October 3, 2025 • 39 mins
Jobs don’t fail because people don’t work hard; they fail because the work isn’t designed to move the numbers that matter. That’s the uncomfortable truth we dig into with Scott Morris—longtime Chief People Officer, HR transformer, and founder of Propulsion AI—who makes a compelling case for designing roles around outcomes, not task lists.
Scott shares a fast history lesson on technological disruption—from calculators to spreadsheets to AI—and shows why the safest path is embracing new tools to change where we add value. Rather than fearing replacement, we can use AI to clarify expectations and accelerate the slowest parts of talent work. His framework helps managers define business outcomes first, then layer in key results, success measures, competencies, and skills. The payoff is visible across the talent lifecycle: recruiters source to impact, candidates self-select with eyes open, and trainers build programs that correlate to movement in KPIs like DSO, eNPS, conversion, and churn. Even “entry-level” roles transform when reframed from “push buttons” to “create experiences that drive loyalty,” unlocking better interviews, stronger motivation, and clearer coaching moments.
If you’re ready to make work more human and more effective, subscribe, share this with your HR and L&D peers, and leave a review with the one outcome you’ll measure differently this quarter.
Meet the Host
Jay Johnson works with people and organizations to empower teams, grow profits, and elevate leadership. He is a Co-Founder of Behavioral Elements®, a two-time TEDx speaker, and a designated Master Trainer by the Association for Talent Development. With a focus on behavioral intelligence, Jay has delivered transformational workshops to accelerate high-performance teams and cultures in more than 30 countries across four continents. For inquiries, contact jay@behavioralelements.com or connect below!
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jayjohnsonccg/
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jayjohnsonccg/
Speaker Website - https://jayjohnsonspeaks.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jay (00:38):
Welcome to this episode of the Talent Forge, where we are
shaping the future of trainingand development.
Today, my special guest isScott Morris.
Welcome to the show, Scott.
Hey Jay, how are you?
Thank you so much for theinvite.
Scott (00:51):
It's great to be here with you.
Jay (00:53):
Glad to have you.
And uh I think this is going tobe a really interesting topic,
mixing a little bit of AI withthe concepts of training,
retention, onboarding, andgetting the right people in the
right seats.
So why don't you tell theaudience a little bit about
yourself and how you got intothis space?
Scott (01:08):
So I've been in the profession of people operations
HR for about 25 years, about 20of those in a C-level role,
organizations as large as15,000, organizations as small
as about 250.
I actually came out of learningand development.
That was my first sort of forayuh into it.
And my first HR job, funnyenough, was as a head of HR.
(01:30):
Um, so a little bit of a sortof weird path, but I've been an
entrepreneur a couple of timesover.
I've been a partner in aconsulting firm where we worked
on HR transformation and uhtechnical transformation for
large governmentalorganizations.
Um sort of a sort of a weirdand different path, but uh but a
good one in terms of theexperience it's provided.
Jay (01:51):
Well, I was gonna say, you know, we don't often hear
somebody from the learning anddevelopment world getting into
the more HR or the technicalfocused HR.
How is that transition for you?
Scott (02:01):
Well, you know, it it was a while ago, but um, but good.
And I actually think morelearning and development people
um should be at higher levels inHR organizations.
Because when you think aboutit, I mean, there's there's two
different ways that you canthink about the practice of
people ops.
And and you know, both of themare necessary.
I certainly have a bent towardone rather than the other, but
(02:24):
one of them is a compliancelens.
And, you know, and that'snecessary.
Risk management is necessary.
Not my bent, but uh, but Irecognize its purpose.
The other is workforcedevelopment and productivity.
And, you know, learning anddevelopment folks and coaches,
they think about that naturally.
And so I think that's why Imake the comment that I wish
(02:45):
more learning and developmentpeople had more senior roles in
in HR.
I love that, Scott.
Jay (02:50):
And I'm I'm actually going to dig in on that because one of
the things that we're hearing,and you know, there's this sort
of shift, this mentality shiftinside of HR, bringing the human
back to human resources.
But one of the issues is, andthis seems to be a little bit of
a stumbling block or a barrier,is that HR's function, at least
(03:11):
one of the HR functions, issomething like compliance, risk,
and protecting theorganization.
How can we balance that and bea balanced product where yes, we
are protecting theorganization, but also that
we're there to protect the humanresources, the actual people
that are working?
(03:32):
Because it seems to be thatsometimes those might be at odds
with each other.
And when somebody gets calleddown to HR's office, generally
they're not like, yes, I'mgetting called down because they
have my back.
Usually it's like, oh God, I'mscrewed up.
And, you know, they become theexecutioner's wing.
So how do we balance somethinglike that sort of pro-learning,
(03:54):
that pro-development, thatpro-employee, but also still
maintain that balance ofprotecting the organization?
Scott (04:01):
I mean, it's it's an easy thing to say and a hard thing
to execute, but it all comesdown to leadership, just like
anything else.
Think about any other aspect ofan organization where a balance
is necessary.
Well, who would we look to toprovide that balance?
And the answer is it's theperson that's at the head of
that organization.
And so I think as more chiefpeople officers, more CHROs are
(04:22):
recognizing that, you know, theyneed smart compliance people
around them, but that should notbe the aspect that's driving
the ship.
The the actual aspect hasnothing to do with HR.
It it, you know, I chief peopleofficers need to have a
business mentality, and theyneed to be thinking about what
levers are moving in thebusiness.
And of course, if you were aCFO, you would be thinking about
(04:42):
moving those levers from afinance perspective.
We should be thinking aboutmoving those same levers, but
with human assets rather thanphysical and financial assets.
So I think the balance comesfrom the mentality of the person
who is steering that ship.
And and and period, I thinkfull stop on that.
Jay (05:01):
Yeah, I really like that.
And I think that kind of goesinto some of our other
discussions that we've had onthis show about having sort of a
more business mindset from thattalent development side of
things, right?
Like when we think abouttraining, we often think like,
oh, I'm doing a service for theemployees.
And but what's the businessobjective?
What's the return oninvestment?
(05:22):
Because talent development canbe expensive for an
organization.
And when we're putting thatmoney into it, it's got to be
achieving some level of businessobjective for it to be
sustainable, for it to not be aluxury, or for it to be taken
seriously.
So I really love your approachon that.
Scott (05:38):
You know, I think anybody who's serious about the work
needs to go back, if theyhaven't in a while, and read
Donald Kirkpatrick's The FourLevels, because that, you know,
he so long ago, and I actuallyhad the honor of meeting him and
talking with him about thebook, but you think about what
level four is, it's the businessimpact.
And that should be the thingthat's driving all of us,
(05:59):
whether we're talking about roledesign or whether we're talking
about, you know, a trainingintervention, it's all in
service of did the numbersactually move?
Jay (06:07):
Yep.
Yep.
I love that.
And if you are one of our ATDfollowers, you definitely know
who Kirkpatrick is.
If you don't know who that is,look it up because it is a
powerful, powerful methodologyto be thinking about business uh
impact.
So, Scott, I want to dig inbecause you are somebody that
has experience in the AI world.
(06:29):
And I know that that'sterrifying and also exciting for
a lot of our trainers, coaches,HR practitioners that are on
here.
And when we think about it,it's you know, that that that
fear is, oh, AI is gonna replaceus.
And the excitement part of itis, okay, well, it can actually
augment us or supplement us orimprove us.
(06:51):
So uh let's start with sort ofa general concept of AI in the
world of human resources, talentdevelopment, et cetera.
What are your thoughts?
What are the trends that you'reseeing?
And how might we think aboutthis maybe a little differently,
or how might we shape this forour future?
Scott (07:09):
Let's break this down, this question, Jay, down into a
couple of different pieces.
First, let me do just a quickhistory lesson because when
radical change happens, andwe're in a period of radical
change right now, when thathappens, it's easy to become
fearful and to try and lock downinto the things that we've
known.
It's a it's a human trait.
If if you know members of theaudience are feeling that right
(07:32):
now, I think that's completelynormal.
But if you go back, look at goback to 1967, believe it or not,
right?
The uh the introduction of thecalculator by Texas Instruments
that seems today like such alike calculator is like it's on
my phone, right?
But if you went back to 1967,this was a big radical change.
And at the time, there was thisfear that bookkeepers would be
(07:55):
put out of business by theintroduction of this calculator.
And it didn't happen.
Now, fast forward to 1983 whenthe Lotus Lotus 123 came out,
the a precursor to what most ofus know today as Microsoft
Excel, made by a differentcompany, spreadsheet concept.
And again, there was this hugefear that now financial
(08:16):
professionals were going to bereplaced.
But what actually happened wasthey started to add value
differently.
And those that were embracingthat technology first were the
safest because they stoppeddelivering value through
calculations, but they starteddelivering value through
analysis and strategy.
(08:37):
And I think we're seeing thesame thing today, where there
are aspects that artificialintelligence and its various
subsets, machine learning andvision and other things.
There are aspects of what we dotoday that are simply done
better by technology.
But there are aspects thattechnology can't do.
(08:57):
I personally don't think thatAI or any technology is going to
take anyone's job.
But I do believe that peoplewho embrace technology are going
to take the jobs of those whodon't.
That's the transformation thatwe're going to see.
And I think that's an importantgrounding for the question that
you're asking.
Jay (09:14):
Well, and I think that's so important.
If you look at any of likeDaniel Coyle's research on
organizational culture,connection is one of the biggest
things that people are lookingfor.
And no matter what level of AIis doing tasks, it's not going
to create.
I guess maybe I have seen someof the articles of how somebody
fell in love with AI, but thatseems few and far between.
(09:34):
Let's hope that that's not thenorm in the future.
But that connective piece andbeing able to actually spend
energy and time really buildingrelationships.
Imagine if you were able totake all those tasks, kind of
set them aside, they were donereally well with AI.
How much time would you have tobe able to invest in just
sitting and having aconversation to make somebody
(09:57):
feel valued, psychologicallysafe, wanted, and needed within
their organization, or evenguiding them in a way?
So I love that you bring thatup.
I think the same way.
I'm in I've I've embraced AI.
I'm still learning.
So let's learn a little bitmore.
One of the things, one of thebig spaces that you are uh an
(10:17):
expert in is obviously theacquisition, the talent
acquisition side.
So we we do focus more on thetalent development, but I think
it's so important that you getthe right people.
And one of the things that youdo is utilize AI to help with,
say, creating a job descriptionor rethinking the job
description.
Let's start there.
Give us a quick overview, andthen we're gonna dig in deeper.
Scott (10:41):
Yeah, you've, Jay, you've said it really, really well.
I want to add one layer ofnuance to that, and that is that
talent acquisition and talentmanagement at learning and
development writ large havetheir feet in kind of the same
pond, right?
And it's not the jobdescription per se.
The document is important, butit's what underlies that
(11:03):
document that is massivelyimportant, and that is the
design of the job.
So I run a company called, asyou know, Propulsion AI.
And one of the things thatwe've done is utilized
artificial intelligence tocreate a guided process for
managers that effectivelyinterviews them about a role
that they want on their team.
That could be a role thatthey're hiring from the outside
(11:25):
or a role that they're pivotingthat's already on their team, or
maybe somebody's coming in froma different division and
they're going to be in this newgroup.
That manager needs to thinkthrough the design of that role.
Now, here's a starting point.
Salary is an investment.
And you, as the investor, andyou're not just investing when
you when you're talking aboutpeople, we're not just investing
(11:47):
salary, we're investinglearning and development time,
personal growth time, right?
There are a bunch ofinvestments that were were are
being made.
But that those investments arejust that.
And as the investor, we shouldbe expecting a return.
And so our mindset when westart out, and whether you are a
learning and development personor a coach or a talent
(12:10):
acquisition professional, themindset should be the same.
What is the outcome that weneed accomplished?
Not what is the task?
This is what's most tangibleand most easy for most of us is
well, I need you to do this.
And I'll give you a practicalexample.
If we were gonna hire anaccountant, and a totally
reasonable duty that most peoplewould write in is follow up on
(12:33):
delinquent accounts.
But you have to ask yourselfwhy?
What's the point of that?
Is it that we want to seepeople come in every day and sit
at a desk and write emails andmake phone calls and have a lot
of activity?
If they do all of that stuffand nothing happens, has that
activity really created right?
What's the value of it?
(12:54):
So following up on Delink andthe other.
Jay (12:56):
And to that point, Scott, in reality, if I just want
somebody to harass anyoutstanding things, I don't need
an accountant, I need an admin.
And that's probably a lot lessexpensive than, say, an
accountant who has a particularset of skills or anything else.
Am I on the right track withthat thinking?
Scott (13:15):
I I think you are.
I would take it one step beyondthat for the audience, and that
is that what you really want,the the following up on the
delinquencies, that is a meansto an end.
And in accounting, the end is anumber called days outstanding.
It is a measure of efficiencyabout how fast the organization
can collect.
That's the number that you wantmoved.
(13:37):
Now, most of us can touch thetangible activity of follow-up.
And it's just a little bitharder to think through what
does that follow-up produce?
That's the outcome.
But once I understand thatthat's the outcome, now I say to
that person in the role, hey,your job is to move days
outstanding from this numberwhere it is today to this number
(13:58):
where we need it to betomorrow.
And that is massively importantto our business.
Now think about what I've donefor them.
I have given themaccountability for something
that is really critical to thefunctioning of the organization.
That is a different propositionthan giving them a task.
I am trusting them to become anowner.
This is where our product helpsdraw this out of the manager's
(14:21):
head, this harder-to-touch sortof outcomes-focused stuff.
And then around that builds keyperformance indicators, key
results, the actual measurementsthat need to happen,
competencies that are necessaryto deliver on that, skills that
underlie the whole thing.
And this is where talentacquisition and talent
management share.
Because now that I have all ofthis out of my head, and by the
(14:44):
way, the platform does all ofthe writing for you as well:
performance-based jobdescription, SEO-optimized job
posting, social media content,interviewer guides.
But once I have the design ofthat role, now not only are my
recruiters better equipped to gofind the right person to put
into that job, but my learningand development people are in a
better spot to say, here are thecompetencies and skills you
(15:05):
have today, here are the onesthat we're going to build, and
develop learning plans that takethat person on a growth path.
And we know that from work thatLinkedIn did that 94% of
employees say they will staylonger in an organization if
that organization has adefinitive plan for their
growth.
Jay (15:24):
Not only that, I'm I'm the thing you you hooked me on is
you have created sort of aconcept here of helping a
manager identify how this personcreates value for the
organization?
Because we all want to feelvalued at work, we want to be
seen, we want our work to beimportant.
Nobody wants to be the personjust sitting there hacking away
(15:46):
at a button and not know that atthe other end it's actually
doing something.
So uh even by doing that andkind of linking that key
performance indicator tobusiness outcomes or to value
proposition for theorganization, it seems to me
that you're gonna get somecandidates highly motivated
right from the very beginning,which is one of the things that
(16:08):
LND does try to do is try tokeep people motivated and set
the expectations and so on andso forth.
So it's almost like you'reshorts short-circuiting that
whole process right up front.
What does that look like?
Uh what does that look like, Iguess, say for give me an
example of this, if if you can,Scott.
Scott (16:28):
Well, I I beyond the sort of accountant example.
I mean, I can repeat thatexample for you, but here's I
think what we want to happen inthe organization.
We want to say, look, you are,and I'll go back to the
accountant for just one second.
You're accountable for daysoutstanding.
Your job is to move the numberfrom here to here.
Now, I'm gonna have aone-on-one with that person, and
(16:50):
maybe the number hasn't moved.
And so they're gonna say, Well,I'm following up on all the
counts.
And I'm gonna say, okay, great,what else?
Now, immediately what I'm doingis I'm not solving the problem
for them.
What I, as the as the boss,what I'm saying is, here's the
outcome, here's the end pointthat we have to get here to.
And I want to help you to becreative about how you're gonna
(17:12):
solve that.
In the ideal case, I want thatperson coming back to me and
saying, Scott, hold up.
You're asking me to do thesethings.
But if this is really what youwant, if this is the outcome you
want, shouldn't I be doingthese?
And as the boss, I want to slapmy head and go, yeah, oh, of
course, I hadn't even thoughtabout that, right?
You're on the front lines everyday.
Yes, do that.
Move the number though.
(17:32):
We want to put people in aposition where they are creative
about solving the problem.
What's non-negotiable for me asa boss is that's the outcome.
What's totally negotiable andshould be open to
experimentation and invention isthe path we take to get there.
And I want the person on thefront line to come back to me
and say, well, how about if Itried this?
How about if I do this?
(17:53):
And I want to be able to say,yes, let's try that.
And we'll know it if thatnumber moves.
Jay (17:59):
And that's exactly what I was looking for.
You're helping to establish thewhat and the why, and then
allowing the space for theperson being hired to do the
how.
And I think that that's reallya critical aspect because when
we think about expectations orsetting, you know, setting the
goals or markers, uh, it reallydoes come back to what is the
(18:21):
end result?
I can send out 25 sales emailsevery single day, but if I never
get a sale, it doesn't meananything.
It really doesn't have anyimpact.
So, from a trainingperspective, and let's get let's
go to that for a minute,because you mentioned it just
briefly with the L and D side.
All right, we know what theoutcomes are.
How can we, as maybe an LDdepartment or a training
(18:43):
department, you know, sort oflook at that and say, these are
the KPIs, these are what we'regoing for.
How might an L and D departmentmake the determination of this
is the competencies?
Is there any way that we shouldbe thinking about that as
trainers or LD people?
Scott (18:58):
I that's a hard question for me to answer, Jay, as an
abstract, because I think thenuance of the individual
situation is going to matterhugely.
However, if you look at thedynamic that I just set up
between that boss and that thatdirect report, where the direct
report is trying things.
And when when you when yousaid, you know, I send 25 sales
emails every day, but nothing'shappening, right?
(19:20):
Einstein said the defend thedefinition of insanity is doing
the same thing over and over andexpecting different results,
right?
So, what do we want people todo?
We want them to recognize thattactic isn't working.
My job is not that tactic.
My job is the outcome.
The tactic is a means togetting there, and it might be
(19:41):
one of many.
So now what do I have to do?
I have to engage in a creativeprocess.
And I think that's in part ananswer to your question about
LD.
L and D should be looking atthat and saying, okay, so this
new mindset says the outcome isthe job, the tactics are
experimental.
What do people need in order todo a better job of
experimenting?
(20:01):
Well, they need creativity,they need resilience, they need
X, Y, Z, whatever.
That's thinking.
Right.
That becomes now informationthat should fund the LD
enterprise rather than justlooking at technical skill,
which is important.
We need to look at all of thethings that surround, you know,
we got to take that hill, andthe way that we're doing it
(20:24):
isn't working.
So what do we have to do?
And I think you can take thatto just about everything.
And I'll give you anotherexample here, and I think it's
important because people likeit's easy to write this off as
this works for more seniorwhite-collar work, and it
doesn't work for anything else.
But we, as a part of what wedid at Propulsion AI, I went to
Burger King's website and Igrabbed a job description, which
(20:46):
if you go to their website,they have the job descriptions
for their team members on theirwebsite.
And I pulled one for a teammember off, and not
surprisingly, it read like anobituary.
Don't steal, get the food out,hot, blah, blah, blah, blah,
blah.
Right.
But what is the purpose of allof that?
So we ran it through our systemand we came out with a
completely differentoutcomes-focused job description
(21:07):
for a person standing at thecounter at Burger King.
You know what responsibilitynumber one was?
Create an experience forcustomers that drives repeat
business and loyalty to thisrestaurant.
Now, if I say your job is standat the counter, cash register,
don't steal and push thebuttons, how excited are you to
come to work?
But if I say you are in thecustomer service, you're in the
(21:28):
customer experience business,not just service, but the
experience, right?
Not only do I open myself,because it's really hard to
interview for don't steal right,objectively, right?
But if the job is create anexperience for people, now I can
apply behavior-basedinterviewing to look at people's
past experiences and try tomatch them to what I'm doing in
(21:51):
the restaurant.
So the entire situationchanges, and all I had to do was
shift my perspective away froma task and on to an outcome that
matters to my business.
Jay (22:02):
So let's let's play with that.
Let's go a little bit deeperhere because I do think that
this is one of the things whereif you're in an LD space or if
you're a trainer or coach, a lotof times onboarding is your
first set of training, or youhave to bring somebody into a
space and kind of get them.
One of the things, and I wantyou to dig deep on this.
You're you're definitely theexpert in this in this space.
(22:24):
You see a job description outthere, you see all the
qualifications, you see all thetasks.
The person gets hired, they'rein there for a week, they start
getting onboarded, and there'ssome disconnect in between that
job description and what they'reactually doing.
And and I had I had shared thiswith you before, but there's an
(22:44):
HBR Harvard Business Reviewarticle that talks about
reframing the job description.
It's been around, it's the samesince like whatever, and that
causes like padding of resumesand lying in interviews, or at
least embellishing ininterviews.
I'm not going to call itstraight up lying, but
embellishing in interviews.
And then when people get intothe position, they're like,
okay, this isn't what Iexpected, and they leave, or
(23:06):
that this isn't what I expected,and they're unhappy and they
quietly quit.
Can you talk about how thisprocess is playing out or what
some of the things that you'reseeing in between that job
description, hiring, and anonboarding space?
Scott (23:20):
This is why we created the platform that we created in
Propulsion AI.
Um, Forbes followed 20,000 newhires.
And Jay, you know what?
46% of them failed in theirfirst 18 months.
That's almost half.
Yep.
And in part, it's becausemanagers are not thinking
through the roles.
And if you're a coach, you'regonna hear this a lot.
(23:43):
Oh, I don't have time to dothat.
It's why we made it reallyfast.
Most of the recruiters and theHR business partners that we
talked to as we were developingthe Propulsion AI platform told
us that it legitimately takesthem four to six hours to get
the design out of the manager'shead, write all of the
collateral, get it out on theweb.
Our platform does this in aslittle as 15 minutes.
(24:04):
But if you don't do that,you're making it up as you go.
And this is where likeemployment processes, hiring
processes take months becausewe're working out what we want
the job to do in the interviewprocess.
And it's why to the point youjust made a second ago, when we
get people in, they say the jobthat I thought I was being hired
(24:26):
for isn't the job they'reasking me to do.
And in the balance of all ofthis are the results that are
important to the organization.
So our thought is spend thetime of a coffee break up front
and create the design of therole that really is going to
have impact to your business,and then hand off to your team
and let them work confidently.
(24:47):
The recruiters and sourcers aregonna be happier and faster and
more productive.
The learning and developmentpeople, I mean, to your point
about onboarding, if I'm alearning and development person
and I'm thinking about trying toparticipate in this onboarding
process, the most importantthing coming out of the
employment process are what arethe outcomes and what are the
measurable results?
(25:07):
Because then I have to thinkabout, okay, you may not have
come in with all of thecompetencies and skills that we
needed.
So let's start to develop thatlearning plan to help grow what
your, you know, your base isright now.
But if those are unclear, or ifthe outcomes that I'm working
to are unclear, or for goshsakes, if the measurements, I
(25:28):
need days outstanding move fromthis number to this number, I
need employee net promoter scoreto move from 50 to 75, right?
If those numbers are unclear,onboarding is just social
onboarding.
There's no business connectionto it.
Jay (25:41):
Well, and I think that that's, you know, finally an
answer to something like otherduties as assigned, you know,
and and when we think aboutthat, is that's the catch-all
that most organizations include.
Recognize, okay, I haven'treally, as you said, haven't
really thought out what are theactual dynamics of this role or
(26:02):
dynamics of this job.
But it seems to me, Scott, andhelp me understand this.
It seems to me that when we'reable to establish sort of that
business objective, thatconnection, that understanding,
it seems to me it might even beeasier for us to justify salary
positions or justify, hey, weneed a new person because here's
where we're currently at on thenet promoter score.
(26:25):
This is what we want to hirefor, and getting a 50 to a 75
would increase our revenue by X,Y, and Z, right?
Like whenever we're asking forsomething, we've got to be able
to show I'm investing, as yousaid, this is the return on
investment.
Seems to me that that processwould be a little easier if we
were able to quantify what theactual business impact is.
(26:47):
And that's something that 100%.
Scott (26:51):
100%.
That's why we're such big fansof starting with the business
outcome, because it anchorseverything.
If if you know, if my job is toincrease month over month
revenue by 20% and I'm at amillion dollars and I'm
successful, well, I'm gonna beat 1.2 million every single
month, which means on anannualized basis, uh, you know,
(27:13):
I'm gonna be what $2.4 millionmore revenue for that year than
I was before.
And so when you think aboutwhat are you gonna pay me to do
that?
$150,000?
So you paid me $150, even grossit up, call it $175 with
benefits, and I return $2.4million.
That kind of thinking isexactly what we want from every
(27:36):
position in the organization.
And that's why it's soimportant to start with what's
the business outcome?
You know, what's the businessresult that I need?
What are the outcomes that getme to that business result?
What are the success measuresthat are gonna help me to
understand whether I'm movingcloser to or farther away to
from from those outcomes?
And then what are thecompetencies and skills that I
(27:58):
need in order to perform thatwork well?
That's a that's complete.
Jay (28:02):
And I like that because once we start with that, and I'm
gonna, you know, kind of tailthis off and let's think about
the entire employee life cycle,right?
Like, so we we get this person,they know what they they know
what highways they're on, theyknow what impacts they need to
create, they're onboarded, ourtrainers, our coaches, they're
able to kind of support them ingetting the competencies that
(28:23):
they need.
Let's talk about what happenswhen you get to performance
evaluation time or when you getto that performance review time.
Like, how does this impact thatspace?
It seems pretty intuitive, butI'd love to hear you speak on
that as well.
Scott (28:34):
I've coached a lot of managers over 25 years, and a
lot of it has been onperformance management and and
you know helping employees tobecome more productive.
And I've gotten asked onequestion, I think more than
anything else.
And it usually happens aroundperformance eval time, which is
the wrong time, by the way, toask the question, but it is the
(28:55):
time that it gets asked.
And that is, Scott, what wordscan I use to make this
performance review go easily?
Jay (29:02):
Let me answer is you can't.
Okay, so I'm with you on this,and literally, so this is
something that I did an analysisof a large organization that
was investing into an external,uh, external training program
that was like, think likeLinkedIn learning.
And it was all these coursesand everything else like that.
And I was like, well, how'sthat working out for you?
(29:23):
And they were like, I don'tknow.
I was like, I'm gonna take onebet here that the proactive
nature of what you're askingyour people to do with the
amount of time and energy, thatthere's two times in this entire
cycle that people are gonna goto this platform and there's one
course that they're looking,and it's difficult
conversations, and it's gonnahappen at performance evaluation
(29:44):
and raise consideration time.
Sure enough, I mean spot onwith that behavioral analysis.
So, yes, thank you.
You crushed that.
Keep going.
Sorry, I just had to throw thatin there with you.
Scott (29:58):
No, I mean, well, I think you and I are aligned in our
philosophy about these things.
So it actually makes me feelgood to hear you say those
things.
The fact is, like again, backto the concept of investment.
If I came to you and I said,Jay, I have an investment, I
want you to give me $50,000.
What would be the next questionthat you would ask?
Jay (30:18):
Okay, so if I'm giving you $50,000, what is the expectation
or what is the outcome that I'mgonna get in return for that?
Scott (30:25):
100%.
And so I'm gonna say, Jay, I'mgonna 3X your money.
What's the next question you'regonna ask me?
How fast?
100%, right?
And so now, so I tell you it'sgonna To happen in a year.
And you're going to be able towatch that grow.
So we start out in January, weget to the end of January.
What's the question that youasked me at the end of January?
(30:46):
How are we doing, Scott?
Exactly right.
And it's the same questionyou're going to ask at the end
of February, March, April, May,et cetera, right?
So why is it that that logic,which is so plain to most of us
when it comes to investing, isnot the mindset that we have
when it comes to our employees?
This is where propulsion helps,right?
We get the design of that roleright.
(31:06):
And the design of that rolesays these are the key results
that we have you in place togenerate.
And so now when we sit down fora one-on-one, it becomes a and
obviously there are multiplepieces to this, but piece number
one is how are you doing on theresults that we agreed you
would get?
(31:27):
Because if we say, look, I'mgoing to move, I'm a chief
people officer, or I was.
So ENPS was always a KPI forme, a key performance indicator.
And let's say that I, you know,the CEO had said to me, we're
at an ENPS employee net promoterscore of 50, and I need you to
get it to 65.
Is it reasonable to believethat that's going to happen all
(31:48):
at once?
Probably not.
But we do quarterly surveys.
So if I'm at 50 and I need toget to 65, it's a 15-point move.
At the end of the firstquarter, I should have 15
divided by four or somesemblance of that, right?
We should be able to see ittracking in the right direction.
So when I sit down for aone-on-one with my boss, the
first thing he should say is, orshe, how are you doing against
(32:11):
the results?
And I should have aconversation about what I've
done and what kind of resultsI've seen, and you know, and and
and whether those are positiveor negative, right?
The next aspect of that is howare you showing up?
Because it's not enough to getthe results.
You have to get them and behavein a way that grows the whole,
(32:32):
not just accomplishes your peryour personal agenda.
So it's how are you doingagainst your results?
How are you showing up in termsof behaviors that we need to
see and the value, the behaviorsthat we value in the
organization?
Next is let's talk about likewhere you're going from here.
How, how are we growing you?
(32:52):
Because my boss might say,Scott, you are knocking it out
of the park on beingresults-oriented, but you're not
so good on communication.
So let's think about how we'regoing to grow that competency
and help you develop theunderlying skills to make you a
better communicator.
And then the last piece, and Ithink that's on the boss 100%,
(33:12):
is as a boss, how do I need toshow up differently to help you
be accountable and get theresults and show up with the
behaviors that we've beentalking about?
And I think that's a completeperformance review.
And you don't need words to dothat.
Jay (33:28):
What is the barriers?
What is stopping us?
Was the 65 that we thought wasrealistic?
Show me or demonstrate to mewhy that's not possible or
what's slowing that down, or howwhat is a realistic?
So all of those things I thinkcan come in.
And it's brilliant.
I really I love this because Ithink, you know, I definitely
lean into Brene Brown.
(33:49):
Clear is kind, unclear isunkind.
And when we don't have clearobjectives, this is literally
why we switch from goals toobjectives and key results as a
planning and strategy platform.
Um, so if you're not familiarwith that, check out measure
what matters.
I love that as kind of astarting point for it.
Uh, but that that is ourcompany is literally built on
(34:12):
objectives and key results atthis point in time because
exactly what you're saying.
If we're not hitting those keyresults, then what does it
matter that we're putting allthis time, energy, effort in?
Scott (34:22):
So and and all of that, Jay, it all comes back to the
design of the role.
If you get that piece right,there's no guarantees in
anything, right?
You still have to get a bunchof other things right.
But if you get that pieceright, it opens the door to
almost everything else thatwe've been talking about.
But if you get that piecewrong, everything else winds up
being hard.
And then you come to somebodylike me and you say, Scott, what
(34:44):
are the words that I can use toget myself out of this pain
called a performance review?
And everybody's life ishorrible, the employees and
yours.
So I love this.
Jay (34:54):
I I think that for our trainers, our coaches, our
managers, our HR people outthere really thinking about what
is the business objectives,which is something it's a
reoccurring theme, and this isjust another vehicle for us to
get there.
You've got to be thinking aboutthe business objectives.
So I really appreciateeverything that you're saying
here today because I do thinkit's so important.
(35:15):
And even as a learning, one ofthe biggest things that I teach
trainers, you have to have clearobjectives that is measurable
by the time that they you hitthe end of the training.
It seems like if we start withthis up front, gives them the
opportunity to say, okay, theobjective is this.
This is the measurement ofperformance for this person, and
(35:36):
this is how we're going to getthem there.
So it makes that return oninvestment of L and D even
easier when we know what thegoal is from the onset.
Scott (35:43):
And Jay, if I could just add one friendly amendment,
because you know I'm I'm 100%supportive of that mentality
that you just described.
But there is a trap in that,and we have to be careful.
Measuring activity is not asvalue as valuable as measuring
the business outcome, right?
What like how like how manyaccounts did I follow up on is
(36:04):
not the right measurement.
Did Day's outstanding move isthe right measurement?
Jay (36:09):
Yeah, no, and I 1000% agree with that.
So, and when we're thinkingabout it from an LD perspective,
part of it, part of it is beingable to track the appropriate
behaviors so we know thesebehaviors are not leading to the
objective result or whateverthose results are.
So, yeah, I definitely on thesame page, but I love the
(36:31):
clarification because I agree itis the result, not necessarily
the task.
So, Scott, if our audiencewanted to get in touch with you,
how would they connect withyou?
Scott (36:43):
So, LinkedIn is a great way.
You can get me at LinkedIn.comslash in slash m Scott M.
That's my profile on LinkedIn.
And you can find propulsionaion the web www.getpropulsion.ai.
Get propulsion.ai.
And you know what, Jay?
Our biggest use case right now,the biggest way that we are
(37:07):
finding inroads into neworganizations is coaches and HR
professionals and talentprofessionals who are trying
propulsion AI and then taking itto their leadership and say,
look at how much easier ourlives would be if we used this
platform.
You can get on right nowwithout a credit card.
You can try the platform forfree.
(37:28):
We do that intentionallybecause I strongly believe once
people try it, they're gonnawant to take it to their leaders
and they're gonna adopt it asan organization.
And I think this platformchanges organizational life.
Jay (37:40):
I love it, Scott.
Thank you for your insights,for your time.
We'll make sure that thoselinks are in the show notes.
So, audience, if you want tocheck that out, again, it's
getpropulsion.ai, and we'll makesure that your LinkedIn handle
is available as well.
So thank you for your time andenergy today.
I think this has really beenenlightening of how we can be
thinking about AI in the talentdevelopment space.
(38:02):
And I really appreciate it,Scott.
Scott (38:04):
Jay, I've I've really looked forward to being on with
you, and I'm super glad I washere.
I'm honored by the invite.
Thanks for having me.
Jay (38:11):
And uh thank you, audience, for tuning into this episode of
The Talent Forge, where we areshaping the future of training
and development.
Welcome to this episode of the Talent Forge, where we are
shaping the future of trainingand development.
Today, my special guest isScott Morris.
Welcome to the show, Scott.
Hey Jay, how are you?
Thank you so much for theinvite.
Scott (00:51):
It's great to be here with you.
Jay (00:53):
Glad to have you.
And uh I think this is going tobe a really interesting topic,
mixing a little bit of AI withthe concepts of training,
retention, onboarding, andgetting the right people in the
right seats.
So why don't you tell theaudience a little bit about
yourself and how you got intothis space?
Scott (01:08):
So I've been in the profession of people operations
HR for about 25 years, about 20of those in a C-level role,
organizations as large as15,000, organizations as small
as about 250.
I actually came out of learningand development.
That was my first sort of forayuh into it.
And my first HR job, funnyenough, was as a head of HR.
(01:30):
Um, so a little bit of a sortof weird path, but I've been an
entrepreneur a couple of timesover.
I've been a partner in aconsulting firm where we worked
on HR transformation and uhtechnical transformation for
large governmentalorganizations.
Um sort of a sort of a weirdand different path, but uh but a
good one in terms of theexperience it's provided.
Jay (01:51):
Well, I was gonna say, you know, we don't often hear
somebody from the learning anddevelopment world getting into
the more HR or the technicalfocused HR.
How is that transition for you?
Scott (02:01):
Well, you know, it it was a while ago, but um, but good.
And I actually think morelearning and development people
um should be at higher levels inHR organizations.
Because when you think aboutit, I mean, there's there's two
different ways that you canthink about the practice of
people ops.
And and you know, both of themare necessary.
I certainly have a bent towardone rather than the other, but
(02:24):
one of them is a compliancelens.
And, you know, and that'snecessary.
Risk management is necessary.
Not my bent, but uh, but Irecognize its purpose.
The other is workforcedevelopment and productivity.
And, you know, learning anddevelopment folks and coaches,
they think about that naturally.
And so I think that's why Imake the comment that I wish
(02:45):
more learning and developmentpeople had more senior roles in
in HR.
I love that, Scott.
Jay (02:50):
And I'm I'm actually going to dig in on that because one of
the things that we're hearing,and you know, there's this sort
of shift, this mentality shiftinside of HR, bringing the human
back to human resources.
But one of the issues is, andthis seems to be a little bit of
a stumbling block or a barrier,is that HR's function, at least
(03:11):
one of the HR functions, issomething like compliance, risk,
and protecting theorganization.
How can we balance that and bea balanced product where yes, we
are protecting theorganization, but also that
we're there to protect the humanresources, the actual people
that are working?
(03:32):
Because it seems to be thatsometimes those might be at odds
with each other.
And when somebody gets calleddown to HR's office, generally
they're not like, yes, I'mgetting called down because they
have my back.
Usually it's like, oh God, I'mscrewed up.
And, you know, they become theexecutioner's wing.
So how do we balance somethinglike that sort of pro-learning,
(03:54):
that pro-development, thatpro-employee, but also still
maintain that balance ofprotecting the organization?
Scott (04:01):
I mean, it's it's an easy thing to say and a hard thing
to execute, but it all comesdown to leadership, just like
anything else.
Think about any other aspect ofan organization where a balance
is necessary.
Well, who would we look to toprovide that balance?
And the answer is it's theperson that's at the head of
that organization.
And so I think as more chiefpeople officers, more CHROs are
(04:22):
recognizing that, you know, theyneed smart compliance people
around them, but that should notbe the aspect that's driving
the ship.
The the actual aspect hasnothing to do with HR.
It it, you know, I chief peopleofficers need to have a
business mentality, and theyneed to be thinking about what
levers are moving in thebusiness.
And of course, if you were aCFO, you would be thinking about
(04:42):
moving those levers from afinance perspective.
We should be thinking aboutmoving those same levers, but
with human assets rather thanphysical and financial assets.
So I think the balance comesfrom the mentality of the person
who is steering that ship.
And and and period, I thinkfull stop on that.
Jay (05:01):
Yeah, I really like that.
And I think that kind of goesinto some of our other
discussions that we've had onthis show about having sort of a
more business mindset from thattalent development side of
things, right?
Like when we think abouttraining, we often think like,
oh, I'm doing a service for theemployees.
And but what's the businessobjective?
What's the return oninvestment?
(05:22):
Because talent development canbe expensive for an
organization.
And when we're putting thatmoney into it, it's got to be
achieving some level of businessobjective for it to be
sustainable, for it to not be aluxury, or for it to be taken
seriously.
So I really love your approachon that.
Scott (05:38):
You know, I think anybody who's serious about the work
needs to go back, if theyhaven't in a while, and read
Donald Kirkpatrick's The FourLevels, because that, you know,
he so long ago, and I actuallyhad the honor of meeting him and
talking with him about thebook, but you think about what
level four is, it's the businessimpact.
And that should be the thingthat's driving all of us,
(05:59):
whether we're talking about roledesign or whether we're talking
about, you know, a trainingintervention, it's all in
service of did the numbersactually move?
Jay (06:07):
Yep.
Yep.
I love that.
And if you are one of our ATDfollowers, you definitely know
who Kirkpatrick is.
If you don't know who that is,look it up because it is a
powerful, powerful methodologyto be thinking about business uh
impact.
So, Scott, I want to dig inbecause you are somebody that
has experience in the AI world.
(06:29):
And I know that that'sterrifying and also exciting for
a lot of our trainers, coaches,HR practitioners that are on
here.
And when we think about it,it's you know, that that that
fear is, oh, AI is gonna replaceus.
And the excitement part of itis, okay, well, it can actually
augment us or supplement us orimprove us.
(06:51):
So uh let's start with sort ofa general concept of AI in the
world of human resources, talentdevelopment, et cetera.
What are your thoughts?
What are the trends that you'reseeing?
And how might we think aboutthis maybe a little differently,
or how might we shape this forour future?
Scott (07:09):
Let's break this down, this question, Jay, down into a
couple of different pieces.
First, let me do just a quickhistory lesson because when
radical change happens, andwe're in a period of radical
change right now, when thathappens, it's easy to become
fearful and to try and lock downinto the things that we've
known.
It's a it's a human trait.
If if you know members of theaudience are feeling that right
(07:32):
now, I think that's completelynormal.
But if you go back, look at goback to 1967, believe it or not,
right?
The uh the introduction of thecalculator by Texas Instruments
that seems today like such alike calculator is like it's on
my phone, right?
But if you went back to 1967,this was a big radical change.
And at the time, there was thisfear that bookkeepers would be
(07:55):
put out of business by theintroduction of this calculator.
And it didn't happen.
Now, fast forward to 1983 whenthe Lotus Lotus 123 came out,
the a precursor to what most ofus know today as Microsoft
Excel, made by a differentcompany, spreadsheet concept.
And again, there was this hugefear that now financial
(08:16):
professionals were going to bereplaced.
But what actually happened wasthey started to add value
differently.
And those that were embracingthat technology first were the
safest because they stoppeddelivering value through
calculations, but they starteddelivering value through
analysis and strategy.
(08:37):
And I think we're seeing thesame thing today, where there
are aspects that artificialintelligence and its various
subsets, machine learning andvision and other things.
There are aspects of what we dotoday that are simply done
better by technology.
But there are aspects thattechnology can't do.
(08:57):
I personally don't think thatAI or any technology is going to
take anyone's job.
But I do believe that peoplewho embrace technology are going
to take the jobs of those whodon't.
That's the transformation thatwe're going to see.
And I think that's an importantgrounding for the question that
you're asking.
Jay (09:14):
Well, and I think that's so important.
If you look at any of likeDaniel Coyle's research on
organizational culture,connection is one of the biggest
things that people are lookingfor.
And no matter what level of AIis doing tasks, it's not going
to create.
I guess maybe I have seen someof the articles of how somebody
fell in love with AI, but thatseems few and far between.
(09:34):
Let's hope that that's not thenorm in the future.
But that connective piece andbeing able to actually spend
energy and time really buildingrelationships.
Imagine if you were able totake all those tasks, kind of
set them aside, they were donereally well with AI.
How much time would you have tobe able to invest in just
sitting and having aconversation to make somebody
(09:57):
feel valued, psychologicallysafe, wanted, and needed within
their organization, or evenguiding them in a way?
So I love that you bring thatup.
I think the same way.
I'm in I've I've embraced AI.
I'm still learning.
So let's learn a little bitmore.
One of the things, one of thebig spaces that you are uh an
(10:17):
expert in is obviously theacquisition, the talent
acquisition side.
So we we do focus more on thetalent development, but I think
it's so important that you getthe right people.
And one of the things that youdo is utilize AI to help with,
say, creating a job descriptionor rethinking the job
description.
Let's start there.
Give us a quick overview, andthen we're gonna dig in deeper.
Scott (10:41):
Yeah, you've, Jay, you've said it really, really well.
I want to add one layer ofnuance to that, and that is that
talent acquisition and talentmanagement at learning and
development writ large havetheir feet in kind of the same
pond, right?
And it's not the jobdescription per se.
The document is important, butit's what underlies that
(11:03):
document that is massivelyimportant, and that is the
design of the job.
So I run a company called, asyou know, Propulsion AI.
And one of the things thatwe've done is utilized
artificial intelligence tocreate a guided process for
managers that effectivelyinterviews them about a role
that they want on their team.
That could be a role thatthey're hiring from the outside
(11:25):
or a role that they're pivotingthat's already on their team, or
maybe somebody's coming in froma different division and
they're going to be in this newgroup.
That manager needs to thinkthrough the design of that role.
Now, here's a starting point.
Salary is an investment.
And you, as the investor, andyou're not just investing when
you when you're talking aboutpeople, we're not just investing
(11:47):
salary, we're investinglearning and development time,
personal growth time, right?
There are a bunch ofinvestments that were were are
being made.
But that those investments arejust that.
And as the investor, we shouldbe expecting a return.
And so our mindset when westart out, and whether you are a
learning and development personor a coach or a talent
(12:10):
acquisition professional, themindset should be the same.
What is the outcome that weneed accomplished?
Not what is the task?
This is what's most tangibleand most easy for most of us is
well, I need you to do this.
And I'll give you a practicalexample.
If we were gonna hire anaccountant, and a totally
reasonable duty that most peoplewould write in is follow up on
(12:33):
delinquent accounts.
But you have to ask yourselfwhy?
What's the point of that?
Is it that we want to seepeople come in every day and sit
at a desk and write emails andmake phone calls and have a lot
of activity?
If they do all of that stuffand nothing happens, has that
activity really created right?
What's the value of it?
(12:54):
So following up on Delink andthe other.
Jay (12:56):
And to that point, Scott, in reality, if I just want
somebody to harass anyoutstanding things, I don't need
an accountant, I need an admin.
And that's probably a lot lessexpensive than, say, an
accountant who has a particularset of skills or anything else.
Am I on the right track withthat thinking?
Scott (13:15):
I I think you are.
I would take it one step beyondthat for the audience, and that
is that what you really want,the the following up on the
delinquencies, that is a meansto an end.
And in accounting, the end is anumber called days outstanding.
It is a measure of efficiencyabout how fast the organization
can collect.
That's the number that you wantmoved.
(13:37):
Now, most of us can touch thetangible activity of follow-up.
And it's just a little bitharder to think through what
does that follow-up produce?
That's the outcome.
But once I understand thatthat's the outcome, now I say to
that person in the role, hey,your job is to move days
outstanding from this numberwhere it is today to this number
(13:58):
where we need it to betomorrow.
And that is massively importantto our business.
Now think about what I've donefor them.
I have given themaccountability for something
that is really critical to thefunctioning of the organization.
That is a different propositionthan giving them a task.
I am trusting them to become anowner.
This is where our product helpsdraw this out of the manager's
(14:21):
head, this harder-to-touch sortof outcomes-focused stuff.
And then around that builds keyperformance indicators, key
results, the actual measurementsthat need to happen,
competencies that are necessaryto deliver on that, skills that
underlie the whole thing.
And this is where talentacquisition and talent
management share.
Because now that I have all ofthis out of my head, and by the
(14:44):
way, the platform does all ofthe writing for you as well:
performance-based jobdescription, SEO-optimized job
posting, social media content,interviewer guides.
But once I have the design ofthat role, now not only are my
recruiters better equipped to gofind the right person to put
into that job, but my learningand development people are in a
better spot to say, here are thecompetencies and skills you
(15:05):
have today, here are the onesthat we're going to build, and
develop learning plans that takethat person on a growth path.
And we know that from work thatLinkedIn did that 94% of
employees say they will staylonger in an organization if
that organization has adefinitive plan for their
growth.
Jay (15:24):
Not only that, I'm I'm the thing you you hooked me on is
you have created sort of aconcept here of helping a
manager identify how this personcreates value for the
organization?
Because we all want to feelvalued at work, we want to be
seen, we want our work to beimportant.
Nobody wants to be the personjust sitting there hacking away
(15:46):
at a button and not know that atthe other end it's actually
doing something.
So uh even by doing that andkind of linking that key
performance indicator tobusiness outcomes or to value
proposition for theorganization, it seems to me
that you're gonna get somecandidates highly motivated
right from the very beginning,which is one of the things that
(16:08):
LND does try to do is try tokeep people motivated and set
the expectations and so on andso forth.
So it's almost like you'reshorts short-circuiting that
whole process right up front.
What does that look like?
Uh what does that look like, Iguess, say for give me an
example of this, if if you can,Scott.
Scott (16:28):
Well, I I beyond the sort of accountant example.
I mean, I can repeat thatexample for you, but here's I
think what we want to happen inthe organization.
We want to say, look, you are,and I'll go back to the
accountant for just one second.
You're accountable for daysoutstanding.
Your job is to move the numberfrom here to here.
Now, I'm gonna have aone-on-one with that person, and
(16:50):
maybe the number hasn't moved.
And so they're gonna say, Well,I'm following up on all the
counts.
And I'm gonna say, okay, great,what else?
Now, immediately what I'm doingis I'm not solving the problem
for them.
What I, as the as the boss,what I'm saying is, here's the
outcome, here's the end pointthat we have to get here to.
And I want to help you to becreative about how you're gonna
(17:12):
solve that.
In the ideal case, I want thatperson coming back to me and
saying, Scott, hold up.
You're asking me to do thesethings.
But if this is really what youwant, if this is the outcome you
want, shouldn't I be doingthese?
And as the boss, I want to slapmy head and go, yeah, oh, of
course, I hadn't even thoughtabout that, right?
You're on the front lines everyday.
Yes, do that.
Move the number though.
(17:32):
We want to put people in aposition where they are creative
about solving the problem.
What's non-negotiable for me asa boss is that's the outcome.
What's totally negotiable andshould be open to
experimentation and invention isthe path we take to get there.
And I want the person on thefront line to come back to me
and say, well, how about if Itried this?
How about if I do this?
(17:53):
And I want to be able to say,yes, let's try that.
And we'll know it if thatnumber moves.
Jay (17:59):
And that's exactly what I was looking for.
You're helping to establish thewhat and the why, and then
allowing the space for theperson being hired to do the
how.
And I think that that's reallya critical aspect because when
we think about expectations orsetting, you know, setting the
goals or markers, uh, it reallydoes come back to what is the
(18:21):
end result?
I can send out 25 sales emailsevery single day, but if I never
get a sale, it doesn't meananything.
It really doesn't have anyimpact.
So, from a trainingperspective, and let's get let's
go to that for a minute,because you mentioned it just
briefly with the L and D side.
All right, we know what theoutcomes are.
How can we, as maybe an LDdepartment or a training
(18:43):
department, you know, sort oflook at that and say, these are
the KPIs, these are what we'regoing for.
How might an L and D departmentmake the determination of this
is the competencies?
Is there any way that we shouldbe thinking about that as
trainers or LD people?
Scott (18:58):
I that's a hard question for me to answer, Jay, as an
abstract, because I think thenuance of the individual
situation is going to matterhugely.
However, if you look at thedynamic that I just set up
between that boss and that thatdirect report, where the direct
report is trying things.
And when when you when yousaid, you know, I send 25 sales
emails every day, but nothing'shappening, right?
(19:20):
Einstein said the defend thedefinition of insanity is doing
the same thing over and over andexpecting different results,
right?
So, what do we want people todo?
We want them to recognize thattactic isn't working.
My job is not that tactic.
My job is the outcome.
The tactic is a means togetting there, and it might be
(19:41):
one of many.
So now what do I have to do?
I have to engage in a creativeprocess.
And I think that's in part ananswer to your question about
LD.
L and D should be looking atthat and saying, okay, so this
new mindset says the outcome isthe job, the tactics are
experimental.
What do people need in order todo a better job of
experimenting?
(20:01):
Well, they need creativity,they need resilience, they need
X, Y, Z, whatever.
That's thinking.
Right.
That becomes now informationthat should fund the LD
enterprise rather than justlooking at technical skill,
which is important.
We need to look at all of thethings that surround, you know,
we got to take that hill, andthe way that we're doing it
(20:24):
isn't working.
So what do we have to do?
And I think you can take thatto just about everything.
And I'll give you anotherexample here, and I think it's
important because people likeit's easy to write this off as
this works for more seniorwhite-collar work, and it
doesn't work for anything else.
But we, as a part of what wedid at Propulsion AI, I went to
Burger King's website and Igrabbed a job description, which
(20:46):
if you go to their website,they have the job descriptions
for their team members on theirwebsite.
And I pulled one for a teammember off, and not
surprisingly, it read like anobituary.
Don't steal, get the food out,hot, blah, blah, blah, blah,
blah.
Right.
But what is the purpose of allof that?
So we ran it through our systemand we came out with a
completely differentoutcomes-focused job description
(21:07):
for a person standing at thecounter at Burger King.
You know what responsibilitynumber one was?
Create an experience forcustomers that drives repeat
business and loyalty to thisrestaurant.
Now, if I say your job is standat the counter, cash register,
don't steal and push thebuttons, how excited are you to
come to work?
But if I say you are in thecustomer service, you're in the
(21:28):
customer experience business,not just service, but the
experience, right?
Not only do I open myself,because it's really hard to
interview for don't steal right,objectively, right?
But if the job is create anexperience for people, now I can
apply behavior-basedinterviewing to look at people's
past experiences and try tomatch them to what I'm doing in
(21:51):
the restaurant.
So the entire situationchanges, and all I had to do was
shift my perspective away froma task and on to an outcome that
matters to my business.
Jay (22:02):
So let's let's play with that.
Let's go a little bit deeperhere because I do think that
this is one of the things whereif you're in an LD space or if
you're a trainer or coach, a lotof times onboarding is your
first set of training, or youhave to bring somebody into a
space and kind of get them.
One of the things, and I wantyou to dig deep on this.
You're you're definitely theexpert in this in this space.
(22:24):
You see a job description outthere, you see all the
qualifications, you see all thetasks.
The person gets hired, they'rein there for a week, they start
getting onboarded, and there'ssome disconnect in between that
job description and what they'reactually doing.
And and I had I had shared thiswith you before, but there's an
(22:44):
HBR Harvard Business Reviewarticle that talks about
reframing the job description.
It's been around, it's the samesince like whatever, and that
causes like padding of resumesand lying in interviews, or at
least embellishing ininterviews.
I'm not going to call itstraight up lying, but
embellishing in interviews.
And then when people get intothe position, they're like,
okay, this isn't what Iexpected, and they leave, or
(23:06):
that this isn't what I expected,and they're unhappy and they
quietly quit.
Can you talk about how thisprocess is playing out or what
some of the things that you'reseeing in between that job
description, hiring, and anonboarding space?
Scott (23:20):
This is why we created the platform that we created in
Propulsion AI.
Um, Forbes followed 20,000 newhires.
And Jay, you know what?
46% of them failed in theirfirst 18 months.
That's almost half.
Yep.
And in part, it's becausemanagers are not thinking
through the roles.
And if you're a coach, you'regonna hear this a lot.
(23:43):
Oh, I don't have time to dothat.
It's why we made it reallyfast.
Most of the recruiters and theHR business partners that we
talked to as we were developingthe Propulsion AI platform told
us that it legitimately takesthem four to six hours to get
the design out of the manager'shead, write all of the
collateral, get it out on theweb.
Our platform does this in aslittle as 15 minutes.
(24:04):
But if you don't do that,you're making it up as you go.
And this is where likeemployment processes, hiring
processes take months becausewe're working out what we want
the job to do in the interviewprocess.
And it's why to the point youjust made a second ago, when we
get people in, they say the jobthat I thought I was being hired
(24:26):
for isn't the job they'reasking me to do.
And in the balance of all ofthis are the results that are
important to the organization.
So our thought is spend thetime of a coffee break up front
and create the design of therole that really is going to
have impact to your business,and then hand off to your team
and let them work confidently.
(24:47):
The recruiters and sourcers aregonna be happier and faster and
more productive.
The learning and developmentpeople, I mean, to your point
about onboarding, if I'm alearning and development person
and I'm thinking about trying toparticipate in this onboarding
process, the most importantthing coming out of the
employment process are what arethe outcomes and what are the
measurable results?
(25:07):
Because then I have to thinkabout, okay, you may not have
come in with all of thecompetencies and skills that we
needed.
So let's start to develop thatlearning plan to help grow what
your, you know, your base isright now.
But if those are unclear, or ifthe outcomes that I'm working
to are unclear, or for goshsakes, if the measurements, I
(25:28):
need days outstanding move fromthis number to this number, I
need employee net promoter scoreto move from 50 to 75, right?
If those numbers are unclear,onboarding is just social
onboarding.
There's no business connectionto it.
Jay (25:41):
Well, and I think that that's, you know, finally an
answer to something like otherduties as assigned, you know,
and and when we think aboutthat, is that's the catch-all
that most organizations include.
Recognize, okay, I haven'treally, as you said, haven't
really thought out what are theactual dynamics of this role or
(26:02):
dynamics of this job.
But it seems to me, Scott, andhelp me understand this.
It seems to me that when we'reable to establish sort of that
business objective, thatconnection, that understanding,
it seems to me it might even beeasier for us to justify salary
positions or justify, hey, weneed a new person because here's
where we're currently at on thenet promoter score.
(26:25):
This is what we want to hirefor, and getting a 50 to a 75
would increase our revenue by X,Y, and Z, right?
Like whenever we're asking forsomething, we've got to be able
to show I'm investing, as yousaid, this is the return on
investment.
Seems to me that that processwould be a little easier if we
were able to quantify what theactual business impact is.
(26:47):
And that's something that 100%.
Scott (26:51):
100%.
That's why we're such big fansof starting with the business
outcome, because it anchorseverything.
If if you know, if my job is toincrease month over month
revenue by 20% and I'm at amillion dollars and I'm
successful, well, I'm gonna beat 1.2 million every single
month, which means on anannualized basis, uh, you know,
(27:13):
I'm gonna be what $2.4 millionmore revenue for that year than
I was before.
And so when you think aboutwhat are you gonna pay me to do
that?
$150,000?
So you paid me $150, even grossit up, call it $175 with
benefits, and I return $2.4million.
That kind of thinking isexactly what we want from every
(27:36):
position in the organization.
And that's why it's soimportant to start with what's
the business outcome?
You know, what's the businessresult that I need?
What are the outcomes that getme to that business result?
What are the success measuresthat are gonna help me to
understand whether I'm movingcloser to or farther away to
from from those outcomes?
And then what are thecompetencies and skills that I
(27:58):
need in order to perform thatwork well?
That's a that's complete.
Jay (28:02):
And I like that because once we start with that, and I'm
gonna, you know, kind of tailthis off and let's think about
the entire employee life cycle,right?
Like, so we we get this person,they know what they they know
what highways they're on, theyknow what impacts they need to
create, they're onboarded, ourtrainers, our coaches, they're
able to kind of support them ingetting the competencies that
(28:23):
they need.
Let's talk about what happenswhen you get to performance
evaluation time or when you getto that performance review time.
Like, how does this impact thatspace?
It seems pretty intuitive, butI'd love to hear you speak on
that as well.
Scott (28:34):
I've coached a lot of managers over 25 years, and a
lot of it has been onperformance management and and
you know helping employees tobecome more productive.
And I've gotten asked onequestion, I think more than
anything else.
And it usually happens aroundperformance eval time, which is
the wrong time, by the way, toask the question, but it is the
(28:55):
time that it gets asked.
And that is, Scott, what wordscan I use to make this
performance review go easily?
Jay (29:02):
Let me answer is you can't.
Okay, so I'm with you on this,and literally, so this is
something that I did an analysisof a large organization that
was investing into an external,uh, external training program
that was like, think likeLinkedIn learning.
And it was all these coursesand everything else like that.
And I was like, well, how'sthat working out for you?
(29:23):
And they were like, I don'tknow.
I was like, I'm gonna take onebet here that the proactive
nature of what you're askingyour people to do with the
amount of time and energy, thatthere's two times in this entire
cycle that people are gonna goto this platform and there's one
course that they're looking,and it's difficult
conversations, and it's gonnahappen at performance evaluation
(29:44):
and raise consideration time.
Sure enough, I mean spot onwith that behavioral analysis.
So, yes, thank you.
You crushed that.
Keep going.
Sorry, I just had to throw thatin there with you.
Scott (29:58):
No, I mean, well, I think you and I are aligned in our
philosophy about these things.
So it actually makes me feelgood to hear you say those
things.
The fact is, like again, backto the concept of investment.
If I came to you and I said,Jay, I have an investment, I
want you to give me $50,000.
What would be the next questionthat you would ask?
Jay (30:18):
Okay, so if I'm giving you $50,000, what is the expectation
or what is the outcome that I'mgonna get in return for that?
Scott (30:25):
100%.
And so I'm gonna say, Jay, I'mgonna 3X your money.
What's the next question you'regonna ask me?
How fast?
100%, right?
And so now, so I tell you it'sgonna To happen in a year.
And you're going to be able towatch that grow.
So we start out in January, weget to the end of January.
What's the question that youasked me at the end of January?
(30:46):
How are we doing, Scott?
Exactly right.
And it's the same questionyou're going to ask at the end
of February, March, April, May,et cetera, right?
So why is it that that logic,which is so plain to most of us
when it comes to investing, isnot the mindset that we have
when it comes to our employees?
This is where propulsion helps,right?
We get the design of that roleright.
(31:06):
And the design of that rolesays these are the key results
that we have you in place togenerate.
And so now when we sit down fora one-on-one, it becomes a and
obviously there are multiplepieces to this, but piece number
one is how are you doing on theresults that we agreed you
would get?
(31:27):
Because if we say, look, I'mgoing to move, I'm a chief
people officer, or I was.
So ENPS was always a KPI forme, a key performance indicator.
And let's say that I, you know,the CEO had said to me, we're
at an ENPS employee net promoterscore of 50, and I need you to
get it to 65.
Is it reasonable to believethat that's going to happen all
(31:48):
at once?
Probably not.
But we do quarterly surveys.
So if I'm at 50 and I need toget to 65, it's a 15-point move.
At the end of the firstquarter, I should have 15
divided by four or somesemblance of that, right?
We should be able to see ittracking in the right direction.
So when I sit down for aone-on-one with my boss, the
first thing he should say is, orshe, how are you doing against
(32:11):
the results?
And I should have aconversation about what I've
done and what kind of resultsI've seen, and you know, and and
and whether those are positiveor negative, right?
The next aspect of that is howare you showing up?
Because it's not enough to getthe results.
You have to get them and behavein a way that grows the whole,
(32:32):
not just accomplishes your peryour personal agenda.
So it's how are you doingagainst your results?
How are you showing up in termsof behaviors that we need to
see and the value, the behaviorsthat we value in the
organization?
Next is let's talk about likewhere you're going from here.
How, how are we growing you?
(32:52):
Because my boss might say,Scott, you are knocking it out
of the park on beingresults-oriented, but you're not
so good on communication.
So let's think about how we'regoing to grow that competency
and help you develop theunderlying skills to make you a
better communicator.
And then the last piece, and Ithink that's on the boss 100%,
(33:12):
is as a boss, how do I need toshow up differently to help you
be accountable and get theresults and show up with the
behaviors that we've beentalking about?
And I think that's a completeperformance review.
And you don't need words to dothat.
Jay (33:28):
What is the barriers?
What is stopping us?
Was the 65 that we thought wasrealistic?
Show me or demonstrate to mewhy that's not possible or
what's slowing that down, or howwhat is a realistic?
So all of those things I thinkcan come in.
And it's brilliant.
I really I love this because Ithink, you know, I definitely
lean into Brene Brown.
(33:49):
Clear is kind, unclear isunkind.
And when we don't have clearobjectives, this is literally
why we switch from goals toobjectives and key results as a
planning and strategy platform.
Um, so if you're not familiarwith that, check out measure
what matters.
I love that as kind of astarting point for it.
Uh, but that that is ourcompany is literally built on
(34:12):
objectives and key results atthis point in time because
exactly what you're saying.
If we're not hitting those keyresults, then what does it
matter that we're putting allthis time, energy, effort in?
Scott (34:22):
So and and all of that, Jay, it all comes back to the
design of the role.
If you get that piece right,there's no guarantees in
anything, right?
You still have to get a bunchof other things right.
But if you get that pieceright, it opens the door to
almost everything else thatwe've been talking about.
But if you get that piecewrong, everything else winds up
being hard.
And then you come to somebodylike me and you say, Scott, what
(34:44):
are the words that I can use toget myself out of this pain
called a performance review?
And everybody's life ishorrible, the employees and
yours.
So I love this.
Jay (34:54):
I I think that for our trainers, our coaches, our
managers, our HR people outthere really thinking about what
is the business objectives,which is something it's a
reoccurring theme, and this isjust another vehicle for us to
get there.
You've got to be thinking aboutthe business objectives.
So I really appreciateeverything that you're saying
here today because I do thinkit's so important.
(35:15):
And even as a learning, one ofthe biggest things that I teach
trainers, you have to have clearobjectives that is measurable
by the time that they you hitthe end of the training.
It seems like if we start withthis up front, gives them the
opportunity to say, okay, theobjective is this.
This is the measurement ofperformance for this person, and
(35:36):
this is how we're going to getthem there.
So it makes that return oninvestment of L and D even
easier when we know what thegoal is from the onset.
Scott (35:43):
And Jay, if I could just add one friendly amendment,
because you know I'm I'm 100%supportive of that mentality
that you just described.
But there is a trap in that,and we have to be careful.
Measuring activity is not asvalue as valuable as measuring
the business outcome, right?
What like how like how manyaccounts did I follow up on is
(36:04):
not the right measurement.
Did Day's outstanding move isthe right measurement?
Jay (36:09):
Yeah, no, and I 1000% agree with that.
So, and when we're thinkingabout it from an LD perspective,
part of it, part of it is beingable to track the appropriate
behaviors so we know thesebehaviors are not leading to the
objective result or whateverthose results are.
So, yeah, I definitely on thesame page, but I love the
(36:31):
clarification because I agree itis the result, not necessarily
the task.
So, Scott, if our audiencewanted to get in touch with you,
how would they connect withyou?
Scott (36:43):
So, LinkedIn is a great way.
You can get me at LinkedIn.comslash in slash m Scott M.
That's my profile on LinkedIn.
And you can find propulsionaion the web www.getpropulsion.ai.
Get propulsion.ai.
And you know what, Jay?
Our biggest use case right now,the biggest way that we are
(37:07):
finding inroads into neworganizations is coaches and HR
professionals and talentprofessionals who are trying
propulsion AI and then taking itto their leadership and say,
look at how much easier ourlives would be if we used this
platform.
You can get on right nowwithout a credit card.
You can try the platform forfree.
(37:28):
We do that intentionallybecause I strongly believe once
people try it, they're gonnawant to take it to their leaders
and they're gonna adopt it asan organization.
And I think this platformchanges organizational life.
Jay (37:40):
I love it, Scott.
Thank you for your insights,for your time.
We'll make sure that thoselinks are in the show notes.
So, audience, if you want tocheck that out, again, it's
getpropulsion.ai, and we'll makesure that your LinkedIn handle
is available as well.
So thank you for your time andenergy today.
I think this has really beenenlightening of how we can be
thinking about AI in the talentdevelopment space.
(38:02):
And I really appreciate it,Scott.
Scott (38:04):
Jay, I've I've really looked forward to being on with
you, and I'm super glad I washere.
I'm honored by the invite.
Thanks for having me.
Jay (38:11):
And uh thank you, audience, for tuning into this episode of
The Talent Forge, where we areshaping the future of training
and development.
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