Episode 79 - HR Leaders: You got this

This week we reflected on our biggest learnings from the last couple of months of The Modern People Leader.????

Go listen now on?Apple ,?Spotify ,?YouTube ,?or read the full transcript?here .

Top takeaways from September & October:

Episode 73 - Group Chat: Hybrid Work's impact on DEI

1. People are rethinking their "purpose portfolio"?- Darren says that everyone has a purpose portfolio, and work is one stock in that portfolio. But if you only invest in work, it's overweight, and people are realizing that they really need to invest in other areas. The tension that we feel is the institutional power that has shifted away from the entity into the people, and people aren’t going to relinquish that power. People are realizing they’re more than their work.?

2. HOW work happens will make the biggest impact on DEI?-?There's a lot more you can do for DEI when you're able to focus on the HOW, and not just the WHERE of work. We have largely figured out how to decouple business results that we drive from physical geography and proximity, but the next frontier is way cooler — which is time independence. This is the ability for a workforce to decouple business results from linear time. Those with mobility challenges, military spouses, who can't easily port their career as they move around the world, those that look or sound a certain way, introverts who aren't the loudest voice in the room, will finally have a voice when they’re all contributing in a Google Doc in the same size font. Workforces need to completely rethink how work happens - even if that means changing their values and operating principles.

3. There are positive signs in the DEI data?-?According to Valerie, the Chief Diversity Officer at Zuora, there have been positive signs in the DEI data. She admits that it’s still early days in the “new world of work”, but she says that belonging, psychological safety, inclusion, and other DEI metrics that they measure are all up. With that said, she emphasized that just because it’s working now doesn’t mean it will work in 18 months. It’s important for leaders to stay nimble and agile. Keep looking at what you know to be important, stay open to what the measurements are telling you, and stay open to new solutions. Then, rinse and repeat.

Episode 75: Group Chat: Gen Z's impact on how we work

1. Advice on how to win Gen Z talent?- If you want to position yourself as an employer of choice for Gen Z, you need to give people flexibility, a wide variety of experiences (e.g., different bosses, projects, departments, etc), prioritize mental health, and be able to adapt to the constant changes happening at work.

2.?Gen Z is the most entrepreneurial generation yet?-?Gen Z will only give an opportunity so much time before leaving if their needs aren’t being met. They have more pathways, platforms, and opportunities to work for themselves than ever before. They aren’t afraid to take the leap into entrepreneurship or to leave for a more interesting role.

3.?More top talent will go independent than ever before?-?Top talent is going independent far more often than we've seen in the past. So, if you want access to that talent pool, you're going to need to come up with different talent models. Companies, like Canva, are already giving people the option to join as either full-time or as a contractor.

Episode 76 - Merary Soto-Saunders on impacting DEI for 500k people

1. Advice to any first-time Head of HR?- Study the governance of your company and figure out who your CEO is accountable to. Everything else will fall into place.?

2.?Separating DEI from HR creates more accountability?-?When you have a DEI initiative or a person that's too closely tied to HR, it's viewed as a tick box, or another event that you're asking people to participate in. But when that DEI conversation is led by a team head who is responsible for a P&L and a team, it sends the message that DEI is an integral part of the culture, business, and directly affects the bottom line. That distinction helps drive accountability at the most senior level.

3.?The four pillars of DEI at CVC Partners?- Attracting, developing, retaining, and monitoring are the four pillars of DEI at CVC Partners. They have a DEI committee —?which has high visibility from leadership and representation?from all different strategies and locations?—?that works toward their targets at a local level for each of these pillars.

Episode 77 - John Foster on how to build a human-centered organization

1. Human-centered = more creativity?-?Being human-centered isn’t about giving people hugs. It's about giving people the conditions they need to perform at their best.?You can't force people to create.?So, if you want to get more creative output and better results, you'll need to take steps to becoming more human-centered.

2. The traditional organization will be viewed as a crack in the sidewalk of humanity?- Have you ever tripped on a crack in the sidewalk, looked down, said oops, and kept walking? That's how John thinks we'll view the traditional organization in the future. He believes we'll adapt to what humans are good at and we'll build organizations to support those skills.

3.?John's definition of a Modern People Leader?- They are business partners, which is?a word that's been around a long time, but they really are. They're helping run a business. They're also designers and they adapt, evolve, and create better outcomes every day. Lastly, modern people leaders are front and center and speak for the company in a lot of ways. They're not in the back shuffling paper.

Episode 78 - Kim Rohrer on creating a unified employee experience across 70 countries

1. Every company should have a Head of Employee Experience?- Employee Experience?has traditionally been a part of people ops or HR and has been thought of as office managers, but it's more than that. It's a strategic function. If?you're seeing the employee experience as a result of a lot of other things that you've done, but you're not defining what you want that result to be, and you're not thinking about how everything plays into it, then you're doing yourself a disservice. You're just throwing a bunch of projects at the wall and saying, I guess that's what our employee experience is.

2. Give global knowledge workers a chance?- The reality is that there are booming tech scenes in Nigeria, Ireland, Singapore, the Philippines — there are people all over the freaking world who are smart and talented and capable, but haven't been given the opportunities.

3. Biggest challenges when building a company across 70 countries?- Hiring strategically at the global level is challenging. You have to really think about what your priorities are. If you're trying to move fast, you're not going to be able to hire strategically in a globally distributed way because it takes more time to find candidates outside of traditional markets and sourcing channels. You also have to make sure that you are acknowledging and appreciating that there will be people from different national cultures and different cultural norms around work.You have to be really careful that you're not applying a US-centric or Euro-centric cultural mindset.

See you next week!

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