April 8, 2025 • 46 mins
In today’s workplace, the relationship between companies and their employees has never been more complex—or more fragile. The pressures of a volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA) world are reshaping how we work, how we lead, and how we navigate the space between personal and corporate values.
For this week’s guest, Ethan McCarty, CEO & Founder of Integral, this isn’t just an academic discussion—it’s the very heart of what makes organizations thrive (or unravel). As a leader in employee engagement and organizational communications, Ethan has spent his career helping businesses bridge the gap between what they say they stand for and how their people actually experience work.
On today’s episode, host Anne Green sits down with Ethan to explore the deep (and often uncomfortable) questions at the center of today’s workplace challenges. How can we better understand the relationship between an individual’s personal values and those expressed by their workplace? What are the implications for more, and less, alignment? Can businesses truly create a shared sense of purpose? And in an era of heightened political and social division, how should companies respond to (or account for) external pressures—without alienating the very people who keep them running?
Join us as we discuss:
For this week’s guest, Ethan McCarty, CEO & Founder of Integral, this isn’t just an academic discussion—it’s the very heart of what makes organizations thrive (or unravel). As a leader in employee engagement and organizational communications, Ethan has spent his career helping businesses bridge the gap between what they say they stand for and how their people actually experience work.
On today’s episode, host Anne Green sits down with Ethan to explore the deep (and often uncomfortable) questions at the center of today’s workplace challenges. How can we better understand the relationship between an individual’s personal values and those expressed by their workplace? What are the implications for more, and less, alignment? Can businesses truly create a shared sense of purpose? And in an era of heightened political and social division, how should companies respond to (or account for) external pressures—without alienating the very people who keep them running?
Join us as we discuss:
- How the pressures of a VUCA world impact both individuals and organizations—and why those impacts aren’t always the same
- The tension between corporate values and personal identity and values—where alignment matters and where it may never fully exist
- The ongoing debates around politics in the workplace, return-to-office mandates, and the evolving role of DEI
- The real effects of values misalignment on belonging, psychological safety, and performance
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Hello, and welcome back to Building brand gravity. I'm Anne Green.
I'm principal and CEO of the GNS Integrated Marketing Communications Group,
and I'm so delighted today to be joined by Ethan McCarty. Hi, Ethan,
how are you?
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Good morning? I'm doing great. Thanks so much for having me,
and it's really a pleasure.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
So Ethan, just for background for our listeners that don't
know him, he and I've gotten to know each other
the last few years to the Page Society, which has
been wonderful. But Ethan has a really interesting background, thirteen
years at IBM and all kinds of I mean, this
is just a short list of your whole life. I'm
not going to go through everything there, right, but.
Speaker 3 (00:43):
Ethan McCarty, this is your life.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
This is your life. I mean, bring on some surprise guests,
it'll be exciting. Am eazy, but at IBM and really
during I think some golden years at IBM. Although IBM
continues to be such a thriving organization, but corp comms, Content,
internal comms, digital and social strategy. You're at Blomberg as
head of Employee and Innovation Communications, so I thought was
(01:05):
really cool, but then most notably, you've founded your own
shop in twenty eighteen, m Integral that focuses on employee activation,
employee experience, employee engagement. So there are a lot of
things I want to talk to you about today, as
you know, because it is a crazy world for organizations
and alike, and I think, just to set up the conversation,
it is a challenging landscape for both people, individuals and organizations.
(01:31):
There's a lot to experience and navigate right now, and
it's quite symbiotic. And I think as two organizational leaders,
we're both client counselors and we're both organizational leaders, and
we're both very worried about internal and external comms. I
just love to start riffing on the big picture that,
like the macro impact both individuals and organizations under these pressures.
(01:53):
In what ways do you think they're similar individual versus
organization and what ways do you think they're distinct? Ethan
how people are experience this wow.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
I mean, we all operate in the context of our
society and the sort of group identities that we're affiliated with.
You know, whether you think of yourself as an American
or a European or you know, a Northern Hemispherian or
you know, or smaller communities like you know, I feel
like I'm part of my family or you know, my
(02:23):
faith or whatever. And you know, there's so much change
happening at those sort of macro levels that we then
have to integrate as individuals. And so you know, when
you have you know, the level of uh, you know,
not just a frequency of changes that are happening in
very significant ways, but the the you know, the the
(02:47):
level of those changes.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
So the significance of frequent change.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
It's not just like you know, the color of houses
is changing or something like literally the fabric of our
society is changing, it seems like on a daily basis,
and so organizations need to accommodate those and so do individuals.
And it gets down, I think, to a very sort
of existential level where we're thinking about our identities as individuals.
You know, what does this mean for me as a
(03:13):
dad or as you know, as as somebody who lives
in Brooklyn versus what does this mean for you know,
an organization like my company? And so I think you know,
you're set up at the beginning and is very on point.
You know, we're you know, the two of us are,
you know, constantly navigating the space in between those sort
of brand identities for our clients and for our own companies,
(03:35):
and then our individual identities and how we relate to
the people we care about. So I think you know
that that Vuka thing, which, by the way, every time
I hear of Vuka, I think of ruk Assault from
a Willie Walk.
Speaker 1 (03:46):
Up, but I think of Vulcans. I'm a sevent Days
Star trek Crow, so it says Vulcan to me. But
I think you're closer with for sure.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
I mean they both had to experience a lot of change, right, Yeah,
I mean what do you what do you think that
you know that that sort of tension between the the
you know, what's happening on maas and what's happening for
us as individuals.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Yeah, I think tension is a way to describe it.
And I want to get into that in a moment,
because I want to dig into what you're saying. I
think it's very much related to the idea of identity,
and I want to get to that question of values,
which to me is an essential tension. But you know,
even before we get there, it makes me think about
that whole nomenclature of employee experience or as you say
(04:28):
on your website, employee activation or you know, you've been
dealing with and that interplay between the organization and the person,
right And I've I've had folks on the podcast before
talking about it. I find it like a really rich
you know, vein to mind. But in all the years
in the arc of your career we talked about earlier,
how do you understand those concepts? And then let's get
(04:48):
back into what you were talking about a moment ago.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
Well, you know, I think if you google the phrase
change management is dead, you'll find many many articles going
back for a long time. Same thing with knowledge management,
by the way, but I think it's particular. I mean,
you know, at this point, having you know, been working
for nearly thirty years, I believe that more now than ever.
(05:11):
I mean, like people have always been saying, I mean,
since I've been in the workforce in the late nineties,
people have been saying, like, you know, change is the
new constant. But my sense of it right now is
that this idea that there's periods of stasis that are
prolonged interrupted by these sort of you know, episodes of
significant change that need to be that you know, managed,
(05:34):
and then there's sort of a beginning, middle, and end
to that change, and then we're back to this period
of stasis and stability that's going to last a long time.
I do think that's kind of done. I mean, you
have it in you know, sort of in you know,
layers within an organization, like okay, so these things may
be constant for a while, and then we're going to
have a big change like Okay, we've deployed a big
(05:54):
enterprise pardon me, enterprise resource planning system and we're probably
not going to do that for another few years. Okay,
sure you probably need you probably need some traditional change management,
change communication around that. But the VUKA of it all
is happening constantly.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
So you know, even.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Those periods of stasis, they're kind of one dimensional, and
you know what you're having.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Is you know, relative stability.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
In one dimension of your life or your organization or
your business strategy. You know, everything else is changing, and
so you know, I liken it to spinning plates. I
always think about that. You know, it's like your spinning
plates and you know you've kind of got these broomsticks
or whatever, and your spinning plates on top of them,
and there's probably a couple of them that you can
turn your back on, but maybe just for a minute.
(06:44):
And I think that's where I mean, frankly, it's it's
there's never been a better time to be in the
communications profession because it's ever more strategic. I mean, I
was actually just talking about a friend of mine who
I was in the Future Leader's experience with like fifteen
years ago. She's now a chief communications office or of
a major telecom company, and she was like, oh my god,
what you know.
Speaker 3 (07:04):
When we were in the Future Leaders.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
Program, which is a Page Society program, you know, you know,
I thought, you know, you'd be a you know, chief
communications officer would mostly like handle PR you know, and
for the CEO. And now I'm like, I'm doing you know,
government relations, investor relations. Uh, you know, the employees the
communities that we're in Suddenly you know, they're like they're
(07:25):
a company that's really mostly operating in the United States.
She's doing international relations. I mean, it's just such a
different role and level of complexity that people in our
profession are contending with. It's really exciting. It's very interesting
that the opportunity landscape is.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
Really really rich.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
It's also super stressful, it's super high risk, and it's
really I mean, frankly, it's it's scary, and it's it's complex,
and there's all these you know, layers of change. So
even if you get that one plate spinning and you're
feeling good about that, chances are there's another one that's,
you know, next to hitting the floor.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
I love the plate spinning analogy. My analogy is the
old carnival game Whack a Mole. So you know, the
moles pop up and you hit them with the big
rubber hammer. And I always joked, I've joked for decades
because I, like you, I've been in doing this since
like ninety two ninety three, so that's been over thirty
years now in agency side, all agency side, large agency,
(08:23):
and then building an agency over decades, and now CEO
again at a at a mid size, larger firm. I've
always felt that whack a Mole was a good analogy
because there's always something popping up, right beture, I oil
clients the world, and the moles are not hiding out
down there, they're not sleeping, and it's constant and you
never know where they're going to pop up, and I
(08:44):
think these metaphors are helpful. But I do think that
even though I've thought of it that way for a
long time, the intensity has ratcheted up so much. And
you're right, it's very, very interesting, almost too interesting at times.
So that's part of I've spent a lot of time
recently contemplating sort of the organizational level of that, as
(09:04):
a person like yourself that's responsible for people, that's responsible
for our brand, ourselves and then is also responsible for
our clients and thinking deeply about their business and not
just them as an entity, but their people and all
those levels. And remember back in the day Ethan how
external and internal communications is like never the Twain shall
meet an or external matters, So it's like the people
(09:27):
internally doing internal comms. I've been saying for years also
that it's like the drop in the pond where the
rings radiate out. The first ring is your own people, right,
and it's a very symbiotic it flows through. So I
think we understand that more now, and that's a good
transition to sort of the heart of the conversation. It
goes back to what you're saying before, which is I
see a very pervasive and common tens to a surprise
(09:50):
when it comes to the values of an organization relative
to the values of the individual staff members. And I
think that feels to me more saling than ever right now.
And I think we're going to have a chance to
unpack that. But I do find it persistently hard to unpack.
I find this dynamic tension to never feel resolved. I mean,
(10:10):
first of all, do you agree with that assertion? Does
that resonate with you?
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Oh, one hundred percent? I mean I in fact, even
the name of my company Integral, you know, the.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
The sort of root of it was.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
I was having a conversation with h with my old
colleague Ben Edwards, who was for a time at at
IBM and at the Economists and PayPal, and we were
we were this was actually this is almost ten years
before I started the company, and we're just talking about
this idea of you know, individual identity and the brand.
(10:44):
And you know, because I was running social media for
IBM at the time, and you know, I had this
notion that you know, individuals could confer a sense of
authenticity to a brand, and brands could uh, you know,
confer a sense of authority to an individual. And there's
like this value exchange that was happening, you know, in
in social media for big companies and you know, getting
(11:05):
employees to be enlisted as advocates for their for their brand.
But one of the things that you know was to
me very apparent was that one's identity it has to
be like there's a sense of integrity to one's identity,
like wholeness. Not integrity like you know, following the rules
or you know, ethical behavior or what have you, but
(11:26):
but that integrity, like it's it's able to hold together.
And when you have to sort of traverse this space
between you know, the brand like oh I'm an IBM
or versus like oh I'm i'm ethan, you know, the
the larger that space is, the more that you're going
to be sort of, you know, spending your day with
(11:48):
this sense of cognitive dissonance where you have to believe
two opposing ideas like I'm like this this whole set
of values that IBM purports to hold versus the you know,
the set of values that I know myself to hold.
If those are not aligned, I'm going to feel a
lot of stress at Cognitive dissonance really is like crazy making.
It causes a lot of stress, It causes people to
(12:09):
behave in erratic ways, antisocial ways. I mean, you know,
things that you would you know that you would say
like you don't want those kind of behaviors. And so
many years later, you know, when I did start this
company and yes, you know, the idea of that integrity
is in the name of you know, my business. But
we started to do some research around this, and we
(12:32):
do this research every year with the Harris Poll, where
we look at I mean, one of the things that
we ask people is, well, do you know what the
company's values are?
Speaker 3 (12:40):
Are they exhibited you know at the company?
Speaker 2 (12:43):
Do you see those you know, like that's actually real
or is it just poster sort of fodder for walls,
you know? And then how much do those track with
your own sense of values? And one of the things
that we found is that the more those correlated, and
more that people and it's again and again now this
we're going into our fifth year of doing this research,
(13:03):
and you know, again and again we see that when
people feel high alignment between their company's stated values and
their personal values, they're like two times, like two hundred
percent more likely to do things like you know, volunteer,
go the extra mile for a colleague, and and you know,
(13:25):
participate in mentorship programs, do extra to satisfy a client
or customers needs, even buy the company's stock. I mean,
like all these what I would call pro social behaviors
go up by an enormous I mean just categorically different
level of that kind of behavior.
Speaker 3 (13:43):
And then likewise, the.
Speaker 2 (13:45):
Behaviors that people the behaviors that people are likely to
exhibit in the workplace that are negative, things like ignoring
safety protocols or protesting against a company, you know, warning
a candidate away, or or posting something negative about the
company online.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
Those go through the roof equally.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
And even seventeen percent of people around seventeen eighteen percent
of people who have that low values alignment say they
would outright sabotage of a company, which is I mean
to me, that's just like mind blow. I mean we
put that in almost as a lark, like, oh, I wonderfully,
like anybody would say they'd sabotage of a company, or
say a colleague would sabotage a company. And fully seventeen
percent in the first you know, in the first year
(14:26):
that we did that study and that's where you know
when you see things online. You know, when you see
these videos of people, you know, like chucking a box
or you know, putting something weird in somebody's food, or
you know, you hear about somebody doing something like horrible
and a healthcare you know.
Speaker 3 (14:40):
Whatever, those those behaviors, it.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
Didn't come out of nowhere. They didn't come That's not
like a bad seed necessarily. There's probably some really big
disconnect in between what's going on inside that person's mind
and that person's life, and what's going inside that person's employer,
like that company.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
It's interesting to think about this, and I love that research.
That's one of the reasons why I reached out to
I want to speak to you because you were doing
some interesting posts on LinkedIn about some dimensions of this,
which we're going to get into in a minute. Where
that value is alignment or disalignment. Isn't great tension, I
think as much tension as ever right now, right but
(15:18):
you're reminding me of how we represent corporate life and culture. So,
for example, on the more benign side, there's the cartoon Dilbert.
For those who don't know, google it, but it's Dilbert
to me, the whole vibe of Dilbert is in management.
You know, it's like poor Dilbert is powerless and in
the you know, the the law of you know, dumb managers.
(15:41):
There's also office space, and there's the office, and then
if you go up the chain to stuff that's a
bit more intense. There's severance now, which is a very
literal metaphorical represent literal and metaphorical representation of the inside
and outside person, that person that is in cognitive dissonance
between their organizational self and their private self. And so
(16:03):
you know, one of my first questions too, I think
I personally feel this is probably irresolvable, Like you're never
going to get complete alignment, because it's just there's people.
People have many dimensions to them. You know, a company
is not going to be all things. And I don't
personally believe in the bring your whole self to work
as something that can be fully fulfilled, nor should it
(16:24):
be to me. But how do you see what are
the practices that companies start to enact to assess that
they have a values gap between themselves and their staff
and then start to figure out how they bring that
Venn diagram Those two circles into closer alignments so they
don't have those terrible outcomes that you're talking about.
Speaker 2 (16:44):
Yeah, well, I mean I love the examples, and I'm
kind of obsessed with severance. I think it's I think
it's it's an amazing social critique because it does it
basically is asserting that it's irreconcilable. You know, this difference
between like my internal self and like who I have
to be in order to be a successful professional. And
the only way that we could possibly navigate that would
(17:06):
be you know, like separating this hemispheres of our brains
or something like really radical, you know, like a.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
I neither of us believe it to that degree, but
it is an interesting concept.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
It's oh, I mean, it's totally fascinating, and and I
tend to agree with you.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
Like the idea of having.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
Total overlap, you know, the like the opposite of severe,
like having total confluence or whatever the opposite would be
would be that would be equally nightmarish.
Speaker 1 (17:31):
You know.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
It's like you don't want I don't think I mean,
I certainly don't want my employees to submit their entire
personalities to the Integral brand. And you know, and I'm
a found. I mean like it's like really intense for
a founder, you know. I mean like this whole thing,
like the name of the company came to me in
a dream. I mean like this is like very personal
for me, you know. And even so like when I
(17:52):
leave work, like I really want to spend time with
my kids and put the phone away, and you know,
like I have a very separate life outside of work,
and I think that should be cherished and honored. I
think where most companies sort of miss the opportunity to
at least tighten up that ven diagram a bit on
around the most important issues is to gain an understanding
(18:13):
of what those issues are to the employees who work
in your organization. And so I mean look, very very early,
my point of view of this is highly highly shaped
by Mike Wing and John Awatta at IBM, who were
my you know, my leaders when I was early in
my career, and we did this whole practice called the
(18:33):
Values Jam, and we were doing these sort of like
giant online dialogues. There's a great HBr piece I think
it's under its authored by the CEO at the time,
Sam Palmasana, that describes what happened in Values jam. But
essentially we said, all right, there's about four hundred thousand
of us here, what do we believe it? And we
(18:54):
had this I mean it was very very early, so
the technology was like really wonky and all this kind
of stuff, but we had this massive online conversation and
then distilled that down into a new set of values
that endure to this day. And the proceedings set were
articulated by the founders of the company, by the Watson family,
you know, one hundred years earlier. So it was time
(19:14):
to check in with a contemporary workforce on what a
contemporary set of values would look like for you know,
like if we wanted that company to last another one
hundred years. And even though that was I think that's
like twenty years ago now at this point, but I
think that at the heart of it's what's so correct
about that is listening first. And so if you're able
(19:36):
to do that, and I'm not saying I mean leaders
should lead, right, but leaders should lead the people that
are following them with some real high you know, emotional sensitivity,
intellectual curiosity, and compassion for the folks that they're leading.
And how can you possibly do that if you haven't
(19:56):
gained through really intentional, large scale, frequent check ins listening,
and not the you know, once every other year employee
engagement survey. You know. I mean those have their place.
Those are good and also not enough. And so I mean, like,
if you think about any relationship that you have in
your life, if that's meaningful to you, if that person
(20:19):
only checked in with you once every two years.
Speaker 3 (20:22):
Like, what would you think of that relationship?
Speaker 2 (20:23):
You would not feel valued, right, and so it'd be
very hard to share values with that person. Well, same
thing goes here, and so I mean this is this
is again it's not some like back twenty years ago
for Abend, it was enormously expensive to kind of pull
that kind of thing off. I mean, you can swipe
a credit card and do that like with some SaaS
software tomorrow at pretty much any company. So that's really
(20:46):
the point of departure if you can understand what the
sensibilities are, and then ultimately you may need to shift
those and that may become as you articulate a set
of values that inform your culture, your business strategy. You know,
how you show up as a company, how those individual
employees show up to each other's That may end up
(21:08):
being a passive filter, like there may be a lot
of people who are like, yeah, actually that's not for me,
and that's okay, that's cool. There's probably a great place
for them to go work and that has, you know,
some values that are more concommonant with their own and
harmonious with their own worldview and so on, and that's great.
That's probably going to be a good thing. And then
it's going to be an attractor for people who see
(21:31):
those values in action and your everything from your marketing
and employer website to how you actually show up to
your customers, what kind of products you produce, and so on,
and that's I mean, that's I think the opportunity which
is enormous.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
I love this conversation about rerooting ourselves and this practice
of listening, compassion, being open to dialogue and then leaders
leading to I had to learn some hard lessons people
who worked with me when I was a CEO and
a CEO the first time watch me sort of learn
in live time the difference between creating consensus and deciding
(22:06):
when it's time to lead. Where do we figure out
and how do we figure out as leaders, but both
as individual contributors, employees, you know, how we define our
own values? What is value based living for us? That's
something I've way out in therapy. What's a value based
approach to my life? How do I look at that
as a leader? How do we understand where we come
come together and where we are apart? And you're right,
(22:28):
how is it individuals make a choice to say this
is not my set of values. I want to move on.
I say leave with love.
Speaker 2 (22:34):
At that point, leaders need to respect that too and
not you know, see that as worthy of punishment. That's
a that's a great choice, and you should support people
and all, you know, and like and ensure that.
Speaker 3 (22:47):
I love that idea of leave with love.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
And you know, separate with some dignity there, and it
will speak well like there's nothing you can do better.
I think there's nothing you could do to attract great talent.
Then be respectful and phases of it with your current talent,
you know. And so if people see like, oh, okay,
that person has had like a great tenure there and
then they went on to go do something else, that's awesome.
(23:09):
You know, that's probably going to be a real big
attractor for talent.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
I think it's interesting what you're saying ethan. And I've
reflected on this a lot in terms of the grace
with which folks leave an organization, whether they're making that
choice or whether they or not, which is even harder
something I've experienced many times as a leader having to
make that kind of decision. But I do feel that
dynamic tension between the organization and the individual is often
on display in very negative ways with leaders when they
(23:34):
treat folks that are leaving as if they've been personally affronted,
and it's just such a bad situation. So I think
you're right that whole life cycle of the relationship is
so critical.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
For a while, I ran IBM's alumni program, and what
was kind of interesting about the choice that my boss
made was like, you're going to run the intro on
it and you're going to run the alumni program at
the same time, which which was fast because you know,
here we have two networks of people who have a
lot in common having you know, especially you know with IBM,
(24:07):
which is a brand that does such important imprinting, you know,
like the identity in the culture. It's like so heavy,
you know, like you when you're an IBM, or it's
like that's a thing. You know, it's like that's a
that's it's almost like an invention of IBM. This this
identity of the IBM or and you know when you
leave IBM and IBM is you know, somebody who's left IBM.
(24:29):
We were trying to change the language. They're not an
x IBM or they're an IBM alump. And because there
were so there's such a positive you know, sort of rotating.
Speaker 3 (24:40):
Door there where people will go out.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Of IBM, gain some industry, experience some new contacts, and
then come back or also or just become clients of
IBM customers.
Speaker 3 (24:51):
And you know, and so I.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Think if you think about the you know, like in
terms of the identity vector here, like you have come
and identified especially you know in North America. I mean
it's not the same for everyone, but you know, in
North America there's a high association with your profession and
your identity. You know, you ask somebody what they do
in North America, and chances are they going to tell
you what they do for a living. They're not going
(25:12):
to say like, oh, I'm like I make candles and
you know, I'd like to go jogging. They're probably going
to lead with their profession and you know, and so
if you honor that that that level, that where people
really integrate a brand into their personal identity, that can
be very powerful just in terms of the meaning of
their work and their lives. And also it's incredibly strategically
(25:34):
valuable for an organization to maintain that kind of bond
with people. And you know, as you were saying earlier
about these kind of like tops down, you know, command
and control, you know, that kind of management system really
has its place, Like that is a very valuable That's
not like a dumb management system. It just doesn't tend
(25:55):
to It doesn't tend to build those kind of deep
hooks into people's souls in a way and people's you know,
individual identities.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
And it also doesn't scale very well.
Speaker 2 (26:05):
It's really really hard to do that kind of command
and control thing at scale. And so like what I
see happening in government right now is almost like a
de scaling that's happening. Whereas if you can, I mean,
I just remember, you know, thinking about the values and
I ended up when I was at the New School
for Social Research, I ended up writing my master's thesis
about this idea of values and culture as a management system.
(26:29):
And you know, because I had experienced at firsthand at IBM,
and I think that, you know, if you can set
up those right, you know, values and sort of cultural
assumptions that people will make you know, in the day
to day work, that is going free leaders to do
so much more. You don't have to be there checking
everything because you know that on principle the decisions will
(26:51):
be made in a way that aligns with.
Speaker 3 (26:53):
Your strategy how you would do it. You know, the
why is.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
Understood by everybody, and so values and culture sure are
to me. They're not a nice to have, you know,
foosball tables and whatever. It's that's a strategic asset that
should be cultivated and managed.
Speaker 3 (27:10):
And I think that.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
The savvy CEOs who really want to scale, who really
want to do something big and empower people who want
to come and do something big, you know, like that's
going to be that's the way to get there, as
opposed to come work at this job that's super well defined,
do X, y Z in that order, because that's what
I've said. And then if you haven't done it right,
(27:31):
they'll you know, if there's a punitive sort of consequence.
Speaker 1 (27:35):
Yeah, I couldn't agree more. I think that for many
organizations the values equation you're talking about is more effective.
I agree with you the command and control. I mean, obviously,
military operations and things like that need that chain of
immand and they function very well and if they didn't
have it, that would have dire consequences. So I think
that's a really good point. You know, in terms of
(27:55):
this discussion again about the organizational values, personal values, the
dell to the distance of the delta between them, I
just want to talk about a few things that are
going on to sort of real time tests of this.
You know. Maybe it's like not a speed round, but
we'll go through a couple. One of them is politics
in the workplace, And I wrote in my notes, yikes,
this one is tough true in pritticularly over the past year,
(28:17):
but certainly today. So the conventional wisdom, and this is
something we talk about in the circles we run in
all the time. There's a conventional wisdom not to bring
or allow politics in the workplace. But to me, that's
really not helpful nor realistic. And you posted a great
short commentary on this on LinkedIn, which is literally while
it was like I have to reach out to Ethan
to talk about this. Thanks, give me your take on this,
(28:39):
and I know you have some data on it too,
But what's your take on that question, which is real
profound right now.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
Yeah, I think, I mean, like we've found in our
research that pretty consistently about half of the employee population
would like to be able to speak about politics and
social issues in the workplace.
Speaker 3 (28:58):
I feel like they should be able to do that.
Speaker 2 (29:00):
About half believe that they're that they have the right
to do it, and they you know, they're empowered to
do that. However, it gets kind of more interesting when
you look at both positionally and generationally. It will probably
not surprise anybody that that rather millennials are way higher,
they're pulling that number, that fifty percent number way up,
(29:23):
and boomers are bringing it down to you know, to
some degree, as our gen xers gen Z also tends
to be a little bit lower. We think that's positional.
We think that's like because they might be in more
junior positions, they might feel a little bit less empowered
in the workplace just because of where they are in
the organization. But the sort of TLDR is get ready
(29:46):
for a workforce that is much more interested in talking
about social and political issues at work and feel that
they have the right to do so.
Speaker 3 (29:57):
And so that is coming. That's already here, already here,
but it's also it's coming more.
Speaker 2 (30:03):
And then also the and so so before I go
on to another sort of dimension that what I would
say the approach needs to be is depending on what
kinds of spaces that you operate in. You know, like
a retail uh, you know, a retail organization is gonna
be different from one that's manufacturing or a pharmaceutical organization.
(30:23):
And even within those like you're gonna have an itinerant
salesforce and you're gonna have people are manufacturing, you know.
So there's a wide variety of sort of spaces, whether
they're digital spaces like a chat room, or physical spaces
like a break room or a town hall meeting with
whatever those spaces are where people gather in your organization,
you just need to be very very prescriptive about what
(30:46):
the rules of the road are. And I think that's
a really good, a really good way to start. It's
just like even if you just say, you know, look,
we are not going to we're not gonna use any language.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
That is you know, hostile and integrading.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
You know, like that's a great start, and most organizations
have those kind of things in place already, but you
need to signal that again and again and again. So
if you have a Slack channel that says, you know,
I find it so funny, you know, like when you
go buy Slack or deploy slack, it comes preloaded with
this general you know, this category where it's like just general,
like anybody can talk about anything. The first thing you
(31:23):
should do is rename that and put something in there
it's like general but also not racist or like but
also not about you know, your political affiliation or you know,
like put something in there that helps people understand like, Okay, yeah,
we actually we're interested. We this is a place where
we can talk, but we're also like here's here's what
we think. Uh, you know, the appropriate kind of discourse
(31:44):
is in this venue. So being really clear about the
rules of the road, I think is the is the
first step. And then and then also you know, the
the other thing is is to really reward and lionize
people who do it well.
Speaker 3 (31:58):
There were there are people.
Speaker 2 (31:59):
Who are going to be natural conveners and community leaders,
and if those people, if you can lionize that behavior,
if you can like make those folks the star of
the show, give them some mechanism for convening people. I know,
like fifty dollars budget to buy donuts and coffee. I
mean like that that could be huge because they're doing
it in a way that is really pro social and
(32:20):
that could be around Okay, well you know this issue.
I'm going to make this up. This issue of homelessness
is really important in a particular area. Great, we want
to talk about that. Let's let's fund the ability for
that team who really cares about it to go do
a volunteer project and they can talk about homelessness all
the time there because they're really engaged in doing some
(32:40):
solution around it, as opposed to sort of getting into
the political sphere and talking about policy issue which the
company may not have any you know, like impact on
at all.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
Yeah, it's it's interesting toope as Another piece of this
is what two companies speak out about or not speak
out about. And I think these are also very symbiotic.
And you know, one of the things I've been trying
to reflect on as a CEO is what is the
foundational context or the lens I can offer staff that
I've been thinking about that we can share a language
and also share a set of values about how we
(33:12):
engage right, So a value of engagement and a value
of connection and communication, but also values of respect. One
of the things I tried to do last year was
reflect on what does it mean to be in a
pluralistic society? What does it mean to stay in community
in tough conversations? What does it mean to hold someone's
humanity even when you're very upset about something. What does
it mean to grapple with the idea that someone's vote
(33:34):
may land differently for them than for you. And also
to say to folks, you may not understand your vote
feels annihilating to another person. So how do we stay
in community in those moments, and how do we create
those guard rails, And how do I gently or my
other leaders step in to say, hey, we're moving into
an area that's less productive, And also how do we
(33:55):
counsel our clients on these pieces? Knowing that staffs are
not a monol, People have different views, and that issues
are very charged. In the media landscape which we all
are deeply engaged in, is highly polarized, So I think
you're bringing up some of the things I've been concerned about,
especially when people say, oh, well, companies, just stick with
(34:16):
your values, speak out and your values. I'm like, I
think it's a lot more complicated than that in this
context right now. But I do think this idea of
the values meaning how do we how are we with
each other, how are we with our clients, how are
we in the world and in community to reflect on
that openly, for leadership to articulate that and then allow
(34:37):
other leaders to bring that to life in their spaces.
And who are those positive, optimistic, caring conveners. I like
a lot about what you're saying there.
Speaker 3 (34:47):
You know.
Speaker 2 (34:47):
I think one of the things as well is to
really look at not just where your organization or your
organization's leaders are speaking out, but where your organization and
your organization's leaders are having impact. And you know, I
think there's a lot of handling around what statements should
(35:07):
we make and you know, and all that, and I
and that's that's not nothing. I mean, it is important,
and it is also very risky, particularly in a political
environment where you're seeing you know, retribution happening for things
that people said, you know, and that is scary and
it's real. And also at the end of the day,
you know, I mean, like you can reflect on your
own experience, and I will also reflect on.
Speaker 3 (35:29):
The research that we do that you know, we ask, you.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
Know, we give this sort of pick list of twenty
eight different issues, everything from Israel and Palestine to you know,
handgun ownership to homelessness, pay equity, you know, all these,
you know, a whole range of topics, and we ask
people to pick five that they think their company should
make a difference on, make an impact on, like actually
you know, through policy, through giving, through product design and
(35:55):
so on.
Speaker 3 (35:57):
And very very very very consistently.
Speaker 2 (36:01):
We've seen the top five dominated by my health and
well being, job security and job creation, equitable pay, and
UH diversity, you know, issues related to diversity and fairness
and UH data privacy as well, and those top five dominate.
(36:21):
And if you think about those, those are all things
that most companies are already doing stuff about. And you
can material you can look at the policies, you can
make sure that those are really really people first policies
and that you are really correct to your employee's desires
on those, and you know, and just really sort of
drive those home, even even with something like job stability.
(36:43):
Yet you know what you might need to lay off people,
that is real, and you can still have policies that
support those with whom you've parted ways, you know, and
do that, as you said, leaving with love and you know,
like doing that, you know, doing that kind of action
with some dignity. But what's interesting as well is that
at when you look at that again, generationally, the top
(37:03):
five issues change significantly, and gen Z and millennials are
much more much more likely to rank LGBTQ plus and
you know, right, you know, basically trans and and you know,
like you know, these these populations rights and privileges and
you know, ability to operate. They're much more likely to
(37:24):
rank gun control higher up. They're much more likely to
rank education higher up. And so these things are and
it may be about like just stage in life where
people are, you know, who they're surrounded by what they're
seeing in the media. And it's also true that the
leaders of organizations need to think of employee populations not
(37:46):
as like monolithic but rather as a group of individuals
who have agency in their lives, who are making choices,
who can either choose you, or they can choose someone else.
They could choose to do something great with and for you,
or they can choose to do something great within for
someone else, and the negative is drew to they can
choose to do something mean and nasty to you and
(38:08):
mean and nast this about it.
Speaker 3 (38:09):
So all those things are in play.
Speaker 2 (38:11):
And again it's like the more we can recognize that,
you know, this individuation of experience is you know, is
like really forgive me integral to your work experience. That is,
you know, that is going to be a key lever
and what you do through policy is going to be
have so much more impact than what you say through
(38:33):
a press release.
Speaker 1 (38:35):
Yeah. Actually, I know, my colleague Steve Halsey is going
to be doing an upcoming podcast to talk with Rob
at Harris Poll about some of the recent research they
did and this idea of words or context have some
trust building characteristics, actual impact has more trust building characteristics.
But combining context and impact is the real hockey stick
(38:57):
up to build trust. And you know, as we as
we wrap up our conversation, because there's a million more
things we could talk about, but one of the things
you're making me think of is in terms of going
back to that question of how to help organizations and
people that work for them understand where their values align
or where they don't. One of the things I think
is extraordinarily important now, especially to say in a client
service context like ours, but I think all organizations is
(39:20):
for leadership to really transparently narrate where they're facing their
own dynamic tensions. So where is it that and where
is it that we're very clear on what we believe?
So for example, when I can ladder things up to
the level to the one hundred thousand foot level of
basic human rights, respect for people in their difference, celebration
(39:41):
of difference, what it means to have a free press,
what it means, what our democratic ideals aside from these
ways that we're fighting with each other about them. You know,
what does it mean to have free flowing business but
also have compassion in that right? So you know, but
also being very clear of hey, this this is an
environment where it's going to be hard for our clients
(40:02):
to speak out in certain things. They need to lay
a little bit more low here, but see how they're
still practicing and creating impact here. If I feel if
I can narrate that for my own stakeholders and also
for my client stakeholders, then we can understand that the
values alignment is not so off because without that narration
and without that context of like why we are speaking
(40:24):
or not speaking, doing or not doing, why a client
may be doing this but not saying that, it's it's
very hard to translate. It's not legible, you know. And
that's one of the things I'm thinking about a lot too.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
Yeah, well, I mean, I think at the end of
the day, we're talking about, you know, translating these ideas
and principles into action, and does everybody understand what that
translation process is? You know, So if you have a
business strategy and you just put the deck out there
and you're like, Okay, here's our business strategy, and then
you know, thirty seven layers deeper in your organization or
(41:01):
in the remote office or whatever you ask people with
the business strategies, I'm not going to understand that.
Speaker 3 (41:06):
You know. They have to you know, like people have to.
Speaker 2 (41:09):
Like learn things and you know, and internalize things in ways,
in multiple ways, and be able to experience it in
order to actually then go and do those things. And
there's some great theory on this like Blooms tax Blooms taxonomy.
It's like this hierarchy of how people learn things. It's
very interesting and how you do course design and that
(41:31):
kind of stuff. But and integral, we have this kind
of employee experience formula that is it's very high level,
but it can be really a helpful tool, you know,
if you're trying to trans if you're trying to create
an employee experience that then ultimately drive some business value
or some business outcome or societal value or societal outcome.
(41:53):
There's just a few components and the you know, the
first one is listening, you know, big surprise, like how
you doing How are you quantitatively and qualitatively understanding what
the actual drivers are for perceptions and behaviors amongst this population,
you know, whether you have twenty employees or you know,
two hundred thousand employees, you know, can you get as
(42:14):
nuanced and understanding.
Speaker 3 (42:15):
Of that population as possible?
Speaker 2 (42:18):
And then you introduce things like content, and you know,
like content might be if something as pithy as your
you know, higher level as your values, or something as
you know sort of you know, s all to the
earth as like help text on a you know, on
an HR website or something like that. You have all
these interactions, which again it could be something as sort
(42:39):
of day to day as like the stand up that
you have in the dispatch dispatch center before you head
off to your shift, or you know, the board meeting
or the town hall with the CEO, and that's all
driven by you know, whatever the strategic intentions are that
you know, it's a you know, is it a cultural intention,
is a business expansion intention? Is it a talent acquisition
(42:59):
or intention? So you put those things together listening, strategic contention,
content interactions that if you.
Speaker 3 (43:07):
Bring your real thoughtful.
Speaker 2 (43:10):
In you know, like very very strategic self to interrogating
the level of commitment you've made to those elements, you
will be able to produce an employee experience that is,
you know, potentially incredibly scalable because people understand what's going
on and they can make decisions independently and operate independently,
(43:30):
and also incredibly durable because it's going to be sort
of like self correcting by you know, by this constant listening, adjusting,
iterating it. You know, you can that is achievable, and
it may be achievable at the whole enterprise level. I
think that would be very audacious and ambitious, and I'm
sure there are companies out there that are close, but
(43:51):
I think, you know, starting at a smaller level, like Okay, well,
can we do this in one business unit, or can
we do this in one team, or can we do
this for one topical air like how we're managing customer experience,
you might be able to create an employee experience that
then radiates like that that employee experience is reified in
(44:11):
the customer experience and the products that you make in
your corporate reputation. Like the best brands are just totally
built from the inside out. And you see that again
and again and again.
Speaker 1 (44:21):
Well, I think that's an amazing place to end. Ethan,
I love it. I love that Rubric. And this podcast
is called building Brand Gravity. So I always like to ask,
what has you in its gravity today? An idea, a book,
a podcast, something in the culture.
Speaker 3 (44:37):
Yeah, you know what.
Speaker 2 (44:38):
I've recently been going into back issues of The New Yorker,
and yeah, I've really enjoyed it. I've read some pieces
by and about James Baldwin, and just the ferocity of
his intellect and his courage has really inspired me and honestly.
Speaker 3 (45:00):
I mean maybe this is just you know, growing up.
Speaker 2 (45:01):
In the Midwest in the eighties, but I didn't really
encounter much of his writing, you know, And so now
I'm kind of getting into it and I and it
led me to go watch a debate that he held
in at Oxford.
Speaker 3 (45:14):
You know you can, it's on YouTube.
Speaker 2 (45:16):
Anyway, just looking into James Baldwin has been amazing and inspiring.
It was so ironic. I've think about it this morning.
I knew you're going to ask this question. You are
kind enough to tell me. And as I was coming
in on the subway with my dog, I look down
to pet her and this guy's got a backpack on
and it's got this big button of a profile of
(45:36):
James Baldwin, and I was like, oh my god, Okay,
so this is there's like I don't know, kismid or
karma or synergy or I don't know, cosmic vibes are happening.
But anyway, I highly recommend dipping into what James Baldmen
had to say.
Speaker 1 (45:48):
That's a magnificent recommendation. I co signed that so much,
and Ethan, thank you for your time today. It's been
a joy, which dis.
Speaker 3 (45:56):
Leasure with you privilege. Thank you very much for inviting me.
Speaker 1 (45:59):
Everybody, there's more building brand gravity wherever you get your podcasts,
and we always appreciate your feedback. Thanks for joining us today.
Speaker 2 (46:07):
Thank you,
Hello, and welcome back to Building brand gravity. I'm Anne Green.
I'm principal and CEO of the GNS Integrated Marketing Communications Group,
and I'm so delighted today to be joined by Ethan McCarty. Hi, Ethan,
how are you?
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Good morning? I'm doing great. Thanks so much for having me,
and it's really a pleasure.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
So Ethan, just for background for our listeners that don't
know him, he and I've gotten to know each other
the last few years to the Page Society, which has
been wonderful. But Ethan has a really interesting background, thirteen
years at IBM and all kinds of I mean, this
is just a short list of your whole life. I'm
not going to go through everything there, right, but.
Speaker 3 (00:43):
Ethan McCarty, this is your life.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
This is your life. I mean, bring on some surprise guests,
it'll be exciting. Am eazy, but at IBM and really
during I think some golden years at IBM. Although IBM
continues to be such a thriving organization, but corp comms, Content,
internal comms, digital and social strategy. You're at Blomberg as
head of Employee and Innovation Communications, so I thought was
(01:05):
really cool, but then most notably, you've founded your own
shop in twenty eighteen, m Integral that focuses on employee activation,
employee experience, employee engagement. So there are a lot of
things I want to talk to you about today, as
you know, because it is a crazy world for organizations
and alike, and I think, just to set up the conversation,
it is a challenging landscape for both people, individuals and organizations.
(01:31):
There's a lot to experience and navigate right now, and
it's quite symbiotic. And I think as two organizational leaders,
we're both client counselors and we're both organizational leaders, and
we're both very worried about internal and external comms. I
just love to start riffing on the big picture that,
like the macro impact both individuals and organizations under these pressures.
(01:53):
In what ways do you think they're similar individual versus
organization and what ways do you think they're distinct? Ethan
how people are experience this wow.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
I mean, we all operate in the context of our
society and the sort of group identities that we're affiliated with.
You know, whether you think of yourself as an American
or a European or you know, a Northern Hemispherian or
you know, or smaller communities like you know, I feel
like I'm part of my family or you know, my
(02:23):
faith or whatever. And you know, there's so much change
happening at those sort of macro levels that we then
have to integrate as individuals. And so you know, when
you have you know, the level of uh, you know,
not just a frequency of changes that are happening in
very significant ways, but the the you know, the the
(02:47):
level of those changes.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
So the significance of frequent change.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
It's not just like you know, the color of houses
is changing or something like literally the fabric of our
society is changing, it seems like on a daily basis,
and so organizations need to accommodate those and so do individuals.
And it gets down, I think, to a very sort
of existential level where we're thinking about our identities as individuals.
You know, what does this mean for me as a
(03:13):
dad or as you know, as as somebody who lives
in Brooklyn versus what does this mean for you know,
an organization like my company? And so I think you know,
you're set up at the beginning and is very on point.
You know, we're you know, the two of us are,
you know, constantly navigating the space in between those sort
of brand identities for our clients and for our own companies,
(03:35):
and then our individual identities and how we relate to
the people we care about. So I think you know
that that Vuka thing, which, by the way, every time
I hear of Vuka, I think of ruk Assault from
a Willie Walk.
Speaker 1 (03:46):
Up, but I think of Vulcans. I'm a sevent Days
Star trek Crow, so it says Vulcan to me. But
I think you're closer with for sure.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
I mean they both had to experience a lot of change, right, Yeah,
I mean what do you what do you think that
you know that that sort of tension between the the
you know, what's happening on maas and what's happening for
us as individuals.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Yeah, I think tension is a way to describe it.
And I want to get into that in a moment,
because I want to dig into what you're saying. I
think it's very much related to the idea of identity,
and I want to get to that question of values,
which to me is an essential tension. But you know,
even before we get there, it makes me think about
that whole nomenclature of employee experience or as you say
(04:28):
on your website, employee activation or you know, you've been
dealing with and that interplay between the organization and the person,
right And I've I've had folks on the podcast before
talking about it. I find it like a really rich
you know, vein to mind. But in all the years
in the arc of your career we talked about earlier,
how do you understand those concepts? And then let's get
(04:48):
back into what you were talking about a moment ago.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
Well, you know, I think if you google the phrase
change management is dead, you'll find many many articles going
back for a long time. Same thing with knowledge management,
by the way, but I think it's particular. I mean,
you know, at this point, having you know, been working
for nearly thirty years, I believe that more now than ever.
(05:11):
I mean, like people have always been saying, I mean,
since I've been in the workforce in the late nineties,
people have been saying, like, you know, change is the
new constant. But my sense of it right now is
that this idea that there's periods of stasis that are
prolonged interrupted by these sort of you know, episodes of
significant change that need to be that you know, managed,
(05:34):
and then there's sort of a beginning, middle, and end
to that change, and then we're back to this period
of stasis and stability that's going to last a long time.
I do think that's kind of done. I mean, you
have it in you know, sort of in you know,
layers within an organization, like okay, so these things may
be constant for a while, and then we're going to
have a big change like Okay, we've deployed a big
(05:54):
enterprise pardon me, enterprise resource planning system and we're probably
not going to do that for another few years. Okay,
sure you probably need you probably need some traditional change management,
change communication around that. But the VUKA of it all
is happening constantly.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
So you know, even.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Those periods of stasis, they're kind of one dimensional, and
you know what you're having.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Is you know, relative stability.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
In one dimension of your life or your organization or
your business strategy. You know, everything else is changing, and
so you know, I liken it to spinning plates. I
always think about that. You know, it's like your spinning
plates and you know you've kind of got these broomsticks
or whatever, and your spinning plates on top of them,
and there's probably a couple of them that you can
turn your back on, but maybe just for a minute.
(06:44):
And I think that's where I mean, frankly, it's it's
there's never been a better time to be in the
communications profession because it's ever more strategic. I mean, I
was actually just talking about a friend of mine who
I was in the Future Leader's experience with like fifteen
years ago. She's now a chief communications office or of
a major telecom company, and she was like, oh my god,
what you know.
Speaker 3 (07:04):
When we were in the Future Leaders.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
Program, which is a Page Society program, you know, you know,
I thought, you know, you'd be a you know, chief
communications officer would mostly like handle PR you know, and
for the CEO. And now I'm like, I'm doing you know,
government relations, investor relations. Uh, you know, the employees the
communities that we're in Suddenly you know, they're like they're
(07:25):
a company that's really mostly operating in the United States.
She's doing international relations. I mean, it's just such a
different role and level of complexity that people in our
profession are contending with. It's really exciting. It's very interesting
that the opportunity landscape is.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
Really really rich.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
It's also super stressful, it's super high risk, and it's
really I mean, frankly, it's it's scary, and it's it's complex,
and there's all these you know, layers of change. So
even if you get that one plate spinning and you're
feeling good about that, chances are there's another one that's,
you know, next to hitting the floor.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
I love the plate spinning analogy. My analogy is the
old carnival game Whack a Mole. So you know, the
moles pop up and you hit them with the big
rubber hammer. And I always joked, I've joked for decades
because I, like you, I've been in doing this since
like ninety two ninety three, so that's been over thirty
years now in agency side, all agency side, large agency,
(08:23):
and then building an agency over decades, and now CEO
again at a at a mid size, larger firm. I've
always felt that whack a Mole was a good analogy
because there's always something popping up, right beture, I oil
clients the world, and the moles are not hiding out
down there, they're not sleeping, and it's constant and you
never know where they're going to pop up, and I
(08:44):
think these metaphors are helpful. But I do think that
even though I've thought of it that way for a
long time, the intensity has ratcheted up so much. And
you're right, it's very, very interesting, almost too interesting at times.
So that's part of I've spent a lot of time
recently contemplating sort of the organizational level of that, as
(09:04):
a person like yourself that's responsible for people, that's responsible
for our brand, ourselves and then is also responsible for
our clients and thinking deeply about their business and not
just them as an entity, but their people and all
those levels. And remember back in the day Ethan how
external and internal communications is like never the Twain shall
meet an or external matters, So it's like the people
(09:27):
internally doing internal comms. I've been saying for years also
that it's like the drop in the pond where the
rings radiate out. The first ring is your own people, right,
and it's a very symbiotic it flows through. So I
think we understand that more now, and that's a good
transition to sort of the heart of the conversation. It
goes back to what you're saying before, which is I
see a very pervasive and common tens to a surprise
(09:50):
when it comes to the values of an organization relative
to the values of the individual staff members. And I
think that feels to me more saling than ever right now.
And I think we're going to have a chance to
unpack that. But I do find it persistently hard to unpack.
I find this dynamic tension to never feel resolved. I mean,
(10:10):
first of all, do you agree with that assertion? Does
that resonate with you?
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Oh, one hundred percent? I mean I in fact, even
the name of my company Integral, you know, the.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
The sort of root of it was.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
I was having a conversation with h with my old
colleague Ben Edwards, who was for a time at at
IBM and at the Economists and PayPal, and we were
we were this was actually this is almost ten years
before I started the company, and we're just talking about
this idea of you know, individual identity and the brand.
(10:44):
And you know, because I was running social media for
IBM at the time, and you know, I had this
notion that you know, individuals could confer a sense of
authenticity to a brand, and brands could uh, you know,
confer a sense of authority to an individual. And there's
like this value exchange that was happening, you know, in
in social media for big companies and you know, getting
(11:05):
employees to be enlisted as advocates for their for their brand.
But one of the things that you know was to
me very apparent was that one's identity it has to
be like there's a sense of integrity to one's identity,
like wholeness. Not integrity like you know, following the rules
or you know, ethical behavior or what have you, but
(11:26):
but that integrity, like it's it's able to hold together.
And when you have to sort of traverse this space
between you know, the brand like oh I'm an IBM
or versus like oh I'm i'm ethan, you know, the
the larger that space is, the more that you're going
to be sort of, you know, spending your day with
(11:48):
this sense of cognitive dissonance where you have to believe
two opposing ideas like I'm like this this whole set
of values that IBM purports to hold versus the you know,
the set of values that I know myself to hold.
If those are not aligned, I'm going to feel a
lot of stress at Cognitive dissonance really is like crazy making.
It causes a lot of stress, It causes people to
(12:09):
behave in erratic ways, antisocial ways. I mean, you know,
things that you would you know that you would say
like you don't want those kind of behaviors. And so
many years later, you know, when I did start this
company and yes, you know, the idea of that integrity
is in the name of you know, my business. But
we started to do some research around this, and we
(12:32):
do this research every year with the Harris Poll, where
we look at I mean, one of the things that
we ask people is, well, do you know what the
company's values are?
Speaker 3 (12:40):
Are they exhibited you know at the company?
Speaker 2 (12:43):
Do you see those you know, like that's actually real
or is it just poster sort of fodder for walls,
you know? And then how much do those track with
your own sense of values? And one of the things
that we found is that the more those correlated, and
more that people and it's again and again now this
we're going into our fifth year of doing this research,
(13:03):
and you know, again and again we see that when
people feel high alignment between their company's stated values and
their personal values, they're like two times, like two hundred
percent more likely to do things like you know, volunteer,
go the extra mile for a colleague, and and you know,
(13:25):
participate in mentorship programs, do extra to satisfy a client
or customers needs, even buy the company's stock. I mean,
like all these what I would call pro social behaviors
go up by an enormous I mean just categorically different
level of that kind of behavior.
Speaker 3 (13:43):
And then likewise, the.
Speaker 2 (13:45):
Behaviors that people the behaviors that people are likely to
exhibit in the workplace that are negative, things like ignoring
safety protocols or protesting against a company, you know, warning
a candidate away, or or posting something negative about the
company online.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
Those go through the roof equally.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
And even seventeen percent of people around seventeen eighteen percent
of people who have that low values alignment say they
would outright sabotage of a company, which is I mean
to me, that's just like mind blow. I mean we
put that in almost as a lark, like, oh, I wonderfully,
like anybody would say they'd sabotage of a company, or
say a colleague would sabotage a company. And fully seventeen
percent in the first you know, in the first year
(14:26):
that we did that study and that's where you know
when you see things online. You know, when you see
these videos of people, you know, like chucking a box
or you know, putting something weird in somebody's food, or
you know, you hear about somebody doing something like horrible
and a healthcare you know.
Speaker 3 (14:40):
Whatever, those those behaviors, it.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
Didn't come out of nowhere. They didn't come That's not
like a bad seed necessarily. There's probably some really big
disconnect in between what's going on inside that person's mind
and that person's life, and what's going inside that person's employer,
like that company.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
It's interesting to think about this, and I love that research.
That's one of the reasons why I reached out to
I want to speak to you because you were doing
some interesting posts on LinkedIn about some dimensions of this,
which we're going to get into in a minute. Where
that value is alignment or disalignment. Isn't great tension, I
think as much tension as ever right now, right but
(15:18):
you're reminding me of how we represent corporate life and culture. So,
for example, on the more benign side, there's the cartoon Dilbert.
For those who don't know, google it, but it's Dilbert
to me, the whole vibe of Dilbert is in management.
You know, it's like poor Dilbert is powerless and in
the you know, the the law of you know, dumb managers.
(15:41):
There's also office space, and there's the office, and then
if you go up the chain to stuff that's a
bit more intense. There's severance now, which is a very
literal metaphorical represent literal and metaphorical representation of the inside
and outside person, that person that is in cognitive dissonance
between their organizational self and their private self. And so
(16:03):
you know, one of my first questions too, I think
I personally feel this is probably irresolvable, Like you're never
going to get complete alignment, because it's just there's people.
People have many dimensions to them. You know, a company
is not going to be all things. And I don't
personally believe in the bring your whole self to work
as something that can be fully fulfilled, nor should it
(16:24):
be to me. But how do you see what are
the practices that companies start to enact to assess that
they have a values gap between themselves and their staff
and then start to figure out how they bring that
Venn diagram Those two circles into closer alignments so they
don't have those terrible outcomes that you're talking about.
Speaker 2 (16:44):
Yeah, well, I mean I love the examples, and I'm
kind of obsessed with severance. I think it's I think
it's it's an amazing social critique because it does it
basically is asserting that it's irreconcilable. You know, this difference
between like my internal self and like who I have
to be in order to be a successful professional. And
the only way that we could possibly navigate that would
(17:06):
be you know, like separating this hemispheres of our brains
or something like really radical, you know, like a.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
I neither of us believe it to that degree, but
it is an interesting concept.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
It's oh, I mean, it's totally fascinating, and and I
tend to agree with you.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
Like the idea of having.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
Total overlap, you know, the like the opposite of severe,
like having total confluence or whatever the opposite would be
would be that would be equally nightmarish.
Speaker 1 (17:31):
You know.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
It's like you don't want I don't think I mean,
I certainly don't want my employees to submit their entire
personalities to the Integral brand. And you know, and I'm
a found. I mean like it's like really intense for
a founder, you know. I mean like this whole thing,
like the name of the company came to me in
a dream. I mean like this is like very personal
for me, you know. And even so like when I
(17:52):
leave work, like I really want to spend time with
my kids and put the phone away, and you know,
like I have a very separate life outside of work,
and I think that should be cherished and honored. I
think where most companies sort of miss the opportunity to
at least tighten up that ven diagram a bit on
around the most important issues is to gain an understanding
(18:13):
of what those issues are to the employees who work
in your organization. And so I mean look, very very early,
my point of view of this is highly highly shaped
by Mike Wing and John Awatta at IBM, who were
my you know, my leaders when I was early in
my career, and we did this whole practice called the
(18:33):
Values Jam, and we were doing these sort of like
giant online dialogues. There's a great HBr piece I think
it's under its authored by the CEO at the time,
Sam Palmasana, that describes what happened in Values jam. But
essentially we said, all right, there's about four hundred thousand
of us here, what do we believe it? And we
(18:54):
had this I mean it was very very early, so
the technology was like really wonky and all this kind
of stuff, but we had this massive online conversation and
then distilled that down into a new set of values
that endure to this day. And the proceedings set were
articulated by the founders of the company, by the Watson family,
you know, one hundred years earlier. So it was time
(19:14):
to check in with a contemporary workforce on what a
contemporary set of values would look like for you know,
like if we wanted that company to last another one
hundred years. And even though that was I think that's
like twenty years ago now at this point, but I
think that at the heart of it's what's so correct
about that is listening first. And so if you're able
(19:36):
to do that, and I'm not saying I mean leaders
should lead, right, but leaders should lead the people that
are following them with some real high you know, emotional sensitivity,
intellectual curiosity, and compassion for the folks that they're leading.
And how can you possibly do that if you haven't
(19:56):
gained through really intentional, large scale, frequent check ins listening,
and not the you know, once every other year employee
engagement survey. You know. I mean those have their place.
Those are good and also not enough. And so I mean, like,
if you think about any relationship that you have in
your life, if that's meaningful to you, if that person
(20:19):
only checked in with you once every two years.
Speaker 3 (20:22):
Like, what would you think of that relationship?
Speaker 2 (20:23):
You would not feel valued, right, and so it'd be
very hard to share values with that person. Well, same
thing goes here, and so I mean this is this
is again it's not some like back twenty years ago
for Abend, it was enormously expensive to kind of pull
that kind of thing off. I mean, you can swipe
a credit card and do that like with some SaaS
software tomorrow at pretty much any company. So that's really
(20:46):
the point of departure if you can understand what the
sensibilities are, and then ultimately you may need to shift
those and that may become as you articulate a set
of values that inform your culture, your business strategy. You know,
how you show up as a company, how those individual
employees show up to each other's That may end up
(21:08):
being a passive filter, like there may be a lot
of people who are like, yeah, actually that's not for me,
and that's okay, that's cool. There's probably a great place
for them to go work and that has, you know,
some values that are more concommonant with their own and
harmonious with their own worldview and so on, and that's great.
That's probably going to be a good thing. And then
it's going to be an attractor for people who see
(21:31):
those values in action and your everything from your marketing
and employer website to how you actually show up to
your customers, what kind of products you produce, and so on,
and that's I mean, that's I think the opportunity which
is enormous.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
I love this conversation about rerooting ourselves and this practice
of listening, compassion, being open to dialogue and then leaders
leading to I had to learn some hard lessons people
who worked with me when I was a CEO and
a CEO the first time watch me sort of learn
in live time the difference between creating consensus and deciding
(22:06):
when it's time to lead. Where do we figure out
and how do we figure out as leaders, but both
as individual contributors, employees, you know, how we define our
own values? What is value based living for us? That's
something I've way out in therapy. What's a value based
approach to my life? How do I look at that
as a leader? How do we understand where we come
come together and where we are apart? And you're right,
(22:28):
how is it individuals make a choice to say this
is not my set of values. I want to move on.
I say leave with love.
Speaker 2 (22:34):
At that point, leaders need to respect that too and
not you know, see that as worthy of punishment. That's
a that's a great choice, and you should support people
and all, you know, and like and ensure that.
Speaker 3 (22:47):
I love that idea of leave with love.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
And you know, separate with some dignity there, and it
will speak well like there's nothing you can do better.
I think there's nothing you could do to attract great talent.
Then be respectful and phases of it with your current talent,
you know. And so if people see like, oh, okay,
that person has had like a great tenure there and
then they went on to go do something else, that's awesome.
(23:09):
You know, that's probably going to be a real big
attractor for talent.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
I think it's interesting what you're saying ethan. And I've
reflected on this a lot in terms of the grace
with which folks leave an organization, whether they're making that
choice or whether they or not, which is even harder
something I've experienced many times as a leader having to
make that kind of decision. But I do feel that
dynamic tension between the organization and the individual is often
on display in very negative ways with leaders when they
(23:34):
treat folks that are leaving as if they've been personally affronted,
and it's just such a bad situation. So I think
you're right that whole life cycle of the relationship is
so critical.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
For a while, I ran IBM's alumni program, and what
was kind of interesting about the choice that my boss
made was like, you're going to run the intro on
it and you're going to run the alumni program at
the same time, which which was fast because you know,
here we have two networks of people who have a
lot in common having you know, especially you know with IBM,
(24:07):
which is a brand that does such important imprinting, you know,
like the identity in the culture. It's like so heavy,
you know, like you when you're an IBM, or it's
like that's a thing. You know, it's like that's a
that's it's almost like an invention of IBM. This this
identity of the IBM or and you know when you
leave IBM and IBM is you know, somebody who's left IBM.
(24:29):
We were trying to change the language. They're not an
x IBM or they're an IBM alump. And because there
were so there's such a positive you know, sort of rotating.
Speaker 3 (24:40):
Door there where people will go out.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Of IBM, gain some industry, experience some new contacts, and
then come back or also or just become clients of
IBM customers.
Speaker 3 (24:51):
And you know, and so I.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Think if you think about the you know, like in
terms of the identity vector here, like you have come
and identified especially you know in North America. I mean
it's not the same for everyone, but you know, in
North America there's a high association with your profession and
your identity. You know, you ask somebody what they do
in North America, and chances are they going to tell
you what they do for a living. They're not going
(25:12):
to say like, oh, I'm like I make candles and
you know, I'd like to go jogging. They're probably going
to lead with their profession and you know, and so
if you honor that that that level, that where people
really integrate a brand into their personal identity, that can
be very powerful just in terms of the meaning of
their work and their lives. And also it's incredibly strategically
(25:34):
valuable for an organization to maintain that kind of bond
with people. And you know, as you were saying earlier
about these kind of like tops down, you know, command
and control, you know, that kind of management system really
has its place, Like that is a very valuable That's
not like a dumb management system. It just doesn't tend
(25:55):
to It doesn't tend to build those kind of deep
hooks into people's souls in a way and people's you know,
individual identities.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
And it also doesn't scale very well.
Speaker 2 (26:05):
It's really really hard to do that kind of command
and control thing at scale. And so like what I
see happening in government right now is almost like a
de scaling that's happening. Whereas if you can, I mean,
I just remember, you know, thinking about the values and
I ended up when I was at the New School
for Social Research, I ended up writing my master's thesis
about this idea of values and culture as a management system.
(26:29):
And you know, because I had experienced at firsthand at IBM,
and I think that, you know, if you can set
up those right, you know, values and sort of cultural
assumptions that people will make you know, in the day
to day work, that is going free leaders to do
so much more. You don't have to be there checking
everything because you know that on principle the decisions will
(26:51):
be made in a way that aligns with.
Speaker 3 (26:53):
Your strategy how you would do it. You know, the
why is.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
Understood by everybody, and so values and culture sure are
to me. They're not a nice to have, you know,
foosball tables and whatever. It's that's a strategic asset that
should be cultivated and managed.
Speaker 3 (27:10):
And I think that.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
The savvy CEOs who really want to scale, who really
want to do something big and empower people who want
to come and do something big, you know, like that's
going to be that's the way to get there, as
opposed to come work at this job that's super well defined,
do X, y Z in that order, because that's what
I've said. And then if you haven't done it right,
(27:31):
they'll you know, if there's a punitive sort of consequence.
Speaker 1 (27:35):
Yeah, I couldn't agree more. I think that for many
organizations the values equation you're talking about is more effective.
I agree with you the command and control. I mean, obviously,
military operations and things like that need that chain of
immand and they function very well and if they didn't
have it, that would have dire consequences. So I think
that's a really good point. You know, in terms of
(27:55):
this discussion again about the organizational values, personal values, the
dell to the distance of the delta between them, I
just want to talk about a few things that are
going on to sort of real time tests of this.
You know. Maybe it's like not a speed round, but
we'll go through a couple. One of them is politics
in the workplace, And I wrote in my notes, yikes,
this one is tough true in pritticularly over the past year,
(28:17):
but certainly today. So the conventional wisdom, and this is
something we talk about in the circles we run in
all the time. There's a conventional wisdom not to bring
or allow politics in the workplace. But to me, that's
really not helpful nor realistic. And you posted a great
short commentary on this on LinkedIn, which is literally while
it was like I have to reach out to Ethan
to talk about this. Thanks, give me your take on this,
(28:39):
and I know you have some data on it too,
But what's your take on that question, which is real
profound right now.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
Yeah, I think, I mean, like we've found in our
research that pretty consistently about half of the employee population
would like to be able to speak about politics and
social issues in the workplace.
Speaker 3 (28:58):
I feel like they should be able to do that.
Speaker 2 (29:00):
About half believe that they're that they have the right
to do it, and they you know, they're empowered to
do that. However, it gets kind of more interesting when
you look at both positionally and generationally. It will probably
not surprise anybody that that rather millennials are way higher,
they're pulling that number, that fifty percent number way up,
(29:23):
and boomers are bringing it down to you know, to
some degree, as our gen xers gen Z also tends
to be a little bit lower. We think that's positional.
We think that's like because they might be in more
junior positions, they might feel a little bit less empowered
in the workplace just because of where they are in
the organization. But the sort of TLDR is get ready
(29:46):
for a workforce that is much more interested in talking
about social and political issues at work and feel that
they have the right to do so.
Speaker 3 (29:57):
And so that is coming. That's already here, already here,
but it's also it's coming more.
Speaker 2 (30:03):
And then also the and so so before I go
on to another sort of dimension that what I would
say the approach needs to be is depending on what
kinds of spaces that you operate in. You know, like
a retail uh, you know, a retail organization is gonna
be different from one that's manufacturing or a pharmaceutical organization.
(30:23):
And even within those like you're gonna have an itinerant
salesforce and you're gonna have people are manufacturing, you know.
So there's a wide variety of sort of spaces, whether
they're digital spaces like a chat room, or physical spaces
like a break room or a town hall meeting with
whatever those spaces are where people gather in your organization,
you just need to be very very prescriptive about what
(30:46):
the rules of the road are. And I think that's
a really good, a really good way to start. It's
just like even if you just say, you know, look,
we are not going to we're not gonna use any language.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
That is you know, hostile and integrading.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
You know, like that's a great start, and most organizations
have those kind of things in place already, but you
need to signal that again and again and again. So
if you have a Slack channel that says, you know,
I find it so funny, you know, like when you
go buy Slack or deploy slack, it comes preloaded with
this general you know, this category where it's like just general,
like anybody can talk about anything. The first thing you
(31:23):
should do is rename that and put something in there
it's like general but also not racist or like but
also not about you know, your political affiliation or you know,
like put something in there that helps people understand like, Okay, yeah,
we actually we're interested. We this is a place where
we can talk, but we're also like here's here's what
we think. Uh, you know, the appropriate kind of discourse
(31:44):
is in this venue. So being really clear about the
rules of the road, I think is the is the
first step. And then and then also you know, the
the other thing is is to really reward and lionize
people who do it well.
Speaker 3 (31:58):
There were there are people.
Speaker 2 (31:59):
Who are going to be natural conveners and community leaders,
and if those people, if you can lionize that behavior,
if you can like make those folks the star of
the show, give them some mechanism for convening people. I know,
like fifty dollars budget to buy donuts and coffee. I
mean like that that could be huge because they're doing
it in a way that is really pro social and
(32:20):
that could be around Okay, well you know this issue.
I'm going to make this up. This issue of homelessness
is really important in a particular area. Great, we want
to talk about that. Let's let's fund the ability for
that team who really cares about it to go do
a volunteer project and they can talk about homelessness all
the time there because they're really engaged in doing some
(32:40):
solution around it, as opposed to sort of getting into
the political sphere and talking about policy issue which the
company may not have any you know, like impact on
at all.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
Yeah, it's it's interesting toope as Another piece of this
is what two companies speak out about or not speak
out about. And I think these are also very symbiotic.
And you know, one of the things I've been trying
to reflect on as a CEO is what is the
foundational context or the lens I can offer staff that
I've been thinking about that we can share a language
and also share a set of values about how we
(33:12):
engage right, So a value of engagement and a value
of connection and communication, but also values of respect. One
of the things I tried to do last year was
reflect on what does it mean to be in a
pluralistic society? What does it mean to stay in community
in tough conversations? What does it mean to hold someone's
humanity even when you're very upset about something. What does
it mean to grapple with the idea that someone's vote
(33:34):
may land differently for them than for you. And also
to say to folks, you may not understand your vote
feels annihilating to another person. So how do we stay
in community in those moments, and how do we create
those guard rails, And how do I gently or my
other leaders step in to say, hey, we're moving into
an area that's less productive, And also how do we
(33:55):
counsel our clients on these pieces? Knowing that staffs are
not a monol, People have different views, and that issues
are very charged. In the media landscape which we all
are deeply engaged in, is highly polarized, So I think
you're bringing up some of the things I've been concerned about,
especially when people say, oh, well, companies, just stick with
(34:16):
your values, speak out and your values. I'm like, I
think it's a lot more complicated than that in this
context right now. But I do think this idea of
the values meaning how do we how are we with
each other, how are we with our clients, how are
we in the world and in community to reflect on
that openly, for leadership to articulate that and then allow
(34:37):
other leaders to bring that to life in their spaces.
And who are those positive, optimistic, caring conveners. I like
a lot about what you're saying there.
Speaker 3 (34:47):
You know.
Speaker 2 (34:47):
I think one of the things as well is to
really look at not just where your organization or your
organization's leaders are speaking out, but where your organization and
your organization's leaders are having impact. And you know, I
think there's a lot of handling around what statements should
(35:07):
we make and you know, and all that, and I
and that's that's not nothing. I mean, it is important,
and it is also very risky, particularly in a political
environment where you're seeing you know, retribution happening for things
that people said, you know, and that is scary and
it's real. And also at the end of the day,
you know, I mean, like you can reflect on your
own experience, and I will also reflect on.
Speaker 3 (35:29):
The research that we do that you know, we ask, you.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
Know, we give this sort of pick list of twenty
eight different issues, everything from Israel and Palestine to you know,
handgun ownership to homelessness, pay equity, you know, all these,
you know, a whole range of topics, and we ask
people to pick five that they think their company should
make a difference on, make an impact on, like actually
you know, through policy, through giving, through product design and
(35:55):
so on.
Speaker 3 (35:57):
And very very very very consistently.
Speaker 2 (36:01):
We've seen the top five dominated by my health and
well being, job security and job creation, equitable pay, and
UH diversity, you know, issues related to diversity and fairness
and UH data privacy as well, and those top five dominate.
(36:21):
And if you think about those, those are all things
that most companies are already doing stuff about. And you
can material you can look at the policies, you can
make sure that those are really really people first policies
and that you are really correct to your employee's desires
on those, and you know, and just really sort of
drive those home, even even with something like job stability.
(36:43):
Yet you know what you might need to lay off people,
that is real, and you can still have policies that
support those with whom you've parted ways, you know, and
do that, as you said, leaving with love and you know,
like doing that, you know, doing that kind of action
with some dignity. But what's interesting as well is that
at when you look at that again, generationally, the top
(37:03):
five issues change significantly, and gen Z and millennials are
much more much more likely to rank LGBTQ plus and
you know, right, you know, basically trans and and you know,
like you know, these these populations rights and privileges and
you know, ability to operate. They're much more likely to
(37:24):
rank gun control higher up. They're much more likely to
rank education higher up. And so these things are and
it may be about like just stage in life where
people are, you know, who they're surrounded by what they're
seeing in the media. And it's also true that the
leaders of organizations need to think of employee populations not
(37:46):
as like monolithic but rather as a group of individuals
who have agency in their lives, who are making choices,
who can either choose you, or they can choose someone else.
They could choose to do something great with and for you,
or they can choose to do something great within for
someone else, and the negative is drew to they can
choose to do something mean and nasty to you and
(38:08):
mean and nast this about it.
Speaker 3 (38:09):
So all those things are in play.
Speaker 2 (38:11):
And again it's like the more we can recognize that,
you know, this individuation of experience is you know, is
like really forgive me integral to your work experience. That is,
you know, that is going to be a key lever
and what you do through policy is going to be
have so much more impact than what you say through
(38:33):
a press release.
Speaker 1 (38:35):
Yeah. Actually, I know, my colleague Steve Halsey is going
to be doing an upcoming podcast to talk with Rob
at Harris Poll about some of the recent research they
did and this idea of words or context have some
trust building characteristics, actual impact has more trust building characteristics.
But combining context and impact is the real hockey stick
(38:57):
up to build trust. And you know, as we as
we wrap up our conversation, because there's a million more
things we could talk about, but one of the things
you're making me think of is in terms of going
back to that question of how to help organizations and
people that work for them understand where their values align
or where they don't. One of the things I think
is extraordinarily important now, especially to say in a client
service context like ours, but I think all organizations is
(39:20):
for leadership to really transparently narrate where they're facing their
own dynamic tensions. So where is it that and where
is it that we're very clear on what we believe?
So for example, when I can ladder things up to
the level to the one hundred thousand foot level of
basic human rights, respect for people in their difference, celebration
(39:41):
of difference, what it means to have a free press,
what it means, what our democratic ideals aside from these
ways that we're fighting with each other about them. You know,
what does it mean to have free flowing business but
also have compassion in that right? So you know, but
also being very clear of hey, this this is an
environment where it's going to be hard for our clients
(40:02):
to speak out in certain things. They need to lay
a little bit more low here, but see how they're
still practicing and creating impact here. If I feel if
I can narrate that for my own stakeholders and also
for my client stakeholders, then we can understand that the
values alignment is not so off because without that narration
and without that context of like why we are speaking
(40:24):
or not speaking, doing or not doing, why a client
may be doing this but not saying that, it's it's
very hard to translate. It's not legible, you know. And
that's one of the things I'm thinking about a lot too.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
Yeah, well, I mean, I think at the end of
the day, we're talking about, you know, translating these ideas
and principles into action, and does everybody understand what that
translation process is? You know, So if you have a
business strategy and you just put the deck out there
and you're like, Okay, here's our business strategy, and then
you know, thirty seven layers deeper in your organization or
(41:01):
in the remote office or whatever you ask people with
the business strategies, I'm not going to understand that.
Speaker 3 (41:06):
You know. They have to you know, like people have to.
Speaker 2 (41:09):
Like learn things and you know, and internalize things in ways,
in multiple ways, and be able to experience it in
order to actually then go and do those things. And
there's some great theory on this like Blooms tax Blooms taxonomy.
It's like this hierarchy of how people learn things. It's
very interesting and how you do course design and that
(41:31):
kind of stuff. But and integral, we have this kind
of employee experience formula that is it's very high level,
but it can be really a helpful tool, you know,
if you're trying to trans if you're trying to create
an employee experience that then ultimately drive some business value
or some business outcome or societal value or societal outcome.
(41:53):
There's just a few components and the you know, the
first one is listening, you know, big surprise, like how
you doing How are you quantitatively and qualitatively understanding what
the actual drivers are for perceptions and behaviors amongst this population,
you know, whether you have twenty employees or you know,
two hundred thousand employees, you know, can you get as
(42:14):
nuanced and understanding.
Speaker 3 (42:15):
Of that population as possible?
Speaker 2 (42:18):
And then you introduce things like content, and you know,
like content might be if something as pithy as your
you know, higher level as your values, or something as
you know sort of you know, s all to the
earth as like help text on a you know, on
an HR website or something like that. You have all
these interactions, which again it could be something as sort
(42:39):
of day to day as like the stand up that
you have in the dispatch dispatch center before you head
off to your shift, or you know, the board meeting
or the town hall with the CEO, and that's all
driven by you know, whatever the strategic intentions are that
you know, it's a you know, is it a cultural intention,
is a business expansion intention? Is it a talent acquisition
(42:59):
or intention? So you put those things together listening, strategic contention,
content interactions that if you.
Speaker 3 (43:07):
Bring your real thoughtful.
Speaker 2 (43:10):
In you know, like very very strategic self to interrogating
the level of commitment you've made to those elements, you
will be able to produce an employee experience that is,
you know, potentially incredibly scalable because people understand what's going
on and they can make decisions independently and operate independently,
(43:30):
and also incredibly durable because it's going to be sort
of like self correcting by you know, by this constant listening, adjusting,
iterating it. You know, you can that is achievable, and
it may be achievable at the whole enterprise level. I
think that would be very audacious and ambitious, and I'm
sure there are companies out there that are close, but
(43:51):
I think, you know, starting at a smaller level, like Okay, well,
can we do this in one business unit, or can
we do this in one team, or can we do
this for one topical air like how we're managing customer experience,
you might be able to create an employee experience that
then radiates like that that employee experience is reified in
(44:11):
the customer experience and the products that you make in
your corporate reputation. Like the best brands are just totally
built from the inside out. And you see that again
and again and again.
Speaker 1 (44:21):
Well, I think that's an amazing place to end. Ethan,
I love it. I love that Rubric. And this podcast
is called building Brand Gravity. So I always like to ask,
what has you in its gravity today? An idea, a book,
a podcast, something in the culture.
Speaker 3 (44:37):
Yeah, you know what.
Speaker 2 (44:38):
I've recently been going into back issues of The New Yorker,
and yeah, I've really enjoyed it. I've read some pieces
by and about James Baldwin, and just the ferocity of
his intellect and his courage has really inspired me and honestly.
Speaker 3 (45:00):
I mean maybe this is just you know, growing up.
Speaker 2 (45:01):
In the Midwest in the eighties, but I didn't really
encounter much of his writing, you know, And so now
I'm kind of getting into it and I and it
led me to go watch a debate that he held
in at Oxford.
Speaker 3 (45:14):
You know you can, it's on YouTube.
Speaker 2 (45:16):
Anyway, just looking into James Baldwin has been amazing and inspiring.
It was so ironic. I've think about it this morning.
I knew you're going to ask this question. You are
kind enough to tell me. And as I was coming
in on the subway with my dog, I look down
to pet her and this guy's got a backpack on
and it's got this big button of a profile of
(45:36):
James Baldwin, and I was like, oh my god, Okay,
so this is there's like I don't know, kismid or
karma or synergy or I don't know, cosmic vibes are happening.
But anyway, I highly recommend dipping into what James Baldmen
had to say.
Speaker 1 (45:48):
That's a magnificent recommendation. I co signed that so much,
and Ethan, thank you for your time today. It's been
a joy, which dis.
Speaker 3 (45:56):
Leasure with you privilege. Thank you very much for inviting me.
Speaker 1 (45:59):
Everybody, there's more building brand gravity wherever you get your podcasts,
and we always appreciate your feedback. Thanks for joining us today.
Speaker 2 (46:07):
Thank you,
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