How to Retain Talent in This Competitive Landscape: Show Notes & Transcript

Welcome back to Strategic Counsel by ForthRight Business! Looking for Marketing Smarts? You’re in the right place. After almost 4 years of helping to make you savvier marketers, we decided to broaden this podcast to include more business-oriented topics that will make you savvier business leaders.

In this episode, we’re talking about how to retain talent in this competitive job market. Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and your other favorite podcast spots – follow and leave a 5-star review!

• Episode Summary & Player
• Show Notes
• Strategic Counsel Summary
• Transcript

How to Retain Talent in This Competitive Landscape

We just covered the keys to recruiting talent in this competitive landscape. In this Part 2, we dive into what may be even more challenging: retaining talent. You can retain talent today by keeping a constant temperature check on the environment, knowing who your key players are and tapping into them, treating people like individuals, and staying on top of your training programs, review processes, and reward systems. You’ve done the hard work of recruiting your team. Now, it’s time to keep your team together. Here’s a small sample of what you will hear in this episode:

• How personalized gestures produce results
• how to build supportive systems for employees
• Adopting a daily approach to appreciation
• Recognizing that not everyone’s growth looks the same
• All leaders are responsible for retention
• Small actions have a big impact

Check out the episode, show notes, and transcript below:

And as always, if you need help in building your Strategic Counsel, don’t hesitate to reach out to us at: ForthRight-People.com.

Show Notes

• How to Retain Talent in This Competitive Landscape
  • [0:31] Intro + focusing on retaining
  • [0:53] Challenges of retention
  • [1:22] Tough Love approach
  • [1:51] How to escalate talent loss issues
  • [2:45] Retention is a constant effort
  • [3:15] Every leader is responsible for retention
  • [4:08] Practical example of leadership involvement
  • [5:26] How to build supportive structures for employees
  • [6:50] Avoid the “once-a-year fix” mentality
  • [7:18] How leaders can recognize difficult times and provide support
  • [8:16] Adapt retention strategies to fit today’s workforce needs
  • [10:18] Embracing a culture that values feedback, recognition, and support for employees
  • [11:05] Identifying key team players and keeping them engaged in feedback loops
  • [12:31] Avoid one-size-fits-all retention strategies – customize to individual needs
  • [13:57] How small, thoughtful gestures build lasting loyalty
  • [16:19] Retention is about compromise
  • [17:16] Knowing your team members well allows for meaningful rewards and incentives
  • [19:36] Building a recognition system within the company reinforces retention
  • [20:03] People want their work to be valued
  • [21:55] While career growth is important, the day-to-day feeling of appreciation is crucial
  • [22:24] Real retention comes from a continuous culture of acknowledgment
  • [24:07] Organized appreciation days or team events don’t have the same impact as personal recognition
  • [25:05] Many employees leave jobs because of poor leadership
  • [28:51] Offering personalized coaching is valuable
  • [32:55] Forcing people into management roles as a form of growth doesn’t work for everyone
  • [34:49] Withholding development opportunities to younger employees is shortsighted
  • [37:02] Investing in great employees is always worthwhile
  • [38:30] Learn more at ForthRight-People.com and connect with us on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn
  • [38:31] Make sure to follow Strategic Counsel by ForthRight Business on your favorite podcast spot and leave us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts

What is Strategic Counsel?

Welcome back to Strategic Counsel by ForthRight Business! Looking for Marketing Smarts? You’re in the right place. After almost 4 years of helping to make you savvier marketers, we decided to broaden this podcast to include more business-oriented topics that will make you savvier business leaders.

Thanks for listening Strategic Counsel. Get in touch here to become more strategic. 

Transcript

Please note: this transcript is not 100% accurate.

_

00:01

Welcome to the Strategic Counsel by Forthright Business Podcast. If you’re looking for honest, direct, and unconventional conversations on how to successfully lead and operate in business, you are in the right place. In our discussions, we push on the status quo and traditional modes of thinking to reveal a fresh perspective. This unlocks opportunity for you, your team, and your business. Now, let’s get to it. Welcome to the Strategic Council Podcast.

 

00:31

I am Anne Candido. And I am April Martini. And you guys, today we are delivering on our promise on a previous episode where we talked all about recruiting talent. Today we’re going to talk about how to retain talent in this, yes, still very competitive environment. Because we know and we have talked to many of you.

 

00:53

where you’re left scratching your head of you’ve hired the candidate you need and then all of a sudden out the door they go. Or even worse, you’re hiring new people in, but people that have been on the team and are top performers and you wanna keep, they’re leaving for different opportunities. And we know it can be so frustrating. We also know how much it costs your organizations to do this. And so therefore, when you do all that great hard work we talked about in the recruiting talent episode,

 

01:22

and then you can’t keep them, that’s a tough place to be. So you’re gonna get a little tough love maybe in this episode today like you did in that one, but all with the goal in mind of fixing this and figuring it out. Yeah, I mean, it can be extremely frustrating as April mentioned, which leads to frankly, some poor behavior that is exacerbating itself and causing maybe that bucket to become a much leakier.

 

01:51

in much more quicker fashion. Yes. And so we- Yeah, it just kind of compounds on itself. It just can continue to compound. So we want to really stop that leaking. And we want to make sure that as you are pulling in these people who are ideal candidates for your organizations, you’re able to keep them happy, keep them feeling fulfilled, despite the fact that there might be

 

02:16

a shinier thing on the other side of the lawn there where there’s more money or there’s a promise for a promotion. You’re not going to necessarily stop some people from taking advantage of that. Oh yeah. The ones that are going to leave are going to leave. They’re the jumpers. They’re going to do it. They’re going to jump. Yeah. But you were kind of hoping maybe that some people are jumping to you too. Yeah, that’s right. Right? Right. So become a place to land as much as you’re becoming a place to launch from. Right? So that’s what we’re going to talk about today.

 

02:45

Yes, so I think the first thing, and we talked about this in the recruitment episode too, is that it has to be something that’s constantly going on in your organization, right? Like it has to be part of the infrastructure of how you operate, something that is top of mind to all of your people every single day. You should be thinking about the people that are in the seats you have, and also the people that you definitely wanna keep, that you don’t want going anywhere, right? And so one of the…

 

03:15

problems we see come up or the reasons that maybe this isn’t happening is that Retainment and recruitment quite frankly get placed in the HR department or your chief people officer or whatever That looks like right and so what we want to start with here Is it needs to be first a mindset but then an infrastructure shift to this being the job of everybody?

 

03:39

And this starts at the sea level and it trickles on down and it should be the expectation of the C-suite all the way through to everyone that this is one of the priorities for the people that are leading the organization and needs to be a primary focus in order to, what did you say Ann, make it a place people want to land and stay versus a jumping off point? Yeah, landing place. Landing place. Not just a launching pad. Not just a launching pad, I knew I didn’t say that right. I’m not as good with the analogies, but anyway.

 

04:08

All that to say. So, you know, what does this look like? Well, I worked at an organization where the CEO found this to be tremendously important and he really wanted to know what was going on. And one of the things we talked about was sometimes that sea level gets a little bit disjointed, right? Or a little high up in the clouds and they’re not really sure what’s going on, boots on the ground across the organization. So.

 

04:31

One of his solves for this was that everyone in the organization was invited to schedule a one-on-one as frequently as once a quarter with him. And for an organization of what were we at that point? A hundred people, maybe 90 some, 90 to a hundred people. That’s a lot, right? But the thing that I think this did really well was yes, it was a good way for him to keep a pulse, but it was also for the rest of us to kind of watch it, not in a manipulative way, but to see who would actually be brave enough to do it.

 

05:02

And so then we would start to identify, like I was saying before, who are those people that we wanna retain and what are they looking for? They felt really good that they got that exposure. And then we had a sense of where are we to that point of the temperature check and maybe what do we need to improve, all of those kinds of things. And then this became an expectation of all the rest of us too. So I had 14 direct reports.

 

05:26

And guess what my offer became? Each of you can reach out to me and do a one-on-one once a quarter, whether I’m your direct boss or not, and more frequently for the other folks. But you get the point. Yeah, I think it’s really, really important to build in some of this infrastructure that allows you to get feedback. So I love that one because that’s a one-on-one personal one. But what most people will do, to be totally honest, is they’ll send out their yearly surveys, right? Which…

 

05:55

It’s data and I applaud that the fact that if you’re doing that, you’re at least doing that. But then what comes back after that is the analysis of the data. Oh, and it just dehumanizes everything. It dehumanizes everything. And then it starts to lump people in as like, well, 75% said that we are a great place to work. Then I’m always like, well, what about that? Oh, they’re 25%. Also did they say that because they’re worried that you can track the IP and you know who said what? Yeah. And that’s always a fear.

 

06:21

which is why sometimes it’s really good to get third party to kind of go to go in and actually do this and do it anonymously so that you can really get the honest to goodness feedback. But where I was going to take this was that a lot of this can be done by just being aware and being like if you’re walking in in your organization is having a bad day you can feel it. Totally feel it. Right. You can feel that it’s tense. There’s anxiety. People are acting differently.

 

06:50

but what we tend to do is ignore it. Yeah. We go like, we’re going through this really tough time where you have to deliver these client deliverables or- This client is just tough, but once we get past this X, Y, and Z, we’ll be good to go. Yeah, it’s always like win, win, win, win, win, right? Or we’re not meeting our numbers and so we’re in a very tough time. That is no excuse for basically letting your people live in a state of agony. Or you can give us an excuse, but to the point of this episode, you’re gonna lose them. You’re gonna lose them.

 

07:18

So what you have to consider in that circumstance is like, I know this is a really tough time for my employees. I know that they’re going through a lot. How can I make it better? How can I make it easier? How can I make it, incentivize them to get through this tough time? How do I make sure that they’re feeling valued? How do I make sure they’re feeling heard? And that’s an ongoing process. When we said recruiting is an ongoing process on the upfront, it’s an ongoing process to retain people as well.

 

07:46

So if you’re just ignoring what is going on and just kind of excusing it away because, well, it’s a quote unquote temporary situation or maybe people should just like buckle up and just do their jobs or these other kind of context. Yeah, you’re lucky to have a job or if you can’t hack it, maybe this isn’t the place for you. I mean, whatever these, and you guys are probably rolling your eyes, but we actually hear these.

 

08:16

We’ve seen it. We’ve seen them in organizations. It rolls off the tongue so easily. We’re just. Yeah. And you know, and this comes down to I’m going to get in my tiebox for just a second. Oh, no. Because it’s really fired up. This is usually mine. But you go. Oh, I know. Well, yeah. And I know we’re only on like kind of like the point one. But like, I think it’s super important for people to understand that, especially us who are 40 plus ish.

 

08:43

The world that the younger generation is working in is not the same world that we worked in, right? When we got a job, we did feel very happy to have a job. And we were still maybe looking at maybe having 20 years at that job, unless you’re an agency like April, then maybe two, two and a half. But no, there were still plenty of people that lasted. I just wasn’t one. Shocker. Not lasted, I left. We could totally do a whole episode just on that. It’s not about me.

 

09:11

It always kind of is, but not today. Not today. But I’ve seen this come out of a lot of, we’ll say more mature, more senior people’s mouths. It’s like, well, when I was their age, I got my job and I just worked really, really hard and I wasn’t caring about all these other things that they care about and they don’t respect the company and they don’t like, so we instill our own judgment based on our own expectations of how we were. It’s like the, I walked three miles in the snow uphill both ways to school.

 

09:41

Well, I mean, and I was gonna say, it was going back to our parents’ generation when our parents said the exact same thing. You have a person who cleaned your house, like what the hell is wrong with you? I mean, you have somebody who mows your lawn. You can get out, you can mow your lawn. I mean, if you just think about our value difference based on from our parents to our generation and what our kids are going through, it’s a totally different world for them. We just have to acknowledge it’s a totally different world and guess what? It’s their world. So we need to play in their world, especially if we’re trying to recruit and retain them. Okay, so.

 

10:08

just shift your mindset for a second, get out of what you think it should be based on what you went through and the rite of passage that you had to go through. It doesn’t even matter. It doesn’t matter. This is life. I mean, and so the quicker that we can accept that this is the way that life is, the more in tune we could be to actually being able to establish a culture, a place, a company, a business that is where they want to land and want to stay. Well, yeah.

 

10:38

I’m done off my tie box for right now. For right now. I feel a little scared for the rest of this episode. We’ll see how we do. I lit a fire unintentionally or maybe intentionally. I don’t know. But anyway. Coker. So, I mean, I think it is though, it all is really important because I think unfortunately, it’s really easy to make excuses and make it a them problem versus an us problem, right? And so I think that.

 

11:05

Part of all of this is, and we said this maybe a little more indirectly, but as part of this whole process and this temperature check is knowing who your key players are and really tapping into them and making them part of the conversation. I’m not saying this in a manipulative way like, oh, well, we know so-and-so always has a scoop, so we’ll just keep going back to that well and they’ll tell us that, and then they feel like they’re going to be tough. The whistleblowers? Yeah, and they’re in a tough position and all of that kind of stuff.

 

11:33

What I mean about this is when you’ve identified people that you wanna keep and you want this to be their landing place and all of that, you need to use them, similar to what we talked about actually in the recruitment episode, as like your profiles, right? Like these are the type of people that we want to work here and these are the people that we want to keep here. And so it does have to be a little bit of how am I gonna keep them happy. Now.

 

12:01

I do not mean that in the way of everything they ask for under the sun, we just do and we’re constantly at their mercy, nothing like that. But what I am saying is, I think that to some of what you were saying on your Tidebox in, around how we just kind of like get a bad taste in our mouth or we’re like, oh, well, we’re not, you know, we’re not doing what they want. This is our company. Well, let’s say old regime, new regime, sometimes dichotomy. I don’t get it. So therefore, I’m not going to acknowledge it. I’m not going to pretend it’s not there. Yeah.

 

12:31

But I do think that when you listen to these people and they’re the right ones, a lot of what you hear can allow you to provide things for them that make them exponentially more happy or fulfilled or feel like they’re making their way or creating their path or whatever. They really aren’t that big of a deal. And I think what it stems from is, oh, it’s another thing, it’s another thing, it’s another thing.

 

12:59

but what it really can become is continuing that dialogue so that yes, you have a temperature check and all of that, but you’re looking at the next, the future of the company, the people that you know are gonna do well, the people you wanna keep, all of those kinds of things, and you have a really good sense of who they are, and you know how to make things just a little bit better. It’s that changing the narrative again. So like you said, when you walk in and you feel it and it’s a bad day and you choose to ignore it versus what if you choose to do something?

 

13:28

Exactly. That is what you’re doing in this instance. Right. Whether or not you think you should be or not, this is not about you. This is about your business. This is about your company. This is about your people. And guess what? About almost like every single company can’t operate without people. Right. Exactly. Right. And I mean, there are like, you know, we have some of this and I remember even, you know, when I, when we would have people leave and, and, you know, you’d have some of that like, I don’t know how the account’s going to survive without me. I’m so sorry I’m leaving. Like, but there is like,

 

13:57

some of that to it, right? Like if you pick these people and all of them left tomorrow, you would be in trouble. You’d be in a lot of trouble. Yeah. Right, and that’s what tends to happen. It usually tends to be a flood. Yes, it is. Like an exodus, a mass exodus. It starts with one or two and then the next thing you know. It starts with one or two and then everybody else goes. Because a lot of times they’re taking them to where they’re going. Where they’re going. Especially in the agency world. If you guys wanna know what it’ll look like in a cut through. Go do a case study. Yeah. You can follow my career path.

 

14:27

I mean, I feel just blessed to be in April on our fifth year of this business. I mean, I think I’m probably the longest ten year agency that you’ve stayed at. That’s not true. It matches. Am I getting close? It’s equal. Oh, OK. We’re almost we’re almost to the the pentacle here. Yeah. When we hit the exact five year mark then. Oh, so a couple more months. But I think the point is well taken is like these people that you identify as kind of being those those key players to have a pulse of the organization. Keep you honest, especially if you don’t have

 

14:56

the ability to kind of recognize or appreciate or understand, they can keep you honest. And I think that’s really important to have those people who you can tap into that are going to guide you, they’re gonna give you that honest feedback, where again, those simple things, which a lot of us, especially me, my generation, my Gen X generation are kind of like, why should I have to continue to tell people they’re doing a good job when they’re just doing their job? Right? Why should I have to go over and ask?

 

15:22

you know, Suzy how her day was. I mean, we’re at work. Why does that even matter? Why do I need to give excuses for people to work from home in order to do their, you know, whatever Erin or because her kids are sick. I mean, why don’t they just like, I mean, the list goes on and on and on. And I’m not trying to demonize Gen X, but I’m just trying to emphasize a point that we have a different point of view for how we showed up and did our job, had no excuses, and we just kind of grinded it out. Again, that’s not the way that’s going. So if you do not,

 

15:52

Appreciate that if this is a blind spot for you, that is totally fine Acknowledge it and tap into these people who are gonna give you that Insight so that you can be mindful of that and be humble enough to realize Alright, I mean my company means more and these people are really strong performers And again, it doesn’t mean that they get to act however they want to act This is where your mission vision values and your expectations for a company protocols and procedures all come into play but

 

16:19

you need to realize that it doesn’t necessarily have to be your high or the highway too. Well, I mean, everything’s about compromise, right? And so you have to at least make an effort to appreciate these people or know where they’re coming from. Listen to them and consider their point of view. Yes. And I mean, if you don’t care, you know what the other side is, right? So it kind of doesn’t matter. It’s a moot point. If you want to keep them, then you know.

 

16:49

You wanna be right or do you wanna have your people? That’s exactly right. And I mean, I think so the next thing I wanted to talk about here is getting more individually based because I think one of the carryovers, in addition to some of the things you mentioned and around like, well, you know, I had to put in the hard work or this is the way it should be all of that, is also this idea that you don’t want there to be any sort of like preferential special treatment.

 

17:16

And I’m not suggesting that, again, you go all in on all the things for every person, right? But if you have those people that you wanna keep, you have to get to know who they are at their core and what makes them tick. And I do not mean this just in a like, you know, like for me, it was, I was always a high achiever, right? So in some ways that was used for good in organizations and sometimes they abused that, right? Like how much more can we pile on her plate? Just keep her churning, whatever.

 

17:43

But for individual people and in that instance, someone like me, I actually needed an, more often than not didn’t get someone to be like, you need to calm down and take some space, right? And so I booked you this appointment to, I don’t know, I guess in that era, go get my nails done or do something because you need a break from this environment, right? Or.

 

18:08

One of the examples that I often come back to is I did have someone that worked for me that I saw exhibiting the same behaviors I did when I was younger, and we were trying to find ways to stop that. And we got to know him and his wife together, and she was kind of saying like, oh, he’s so serious, he’ll never go and do, you know, whatever it was. And so we ended up giving them a gift card to Jeff Rubies downtown here locally to go out to dinner together, because we knew that’s something that she valued and wanted to do, and he loved it too, but he was never gonna pay that.

 

18:37

Right? We’re not talking about thousands of dollars or a big promotion or every six months, you know, saying like, oh, we’re gonna pay you more and more and more. That was like 250, 300 bucks or something, right? But like that exact example wouldn’t have worked for everyone, right? There would have been other people that would have been like, I don’t even eat steak, why would you buy me that? Right? Or so like getting to know really people and their worlds outside and their significant others or their kids and where they are in life and what those things…

 

19:06

you can do that honor them as individuals. And yes, it’s a little more work on your part. But it builds that much more loyalty and it ingratiates them to you, right? And they speak on your behalf and all these other great things. And they’re the talent you’re trying to keep anyway. So keep them happy. Yeah. And I think that that’s a really, really good point. And I mean, even a P&G for a company of that size, we had that, I mean, we even had a system that you could order up gift cards for people based on

 

19:36

some sort of acknowledgement, right? And everybody had a budget for being able to do that. And it was just these little points of recognition. So if I was gonna thematically, because if some people are like, I don’t even know what that looks like, I don’t even know where to start. Let me give you, and I know April has some too, some themes that we’ve heard from people when we’ve gone and interviewed your employees and asked them what’s important to them. And this is from Gen Z all the way up, okay? So these are just some common themes. One is…

 

20:03

people want their work to be seen. So they want management, that’s not just their boss, to recognize the fact that they did something, especially if they went above and beyond, they just wanna be seen. This could look so different. There was one point where I had some sort of report and my report matriculated up to the CEO of PG was A.G. Lafley at one point, and he wrote, put a smiley face and said,

 

20:31

It took them two seconds. The secretary might’ve even done that. But I was like, oh, he saw my work. I mean, how exciting is that? I mean, these are such small, simple things. People wanna be seen. They wanna know what they were doing matters and they wanna just be recognized to say, hey, you see me, great. That makes me feel really good that it’s getting out there. My name, my recognition, all of those sorts of things is getting out there. That’s a very easy one that everybody can go do and you can.

 

20:59

Stay in touch with that through the management structure and all those sorts of things. That’s his expectation. Right? Yep. So that is one. What April said was also another big one, which is just small tokens of appreciation. That’s all sometimes people are looking for is like, oh, well thank you. That made my day or that made me feel valued or that made me feel again, seen. Little tokens of appreciation, little gift cards, little moments of thanks. It’s such a small thing that.

 

21:25

we sometimes get so wrapped up in our day-to-day as leaders and managers that we just forget to say thank you. Are we just gonna say saying thank you as one? Just saying thank you. It’s like, hey, I know you were working really late the other night to finish that up. I really thank you for investing that time and the company really appreciates that. It just carries so much weight. So those two things were really, really important. And those were like the two primary things that people said. Right, of course everybody would like to progress

 

21:55

get more experience and all those sorts of things. But as a day to day, just like, give me a moment that I can point to and say, my company values me, my company appreciates me, my company sees me, and what I’m doing matters. That is gold. Yeah, I mean, I think it is so true. It’s so easy, but it’s not done enough. And I think that I’ve never been able to quite figure this out, but-

 

22:24

It feels like one of the hardest things to get to take hold in the organization, but you’re right, it’s one of the easiest things to make people stay. And there’s some, I’m trying to remember, which it might’ve been a Harvard Business Review report or something about how when you promote people and you give them more money or more whatever those things are, PTO, whatever, it lasts for a period of time, but actually…

 

22:51

those aren’t the reasons that people stay because those become commoditized things or expectations. Well, they’re usually they’re lagging too. Yeah, right. I should have been promoted a long time ago. I should have gotten the prey raise a long time ago and that’s all the pay raise I got, I should have gotten more. Well, we could have an episode on that too. And I think we’ve touched on it in other ones, but yes, all of that. And so.

 

23:11

These are proactive human moments, again, where your understanding and people feel seen for who they are and the work that they are doing, and they feel like they’re really part of something. And I don’t think that that is a generational thing so much. You might be able to say that it’s more important to this generation, but I mean, I’m also in my 40s, and those are the moments I remember in my career. It’s when someone took notice that was important or someone took the time to say thank you.

 

23:38

or someone said, you know what, you have been working too much, you’re taking the day off, I don’t wanna hear it, close it down. Like those things that actually I, as a person, needed to hear or needed to be seen for, those are the things. Because everybody at some level expects to be promoted or make more money over time or all those things. It’s just part of the table stakes of having a job. Right, and I think that’s so well said, because I did, I appreciated those things way more than I appreciated an employee appreciation.

 

24:07

where we all went to the zoo and we all got a crappy lunch and then we got to walk around. That’s a check the box for the organization. It’s a check the box, so you should be doing those things anyway. HR said we need to, therefore this is what it looks like. Yeah, and so we’re going to do it. And I’m not saying you shouldn’t go do those things. People do appreciate them, but if we’re talking about personal individuals and individual retention, it’s by making sure that those people feel seen, heard, and valued. It’s also about asking, are you okay? When it makes sense to ask, are you okay?

 

24:35

How are you coping? It goes back to the initial thing that we’re saying is by checking in and making sure your individuals are actually thriving and you’re not ignoring the fact that some people, they address stress differently. Some people thrive in environments that are, you’re grinding it out in high, yeah, in high energy environments and some people really struggle in those. And so- And you need both. And everything in between. Yes, so just pay specific attention to it.

 

25:05

I knew it was going to come back around. It’s like now it’s in red. Here we go. Yeah. I don’t know where exactly this fits, but I think it’s very important to say a lot of people when they leave, they’re leaving their management, not the job. 100%. I know we say it as a cliche now, but the data doesn’t lie. It’s part of that mass exodus. It is part of the mass exodus. We’re going to get to in a second, I won’t pre-up the point about what some of the triggers are for that and what is…

 

25:33

kind of constitute quote unquote poor leadership. But if you are not developing your leaders in a way that’s making them, dare I say, empathetic, vigilant leaders, then you are not doing your company any service, all right? So this is a new style of leadership. We have a lot of episodes on that as well, but it’s all about creating highly effective teams. It’s about making sure you’re keeping an eye on

 

26:01

your organizations without kind of getting in the weeds and micromanaging, but you’re spending, and when you now do that, you could spend the time actually caring about the people and spending your time on the people, which even though everybody says it, they don’t always deliver on it, is your most important asset. So think about that, address at the top level, the leadership capability you have, where that needs to be stored up, where training needs to happen there, and really address if you have the right

 

26:30

people there and then as well as do you have the right style of leadership there that’s being conducive to all of this? Yes, which… Okay, I’m down with my tight box right now. Well, actually, I mean, that set up what I wanted to talk about next because it wasn’t really a natural transition to take the step back and say, we’ve talked a lot about the individuals, the people, all of that, which yes, 100% agree if you don’t have them, what do you have?

 

26:53

But part of that is also building the infrastructure in order to make this a focus area. And that is some things that we’ve seen really become very antiquated in organizations. And that is training programs, review process, reward systems. All right, I’m gonna get back at my tiebox in a second, but you finish. All of these different systems or infrastructures that I think have become dated in a lot of cases. And

 

27:21

aren’t then utilized as something to systematize some of this stuff and then make it an expectation of the organization. And one of the quotes that just sticks in my head with whether we’re talking individual coaching clients or that when we’re in working on organizational structure within organizations is how often I hear, I’m discouraged by inserts. This training program, this review template we use, sometimes I’m the one saying it because I don’t feel like it aligns with our culture or how I do my job.

 

27:51

That is a massive miss within organizations because think about it, how much momentum is built to the reviewed process, right? Or how much time is wasted when someone’s like, I don’t know how to do this and there’s nothing here that’s gonna help me figure out how to go do that. Or like we were just talking about before, when there’s opportunities for small rewards, but people aren’t thinking about that or realizing the importance of that.

 

28:16

all of those things. I mean, it is all about the people, but then your systems need to support those people. I mean, and I remember like, and to your point about the leadership, the one example that I always come back to that should have been so great in one of the agencies I was at, but it just fell flat was we hired, well, they hired a coach. The same coach for 14 people. Because everybody…

 

28:46

Everyone needed to go through this tree. The same coach. Yes.

 

28:51

I think two of the 14 people got anything out of that. And the other 12 were mad. Not to mention, I can’t remember the exact number, but it was in the high tens, if not into 20,000 per person. Oh yeah, at least. So that was an example of a huge missed opportunity where if we have the infrastructure of…

 

29:12

How do we do all the things we’ve talked about this episode, recognize people for who they are, know who we’re talking to, know the people we wanna keep, and then treat them as individuals where needed? The idea was right. We all did need coaches. Not enough of us were hiring them, and the top was stagnating, and the bottom was pushing up, and we all needed to elevate. That was right. The way in which it was delivered was completely wrong.

 

29:35

I think that’s a really great example of where the spirit of the intent is in the right place. But the execution has fallen off generally because of simplicity. Right. The work wasn’t done to actually solve that. Solve that. It was just like, we’re just going to get one coach and we’re going to solve. I mean, it’s like, if you only have a hammer, everything’s a nail. Yeah. Right. So that’s that. Now, what I was going to get back on my tiebox to say is- This is three times in one episode. I know. This has got to be a record.

 

30:05

I don’t think I knew you were like so passionate about this. Oh, the people think it’s a big deal. I mean, I know you’re passionate about that, but we really unleashed it today. I know we really did. Something lit that fire and kept poking it. I mean, for sure. And maybe it’s because growing up at P&G, I didn’t, I mean, I have to be careful how I say this because I don’t want to. There are a lot of great things about working for that organization. There’s a lot of great things about working with P&G and I do feel like they care about their people, but I do feel like for certain,

 

30:35

people with certain styles, with certain aspirations, it got demonized in some ways. And so got told they needed a coach. Or it was a punishment. It was a punishment, even though I really benefited from my co- Oh, yeah, that was me. But I really did benefit from my coach. I think people know us well enough by now to know in a lot of cases, the they is really the we. Yeah, the third person. Especially when you’re on a Tidebox. Yeah, right. Oh, that’s right, I’m still on my Tidebox.

 

31:01

But I think that’s, I think the thing that I’m, reason why I’m fired up is because there was a lot of things that they did well, but there’s also ways where I felt like individualism was not honored and cared for. I think that’s fair. I observed that too working with you guys. And everybody was kind of told that they had to operate the same. It had to be the same. And that’s where, I mean, when people talk about proctoids and they joke about that, I’m like, yeah, there’s, there’s a little bit of truth in that, you know, because it’s like if you don’t operate within the system in the way that the system is designed,

 

31:30

then your value to us is a little bit diminished. And that was hard. I mean, that was really, really hard. So the spear and the passion that you’re hearing from me is because I truly believe in the individuality of people. I believe if you can harness the individuality of people and really plated their strengths and their passions, you can have on tap exponential potential because people are gonna feel like they’re in their flow and they’re gonna offer more than they would if you’re trying to force them into a box.

 

31:58

that they are feeling confined, like they’re feeling that they’re not offering the best of what they can be. And all of those reasons where people start feeling the devalued and they’re feeling that there’s not a place for them, that they’re feeling they can’t bring their whole selves to work, a lot of those things we’re hearing are because people aren’t recognizing the individuality of what their people bring and they’re forcing them into these roles and responsibilities. And what we talked about how important it is

 

32:27

you’re the profiles and the psychographic profiles of the people that you want to fill these roles. They’re not honoring that, right? They’re bringing them in and they’re forcing people into positions. They’re saying, oh, these are leadership opportunities. Oh, you’re not good at this. We’re gonna give you an opportunity to go and spread your wings and grow and do this, you know? And you’re like, and then you fail. And they’re like, well, how could you, you didn’t fail. You didn’t rise to the occasion. It’s like, no, you put me in exactly a position that I told you.

 

32:55

is not a good fit for me. I mean, we did a lot of this, like when people force people to become managers, not everybody’s a great manager. We did this on the agency side too. But you’re forced to become, you know, have management experience in order to become a quote unquote better leader, which is a bunch of bullshit. And then, oh, you’re not great at managing people. No, I told you I wasn’t great at managing people. Is there not a role for me here? Also, like, I don’t wanna do that. I don’t, like, there are a lot of people that don’t want to. You don’t wanna do that. And that’s okay. Yeah.

 

33:21

So there’s not a role for me here because I don’t want to manage people. I mean, how narrow-minded and small-minded is that? Right. So that wasn’t even my tide box, but thank you for- You’re on a roll. Yeah. My tide box has just gotten bigger. But I think when you asked me about that, it kind of triggers some of that elements of like, God, if they had just let me do what I was really good at. I mean, I think I could have done like the tremendous more impact than I did, but I was forced to confine myself.

 

33:51

but this is not a therapy session for me. So, but if you hear yourself in me, know that there’s hope, you can find your way out of it, but you have to be confident enough in yourself to realize it’s not you, it’s them. Yeah. Now that being said, the other part of this that I really wanna make a point about is that the millennials and Gen Zers are getting bad rap for this job jumping. So what a lot of companies natural reaction is, was like, well, then I’m not even gonna

 

34:19

bother training, developing, and mentoring and coaching these people. They can sit here for how long they’re going to do it and then they can go and I don’t care. And they’re going to go, right? They’re going to go anyway. Why should I even bother trying to develop these people? I’m like, okay, did you just hear yourself? And if you heard anything in this episode, know that that is extremely important for retention. Making sure people have a clear path. They have mentorship and coaching that’s going to allow them to grow and develop and have that ability to be able to get that feedback in a really authentic way.

 

34:49

questions, be able to recognize who they want to be and somebody else. All those things are so important, even for a small organization. If you don’t have those people within your organization, which I know we’re all still kind of working on a lot of those things, find it in a different company or outside of your organization. But don’t just say, well, that’s too bad. We don’t have that. I mean, oh, you’re a woman with two children and you want to be CEO? Well, I’m sorry. We’ve never had a female CEO.

 

35:20

Oh, and I’m talking about P&G again, but that’ll be in the case. I mean, find it someplace else, right? And help them find someplace that actually helps them feel connected in a way that they can attribute back to you. It’s like my company, again, really cares about me. They really value me. They are really invested in my development. And if they’re gonna leave, they’re gonna leave. But again, if you have these systems in place, you are gonna be the landing pad for somebody else who wants that too, you know? So just think of it as that. It’s kind of like…

 

35:47

You know, we’ve been listening a lot to the art of attraction. It’s kind of like, you kind of have to release it in order for it to kind of come in. But if you think about it as a scarcity mindset, that’s what it’s going to become. Well, and I think that’s a good combination on this episode. We’re really talking about a mindset shift and then subsequently the behavior changes that need to happen related to that. Right. And so I think where you went at the end there was, you know, this is why this is.

 

36:12

so important and that’s what we’re trying to do here from a strategic council standpoint is set everybody up for success but also sometimes we need to be really honest about where we are with our organization and that sometimes it is us just as much as it’s them whoever the proverbial them is and we need to really be working together to get this right because we said if you don’t have your people you don’t have anything right? Right.

 

36:37

but you also have to know the right infrastructure that works for the people and all of those things. So I’ll just quickly hit the culminating headlights. That’s good, because I’m spent. The culminating, not headlights. Too much getting on and off my tide box. You got your step workout today too. My steps are in. But I mean, really what we’re talking about here is, if you find great people, keep them. Yes, you can’t.

 

37:02

keep people under lock and key and you know, well you can’t but that’s a whole different job that you might get in trouble for. Yeah, that’s a whole different episode for a different day. But you really have to make this an ongoing initiative. First, you have to decide it’s important. Second, you have to make sure that you have people that can shift the mindset and do the work here. And you have to constantly know where you are. Who are the key players? What’s the temperature that’s going on in the environment? How is everybody feeling? How can you individualize people so they feel appreciated for who they are as people first and foremost?

 

37:31

And then how do you build the right systems, review processes, training programs, all that infrastructure so that it pays off for people what their actual needs are versus what you as the organization or owner or whatever wanna say is important. I think the other only thing I’d build on it, it doesn’t have to be big, it can be very simple. It’s true. Just do it. Yeah, yeah. And know that the shift isn’t gonna happen like we say overnight, but you can make a pretty big impact pretty quickly and differentiate yourself.

 

38:01

if you start to operate from this perspective. So with that, we encourage you to take at least one powerful insight you heard and put it into practice right now, not just today, immediately after this episode. You heard both of us have a lot of strong opinions and energy, maybe a little more on Anne from the Tidebox perspective. And remember that strategic counsel is only effective if you put it into action. Yeah, go say thank you to somebody. That’s right. Did we spark something with this episode that you wanna talk about further?

 

38:30

reach out to us through our website, fort We can help you customize what you have heard to move your business. And make sure to Follow or Subscribe to Strategic Counsel on your favorite podcast platform!