Mindy Honcoop: Fractional, Upskill, Micro dose Change | Work 20XX Ep48

Mindy Honcoop helps people grow, one micro dose at a time. As the founder of Agile in HR and a seasoned people leader, Mindy brings a unique lens as her path started in the juvenile justice system, working with kids, and figuring out how happiness, and being one’s best self at work, contributed to a child’s well being. 

At Running Remote, Mindy emcee’d the outside stage for two days, absorbing insights, and sharing her own perspective on the evolving nature of leadership, work, and upskilling. In this episode, she shares how fractional roles work, her approach to growth and creating a people and skills roadmap, and then training her way out of the engagement, upskilling the internal team to take the business up a notch. Mindy has a laser focus on a market segment where she identified a gap she could fill.

Micro dose change is just one secret she shared.

Please join me in welcoming Mindy Honcoop to the Work 20XX podcast.

Editor’s Note: Recorded 2025-April-30 at the Running Remote conference in Austin, Texas. 

Special thanks to Liam, Egor, Ana, and Team Running Remote.

Mindy Honcoop: Fractional, Upskill, Micro dose Change | Work 20XX podcast with Jeff Frick Ep48 from Running Remote

#MindyHoncoop #AgileHR #MicrodoseChange #Fractional #Upskill #Microdose #Change  #FractionalLeadership #Upskilling #FutureOfWork #RemoteWork #PeopleOps #Digital #Distributed #Remote #Hybrid #Workplace #RunningRemote #LeadershipDevelopment #HumanCentered #WorkplaceTransformation #ContinuousImprovement #TeamCulture #Interview #Podcast #Work20XX

YouTube  - Click Here 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zc-JKzPVZMw&list=PLZURvMqWbYjmmJlwGj0L0jWbWdCej1Jlt

 

Transcript and Show Notes - Click Here 

Mindy Honcoop: Fractional, Upskill, Micro dose Change | Work 20XX Ep48 - Work 20XX

https://www.work20xx.com/episode/mindy-honcoop-fractional-upskill-micro-dose-change-work-20xx-ep48

 

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
All right.
So I will count us down
Okay.
All right
in three,two, one
Hey welcome backeverybody Jeff Frick here
coming to you from Work 20XX.
But I'm not in my home studio.
I’m not in thehome office.
I'm actuallyin Austin, Texas
at Running Remote.
We came down herebecause this is where
all the leaders are
with all the best practice
and the cutting edgetechnology
and all the cool researchto talk about

(00:21):
how you can leverage
the processes of running remote teams
that make all teamsactually work better,
and to makeall work better,
whether you're remote, hybrid,distributed or anything in between
or I guess those people that are 40 hours back in the office, but
It'll work for you too.
So we're excitedto have our next guest.
And she's actually been emceeing a ton
of sessions,so she's probably got

(00:41):
all kinds of new insight.
After listening to all these smart people
for the last couple days
we're excited towelcome
She's Mindy Honcoop.
She is the founder of Agile in HR
and a whole bunch of other stuff that we’ll cover
Mindy, great to see you
It's so great to be here.
Thank you so muchfor having me.
Absolutely.
So you have areally interesting story
that you started outhelping juveniles

(01:02):
that got in troublewith the law.
And, you thought that was going to be
your direction for your lifeand it actually
kind of informed to where you got to today.
It is
Even though you’re not working in the juvie system anymore.
No.
I was, it was part of my social work program.
I was set on doingbeing a social worker.
I've always wantedto make a difference.
I think that's a commontheme throughout my life.

(01:24):
And I thought that wassocial work.
That was my goal in high schoolwas to be a social worker.
So I chose Universityof Washington,
ranked third in the nation
Go Huskies.
Go Huskiesand the internship.
My last internshipmy senior year was
with the juvenile defender's office and
My husband's like, younever choose anything easy.
But it really got mepassionate about.

(01:45):
How do I make a bigger difference?
And, you know,I really started to
as I talked with thethese youth
I really started to see the adults in their lives.
Not that it was a causation,
but there was a strong correlation of
the adults in their community
and in their families
not coming homefrom work
being their best selves.
You know, we're not born
with a sense of self-worth.

(02:06):
That's something that's modeled
for us as young people.
And so when we are
have the adults coming backfrom unhealthy workplaces,
that's where I startedto get passionate.
I was also rare, got married in college really young.
My husbandwas in the workplace,
and he started saying
Mindy, your workyour,
our HR team should be asking the questions that you're asking

(02:27):
and preparing for as a social worker.
He's like, we need youin the workplace.
So he actually arranged an interview
with H.R. teamat his workplace
and that led to social workin the workplace.
Right, right.
So you've done a bunch offormal roles in HR,
but nowyou're doing your own thing,
and you're doinglittle fractional pieces

(02:47):
here and there.
How does fractional work
for a senior executive?
I've never quitefigured out.
Is it you have X number of commitment?
Do you have equity?
I mean how is a fractional CMO different
than a, just a regular kindof consulting relationship?
I feel like thatanswer depends.
And some people reallyare staunch on their answer.

(03:08):
The definitionof fractional executive
or fractional expertise.
I do not have a dog in the fight.
I'm just lookingfor a little clarity
because to me the consultingis pretty straightforward.
And fractional sounds like more.
Yeah.
But what makes it more?
Yes
And then it’s likeis it equity?
And then, you know,
where do you draw linesas a fractional.
Can you be
obviously not with competitors

(03:29):
but you know it'sit sounds like a
not quite so easy and cut and dry.
That's true.
For memy definition
and frommy experience
is and I work specifically,
with small medium businessesbetween 50 to 500 employees.
Have an intact HR person.
I really saw a gapin that space.
And what I loved aboutfractional versus consulting

(03:50):
was that you actually get to help
build the strategy with the leaders
but then you stay tothen operationalize it
and really help equip and upskill the current team members
to be able to take that on beyond you.
So that might be where I'ma little bit different
than some fractionalwhere they're kind of
they have ongoing longerterm commitments
for me, in fractional expertiseor in leadership, fractional executive

(04:15):
It is really aboutbuilding out that roadmap,
that HR product roadmapthe people roadmap
and aligning thatto the business strategy.
I always talk about,
connecting the cultureto the revenue.
Okay.
And in a six monthto nine month period
weaning away from me and the need for me
because we have helped you build the roadmap
identify it starts to uplevel the people

(04:37):
that will maintain that and take that further.
And then you work with me
on a retainer
an ad hoc basison call
So you're doing a great job.
I'm sure the CEO is like,Mindy, come on, we need you
we need you.
Not only do we need you
40 hours a week, we need you 60.
Is it just a function of the fact that
you usually work with smaller companies that aren't
necessarily either big enough in revenue or just can't support

(04:59):
that type of senior executive role or
you just say, this is theexpectation coming in.
I have a very specific processI'm going to help you with
and give you some greatleave behinds.
But I'm not here.
I'm not hereforever.
So often.
For me, as afractional leader,
I'm coming inand you need to be able
usually theleaders are
I think we got thepeople thing wrong.

(05:20):
And I see amindset shift
and help me be able to understand
how do I move the needle
and makethat shift
and really thinkabout my people
in a strategic way
and align that to the people, processes and systems
of the workplace ecosystem.
And we can't afford
and you wouldn't want to have a Mindy
that has 25 yearsof experience to come in.

(05:42):
And you don't need me40 hours a day.
But I do get involved.
I build relationshipswith the leaders and,
and really work tounderstand the current state
and really then think about
how do weshift the mindset
but put into place a plan
that is agile
that can evolve
but then it's about
how do we build in

(06:03):
your intact HR team
for what you need right now?
But how do we think about
continuing to upskilland evolve that team
so that we don't constantlyhave H.R leaders
that can only do the same thing over and over again,
because that's oftenhow I saw them
getting burnt out. And like,
I'm sorry, I want to get beyond startup.
I want to help a company grow.

(06:23):
And so you can have that HR leader
if they want to, andif they have the capability
to be able to growwith the organization
and so thatwas my passion.
Was being able to, yes,set in place a roadmap,
but then be able to coachand guide and equip
that HR leader to be ableto show up differently
and really drive changethrough them.
And I've alsoin a way

(06:45):
found that as a fractional leaderI was getting better
results by first initiating
a mentorship withthe HR person
because they needed to seehow they were the solution.
And then in order to start showing
just drops of change.
I always call it microdosing of change.
And thenthe leaders
were able to start

(07:05):
to finally see, oh, that's what Mindy meant.
Now that I can tangiblyfeel the difference
and the impactin the organization
now, I'm going toinvest more in this.
Now I want to like,have the full fractional
HR advising Mindy
versus just let's start with a mentorship.
Okay.So your
So part of your program

(07:26):
is developing the team.
Yes.
To put them in a different position.
Yes.
So that when it's timefor you to exit.
Yes.
You’ve left behindnot only the strategy
but the team to actually execute it.
Right.
Because for me,the healthier workplaces, I
for fractionalif you continue
you can onlydo so much.
You can only work withso many companies.
Right.
We have so many smallmedium businesses
that have to startthinking differently.

(07:48):
They're going to becomeobsolete if they don't.
And I just had such a passion ofhow can I replicate this?
How can I get tomore companies?
And so that's why I startedto change and evolve
how I wasdoing my work.
Okay, cool.
So shifting gearsyou've been out here
on the on the stagefor a couple days
emceeing, seeing a lotof great presentations.
I wonder if you could sharesome impressions.

(08:09):
What are some of yourtakeaways in terms of
things you hadn't thought about?
Interesting twists and turns
some of the cool people that you've heard and
interesting concepts.
Yeah.
Amazing peopleamazing concepts.
Some of the common themes that I saw
was one around thebiggest barrier being
fear to change
and fear of adoption of new things.
Fear of being replaced,fear of becoming obsolete,

(08:31):
and how that really gets people stuck
into a scarcity mindset
where you don't actually get to
get to curiosity.
I also heard the theme ofyou need to be curious.
You need to start asking questions about
How am I working?
How can I work differently?How can I work better?
It's really that needto seek to understand.
But that doesn't happen

(08:51):
from a place of scarcitybecause you're holding on
so tightlybecause of that fear.
And Melinda like talked about that
before, about how in order to
to have change
we have to be in a place of possibility.
We have to be in a place of positivity
and be ableto trust.
It's reallyinteresting
the economics and the science of scarcity versus

(09:12):
the economics and scienceof abundance.
That’s right.
And many people will say
that in the not too distant future
actually, I intervieweda guy from the robotics.
His vision is unlimited free labor
in the form ofhumanoid robots.
And you know how you start to manage things
when you've gotan abundance
versus scarcity is really,really different.
But being scared is a basic human thing

(09:33):
especially scared of the unknown.
So what were some of the solutions
that they providedso we can get over our
our fear of the unknown?
I don't know if we can ever get over scared.
There's so many solutions,so many solutions, but
I think that's aboutit's about creating, right?
We have to be creativeto think about
what is a possibilityto be able to think
what doesn't exist today
that I can create, that AI doesn't even know about

(09:55):
because I'mcreating something new
Like someone wastalking about
during the Industrial Revolution,that jobs were a place,
but there wasn'treally vacations.
And now we have a whole vacation industry.
Right.
I thought I was like,oh my goodness,
that's such a light bulb moment.
That was so exciting.
Like, what doesn't
what don't we have today?
I mean, now we have self-driving cars.
And so like,what does that open up?
Because we have that

(10:15):
that now makes possible
something that wecouldn't before
without self-driving cars.
For me, that's exciting.
Since I get old
I can actually still go places
because you're going to takemy driver's license away
and I want to still go places.
Oh, it's such a big
self-driving cars for senior mobility is
[Mindy] Huge[Jeff] Huge
[Jeff] Huge, huge, huge[Mindy] Yeah
even in geofenced locations
to get started incommunities

(10:37):
is giant.
It's interesting Kay Sargent
from HOK wastalking recently
and she said actually
that Ford createdthe five day workweek
so that people wouldhave time to go drive cars.
Because up tothat point,
everybody worked onSaturdays as well.
So he actuallychanged I think
because I thinkhe also created
you knowthe eight hour shifts
so that he could havethree shifts

(10:58):
per 24 hoursto run the factory.
So it's interestinghow that stuff evolves.
Just innovation.
Right, right.Okay.
So here's one.
I've been hearing all kinds
of interestinguse cases of AI.
So I want to knowhow do you use AI
in your day to day world.
Give us a couple examples.
Because everyoneis looking for
either they knowand they're started
or like ‘I don't know where to start’.
Where do I start?
So how do you use AI?
It’s my best friend.

(11:19):
I use it a lot.
I use it a lot
and I
and I'm an early adopter
so I love trying outnew things.
And thething is
is that keeping up to dateon all the new AI solutions
like one
is I was thinkingabout okay
I can't really afford an executive assistant
but this email situationis out of control.
So Fyxer is a phenomenal

(11:40):
email assistant and alsodoes some scheduling.
And so I use that as myAI email assistant, Fyxer.
It's amazing.
So it just APIinto your Google email
or Microsoft Teams or whatever?
[Mindy] Yeah[Jeff] Okay
And it actually learnshow I respond to emails.
Okay.
And it's actually
it's really good
[Mindy] I was like, I didn’t think[Jeff] How many emails has it written for you?
[Mindy] to respond that way. [Jeff] Tell the truth

(12:01):
It is.
It has reduced significantlythe amount of time
that I'm in my email,because it also prioritizes
what I should focus on
and then it de-prioritizes
now sometimesit's too good
because I'm like,that was important.
And I missedthat because.
But it gets better over time, right?
It has to learn.We have to train the AI.
So that's one thingI use ChatGPT quite a bit,

(12:22):
obviously in anonymizedand secure way
in order to be able totake and synthesize
a lot of data in orderto show outliers and themes.
And that has really helped
really reduce
the amount of work around culture
around values.
And so you're doinga lot of focus group
around values
seeing what resonates
and taking all that focusgroup feedback
and taking all that focusgroup feedback
and being ableto even get to a place of,

(12:45):
I need to nowrespond back to
what are the commonthemes that are coming out
and how are wedescribing these?
It just reduces amount.
it takes hoursout of the process.
Awesome.
Well thanks for sharing this
because everyone's looking forthis great productivity
that they keep reading about
and they haven't found it yet.
So thanks for sharing.
A couple concrete examples.
Yeah.And there are
the sessions are recorded.
So if you were a part of Running Remote

(13:07):
you can relisten and
the last session we had on the deep dive stage with Alina,
she actually had a ton of awesome case studies
of how they've usedAI in their organization
that were very practical.
Awesome.
So keep an eye outfor the on demand assets
that’ll be coming to aYouTube channel soon?
I don't know.
All right, well, Mindy,it was great to,
to sit downwith you.
Congrats, you've been working hard out here on

(13:29):
hot stage fortwo days.
So, you did a great joband we’re almost through
Almost timefor the evening affair.
Yeah, it was such a pleasure.
Thank you so much.
My pleasure.
Super.
She's Mindy,I'm Jeff,
you're watching Work 20XX.
We're down in Austinat Running Remote
for a specialedition.
Thanks for watching.
Thanks for listeningon the podcast.
See you next time. Take care.

(13:50):
Hey, Jeff Frick Here
big shout out to the podcast audience.
Thanks for listening in.
You can get show notes and transcripts at Work20XX.com
And that also has links to the videos as well.
Appreciate you listeningin on the podcast
Do reach out
say hello, like subscribeand smash that notification bell.
Thanks for listening.Take care. Bye bye.