When Work Sucks: Calling Out the Grind and Leading the Change

Let’s be real: much of modern work just plain sucks. The hidden frictions—pointless tasks, constant pressure, small daily irritations—drain workers and diminish results. But leaders can change this. In this episode, we expose what’s really going wrong beneath the surface and share strategies to redesign work so people thrive, contribute more fully, and organizations truly perform. Guest: Melissa Swift

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The topics and opinions express in the following show are
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(00:21):
W FOURCY Radio.

Speaker 2 (00:28):
What's working on Purpose? Anyway? Each week we ponder the
answer to this question. People ache for meaning and purpose
at work, to contribute their talents passionately and know their
lives really matter. They crave being part of an organization
that inspires them and helps them grow into realizing their
highest potential. Business can be such a force for good
in the world, elevating humanity. In our program, we provide

(00:51):
guidance and inspiration to help usher in this world we
all want Working on Purpose. Now, here's your host, doctor
Elise Cortez.

Speaker 3 (01:04):
Welcome back to the Working on Purpose program, which has
been brought to you with passion and price since February
of twenty fifteen.

Speaker 4 (01:09):
Thanks for tuning in this week. Great to have you.
I'm your host, doctor Elise Cortes.

Speaker 3 (01:13):
If you if we've not met before and you don't
know me, I am a workforce advisor, organizational psychologist, management consultant,
logo therapist, speaker and author. My team and I at
Gusto now help companies to enliven it and fortify their
operations by building a dynamic high performance culture, inspirational leadership,
and nurturing managers activated by meaning and purpose. And you
do know that inspired employees outperformed their satisfied peers by

(01:37):
a factor of two point twenty five two one. In
other words, inspiration is good for the bottom line. You
can learn more about us and how we can work
together at GUSTODESHNEU dot com or my personal site atliscoretes
dot com. Getting into today's program we have with us
Melissa Swift. She's the founder of Anthrom Insight and Innovative
Organizational Consultancy, and her long and distinguished career has included

(01:58):
leadership roles at Corner Fairy, capt Jain and I Mercer
and Deloitte. Over the years, she has developed novel and
market leading analytical techniques to better understand and address the
human side of organizations.

Speaker 4 (02:10):
She is letting large scale people transformation work across industries
ranging from life sciences to aerospace to professional services. She's
the author of Work Here Now, Think Like a Human
and Build a Powerhouse.

Speaker 3 (02:21):
Workplace Today will be talking about that book. She joins
us from New York City. Melissa, are hearty, welcome to
Working on Purpose.

Speaker 5 (02:29):
Thank you for having me. I The whole thematic behind
this podcast really resonates, So I am just super excited
to be having this conversation.

Speaker 3 (02:38):
Delighted, right, you and I have I think we might
be able to occasionally finish the sentences, maybe using different vocabulary. Yes, yes,
Well let's just start with as I was saying before
we got on air, and you're clearly a very busy
woman gallivanting about the planet with lots of things going on.
You have a family, a very very big career, and
now we're out writing books. So why did you write

(03:00):
this one?

Speaker 5 (03:01):
Yeah? You know, so it's interesting. Work Here Now was
born as a very different book. In my mind, that
part of what I originally got interested in was just
we do some stuff at work that I think is
kind of kooky and strange. You know, everything from you know,
agile rituals to hot desking. You know, we do a
lot of things that have like a tiny flavor of

(03:22):
the absurd. And so the book started off as this
kind of you know, carnival fun house tour through the
world of work, and then COVID hit and it suddenly
just became so absurdly clear to me as I'm you know,
trying to work and lead a practice at Cornberry and
you know, teach my daughter virtual kindergartens. It kind of

(03:44):
it was one of those moments where like the water
got all pulled out of the lagoon, you could really
see the rocks, and that's sort of where the what
work here now became? You know, That's that's where it
was born. Is this idea of can we really put
language again what's wrong with work? And then like, let's
you know, what would we do differently if we could

(04:05):
name some of the problems in really clear and explicit ways.
And that kind of became my mission.

Speaker 4 (04:10):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 (04:11):
Well, I really appreciate that on a number of levels,
in part because the work that I do helping develop
organizations and leaders of course starts with as as you're saying,
getting clear and making it conscious, just what's going on
here and how people are feeling, how the leader is feeling,
how you're relating to your people in the organization. If
you don't have one consciousness about that and l language

(04:32):
to use around it, it's really hard to start to
address it. So I really like how you have put
words very very interesting, I would say, creative words to
why these problems exist. So what I would like to do, Melissa,
for this conversation, for the benefit of our listeners and
viewers around the world who are listening, is I want
to just take.

Speaker 4 (04:49):
And kind of jump into each one of your chapters.

Speaker 3 (04:52):
We won't get to all of them, and just situate
a bit about what it is you're trying to put
forward us, So what's problematic there? And then I want
to just offer, because you offer nineties strategies in the
book on an organizational or team level to start to
address this stuff. So for each of these sort of issues,
we'll talk about a couple of strategies that the listeners
and viewers can start to use to address that. So
as they recognize, yep, we got that problem, then we're

(05:14):
going to immediately give them at least a couple of
strategies that they can start to take back home and
put to work.

Speaker 4 (05:19):
So let's dive on you're ready.

Speaker 5 (05:22):
I'm ready, Okay, right, chapter one.

Speaker 3 (05:24):
Let's just you know, the great work, unpack, understanding and
fixing broken work. Yeah, it really is, right, I mean,
And first, let me situate for you, Melissa. I am
an organizational psychologist and do the work that I do because.

Speaker 4 (05:36):
I believe in the wonder and power of work, and.

Speaker 3 (05:39):
It's it needs to be a more fluid, workable part
of our lives, and it just isn't for so many people,
as you so eloquently point out. So let's talk about
just a couple of things that are related to that
first idea of you know, maybe if we make the
everyday experience of work subclass, maybe we would actually get
more done.

Speaker 4 (05:57):
What a concept.

Speaker 5 (06:00):
Funny though, because we do a lot to avoid talking
about the everyday experience of work.

Speaker 6 (06:05):
This is one of the things that really fascinated me
in my career, and we probably seem manifestation in your
work with leaders, I would guess is that we will
systematize and framework eyes and do anything to kind of
talk around.

Speaker 5 (06:19):
What are people's working days like day to day and
just treating kind of that everyday average experience would work
as a data point, right, not getting weird about it
and not getting emotional about it, and not saying it
has to be what it has to be, because this
is the ROI we need and this is what the
stakeholders need, just taking a step back and saying, Okay,
this is what people's working days are like. Are these

(06:41):
all choices we would make to your point about anxiousness? Right,
would we choose to step work up this way? And
in general we absolutely would not, And by the way,
the shareholders wouldn't want us to either.

Speaker 4 (06:54):
Right.

Speaker 5 (06:55):
It's not a win for individuals, it's not a win
for the organization. It's not a win for anybody. But
it requires that moment off you have to kind of
almost like look right into the eyes of what people
do all day long.

Speaker 3 (07:07):
And that's a journey, it really is. And I love
how you just brought that down to just like, let's
just talk about what we're actually doing here. So let's
talk about this. So if work isn't working, it sucks
for a lot of people. Let's talk about a couple
of strategies that you offer in the book. Just one
of them is is you talk about the need and
the opportunity to regularly re examine work for signs of

(07:30):
being dangerous, dull and annoying, frustrating and confusing.

Speaker 4 (07:34):
Wow, if we were to alleviate those kinds of things, man,
we would turn the world upside down right there.

Speaker 5 (07:39):
Yeah, absolutely, and again just treating them as data. Right,
I've seen so many leaders and again I'm sure you
have seen this too, where people are whiny and people
are complaining. Well, no, when they talk about being bored,
when they talk about being frustrated, that's work going wrong, right,
that is not helping your profitability as an organization. Actually

(08:00):
trying to tell you that they're giving you helpful data
and you're disregarding it. The same with work being dangerous.
You know, you look at those those wonderful visualizations of
what your brain looks like when you're on zoom calls
back to back all day, right, you can actually see
people's brains kind of subtly on fire. You know. You
look at that, and you know it's like, well, people
need to just tough it out. Well, no, that's not

(08:21):
somebody at peak performance at that point. So it's like,
just correct for those things that workers experience is problematic,
and actually the whole operational machine runs better at that point.
But you have to again kind of get past that
psychological hurdle from their whining to their giving me neutral

(08:42):
data and I can choose what to do with it.

Speaker 3 (08:44):
Yes, beautifully explained. Okay, another strategy that I'd like to
offer for this just idea of working work sucking as
it does for many people. One of your other strategies
is don't take intensified work for granted, and don't be
afraid to be to intensify. So first we've got to
situate what do you mean by intensified work.

Speaker 5 (09:01):
So intensified work is one of the most interesting concepts
from the academic world that we don't talk about enough
in professional practice. So I went down kind of you know,
a rabbit hole and academic studies of work, just trying
to figure out why. You know, I'm gen X and
I feel like work has gotten harder in my lifetime, right,
Like I have watched something happen and it's not just that,

(09:23):
like I'm old at curmudgeonly, honestly, I was a curmudgeon
at age twenty two. Right, like theudgeon. Curmudgeon is a
constant across my life. But something has gone gone a
bit weird. And it turns out that academics actually study
this notion of work intensification, and it's got three aspects
to it. Number one is too many tasks into little time.

(09:43):
Number two is excess interdependence. I love this one because
any large complex organization, which is what all my clients
have been like over the years, right, this business of
I rely on this process and this process and this person.
It wears people down. It's what you saw Jamie Diamond
very upset about the seventeen committees. Right, He's complaining about interdependence.
And then the third one is just excess emotion in

(10:06):
the workplace. So that could be your customer service rep
who gets yelled at, or that could just be your
boss yelling at you. But all of those things I
am the book that I'm working on now. I analogize
it too. It's like carrying a bag of sponges versus
carrying a bag of bricks. The sponges might be the
same size as the bricks, but the bricks are so
much denser and they weigh you down more So, That's

(10:27):
why if you have an intensified work day, either too
many tasks, too much interdependence, or too much emotion, that
same ten hours, eight hours of work feels a lot
heavier than it did before. Again, you know, we say, well,
just work is work, and you got to grind, and
oh no, if we've just convinced ourselves that we can

(10:47):
do more tasks than we can actually do, that's again,
that's just us doing it wrong. It doesn't have to
be that way, and you can fix it, and you
can fix it within your own working team. And I
think that's where some of the power lies in record
more intensification is you may not be empowered to fix
it across your whole organization, but oftentimes you can kind
of get some stuff done sort of local to yourself.

Speaker 3 (11:09):
I got to believe right about now, LISTA, there's a
few people listening in there going, oh my gosh, there's hope.
I now she's helped me understand and put words in
language of just what's happening around her, and even just
that simple thing of what do you mean people don't
actually have to scream at you at work that I
don't actually have to experience that I'm sure that people
are listening to that, going, Wow, what a different day

(11:30):
that would be.

Speaker 5 (11:33):
Yeah, well absolutely, because we just we do a lot
of myth making. You know, we have these myths of
like screaming, passionate boss. Right, you know, are got it done?
You know, it's it's just a myth, right, right. You
don't have to believe in the Easter Bunny, you don't
have to believe in Santa Claus, and you don't have
to believe that that style of leadership is the most
impactful and effective. And you know, folks like you and

(11:54):
I who work with a wide array of leaders often
see leaders who are wildly different from that and incredibly effective.
You know who can be you know, either quiet and
introverted or very extroverted, but they don't have that sort
of like yelling negative emotion thing going on, and it's
unbelievable what they can accomplish.

Speaker 3 (12:13):
Oh yes, I encourage that kind of behavior, right and left. Okay,
So your language in the book is so fun, Melissa.
I knew you were going to be great gobs of
fun to talk with because your language choices already are
so fun. So part of what you talk about in
another chapter is why don't we just get better at
digging into the experience of work and fixing it.

Speaker 4 (12:33):
And then you talk about two monsters that are menacing
the world to work. Let's talk about those two monsters.

Speaker 5 (12:39):
Yeah, so the first one, we've got the work anxiety monster.
And this is the little voice in your head that says,
either people are lazy and people are slow, or you're
lazy and you're slow, and don't underestimate the impact of
these anxious thoughts. I mean, my god, I wrote about
the anxiety monster. I think about it, and I still
hit myself with those own and I have to correct

(13:01):
for them on a day to day basis. Right, So,
there is something about those anxious thoughts that drive a
lot of really bad decisions at team level, at workforce level.
You know, every time you assume that people are too
slow and too lazy, you start you manage them in
ways that, again a ton of research shows us, are

(13:21):
actually not constructive or helpful. You know, if you harken
back to the theory X and theory why management of
the sixties, right, this is integrally related to that either
you believe people will do the right thing properly empowered
or you don't. I believe people will do the right
thing properly empowered, and I think a lot of the
research is on my side too. But to do that,

(13:42):
you got to make the anxiety monster shut up.

Speaker 4 (13:45):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 (13:46):
Well, and so to that end, one of your strategies
is simply to unpack your foundational talent management assumptions and
what decisions are you making on the basis of believing
that people are lazier slow.

Speaker 4 (13:58):
So this is where it gets really interesting. Both of
us works.

Speaker 3 (14:00):
I have to imagine I will go into an organization
and start to help help organizations a mirror back the
language they're using and so they can actually hear, Oh,
they are telling people that they're lazy and slow or
whatever it might be.

Speaker 4 (14:13):
Or there's a punitive relationship between the.

Speaker 3 (14:15):
Boss and the employee, the parent and the child, kind
of thing they're not even not at all aware of.
So I think this idea, how even the word using
unpack is really important because it still speaks to They
got conscious to it, and they got to understand how
it's deriving their communication and their behavior. So I think
that strategy is really really powerful, hard to do without
some help, probably from a third party or somebody else.

Speaker 5 (14:39):
Well, because part of I mean part of the issue
here again is you know, to your point unconscious choices
that you know, if organizations knew, for instance, they were
treating their employees like arrant children, many of them, not
all of them, but many of them wouldn't do it.
But that moment of the aha moment where somebody reflects
back to you, this is what you're actually communicating, and

(15:00):
this is what your your choices and your decisions say.
You know that it just sort of a simple example.
You know, if you don't complete your training hours, we're
going to dock your pay, right right. That's a classic one.
I've seen that a lot of places. What that implicitly
says is I don't believe you are intrinsically motivated to learn.

(15:23):
I believe you have zero intrinsic motivation to learn. Now,
who's sat down the CEOs and most of those companies
say do you believe your people have zero intrinsic motivation
to learn? They'd be like no, no, no, no, I've all
these great people. I really, you know, like they would
express constructive, positive sentiments, But the policy doesn't say that.
The policy communicates something else, and that's the journey that

(15:46):
you know, you're taking organizations on, and a lot of
us are like trying to be that helpful mirror to say,
this is what you really communicated. You probably didn't mean it,
but this is what you said.

Speaker 3 (15:58):
Yeah, And I think I see a lot of organizations
that are using very very very outdated, archaic language like
that that isn't suitable for today's times for what.

Speaker 4 (16:08):
People how people want to be treated.

Speaker 3 (16:09):
They want to be treated with respect, with appreciation, with
day to day and that sounds very very punitive and dictatorial.
And so it's that kind of language that we have
to start to learn how to fare out of organizations
that aligns with your strategies as well. Okay, so we
have to talk about the other monster again, really fun
language here, and the other monster as president organizations that

(16:30):
we need to address is the boss baby customer.

Speaker 4 (16:34):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (16:34):
So this is a fun one for me because it's
a great example of something not so hot coming out
of like a really good, well intentioned place. So, you know,
some years ago, organizations kind of got hipped to this
notion of customer centricity. Right, We're going to really think
about our customer as a person and center a lot
of stuff on them, and up to a certain point, probo,
that is fantastic, and I would not argue with thinking

(16:56):
that way. But what happens is there's always, as in
many of the things, this tendency to over rotate, and
eventually you're treating your consumer like you know, they're a baby,
but they're also in charge of every single thing you do.
And what happens when you establish that dynamic is you
end up putting kind of unbearable pressure on your human workers.

(17:16):
So you know, if you say, okay, we can ship
in X amount of time and it's not actually feasible, right,
but you're making that boss baby assumption of like, well
they can't live without it for more than x amount
of time. You know, a you end up with failures
because you promise something that wasn't humanly doable. So you

(17:37):
end up disappointing your customer anyway. But be what you've
done to your employees, right, is you've created You've made
your customer into a monster for them, and it's not again,
it's not actually what you'd want really good customer centricity.
You'd want your employees and your customer to actually have
this kind of symbiotic and catholic relationship where each under
each group understands the other and they interact really positive

(18:00):
ways that kind of generate a lot of value for both.
But you've taken what could be a virtuous circle and
really turned it into a vicious cycle.

Speaker 3 (18:07):
And I appreciate just to call that out for our
listeners and viewers who haven't yet read the book as
I have, that one of your strategies is to actually
map out how your customer experience and your employee experience interact.
And each time you change your customer experience, how is
an employee experience impacted.

Speaker 4 (18:22):
I think that's really important to see.

Speaker 3 (18:24):
So I will comment more on that and when we
come back from our break. But let's grab our first break.
I'm your host, doctor Relie's Cortesz. We've been on the
year with Melissa Swift. She's the founder of Anthrome Insight
and Innovative organizational consultancy, helping organizations address the human side
of organizations. We've been talking about a few of the
issues that are really pertinent and invading organizations. Today, after

(18:47):
the break, we're going to talk about one of the
next ones, which is what she calls the organizational copy machine.

Speaker 4 (18:52):
We'll be right back.

Speaker 2 (19:08):
Doctor Elise Cortes is a management consultant specializing in meaning
and purpose. An inspirational speaker and author, she helps companies
visioneer for greater purpose among stakeholders and develop purpose inspired
leadership and meaning infused cultures that elevate fulfillment, performance, and
commitment within the workforce. To learn more or to invite
a lease to speak to your organization, please visit her

(19:30):
at elisecortes dot com. Let's talk about how to get
your employees working on purpose. This is working on Purpose
with doctor Elise Cortes. To reach our program today or
to open a conversation with Elise, send an email to
Alise A Lise at elisecortes dot com. Now back to

(19:54):
working on Purpose.

Speaker 4 (20:00):
Pictures saying with us and welcome back to working on Purpose.
I'm your host, doctor Realise core Tess.

Speaker 3 (20:04):
I am dedicated to helping create a world where organizations
thrive because they're people thrive. They're led by inspirational leaders
that help them find and contribute their greatness, and we
do business a betters in the world. I keep researching
and writing my own books, so one of my latest
came out it's called the Great Revitalization, how activating meaning
and purpose can radically in life in your business. And
I really wrote that to help leaders understand today's very

(20:25):
diverse and discerning workforce at a different sort of take
that Melissa has done. And then I provide twenty two
best practices that you can be used to equip and
embed them into your cultures to provide that for them.
You can find my books on Amazon or my personal
site at leastcore tes dot com if you are just
now joining us.

Speaker 4 (20:43):
My guest is Melissa Swift.

Speaker 3 (20:44):
She's the author of work here Now Think like a
human and build a powerhouse workplace. So before we get
into one of the other issues that you've outlined in
the book, I did want to comment on this notion
of customer service and the notion of really creating a
spiler around that with the employee experience. The other extra
dream of that that I think is also maybe equally present.
It's just a complete lack of customer experience a customer service.

(21:07):
I'm amazed how many organizations make it impossible for you
to contact anybody anywhere in an organization to talk about
a missed service and miss deadline and misproduct.

Speaker 4 (21:18):
Can't. It's amazing to me. So lots of room for
improvement here, yes, Melissa.

Speaker 5 (21:24):
Yeah, absolutely, And you know, it's it's interesting because it's
a version of the same thing we've been talking about
in a weird way. It's just a there's I think,
just a bad business myth about the less we see
people as people, like, the more money we will make,
you know, putting very stark terms, but what you're describing
of because I had one of those experiences today, you know,

(21:45):
speak to a human, speak to a human, No, speak
to a human, right, And unfortunately, I think chatbot technology
is making what you've described a lot worse. So we
have the problem of kind of tech now layering on.
But at the root this it's the same idea, you know,
if we kind of fail to think about people as people,
that's where we make business progress. And I just again

(22:06):
I don't I don't buy it.

Speaker 4 (22:07):
I don't either. I don't either. Well I'm not.

Speaker 3 (22:09):
I'm choosing increasingly to move away from the organization so
that I can't actually connect with and I think I
don't feel you know, the heartbeat of voting with the
wallet is we like to say, okay, so I think
this next idea here that you have in your book
is really, really, really powerful. We want to bring this
to life and help our listeners and viewers understand it.
And that's this notion of the organizational copy machine. Let's

(22:32):
talk about what that really means.

Speaker 5 (22:34):
Yeah, so this is interesting. So the deep roots of
this idea, actually it came from I wrote my college thesis,
my senior thesis on Dracula and using some of Freud's
ideas to analyze Dracula and esctatics and seven Gothic tails.
And you know, one of the big Freudian ideas is
this repetition compulsion, right, like we just can't stop doing

(22:57):
the same stuff over and over. And it's a you know,
it's a big and you know, obviously you're incredibly familiar
with it, right because in therapeutic practice, right, there's a
lot of focus on just pattern breaking. Let's stop doing
the same silly thing over and over. So just like
individuals do the same silly thing over and over, or
families do the same silly thing over and over, organizations

(23:20):
do the same silly thing over and over. And that's
the organizational copy machine that left to our own devices
in groups just just as in it, as you know,
individuals will we will just copy paste the past right
into the future, over and over and over and over.
And that's I think some of the sometimes the frustration

(23:41):
I hear from you know, practitioners that work on organizational
culture is like, oh my goodness, we just have to
stop doing the same silly things over and over. And
I think that's why this idea of the organizational copy
machine is really powerful, because again, if you can name
the patterns, and to your point earlier, sometimes you need
an next a party to say, look, when you did this,

(24:02):
it was just like this. It was just like that,
and it was just like that. Name the patterns and
you have a chance of breaking the patterns. But I
think until we really confront the fact that organizations will
just neurotically repeat and repeat and repeat, you know, we're
going to be kind of constantly unpleasantly surprised by things
that should not be surprising.

Speaker 3 (24:24):
Indeed, indeed, so let's let's share a few of the
shortgies to offer in the book. The first one I
think is really quit quite quite interesting that I wanted
to talk about, so listeners and viewers, just so you
know what she's done in the book is for each
of these issues that she said about, she then offers
five organizational strategies and then five team strategies. And so
I'm just focusing on the conversation for organizational for this
for now. But the idea of creating a single account

(24:47):
of truth on the workforce of your organization, however you
employed them, and systems and processes to maintain it in
real time, that's a really interesting idea. What would that
look like, maintaining a single account of.

Speaker 5 (25:01):
Well, it starts from extremely basic basis. I mean, I
will never forget the time I was in a conversation
you know, you're talking about sophisticated human capital analytics and
senior executive leans across the table with Melissa. I couldn't
tell you how many employees be have I love have
funny And He's like, no, no, no, I can't give
you a number. I don't have that number accurate. And

(25:22):
for me that was a little bit of a wake
up call about how we in some ways need to
rebuild the foundations of how we think about workforces, you know,
and really say, you know, okay, right, we have this
is okay, this is our activity group right, you've got
a good account on those. But all those contractors, you
don't employ them through HR. You employ them through procurement.

(25:43):
You may not even know how many of them there are,
Like maybe you're counting badges, maybe you're not.

Speaker 7 (25:48):
And then as the types of work get more varied
and diverse, which is general a positive trend, right, Like
you want big workers and task workers, and it's a
good thing that the ways you can engage with the
workforce more varied.

Speaker 5 (26:01):
I'm actually hearing a lot right now about making the
retirement clip, which I think is a fabulous idea, right completely,
Why do we chuck all of that institutional knowledge out
todoor all and once, like it's silly. So in general,
it's fantastic that we can employ people in a lot
more different ways and modes. But if you don't, again,

(26:21):
how can you manage your workforce if you don't quite
know how many of them there are. If you don't
know you know exactly how you pay them? Right, Because again,
if you got this whole group you're paying through procurement,
you know, you may be paying them way more per
hour for the same work or way lesser. You know,
doing some of this basic math and then actually getting

(26:41):
into some analytics on what are you paying people for.
So there was a wonderful study by some former mercer
coworkers of mine where they looked at organizations stated strategies
about what they compensated for versus what actually came out
in their pay data. So all these organs are we
pay for performance. Nope, you pay for tenure. People just
have to stick around. That's what your data shows. And

(27:03):
so you start to look at things like that, and
that's where a single account of the truth is really important.
You know, who do you employ, how do you pay them,
what do you pay them for what? Again, back to
the day to day, day to day what work are
they doing? You know some of these basic basics. I
think that's part of what actually again gets people working
together really constructively, is that you may be treating people

(27:24):
in kind of dramatically inequitable ways, again completely unintentionally, but
also sort of you know, leveraging human talent in ways
that's super inefficient. You know, you might be paying contractors
to do really you know, sort of advanced vanguardish work
that you should have FTEs doing or vice versa. Or
you might be automating things that humans should still be doing,

(27:45):
not automating things that you should be automating, et cetera,
et cetera. But if you don't have that single account
of the truth about what is the work, who does it,
how do they get paid, et cetera, et cetera, you'll
never know.

Speaker 3 (27:57):
Yes, indeed, And I can imagine there's a few people
that are listening to this right now going, oh, my gosh,
that's me.

Speaker 4 (28:02):
I don't know.

Speaker 3 (28:04):
So that one of the other strategies which we sort
of alluded to in the last bit that we were
talking about here, that you have here related to the
organizational copy machine is just, yeah, maintaining in periodical energizing
the organization and the conversation about how work actually gets done.
And this is something that I can say, even in
my little small consultancy, we are constantly looking at how

(28:27):
to revise how we can do our work more effectively
and efficiently, just because we have technology that is showing
up in different ways and so being able to look
at how is work getting done on a pretty regular
periodic basis, I think that's a really powerful strategy that
you offer.

Speaker 5 (28:45):
Yeah, and I think your point about technology is a
great one. Because it's sort of like there's never been
a better time to be constantly reevaluating, because if you
think about some of those technologies, like I think of
honestly chat GPT as one of my coworkers in my
little entrepreneurial business, I think about co pilot as a different,
less clever coworker, right, but co pilot is really good

(29:06):
at certain things and chat chepps, but those underlying technologies
change all the time. So to your point, even with
my non human co workers, I'm constantly rethinking how the
work gets done. But I think you know, in the
current moment, there has never been a better time to
do that.

Speaker 3 (29:24):
Yeah, And one of the other strategies you talk about,
when there are many others as well, but I think
this one is really important to talk about here, and
I want to help more and more companies do this
than I imagine you do too, and that is to
reinvent HR on your organization's terms. And so I know
that we have a tendency and it's just fac to
the organizational copy machine. We are using policies back from

(29:46):
the nineteen fifties, still sixties and seventies. It is insane.

Speaker 4 (29:50):
So let's talk a little bit about what would that
look like to reinvent HR.

Speaker 5 (29:55):
Well, you know, I think some of it is honest
about what are your true HR needs as an organization,
because there are all kinds of sort of fads you know,
agile agile talent pools in HR, and you know the
three leg and stool and all these different constructs and
different pieces of them. They may or may not be,

(30:16):
you know, terrific for your organization. But rarely does an
organization really take a step back and say, you know, okay,
this is the general HR template, but what do we
really what do we need? What is the what is
the ACH here?

Speaker 7 (30:29):
Right?

Speaker 5 (30:29):
Like forget kind of checking all these compliance boxes? What
is super painful? And you know, and it might lead
you in a different direction than you think. So as
of for instance, you could say the ach honestly, oh
my god, you know it's it's employee relations, right, we
have a zillion employee relations complaints. That's a mess. Well
is that a function of funky leader behavior? Perhaps, because

(30:50):
that might lead you in a completely different direction where
you really staff up with hrbps who are high powered
and can face off against your executives and create culture
change that then solves for what looks like a big
transactional er problem. But I think you have to kind
of go into it with your your detective had on
a bit and that's you know, again, you could slavishly

(31:12):
adopt all these different trends and you could augment your
tech stack. I mean, there's been so much focus on
HR tech, and tech's not really the issue. It's what's
the model and does the model serve your actual strategic objectives?
And does the model? You know, are you actually kind
of caring for the human beings in your organization? You know?

(31:35):
I mean you wouldn't. You wouldn't treat the organization's external
image this way in the marketing department. You wouldn't treat
its money this way in the finance department, right, So
don't treat your humans that way in the HR department.

Speaker 4 (31:49):
Well said Melissa.

Speaker 3 (31:50):
And it's just so simply stated and like, yes, let's
just what's the I really applaud that and appreciate that.
Grabbing our last break, I'm your host doctor really score
Tees on the air with Melissa Swift. She's the founder
of Anthron Insight and Innovative Organizational Consultancy, helping organizations to address.

Speaker 4 (32:06):
The human side of organizations.

Speaker 3 (32:08):
We've been talking about a few opportunities here to really
change and elevate your game as an organization, including really
looking at how you've got an organizational copy machine that's
running your organization. After the REK, we're going to talk
about one of the other opportunities to look at your
decisions about people and really make them addressed to for

(32:29):
your people.

Speaker 4 (32:29):
We'll be right back.

Speaker 2 (32:46):
Doctor Elise Courts has as a management consultant specializing in
meaning and purpose. An inspirational speaker and author, she helps
companies visioneer for greater purpose among stakeholders and develop purpose
inspired leadership and meaning infused cultures that elevate fulfillment, performance,
and commitment within the workforce. To learn more or to
invite Elise to speak to your organization, please visit her

(33:07):
at elisecortes dot com. Let's talk about how to get
your employees working on purpose. This is working on Purpose
with doctor Elise Cortes. To reach our program today or
to open a conversation with Elise, send an email to
Alise A LISEE at elisecortes dot com. Now back to

(33:31):
working on Purpose.

Speaker 3 (33:37):
Thanks for staying with us and welcome back to Working
on Purpose. I'm your host, doctor Elise Cortes. As you
know by now, this program is dedicated through empowering and
inspiring you along your journey to realize more of your potential.
If you want to learn more about how we can
work together and learn about the Gusto Now Academy for
leaders and individuals across various journeys alike, make your way
to gustoshnow dot com and then navigate to the training

(33:58):
tap and you can find the hav to meet content there.
If you are just now joining us, My guess is
Melissa Swift. She's the author of work here Now, Think
like a Human and building a powerhouse workplace to me, Okay, so.

Speaker 5 (34:11):
Let's talk about this idea.

Speaker 3 (34:13):
This sounds again so simple and so eloquent, but if
you could actually do this, what a game changer it
would be.

Speaker 4 (34:18):
And that is you have this notion of decisions about
people for people.

Speaker 5 (34:24):
Yeah. So it's interesting I wrote this chapter because people kept,
like everyone around me, kept talking about human centric decisions
and I couldn't find anything about how.

Speaker 7 (34:34):
To do it.

Speaker 5 (34:34):
So it's one of those things if I can't find
you know how to do it I'll figure out how
to do it. And it's interesting because really making human
centric decisions a lot of times comes back into kind
of super operational practical reality. Right, So just you know,
thinking about, you know, if I make this decision this way,

(34:56):
what are kind of some of the scenarios that might result?
What are the actual human impacts? Is this decision sustainable?
You know, is this something that human beings are going
to be able to do in three or four years?
Does this decision consider people as actual humans? So, you know,
I'll give you an example that's interesting because it's a

(35:17):
really neutral one. So a lot of the work that
I've done has been global. Well, when you are trying
to work globally, time zones are not your friend. I
had one boss at one point from New Zealand who
educated me and the entire team at great length about
how hard it was to work from New Zealand, right
and how they had calls scheduled at four in the morning,

(35:37):
et cetera, et cetera. And you know a lot of
times organizations will just say, well, we're working globally and
you know you're going to be on the phone at
two am or et cetera, et cetera. Well, it doesn't
consider the sort of profound impact of sleep for human beings.
And that doesn't mean you can't ever schedule to call
at two am, but maybe it means for that particular country.

(35:59):
You know, the call can like rotate around, So it's
two am for New Zealand this week, it's two am
for the US this week. You know things like that
where you know, once I say it, you're like, well, God,
what an organization would do it any other way? Melissa?
And the answer is all of them. You know, we
make all of these kind of silly, boneheaded moves because
we're just not thinking about, you know, kind of basic

(36:20):
human stuff like when what when we killed lunch. I
actually talk about this in the book that I'm working
on right now. When we killed lunch and suddenly we've
got all these people acting weird in early afternoon meetings.
Well you know what, they're angry, right, basic basic basic
human basics around eating, around sleep, all of those things,

(36:41):
Like just bring it back into the equation and then
think through kind of operationally these decisions that you're making,
You know, can they really play out in real time
in the long run without humans having to kind of
like stretch to fill the gap, right, Like, Okay, we're
gonna we're going to develop the software an accelerated timeline.

(37:02):
You know, Well, okay, if you don't have the technological
tools that strictly speaking enable you to do that, right,
then it's just humans staying up all night and probably
producing an inferior product at the end of the day.

Speaker 4 (37:13):
Right.

Speaker 5 (37:13):
It's a good example of what's going to stretch into
any system. It's going to be the humans.

Speaker 3 (37:19):
Well, and then what I would say to that, of course,
for the practice that we serve for organizations, is well,
now you have totally discounted that this person is attached
to anything else in their life but you, the employer.
They don't need sleep, they don't need to they don't
have a family that they might actually want to see
and engage with. They don't actually need to go out
and exercise, they don't need to go out and buy groceries.

Speaker 4 (37:40):
They just need to hang out with you.

Speaker 3 (37:42):
And of course I've had guests on before we talk
about what a tremendous disservice that is to this one
human being, the quality of their life and the extent
to which they could ever realize their potential, and of
course I have a problem with that.

Speaker 5 (37:56):
Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. And then at the end of the day,
if I always say, even if you don't care about
the person as a person, which you should, even if
you don't taking away to your point all of that
other meaning in their life, are they going to really
do their best for you? No, No, they're not. They're not.
So it's lose loose, right, You're not getting the best

(38:17):
of that person, and that person isn't getting the best
of their life.

Speaker 6 (38:21):
You know.

Speaker 5 (38:21):
It's again it's a vicious cycle where it could be
virtuous circle.

Speaker 4 (38:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (38:27):
Yeah, So that brings me to just one of the
strategies that you put forth here, number thirty four. I
love that they all have numbers too, in very crisp names,
and it's related to what we're talking about here.

Speaker 4 (38:36):
So it's this idea of make humanism an acceptable part
of corporate discourse, in.

Speaker 3 (38:40):
Other words, make it possible to be able to have
this kind of conversation inside your organization.

Speaker 5 (38:47):
Yeah. And it's interesting when you try to speak this
way how quickly people will sometimes slap your hand. I mean,
I've been in a few of those conversations in the
last let's say three weeks where someone was like, oh no, Melissa,
but ROI but stakeholders. But no, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope.

Speaker 4 (39:03):
You know it just like it.

Speaker 5 (39:06):
We cannot have a business discourse that does not allow
for the human beings that actually create organizations. I mean,
it's interesting. That's where the name of my company actually
comes from. Is until two thousand and eight, biologists saw
biomes and humans separately, so it would be like the tundra,
and you know, people live in the tundra, and an
anthrome was them acknowledging that when people live in an environment,

(39:29):
they change it so fundamentally that the name should change.
And I love that because that's like people that there's
no people and organizations, right, it's one. It's one anthrome.
And that's how with got to be thinking about it.
And then we're like, I don't understand why productivity doesn't increase, well,
because you couldn't understand what your organization was literally made of.

Speaker 4 (39:49):
I love the thought behind you.

Speaker 3 (39:51):
The name of your company's I appreciate that when there
really is thought to it. Ours is Gusta now because
we believe in Gusto and I speak Spanish and Portuguese,
and I got the benefit of being in those cultures.
They taught me about the power and the enlightening and
lightning agent of passion and connection and relational experience, et cetera.
So I really appreciate that yours also has a strong

(40:13):
thought behind it. Okay, there's so much more we could
talk about, but I would be remiss if I didn't
have you talk about your chapter on the intention of
workforce combating the Great Resignation by managing workforce populations more thoughtfully,
given that, you know, one of my books is called,
you know, the Great Revitalization, which is about combating the
Great Resignation.

Speaker 4 (40:33):
So let's talk about what's going on there. What do
you want to surface around that theme?

Speaker 5 (40:37):
Yeah, so I think the baseline data itself is super interesting,
and again this gets to a lot of the thematics
that you touch in your work that at any given
time and this baseline has been the same across kind
of a crazy long period of time. About twenty eight
percent of any given organization that's thinking about quitting. That's,
you know, to your point of two seconds ago about

(40:58):
the role of passion, Right, that's almost a third of
your workforce that's like, you know what, my passion's gone, right,
I'm about two seconds from being out the door. And
then the interesting thing is that percentage varies by different
you know, demographic groups, so you know, depending on what

(41:19):
you know, piece of the population you're from, you may
be even more alienated than that or you know, And
that to me is a fascinating concept because the Great resignation,
I think again it is one of those like water
coming out of the lagoon moments that shows the rocks.
I think it highlighted how there is this sort of
long run slow burn, you know, and again a lot

(41:39):
of us see in our work engagement crisis, it really is.
And then and just also that your your mileage may vary.
I think that's the other piece is that if you're
the leadership of an organization and you come from one
of the demographic groups that where the problems are not
as pronounced, you're like, okay, everything's fine, Sunny's guy's happy days,

(42:00):
and you don't necessarily until somebody kind of shows you
the data say well, you know, look x percent of
your coworkers from why group we're thinking about quitting every day.
Like that's that's something.

Speaker 4 (42:12):
To combat right, And if they're thinking about that, we
already know it's going to detract from their focus on
their productivity and their actual work. If that's what they're
thinking about, right, that's where their thoughts are, that's where
the energy is. So there are three groups that you.

Speaker 3 (42:26):
Identified in your book that I think are really important
for us to talk about so that our listeners and
viewers can start to consider how many of these groups
that they might have this impact in their organization. And
you talk about how these three categories are deeply dissatisfied
and potentially looking for other jobs.

Speaker 5 (42:42):
All the time.

Speaker 3 (42:43):
So one of them is groups who've experienced demographically based discrimination.
Can you talk a bit about what that means?

Speaker 5 (42:50):
Yeah, you know, it's an interesting one. This one really
came to life for me, not even so much from
the data. The data was already pretty bad, but when
I went out and did some interviews and folks are
speaking about once you've experienced kind of you've taken enough
kind of slaps across the face in terms of just
feeling like you've not been treated fairly. At that point,

(43:12):
it's like your whole tie to work is just it's
just it just loosens and so they said, you know,
you would you might need a raise of x percent
to lure away my other coworker who hasn't experienced what
I've experienced. But it only has to be half of
that for me because I'm just not as closely tied
to this organization. And it's interesting because it transcends the

(43:33):
actual organization. It might be that you haven't actually been
necessarily discriminated against at the particular company that you're at
at that moment. It's just the experience of discrimination kind
of builds up in your psyche and you don't bond
to organizations in the same way, which is a perfectly
rational response. That's what makes it kind of heartbreaking, is

(43:56):
you know, I see that, and I kind of go, yeah,
I get it. I get it that you wouldn't at
a certain point, you just wouldn't invest in any employer.
You wouldn't give your heart and soul in the same way.
And that's that's sort of it's it's sort of super sad,
and it's worth it's worth thinking about because a lot
of times people say, well, we're a good company, we
don't discriminate, But that's not the part that matters. It's

(44:19):
that individual's experience over their lifetime that they are bringing
into that job. And that's what you have to think about.

Speaker 4 (44:27):
Right, And I certainly look at you know that one
precious life.

Speaker 3 (44:29):
This is somebody's precious child who deserves dignity, love and respect,
and it's not feeling that.

Speaker 4 (44:35):
So it's related of course to the concepts of inclusive
conclusivity or.

Speaker 3 (44:39):
Not feeling like you belong or feeling passed over or
that nobody sees me and all these sort of things.

Speaker 4 (44:44):
So we say discrimination and sometimes people are.

Speaker 3 (44:47):
Like, oh no, wait, we don't do that, We don't
do that, right, but but it shows up so many
other and other very slight ways that you need you
are just not at all aware, but they serve they are.
So I think your word heartbreaking is exactly the right
word to use. Okay, So another group that you talk

(45:07):
about that is deeply dissatisfied and potentially looking for other
work are groups who are more loosely tied to their
employers by virtue of life cycle or role.

Speaker 4 (45:16):
Say more about that.

Speaker 5 (45:18):
Yeah, so you know, this is the other interesting thing
is you know, again we're employing people in more diverse ways,
and you know, and also you go through different permutations
and combinations of different kinds of jobs within the organization.
You know, you might be at a point in your
life where your life, you know, to your point about

(45:38):
there's all this other stuff in your life. You might
be at a point where your life's just a little
bit less about work. And again, we kind of apply
this very flat lens of engagement to folks. Sometimes we're like, well,
the bad people are less engaged. Well, no, I think
that this insight is all about there are a lot
of good reasons why you might not have that close

(46:00):
tie to your employer at that exact moment. But at
the same time, you know, it's a it's a watch
out for the employer.

Speaker 3 (46:09):
You know.

Speaker 5 (46:09):
I think you see some of it with for instance,
RTO mandates, Yes, really hitting you know, let's say, you know,
women with kids, and it was a group that was
again already not totally feeling it, and then you hit
them with that and that was it, and people are going, wow,
they just quit.

Speaker 4 (46:28):
Yeah, your camel's back.

Speaker 5 (46:30):
Yeah. Absolutely. When the thread is already freed, it doesn't
take a lot for it to snap. And I think
that's how we kind of have to think about these groups.
But you know, also again if you some of these
little things about little nuances, if your contractors all were
different badges in the cafeteria, you know, even little things
like that, you know they again you can't vault them

(46:52):
for having a different relationship to.

Speaker 3 (46:53):
The organization, right right, So, Ruth, because we're coming out
of time here, But the last group really quick guard
you talk about that really are feeling dissatisfied and potentially
looking for other jobs or groups and industries with long
standing structural issues that flare during the pandemic. Can you
briefly speak to that, and then we're going to talk
about maybe one strategy we can maybe address here.

Speaker 5 (47:13):
Yeah, well, if you're in retail, healthcare, any of these things,
we're kind of the model of really serving customers properly
in a way that also works for employees has had
a ton of friction. You're in one of those industries, right,
you are, again, you are at risk. I mean, if
I'm a hospital, I should be thinking about all my

(47:34):
nurses in that category, just as a for instance.

Speaker 3 (47:37):
Right and just you know, we know how expensive it
is to replace people, to train them and such. And
then there's of course what they have to say to
other people when they leave your organization. So just one
strategy that you talk about to be able to address
this issue here is figure out which employee groups are
burned out and which ones are fed up, and design
differentiated strategies to address each of these issues. It's probably

(47:59):
really obvious too if you just start looking at this
and you could just say a little bit about this strategy.

Speaker 5 (48:03):
Absolutely absolutely well. Some of it is that you have
to kind of engage with the concept of fed upness
and fed upness is there's a structural problem, you know,
so oh goodness, our software engineers keep quitting. Well, what
is it about how you design software engineering jobs? What
is it about how you manage software engineers? Right? You
see these little data pockets? Right then you've got to say, okay,

(48:26):
it's not you know, burnout is already bad, but this
might be fed up. This might be structural, and I
might need to make structural choices differently.

Speaker 3 (48:36):
Melissa, this has been amazing. It's gone by so incredibly fast,
but I want to give you the chance. You know,
the show's listening to by people around the world. Many
of them are tuning in because they want to become
better leaders themselves. They want to run their organizations in
a better fashion, or they're just trying to learn how
to be able to experience work in a better way
for themselves.

Speaker 4 (48:53):
What would you like to leave them with?

Speaker 5 (48:55):
Yeah, I would say I come back to the point
that we started with, honestly, the everyday experience answer work.
I think the closer you can get to the everyday
experience of work, that's that's where the real insights lie.
So just keep keep pressing on that simple thing.

Speaker 4 (49:10):
That is a fantastic, crisp way to close.

Speaker 5 (49:12):
Melissa.

Speaker 3 (49:12):
I'm really delighted to know you. I learned a lot
in your book. That's part of why I keep hosting
the show, and then I meet amazing humans.

Speaker 4 (49:18):
Like you, So thank you for coming on working on purpose.

Speaker 5 (49:21):
Well, thank you for having me. Frankly, I feel the
same way. I feel so excited to have connected with
you and the work you're doing, and I was really honored.

Speaker 4 (49:28):
To be on. I'm so glad. Thank you listeners and viewers.

Speaker 3 (49:31):
You are going to want to learn more about this
amazing human Melissa Swift, the work she's doing it and
throm insight in her new book Work here Now. So
there's a couple of ways you can find her. One
is by visiting her website. It's anthromeinsight dot com. Let
me spell that for you so anthrom is A N
T h R O M E and then insight I

(49:51):
N S I G h T so anthrominsight dot com.

Speaker 4 (49:55):
Or find Jo on LinkedIn. Last week, we missed the
live show you can always catch to be recorded podcast.
We are on air with Pritharage Childre talking.

Speaker 3 (50:03):
About his book The World Is Your Office, How work
from Anywhere boosts talent, productivity and innovation. Next week will
be on the air with Rich Davinnie talking about his
book Masters of Uncertainty, The Navy Seal Way to turn
Stress into success for you and your team. So you,
then and together, let's lean in and learn together how
to make workplaces that work for everyone and find ways

(50:25):
to do business that in a way that betters the world.

Speaker 4 (50:27):
Let's work on Purpose.

Speaker 2 (50:32):
We hope you've enjoyed this week's program. Be sure to
tune into Working on Purpose featuring your host, doctor Elise Cortes,
each week on W four C. Why Together, We'll create
a world where business operates conscientiously. Leadership inspires and passion
performance and employees are fulfilled in work that provides the
meaning and purpose. They crave see you there. Let's work

(50:52):
on purpose.