year, especially with your podcast, I'm excited to hear about it.
Robb Conlon 2:43 Thanks again, for having me here. It's always fun to launch a new show. And actually, I call shows like yours that I've either consulted on or been a part of the brainstorming session for or even helped to actually produce. I call them my podcasts, children in this case. And now, my show Recruiting Hell, I think he's got six kids now, which is wild. It's a pretty neat thing. So a lot of stuff has been going on in my world. Folks may not know, but I produce podcasts professionally. That is what pays my bills pays my mortgage, which is a fun thing. And we generally do that for Business to Business Show. So while we're not necessarily you know, into true crime or anything like that, my world revolves around podcasting from about 7:50 in the morning until well, depending on how late the night is five o'clock, today I'm recording this recording another one with another great podcast friend of mine at 7:30. So we'll probably go until about 9:00 so, 12-14 hours of podcasting.
Leighann Lovely 3:45 That's awesome. And you're, brilliant, not only at your own podcast but brilliant. I mean, you've been so helpful. You've given me such amazing advice through my journey, not only on sometimes hard advice of things that I'm like, Oh, wow, okay, I can do better. But you're you really you're a wealth of information. And it's amazing to have a friend like you. Let me just say that, but thank you. I mean that from the heart. So, you've had some major milestones, with Recruiting Hell, I mean, it's grown. Your audience has grown. Congratulations on that.
Robb Conlon 4:31 Yeah, thank you. Actually, I just got my Spotify rewind the other day. And when you think about it as a small creator, it's really tough to see, like low numbers sometimes. Like, Oh, I got four downloads a day, it's like, that's great. But it's also like four downloads. We're not all Joe Rogan. None of us are gonna be Joe Rogan, unless we're exceptionally lucky or exceptionally skilled. In that case, you got to kind of be the unicorn of that. But the thing about podcasting, the thing about making them is that it's not necessarily for mass consumption, you're not making the next Last Podcast On The Left for horror or true crime, you're not making my Favorite Murder, you're not making this American Life. Because those have that massive appeal, podcasting can niche down so much into people who are just looking for a job in that case with my show. And I think that for a show like yours, which is something of a cousin to mine, in this case, kind of the other side of the fence, if you will, from recruiting versus, being an actual HR professional and things like that. I think that even a small audience and a dedicated audience can be way better than a mass consumption audience. So that's something that, we look at creating inside of this space. And I think that's something that everybody should be proud of. I had in that rewind, they said, You're the top podcast that 15 People listened to this year, and I'm like, wow, like, okay, like, that's actually pretty cool. But there were also some other really neat numbers for me of like, you've been in 56 countries, you doubled your downloads, and all sorts of cool stuff. And that's been a lot of major milestones. I just ended what I call series three of the show, series, four is in production right now. And trying to level it up, every time has gotten progressively harder, which is a funny thing. But the nice thing about podcasting, and the cool thing that I think will work for your show, Leighann, is that taking the best from other shows in your genre, and leaving the things that they do, that you don't like behind is super helpful. So, I'm really excited to see where your show goes. And I'm excited to see how I can continue to give back to the world of, professional podcasting, whether it's in as a guest as a host as a producer, or even just as a resource for anybody out there and invited to be listening to this. Reach out to me on LinkedIn. Seriously, I love talking to people about this stuff, like 24/7. Robb Conlon - Linkedin Profilelinkedin.com/in/robbconlon86
Leighann Lovely 7:10 Yeah, you're a geek in your own way, just like I'm a geek in HR. Right. I suppose your passion comes across when you talk about it. And that's, I guess, hopefully, what's gonna happen when people listen to my podcast? And with that said, why don't you take the reins
Robb Conlon 7:31 Sure thing and you know, that's, you mentioned your podcast, and you previously had a podcast, that was really fun to be on. I was a guest on that as well. And you're starting a new one right now. Tell me a little bit about what happened. Why the change?
Leighann Lovely 7:47 Yeah, so I did, I had a podcast, I brought the idea to my previous company. And it was designed to reach out to individuals that were interested in knowing what was happening in the world of HR. I really enjoyed that. But I was tied to, and it was tied to the company that I was working for. And that being said, I was under the constraints of making sure that I was representing that company and the topics. So I decided on a personal level that I wanted to do more. And I wanted to be able to take my own spin on it. And bring in my own personality, to impact people in a way that brought in my flavor of what I'm trying to, you know, get out to the world. And that being said, I'm a huge supporter of mental health, if you are working in an organization that doesn't see eye to eye with you, and I'm not saying that my last organization didn't, I guess you're kind of under the constraints of making sure that you're not inappropriately represented them. And since this is now mine, I get to tell the world, my story, and I get to, interview people, and talk about whatever, interests me on a personal level. So I just feel like I can do so much more. I feel like I can talk about so much more, and really impact people on a different level. Because now I have the opportunity to talk about those things that are personal to me. And like I said, huge mental health supporter, I've experienced struggles with mental health on my own. And I want to be able to you talk about that on an HR level on a human level on how does that impact the workforce? You know, how does hiring a neurodiverse individual affect the workforce and why aren't we talking about that? Why aren't we talking about, so many other topics that I'm looking forward to, bringing forward as my first season rolls out?
Robb Conlon 9:57 That's outstanding, and I think cracking open some of the tougher eggs, if you will, there and having the freedom to do so without somebody may be putting on some handcuffs, if you will and say, Yeah, we don't want you to talk about that. Because it's either not germane to the business that you're working in or directly, you know, sometimes having that mental health episode doesn't drive revenue. And that's a business sense thing in some cases, and I hope nobody thinks that I'm a proponent of that. But I can see where somebody who is a bean counter, could very much be like, Well, that didn't interview like a prospect for us, or whatever it might be. So, right, I'm really glad that you.
Leighann Lovely 10:39 Go ahead. No, and as an owner of a company, I completely understand that how is this benefiting us? I do I totally, completely agree, you know, is having this conversation? Or is this going to turn off a small population of people who otherwise would have worked with us if you have this conversation? And again, I get it. But the way that I look at it is I am authentic, I am who I am. You can choose to work with me or not work with me. I guess I just want to be able to be my authentic self. And you can make your own decision, you know, on whether or not you want to talk with me, work with me, be friends with me
Robb Conlon 11:23 Well, you're wonderful to be friends with, anybody who doesn't want to be right has something wrong with them. But in this case, you know, it's kind of interesting that you talk about the, drive behind that, you know, I can create a control for a host and for creator, super important, especially when I see this in my job where marketing departments come in, and they put handcuffs on those hosts. And they say you're gonna talk about this, but people don't want to hear about them. Bill, people want to get, you know, get the host in there and, hear their perspective. Well, that doesn't line up with the company. So Right. There's a lot of butting heads. It's not just you know, this transition for Leighann. But it's also you know, it's widespread throughout the business world, I think it's a brilliant idea that you've taken this into your own arena. And you can hold court with it, which is just fabulous. So, again, looking forward so much to seeing how this goes. But there was one other thing that was I thought really interesting, that dovetails right into this, you made a job change not too long ago, what drove that decision? And how did you arrive at that?
Leighann Lovely 12:28 You know, this is obviously, we all know, an employee market. It's a candidate market. And I looked around at my family, at my life, and I thought, I'm not entirely happy. I'm not completely unhappy. But I'm not, I'm not going to work every day with this huge smile on my face. I know, there are a lot of people out there that do jobs, and they're not necessarily excited to get started. But in this market, you have the opportunity to change that, you have the opportunity to do something that you can get excited about. I had a conversation with one of my girlfriends the other day, and she says, Well, I'm just a server. And I said, No, no, you're not. You're not just anything in this world anymore. I think that the world has shined a light on the importance of every single job that exists from the servers, from the person who pushes the broom. Every position out there is vital. And we saw it when all of the sudden people are like, well, I want to go out to dinner. Well, there are no people to serve you. Those people are extremely important, because, hey, I enjoy being able to go out to dinner. And you know what, if there's nobody at those restaurants, I don't get that small, little pleasure that I normally am used to, I have 100 times more appreciation for those jobs. And all of a sudden it is a lot easier for me to go, No, we need to pay or give a much larger tip. Because they're busting their butts, they're showing up to work. And if you don't like what you're doing every day, why are you doing it, we now have the opportunity to change the narrative of what we are and how we live our lives because jobs are everywhere. So, getting back to your question, because I went on a rant. Why did I make that change? I wasn't entirely happy. So I started to look and in looking realized that I can also take control of a podcast. And there were just so many other opportunities. It's time for me to change my narrative. And when I started meeting with companies, I told them flat out. If you hire me on, I'm going to do a podcast. It's going to be mine. I'm going to own it and you're going to get the entire package. Not one company said, No, we don't want you to do that. They were all like, great, you want to have a side hustle, you want to go and have had a company said, No, we don't like that. I mean, it would have been hands down. No, I'm not interested, in working there. See you later, right companies now want the authentic people, they want people who are, you know, are passionate about other things or passionate about the job that they're coming in to do. I'm in the HR world, I joined a company Vaco (www.vaco.com) there, they're new to the Wisconsin market. They were looking to beef up their sales team on the staffing side that takes care of finance and accounting, and support staff and they needed a sales rep to you know, basically start-up that side of the business. And I went, Wow, this is a perfect opportunity for me to leave the general labor market, which is very rough right now. Yeah. I move into a position that I am very passionate about still in HR. And I jumped at it. And there were other companies that, you know, were pursuing me that I was very interested in. But I met my now manager, he was so like-minded with me that I think we talked about business for 10 minutes, we could probably talk for two hours about everything else. And that's the kind of company that's the kind of people that I want to work with. So it was hands down. I haven't been happier. I've been revitalized in my job. And I'm so excited. It's only been a couple of weeks. And I'm just so excited to take on the world again. Again, if there are people out there who are considering it, now is the time. Take a look around if you're not happy, now is the time. And I am, you know, with a staffing company, so please don't hesitate to reach out,
Robb Conlon 17:12 You're absolutely correct that it is it's an employee market right now. And in my lifetime, I've never seen that. I've never, ever seen that in my lifetime, it's always been that the companies hold most of the cards. And if you're an employee, you're lucky, maybe you do have a few cards to play. But it sounds likely that you took a number of those cards that you had in your hand and you really powered and leverage them into something that's a new opportunity for you and you even said yourself, you're revitalized, you're charged back up, you're something new, you're something different than what you were just a couple months ago at your old job. So in that style of difference, Leighann, your old show, HRables loved it. Thank you. What's different about Let's Talk HR?
Leighann Lovely 18:02 Yeah, Let's talk HR Humanizing the Conversation. It's not about talking to professionals and saying, Okay, what do you do? And what services do you provide? And how do you do it, it's about diving into, that deeper on, on a human level of, you know, from different angles. I'm not just talking to the HR professionals, I'm not just going to talk to the business owners, I'm also going to bring in the employees. And have them walk me through how did you make that decision? Why did you pass on a company and again, I don't want people to get the wrong impression. This is not going to be Oh, I passed on XYZ company because and bash, it's about education, of, hey, they were offering one week of vacation for the first year. And this company was a same offer but offered three weeks of vacation for the firm. It's about education, it's about the feeling that employees had when they interviewed, it's about, you know, what this business owner is doing that has made them successful, and, how, you know, they've leveled up or pivoted to the world that we're living in now. It's not just simply the technical side of what we do, it has to tie into the emotional side of the world and the human side because that is where this world is going. I mean, people inherently want to be heard and, desire to be cared about, and the companies that are doing that and making their employees feel that they are not a number, that they are more important than that, are going to be the companies that succeed at hiring, training, retaining and retaining is really, I think the most important thing, companies can hire all day long. But if they continue to spit them out the door, they need to really take a good internal look. And there are so many professionals out there right now that are addressing those, but how are they addressing those? How are they addressing those issues? Is it management? Is it training? You know, it's just a lot of things that go into that. And that's really what, this is all about, it's about humanizing the conversations and bringing these professionals together to talk about how we can, I guess make a better world that sounds so cheesy. But
Robb Conlon 20:46 That would maybe make a better, job world, I think is not cheesy at all, I think the job world is something that has been in need of a heck of a house cleaning for I don't know, half a century or so. And I think we're seeing a lot of chickens coming home to roost right now. And I think that the differential that you described there that this is more of the how can we work with people more, here's some HR tactics, I think that's a great differentiator for your show, Leighann, and I think that's why people should tune in, is because getting in touch with the modern, and getting in touch with the way things work in 2021, not 2014, not 1991, not 1976. That is what's going to help companies push forward, finding a much more engaged workforce, there is such an opportunity out there right now for folks who are in industries, like the trades, manufacturing, all of these industries that are generally skilled laborers, where you need some sort of education and things like that. And of course, college degrees can pivot and things like that there's a huge opportunity for these, these industries that have had shortcomings, trucking is another great example, right? To attract brand new talent to their industry, and say, Hey, we're gonna treat you like a darn king. But you're gonna work hard, but we're gonna treat you like a darn king here, right? Because we have benefits second to none.
Leighann Lovely 22:17 Right. And they are people, I think employers have forgotten that people are, they're emotional. And for so long, it was leave your emotions, leave your baggage at the door when you walk into work. I'm sorry, It's not possible. We're not robots. And that way of thinking is just not ok, there's going to be crossover no matter what. For so long it has been the old school way of thinking it, then on the flip side of that, you know, it's been when you get home from work, leave your work at the door. Why not find the balance between I like my job, I can go to my job and not come home, being miserable. And I can go to my job, not feeling like I can't let some of that whatever's happening at home, bleed over just a little bit, as long as it's allowing me to be productive. If that company has programs or systems in place that if somebody is struggling, they can go and get help for that. Here's a perfect example. There. Right now, there's a major issue with childcare, this is not to pick on them in any way, shape, or form, but they're trying to protect the children. So they're shutting down if there's a COVID Scare. Obviously, this is impacting the families, all of a sudden, I can't come to work because my daycare shut down. Well, this is happening very frequently, I was just talking to, a contact of mine. He's like, Oh, my daycare shut down again. And I'm like, Gee, how often is that happening? He's like, constantly. It's happening all the time. So there are some employers that are like, well, you know, you've missed this much work, you're going to get in trouble. As an employer, you have to understand. So put a remote worker system in place so that when that happens, you can roll with it and allow your employees to not feel like they're failing. I mean, I understand there are jobs out there, you can't do remotely.
Robb Conlon 24:33 I can't sling tacos remotely
Leighann Lovely 24:37 This is the world that we are living in. Make it so that your employees don't feel horrible when life happens.
Robb Conlon 24:46 Yes, that's a quotable right there. Make it so your employees don't feel horrible when life happens because life's been happening all over the place here these past couple of years. I really liked that. And I think that the companies that do that the companies that can be flexible are the companies that begin to understand that they're not just this monolithic thing where you will work for the pay that we give you. Yes, yes, we are also generous, the companies that move away from that are the ones that are going to win. And the ones that stay that way, the ones that don't listen to this show, and don't learn the new way of doing things. Those are the ones that are going to be screaming out loud. We can't find anybody to work. Well. Maybe if you paid a living wage had some great benefits and treated people like people, you just might be able to find some folks willing to sign on to your company.
Leighann Lovely 25:37 Right? Those deals, brilliant key factors, livable wage, treat people like people, and benefits. I mean, if you can get those three mastered,
Robb Conlon 25:51 Yep, solves a lot of problems for people, right? yourself included if you're a business owner. Alright. Now, there is one last question I did want to ask you. And I think it's gonna be giving folks a great insight into why they should come and why they should listen to the show and how it's going to benefit them in their HR career and what they're pursuing, making sure that hiring the right people and finding the right folks in this new and wild labor market is going to be so important for them, Leighann, what is a commonly held belief in HR that you completely and utterly disagree with
Leighann Lovely 26:31 HR professionals, get a bad rap, human resource, the corporate human resource often gets a bad rap, nobody wants to go see him/her. And if they see him/her coming, walking towards them, or they're being pulled into HR. I remember, in my younger days, I'd get butterflies in my stomach, like oh my god, am I getting fired. And on the flip side of that, you know, HR truly cares, they do care about, the people. They want to make it better. But often, they're not given all of the resources that they need, or the amount of help that they need. I mean, often, Human Resources has got 50 billion things going on. I mean, if you think about it, they're managing benefits, they're managing every employee complaint they're managing, if somebody stubbed their toe, they're the ones who are overseeing the process, for, pretty much everything. So it's HR professionals do have a tendency to get a bad rap. Now, on the flip side, I think that a lot of employees think that HR is just there to make their lives miserable because they are constantly asking for information. And every time they come around, it's, I need this, I need you to do this, I need you to fill out this, this information I need. And that is not the intent. I mean, they truly, in my, in my experience, if given the option, they would prefer to be down working with individuals. That's why I originally went to school for HR, because they wanted to work with people because they wanted to help people. And it wasn't because I wanted to do all the paperwork or because I wanted to, but that's the job.
Robb Conlon 28:32 And I think a lot of times people see HR, as HR can sometimes work for the company if you will. And that's something for employees to be cautious about. I caution my listener, sometimes HR is not your friend. HR is looking out for the best interests of the company. But at the same time, there is a human side to that too, where sometimes HR is indeed trying to work with people. I love that your belief there. I think it is summed up as, HR isn't always the bad guy. And I really liked that, that's a at least aside
Leighann Lovely 29:06 Unfortunately, they also have to follow certain guidelines in order to avoid lawsuit and there are very delicate processes they are trained on how to handle those delicate processes. And because of that, I think that many of them become very standoffish in certain areas. And after being in the industry, you know, for years and years. I think a little closed off and, again, human resource professionals can't be friends with the employees because they may have to fire them.
Robb Conlon 29:51 Like conflict of interest. Yes. And maybe that's your, HR belief that is you know that it's easy to be an HR person? And it's not. It's not because you have to be a consummate professional if you're not, there's a major problem. Correct? Right. Good deal. Excellent. Well, Leighann I that is bringing us to almost a time here. And I just want to thank you so much for having me on to introduce, Let's Talk HR and listeners if you're enjoying this, this type of discussion so far, very much encourage you to continue to be a part of Let's Talk HR, get in contact with Leighann. Leighann how would a listener best get in contact with you?
Leighann Lovely 30:38 Well, first this podcast will be available anywhere you can listen to the podcast. I am also available on LinkedIn. Robb it has been an absolute pleasure talking with you I really appreciate that you have taken the time to come and talk with me You have no idea how much it means to me, I look forward to more conversation with you in the future.
Robb Conlon 32:20 It's my pleasure and I believe that podcasting is about helping to elevate others as well, when we pull other people up with us we ourselves do better, thank you so much
If you are interested in reaching out to Robb Conlon or learning more about Recruiting Hell https://www.recruiting-hell.com/
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Music by Cruen - Family Time
Tuesday Dec 14, 2021
Tuesday Dec 14, 2021
Let's Talk HR - I want to humanize the conversation through openness, communication, and authenticity. Come and get to know me and if you enjoy what you hear, like, share and follow so we can continue the conversation.
Leighann Lovely here,
Let’s Talk HR is a place for HR Professionals, Business Owners, and employees to come and share experiences, talk about what’s working and not, how we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train, and retain all generations of workers.
We all know that there had been a huge shift in what people want, generations are coming together more than ever on what’s important, mental health had been brought to the forefront of everyone’s mind, let's humanize these conversations, let’s talk about how the economy has been impacted and what needs to happen to find a balance.
Contact Leighann
Linkedin - www.linkedin.com/in/leighannl
E-mail - Leighann@loveyoursales.com
Phone - 262-893-7871