June 24, 2025 ⢠27 mins
The crew reunites to unpack the second part of Nexthinkâs landmark research series, The Science of Productivity. Titled 'The Experience Silo: HR, IT, and the Digital Workplace', the latest installment explores the growing overlap between HR and IT, revealing that 64% of IT leaders foresee a formal merger within five years.
Tom McGrath is joined by Sean Malvey (report author as well as RB regular), Tim Flower, and Oriana Ott to discuss whatâs driving this trend, whatâs standing in its way, and what a future Chief Employee Experience Officer role might look like.Â
Download Part 1, 'Transformation: Driving Adoption, Productivity, and Change in the AI Era', free of charge right hereÂ
Download Part 2, âThe Experience Silo: HR, IT, and the Digital Workplaceâ here
Get the latest edition of the Gartner Magic Quadrant here (https://nexthink.com/gartner-magic-quadrant-dex)
Stay up to date with ALL NEW EPISODES of Parallel, as they're released, right here (https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/parallel--6616391)
Tom McGrath is joined by Sean Malvey (report author as well as RB regular), Tim Flower, and Oriana Ott to discuss whatâs driving this trend, whatâs standing in its way, and what a future Chief Employee Experience Officer role might look like.Â
Download Part 1, 'Transformation: Driving Adoption, Productivity, and Change in the AI Era', free of charge right hereÂ
Download Part 2, âThe Experience Silo: HR, IT, and the Digital Workplaceâ here
Get the latest edition of the Gartner Magic Quadrant here (https://nexthink.com/gartner-magic-quadrant-dex)
Stay up to date with ALL NEW EPISODES of Parallel, as they're released, right here (https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/parallel--6616391)
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome it, change Makers to the Deck show with Tim
Flower and Tom McGraw. Let's get into it.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
How they change makers. Welcome back to Reality Bites. It's
been a minute, but we've got a slightly smaller crew
on board, but we've got a great a great episode theme.
We got Oriana, we got Sean and we got Tim
Flower as well. And before the one of the reasons
we've been away from the microphones here on Reality Bites
for for a few weeks now, I think, is that
(00:31):
we launched Parallel Tim the the It Mystery series. If
people haven't heard it already, tell them a little bit
about it.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
Yeah, even even as you're talking about a time. I
love the.
Speaker 4 (00:47):
I love the just the naming that we came up
with because it's a parallel podcast, we're normally doing right.
We had the little brainstorming session on how we could
maybe bring some creativity to the air and maybe bring
a little a little levity enlightenness. So I was always
a big fan of the podcast. I think it was
about ten years ago called Cereal, A Murder Mystery of
a Teenager, A real story of a teenager who went
(01:09):
missing and a podcaster who dug into the investigation it was.
She had a very unique cadence, a very unique style
of interview, real cool intro music, and it was just
a real fascinating thing back then. And it struck me that,
you know, why don't we we're always investigating things in it,
why don't we look at it as a murder mystery?
And you know, the name Parallel has so many different connotations.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
One, it's the.
Speaker 4 (01:34):
Technology, the sister technology to a serial cable. It's a
parallel cable, but it's also the reverse of the serial
name on the on the podcast. There's so many different,
really cool ways to look at it. But we just
it's just a five five episode kind of fun, tongue
in cheek spoof on cereal and gives us a little
(01:57):
creative outlet to uh to have a little bit of
fun so the folks can find it and chuckle along
with us.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
Absolutely, a lot of for qualities you know about Tim,
great cadence, terrific music.
Speaker 3 (02:09):
You know, it reminded me of your work on.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Parallel, and not just your work, but the whole team's
like there's a few different voices on there, Tim. Tim
has us all acting ladies and gentlemen. If you can
if you can believe that, and if you haven't, if
you haven't already heard it, you can find episodes one
and two on the deck show main feed. And how
do people what's your recommendation for searching for it, Tim,
because I did. I remember when I went into like
(02:32):
Apple podcast, I put in Parallel by itself. There's a
few different shows called Parallel. It's a bit confusing, was
the official wreck if you're trying to find the home
of the show.
Speaker 4 (02:42):
I did find a couple of those other ones too,
And I don't know that there's any active that are
called parallel, but I just search on parallel, next thing,
and then those two will come up.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
Search on my name, it should come up. Yeah. But
you know, any combination of a couple of those searches
and you'll find it. Explor you know what the other
place is, go to the deck so then you can
you can find it on our website absolutely, And.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
I will just say, you know, we'll be getting you
know that, making the episodes available and getting great response
so far. So there may be some more Parallel episodes
appearing on the deck Show feed as well in the
coming weeks, but for now, let's come back to a
reality bias discussion, and we've got a great reason to
come together and break bread again because regular listeners might
(03:28):
recall the episodes we did a few weeks ago. Now,
Productivity in twenty twenty five new insights on AI decks
and adoption, and those new insights were cutesy of part
one of our it's New Mandate, the Science of Productivity,
two part report based upon exclusive Vans and Born research.
(03:50):
The second installment of that report is called The Experience
Silo hr IT and the Digital Workplace. It came out
two three weeks ago, and we're very lucky, We're always
very lucky to have next week senior editor and report
author Sean Malvey on the Reality by his team. So
(04:12):
we better to invite to tell us a bit about it.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
How you doing, Sean?
Speaker 5 (04:16):
Not too bad? And happy Friday to everybody during this recording.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
During this recording, and if you're listening to it on
Tuesday when it comes out, Unhappy Tuesday. I guess bring
us up to speed with this report, my friend, How
is it different from part one? Who was targeted and
what were the main findings that stand out?
Speaker 5 (04:34):
Yep, sure thing, So same audience as a Part one one.
Senior IT leaders spread across four different countries, the US, France, Germany,
and the UK. And in the first part of the report,
Art one, we were focused on AI and digital transformation
and how that was going to make us more productive
(04:54):
and answering big picture of questions. But in Part two,
we wanted to focus in on who's going to actually
own the employee experience. And we've known this for a
couple of years now, but HR and IT have had
a lot of overlap over the past couple of years,
so we wanted to kind of dig into that topic
and that's exactly what we did in Part two. But
(05:16):
I'll just give you a few of the main takeaway
right now. So sixty four percent of the senior IT
leaders that we surveyed came back and said that the
merger is definitely going to go down within the next
five years. About thirty one percent think it's going to
happen in the next three another thirty three percent think
it's going to happen sometime between three to five years,
(05:37):
and then there was another close to a third of
respondents who think that no merger in name is going
to happen. But the two entities will be more collaborative
in practice.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
Was that a surprise showing what were you anticipating of
that particular day a point or response?
Speaker 5 (05:55):
Yeah, I think so. I think people naturally say three
to five and just put off as like that could
be two hundred million years away, you know. So I
think that, But I was actually surprised later on when
we dug into some of the country data to see
how they felt within the next three years, because three
years in a tech company can actually fly by. But
(06:18):
I think five years is sort of a safer answer,
and some people do feel like the merger is coming
sooner than later.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
And I think when I read the reports, I felt like,
particularly in tandem, I felt like there's a real relationship
between the confusion around the areas of responsibility of it
is increasingly assuming covered in Part one, which we call
the science of productivity itself, if you will, and the
(06:47):
confusion that's come from this kind of new area of
technology management in terms.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
Of who's responsible for what.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
I mean, is there evidence of that confusion in the
data in part two?
Speaker 5 (07:00):
Yeah, certainly so. I mean we could probably think of
it even without looking at the report. But there were
three specific topics that came to mind employee satisfaction overall,
like enterprise productivity and then employee engagement, and a lot
of the leaders said that they actually felt that both
hr IT should own all three of those variables. There
(07:22):
wasn't like any clear indication, I'll put it this way.
There wasn't any clear indication that like everybody feels that
one department should own it versus the other, you know
what I mean. So there was a lot of confusion
across those three different variables. And then to take it
even further, we asked them, well, if they were to merge,
what would be some of the biggest challenges that you'd foresee?
(07:43):
And fifty percent of respondents think that they'd just be
poor communication between hr IT, so they'd have to solve
that problem, and then just differing priorities between the departments.
Historically speaking, these are very different. You can be more
different between hr I TEA, So they would have to
iron out those issues before any actual merger were to occur.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Yeah, it's just something a tinder. I mean, it's hard
to think of many other areas in a corporation where
there's that much contestation either who's actually owning things as
significant as the report covers. And I know you're currently
in the sort of last stages of producing sort of
individualized reports in different languages, you know, reflecting results from
(08:28):
different territories. They're coming out in a few weeks. I think,
what if you can give us a sort of a
four glimpse of those What do it leaders in those
four different countries that you're covering in those other reports,
How do they think differently about the possible merger?
Speaker 5 (08:45):
Yeah, for sure, So after people listen to this recording,
those reports will come out throughout the summer. Just like
personally speaking, I didn't want to include it all in
the part two report. I think it would have been
too much. But they're very interesting. The country breakdown, so
the US, the UK, Germany and France, because you get
like kind of the cultural, political, the market context to
(09:06):
what might explain some of the data that we collected
and when it comes down to the merger. It was
interesting in the In the US and Germany, they were
less willing to say that like the merger was going
to happen in the next three years. They were kind
of hedging their bets and saying, well, maybe in five
or maybe never but they'll be more collaborative. And I
(09:26):
think one possible explanation, let's talk to the US first,
is that we have like a lot of obviously state
labor laws and employment is tied to your healthcare in
the US, so that could be one factor that kind
of complicates any type of merger. And in Germany just
in general, the sentiment that we found through our research
was that, you know, things are more long term focused
(09:48):
and they're a little bit more conservative with some of
these mergers and huge digital transformation projects. But conversely, in
the UK and France, nearly half of all leaders came
back in so that they think a merger is going
to happen in the next three years. I don't really
have a strong evidence as to why that might happen,
(10:08):
at least in the UK, but in France, I do know,
like they I think they have a policy. The translation
would be like quality of working life basically, so it's
written into law, and I know they have even legally speaking,
like a right to disconnect. So holistically speaking, that culture
and government is focused on different ways to make work
(10:28):
life better, and one of those ways to make work
life better is you know, digitalizing your company and possibly
merging HR. That's one theory that we.
Speaker 2 (10:39):
Had, amazing, connecting it to the well known French predilection
for not working through the month of August, which is
we all enjoy, we all enjoy as colleagues. Yeah, excellently.
What job title in your existing do you think would
be best leading this new department?
Speaker 3 (10:59):
And why?
Speaker 2 (10:59):
Shown well, what types of personality, trade, skill sets, etc.
Should that you know? Future leader early embody?
Speaker 5 (11:07):
Yeah sure.
Speaker 3 (11:08):
So.
Speaker 5 (11:08):
Overall about the majority kind of split between a couple
of different roles. They feel like, whoever's going to lead
this merger? Forty percent said that they think it would
be an entirely new role, like a chief Employee experience officer,
something that you don't typically find nowadays in LinkedIn, and
then there was almost a third of respondents felt like
(11:30):
the CIO is positioned to take that responsibility. And then
of course that we had like a chief human resources
officer got like the least amount of responses, and then
a chief operating officer, which oddly, you know, across all
the four countries only got fifteen percent of responses. But
when we looked at France, for some reason, I think
(11:52):
they got the majority of respondents felt like the chief
operating officer is positioned to take over any type of merger,
which I thought was interesting. I do not have an
explanation why that is, but could have been just like
an English translation type of thing. But in terms of
like the personality and the skill sets, you know, for
(12:13):
like any sort of dex director role, I think it
just has to be anyone who has a really strong
understanding of like real time analytics automation. Obviously has a
strong IT background, but someone who also likes to solve
problems based on sort of user feedback and sentiment data
and likes to essentially blur the lines between people and
(12:37):
technology as simple as simple as that.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
Pretty well, said Suan, Thanks mate, Tim. If a merger
does take place, interested in your vif that or expectations
of that. Respondents predicted that free principle challenges might stand
in its way. Lack of clear ownership for new existing responsibilities,
poor communication between the current two entities, and differing priorities.
(13:02):
What are some things that IT and HR leaders can
do now to remedy these problems? Not only an anticipation
of this merger, which may or may not arise, but
just in terms of facilitating better collaboration, better outcomes for employees.
Speaker 4 (13:17):
So I looked at the concept of a merger the
same way I look at companies merging, and there's kind
of two different ways that they go about doing it.
One is kind of like what we did with app learn.
You buy the other entity and you fully absorb it
into your team, so it becomes one entity. The second
(13:38):
merger M and A on a company standpoint is you
buy the other company and they act as either parallel,
side by side independent entities or a subsidiary, but they
remain their own entity while they're part of the bigger hole.
And I looked at my opinion is IT and HR
(13:59):
are not going to become a single combined unified entity
where you have teams with HR and IT accountabilities combined.
I believe that HR and IT will come together under
one leader and they will then force organizationally and operationally,
more collaboration, more cohesiveness under a single leader.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
So that's the.
Speaker 4 (14:21):
Context that I looked in at IT, and I agree
that those three hurdles still exist. But in terms of
the first one, you talked about ownership, and I'll restate
what I just said because I firmly believe that an
org should consist of a single leader across those new teams,
and ideally, and Sean touched on a little bit of this,
(14:43):
that leader should have prior experience managing these two teams together.
I'm not a fan of taking somebody from JAR and
making them the leader, or somebody from IT and making
them the leader, because you've got instant potential I'll call
it inflict. You've really got to have a leader who
(15:04):
can define ownership of accountabilities, set clear communications, goals, priorities.
These all start at the top. So I think that
you've got to combine in that leader somebody who can
manage that, and also somebody who's a good collaborator themselves
and can reach out to the organization and get feedback.
(15:25):
And in terms of ownership, everyone on that new combined
team needs to feel that they're a part of that
new team and not one owning the other. And I
don't think that this should result in, for instance, it
reporting to HR or vice versa. So ownership with single
leadership I think hits the first hurdle that you talked about.
(15:50):
The others are kind of combined communication and no offense
to my teammates or peers or or anyone in either
of these organizations, but as departments that serve the entire
employee base, both of these corporate functions can carry negative
(16:12):
opinions by employees. Not always and not everybody, but there
are times where these departments are the ones that you
love to hate.
Speaker 3 (16:21):
And I right, So.
Speaker 4 (16:23):
I wouldn't compound that problem by missing the opportunity to
communicate both to the new teammates. But you're also servicing
every employee, So you've got to community your communication goals
in your communication hurdle is not just with your new
teammates in these two teams, it's with every employee. And
the way I look at it is this in communication.
(16:45):
It doesn't solve everything, but a lack of communication can
break everything. So you've got to have a person and
a part of this merger and program that is solely
focused on communicating internally into the to the external population.
And the reason for that is these teams need information, right,
(17:09):
They've got to understand what the goals are, why they're important,
and how I, as an individual and my department contribute
to those goals. So a communication, I think is critical
and it comes from all areas and it can't a
lot like next thing, it can't be a hobby. It's
got to be part a core part of the project.
(17:30):
And I think the last one was was around.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
Priorities and goals and.
Speaker 4 (17:37):
Competing, competing, competing goals, and yeah, so I have experience
in this kind of a thing at my prior employer.
And like I alluded to earlier, it was not a merger.
Speaker 3 (17:50):
It was an acquisition.
Speaker 4 (17:51):
It reported to finance, and what happened in that merger,
in that acquisition is that it reinforced the fact that
it was a cost center with expenses that needed to
be controlled and managed and reduced. It didn't it didn't
form the basis for collaboration with finance, and it certainly
(18:12):
didn't improve the reputation with the business. It caused increased
stress in it because we were reporting to the being
counters and it wasn't about technology anymore. So you've got
to look at your combination of these teams in the
right way and in terms of kind of getting past
the hurdle of goals and priorities, you've got to just
(18:34):
you've got to make sure that you're not just setting
goals for the team, but you've got to talk about
and drive toward desired outcomes and shown the report does
a really good job at drawing these out productivity, onboarding, enablement,
adoption of new technology, training, engagement, retention. It's all the
outcomes that you're trying to drive for this. You need
(18:54):
to make sure that people understand that this is not
just moving the chairs the deck chairs around the Titanic.
This is a bigger deal, and you're doing it for
a specific reason. In all of those goals and priorities
that you set also help with decision making when you're
setting those priorities, and I think if you look at
it that way, you're able to then balance your goals
across the two teams, and everybody then drives to the
(19:17):
desired outcomes and not just participating in a new.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
Orchard comprehensively insightful analysis. There to many many thanks. Conscious
of time, and do not want to sign off about
getting Oriana's view of this. And last time we spoke
to Oriana in this context, or at least concerning report
installment Part one turned out, Oreana, you'd basically been pursuing
(19:42):
your own research in that very area. I don't know
as curious if there was any crossover all with what
report Part two looks at and anything you've done, and
then more specifically, there is a mention in the report
that AI could be leveraged to personalize on boarding and learning,
and we're definitely interested in getting you take on that
(20:03):
as well.
Speaker 6 (20:05):
Yeah, so this isn't necessarily material that I'm personally working on,
but it's definitely top of mind for the product product organization,
which means it is top of mind for me because
we are thinking a lot about how do we provide
people with the resources they need for things like onboarding,
learning and especially that kind of in app very contextual
(20:30):
information that helps people to smooth work processes, have really
tailored recommendations, be informed about what it is they need
to do without relying on sort of outmoded and clunky
systems like documentation that has to be kept up to date,
things like that. So I think there are really great
(20:51):
opportunities and next think is definitely investigating those. So I
would say when it comes to the question of personalizing
onboarding and learning, there's two specific applications that build off
of each other. The first one is understanding the persona,
So who is the end user, what are their needs?
And sometimes we think of that in terms of role, right,
(21:14):
like finance versus sales, versus engineering. But it can also
be things like new to the company versus very experienced, Right.
It can be new to a particular software but experienced.
And that type of nuance is something that you can
get at a much more sophisticated level today than you
(21:35):
could maybe in the past, where it was just you know,
new versus old and department based. So we start to
be able to understand people's needs much more specifically and
then address those in context. So that's applying those insights
to provide people with education and information that's hyper contextual. Right.
(21:57):
It's the little reminders in the product telling you something
has changed, something has improved. There's a workflow that you
can be using that sort of anticipates your needs. The
thing that I always think about is sort of what
we wish Clippy was. So anybody who was using later
in the nineties will remember Clippy, which was not particularly
(22:19):
useful but extremely cute and extremely annoying. But what if
it were actually useful? Right? I think the concept certainly
appeals to people on a very emotional level.
Speaker 5 (22:30):
Right.
Speaker 6 (22:30):
We have this idea of tiny unobtrusive guides that are
personable and relatable. We see it in video games, right,
we see it in science fiction. And I think that's
sort of the mental image that we have and that
we can use, as you know, not necessarily the end point,
(22:53):
but rather an inspiration for what it will look like
to have more contextual information and guidance.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
Imagine if Microsoft AI tool launch was Clippy Clippy, a
return of Clippy, I mean, I would have been fantastic.
Speaker 4 (23:08):
I want my own little R two D two follow
me around some a little droid that can help me
get through my day to day exactly.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
Are in a good great, great question for you to
finish it off? And it's possible many of the job
titles in the future hr I T department our positions
we can't articulate today. Sure, but what career advice would
you offer anybody interested in working in the intersection between
people and technology? And I have to say, what better.
Speaker 3 (23:39):
Person to ask?
Speaker 2 (23:40):
Because I in a way that describes your career en
role arguably or Oreana would use.
Speaker 6 (23:46):
Yes, absolutely, And I love this question. I love this topic.
I think there's always a need for people who are
genuinely excited by both people and technology and are able
to bridge those gaps. It's something I've talked about with
a number of our customers. So there are already starting
to be those roles right at some of our more
(24:07):
mature DEX teams or centers of excellence. I've spoken to
people who do focus on the easier experience of it,
for example, And when I worked in it, right, that's
where I first got interested in working technology. I had
a BOSSO called me the human computer translator.
Speaker 5 (24:26):
Right.
Speaker 6 (24:26):
Digital communications tay call me the product therapist. And I
think these are sort of joking terms, but they really
get at the heart of the matter.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
Right.
Speaker 6 (24:34):
You need somebody who is passionate about understanding what do
people need in order to interface with technology, what is
the relevant experience that technology can deliver? And I think
the people who are most effectively leveraging next thing and
are going to be able to leverage these new technologies
as they arrive are the people who are thinking about
(24:56):
change management from a human perspective, right, in terms of communications,
like you were saying earlier, and really leveraging that ability
to connect those dots and to bring those teams together
and to come up with scotto chees for making that
(25:17):
technology more human.
Speaker 2 (25:21):
Beautifully said Oriana and beautifully said everyone and special shout
out and thanks Sean for not only joining us today
but as ever, but for writing both fantastic reports they've
they've really done phenomenally well. It generated so much interest
and engagement and input from customers and from listeners. They've
been a pleasure to kind of delve into as well.
(25:45):
And if you haven't yet downloaded Part one and all
Part two, just check the show notes. You can get
them both right now for free, along with the latest
Gartner Magic Quadron, which I don't think if you even
had a chance to discuss it. Yeah, I mean it's
been as your time. But next thing did pretty well
spoiler all that along with along with what else along
(26:06):
with you can get you you can book now for
Boston or London experience and of course you can listen
to You can go over you can find a link
to the Parallel Special podcast feed, or you can listen
to the first two installments here, released over the last
few weeks if you haven't yet heard it, and be
(26:27):
sure to let us know what you think as well.
Speaker 3 (26:31):
So it just.
Speaker 2 (26:31):
Reminds of me to thank everybody once again for listening
and of course for joining.
Speaker 1 (26:37):
Bye. To make sure that you never miss an episode,
subscribe to the show in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your
favorite podcast player, and if you're listening on Apple podcasts,
make sure to leave a rating of the show. Just
have the number of stars you think the podcast deserves.
If you'd like to learn more about how next Thing
can help me improve your digital employee experience, head over
(26:58):
to next think dot com. Thank you so much for listening.
Until next time,
Welcome it, change Makers to the Deck show with Tim
Flower and Tom McGraw. Let's get into it.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
How they change makers. Welcome back to Reality Bites. It's
been a minute, but we've got a slightly smaller crew
on board, but we've got a great a great episode theme.
We got Oriana, we got Sean and we got Tim
Flower as well. And before the one of the reasons
we've been away from the microphones here on Reality Bites
for for a few weeks now, I think, is that
(00:31):
we launched Parallel Tim the the It Mystery series. If
people haven't heard it already, tell them a little bit
about it.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
Yeah, even even as you're talking about a time. I
love the.
Speaker 4 (00:47):
I love the just the naming that we came up
with because it's a parallel podcast, we're normally doing right.
We had the little brainstorming session on how we could
maybe bring some creativity to the air and maybe bring
a little a little levity enlightenness. So I was always
a big fan of the podcast. I think it was
about ten years ago called Cereal, A Murder Mystery of
a Teenager, A real story of a teenager who went
(01:09):
missing and a podcaster who dug into the investigation it was.
She had a very unique cadence, a very unique style
of interview, real cool intro music, and it was just
a real fascinating thing back then. And it struck me that,
you know, why don't we we're always investigating things in it,
why don't we look at it as a murder mystery?
And you know, the name Parallel has so many different connotations.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
One, it's the.
Speaker 4 (01:34):
Technology, the sister technology to a serial cable. It's a
parallel cable, but it's also the reverse of the serial
name on the on the podcast. There's so many different,
really cool ways to look at it. But we just
it's just a five five episode kind of fun, tongue
in cheek spoof on cereal and gives us a little
(01:57):
creative outlet to uh to have a little bit of
fun so the folks can find it and chuckle along
with us.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
Absolutely, a lot of for qualities you know about Tim,
great cadence, terrific music.
Speaker 3 (02:09):
You know, it reminded me of your work on.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Parallel, and not just your work, but the whole team's
like there's a few different voices on there, Tim. Tim
has us all acting ladies and gentlemen. If you can
if you can believe that, and if you haven't, if
you haven't already heard it, you can find episodes one
and two on the deck show main feed. And how
do people what's your recommendation for searching for it, Tim,
because I did. I remember when I went into like
(02:32):
Apple podcast, I put in Parallel by itself. There's a
few different shows called Parallel. It's a bit confusing, was
the official wreck if you're trying to find the home
of the show.
Speaker 4 (02:42):
I did find a couple of those other ones too,
And I don't know that there's any active that are
called parallel, but I just search on parallel, next thing,
and then those two will come up.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
Search on my name, it should come up. Yeah. But
you know, any combination of a couple of those searches
and you'll find it. Explor you know what the other
place is, go to the deck so then you can
you can find it on our website absolutely, And.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
I will just say, you know, we'll be getting you
know that, making the episodes available and getting great response
so far. So there may be some more Parallel episodes
appearing on the deck Show feed as well in the
coming weeks, but for now, let's come back to a
reality bias discussion, and we've got a great reason to
come together and break bread again because regular listeners might
(03:28):
recall the episodes we did a few weeks ago. Now,
Productivity in twenty twenty five new insights on AI decks
and adoption, and those new insights were cutesy of part
one of our it's New Mandate, the Science of Productivity,
two part report based upon exclusive Vans and Born research.
(03:50):
The second installment of that report is called The Experience
Silo hr IT and the Digital Workplace. It came out
two three weeks ago, and we're very lucky, We're always
very lucky to have next week senior editor and report
author Sean Malvey on the Reality by his team. So
(04:12):
we better to invite to tell us a bit about it.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
How you doing, Sean?
Speaker 5 (04:16):
Not too bad? And happy Friday to everybody during this recording.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
During this recording, and if you're listening to it on
Tuesday when it comes out, Unhappy Tuesday. I guess bring
us up to speed with this report, my friend, How
is it different from part one? Who was targeted and
what were the main findings that stand out?
Speaker 5 (04:34):
Yep, sure thing, So same audience as a Part one one.
Senior IT leaders spread across four different countries, the US, France, Germany,
and the UK. And in the first part of the report,
Art one, we were focused on AI and digital transformation
and how that was going to make us more productive
(04:54):
and answering big picture of questions. But in Part two,
we wanted to focus in on who's going to actually
own the employee experience. And we've known this for a
couple of years now, but HR and IT have had
a lot of overlap over the past couple of years,
so we wanted to kind of dig into that topic
and that's exactly what we did in Part two. But
(05:16):
I'll just give you a few of the main takeaway
right now. So sixty four percent of the senior IT
leaders that we surveyed came back and said that the
merger is definitely going to go down within the next
five years. About thirty one percent think it's going to
happen in the next three another thirty three percent think
it's going to happen sometime between three to five years,
(05:37):
and then there was another close to a third of
respondents who think that no merger in name is going
to happen. But the two entities will be more collaborative
in practice.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
Was that a surprise showing what were you anticipating of
that particular day a point or response?
Speaker 5 (05:55):
Yeah, I think so. I think people naturally say three
to five and just put off as like that could
be two hundred million years away, you know. So I
think that, But I was actually surprised later on when
we dug into some of the country data to see
how they felt within the next three years, because three
years in a tech company can actually fly by. But
(06:18):
I think five years is sort of a safer answer,
and some people do feel like the merger is coming
sooner than later.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
And I think when I read the reports, I felt like,
particularly in tandem, I felt like there's a real relationship
between the confusion around the areas of responsibility of it
is increasingly assuming covered in Part one, which we call
the science of productivity itself, if you will, and the
(06:47):
confusion that's come from this kind of new area of
technology management in terms.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
Of who's responsible for what.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
I mean, is there evidence of that confusion in the
data in part two?
Speaker 5 (07:00):
Yeah, certainly so. I mean we could probably think of
it even without looking at the report. But there were
three specific topics that came to mind employee satisfaction overall,
like enterprise productivity and then employee engagement, and a lot
of the leaders said that they actually felt that both
hr IT should own all three of those variables. There
(07:22):
wasn't like any clear indication, I'll put it this way.
There wasn't any clear indication that like everybody feels that
one department should own it versus the other, you know
what I mean. So there was a lot of confusion
across those three different variables. And then to take it
even further, we asked them, well, if they were to merge,
what would be some of the biggest challenges that you'd foresee?
(07:43):
And fifty percent of respondents think that they'd just be
poor communication between hr IT, so they'd have to solve
that problem, and then just differing priorities between the departments.
Historically speaking, these are very different. You can be more
different between hr I TEA, So they would have to
iron out those issues before any actual merger were to occur.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Yeah, it's just something a tinder. I mean, it's hard
to think of many other areas in a corporation where
there's that much contestation either who's actually owning things as
significant as the report covers. And I know you're currently
in the sort of last stages of producing sort of
individualized reports in different languages, you know, reflecting results from
(08:28):
different territories. They're coming out in a few weeks. I think,
what if you can give us a sort of a
four glimpse of those What do it leaders in those
four different countries that you're covering in those other reports,
How do they think differently about the possible merger?
Speaker 5 (08:45):
Yeah, for sure, So after people listen to this recording,
those reports will come out throughout the summer. Just like
personally speaking, I didn't want to include it all in
the part two report. I think it would have been
too much. But they're very interesting. The country breakdown, so
the US, the UK, Germany and France, because you get
like kind of the cultural, political, the market context to
(09:06):
what might explain some of the data that we collected
and when it comes down to the merger. It was
interesting in the In the US and Germany, they were
less willing to say that like the merger was going
to happen in the next three years. They were kind
of hedging their bets and saying, well, maybe in five
or maybe never but they'll be more collaborative. And I
(09:26):
think one possible explanation, let's talk to the US first,
is that we have like a lot of obviously state
labor laws and employment is tied to your healthcare in
the US, so that could be one factor that kind
of complicates any type of merger. And in Germany just
in general, the sentiment that we found through our research
was that, you know, things are more long term focused
(09:48):
and they're a little bit more conservative with some of
these mergers and huge digital transformation projects. But conversely, in
the UK and France, nearly half of all leaders came
back in so that they think a merger is going
to happen in the next three years. I don't really
have a strong evidence as to why that might happen,
(10:08):
at least in the UK, but in France, I do know,
like they I think they have a policy. The translation
would be like quality of working life basically, so it's
written into law, and I know they have even legally speaking,
like a right to disconnect. So holistically speaking, that culture
and government is focused on different ways to make work
(10:28):
life better, and one of those ways to make work
life better is you know, digitalizing your company and possibly
merging HR. That's one theory that we.
Speaker 2 (10:39):
Had, amazing, connecting it to the well known French predilection
for not working through the month of August, which is
we all enjoy, we all enjoy as colleagues. Yeah, excellently.
What job title in your existing do you think would
be best leading this new department?
Speaker 3 (10:59):
And why?
Speaker 2 (10:59):
Shown well, what types of personality, trade, skill sets, etc.
Should that you know? Future leader early embody?
Speaker 5 (11:07):
Yeah sure.
Speaker 3 (11:08):
So.
Speaker 5 (11:08):
Overall about the majority kind of split between a couple
of different roles. They feel like, whoever's going to lead
this merger? Forty percent said that they think it would
be an entirely new role, like a chief Employee experience officer,
something that you don't typically find nowadays in LinkedIn, and
then there was almost a third of respondents felt like
(11:30):
the CIO is positioned to take that responsibility. And then
of course that we had like a chief human resources
officer got like the least amount of responses, and then
a chief operating officer, which oddly, you know, across all
the four countries only got fifteen percent of responses. But
when we looked at France, for some reason, I think
(11:52):
they got the majority of respondents felt like the chief
operating officer is positioned to take over any type of merger,
which I thought was interesting. I do not have an
explanation why that is, but could have been just like
an English translation type of thing. But in terms of
like the personality and the skill sets, you know, for
(12:13):
like any sort of dex director role, I think it
just has to be anyone who has a really strong
understanding of like real time analytics automation. Obviously has a
strong IT background, but someone who also likes to solve
problems based on sort of user feedback and sentiment data
and likes to essentially blur the lines between people and
(12:37):
technology as simple as simple as that.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
Pretty well, said Suan, Thanks mate, Tim. If a merger
does take place, interested in your vif that or expectations
of that. Respondents predicted that free principle challenges might stand
in its way. Lack of clear ownership for new existing responsibilities,
poor communication between the current two entities, and differing priorities.
(13:02):
What are some things that IT and HR leaders can
do now to remedy these problems? Not only an anticipation
of this merger, which may or may not arise, but
just in terms of facilitating better collaboration, better outcomes for employees.
Speaker 4 (13:17):
So I looked at the concept of a merger the
same way I look at companies merging, and there's kind
of two different ways that they go about doing it.
One is kind of like what we did with app learn.
You buy the other entity and you fully absorb it
into your team, so it becomes one entity. The second
(13:38):
merger M and A on a company standpoint is you
buy the other company and they act as either parallel,
side by side independent entities or a subsidiary, but they
remain their own entity while they're part of the bigger hole.
And I looked at my opinion is IT and HR
(13:59):
are not going to become a single combined unified entity
where you have teams with HR and IT accountabilities combined.
I believe that HR and IT will come together under
one leader and they will then force organizationally and operationally,
more collaboration, more cohesiveness under a single leader.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
So that's the.
Speaker 4 (14:21):
Context that I looked in at IT, and I agree
that those three hurdles still exist. But in terms of
the first one, you talked about ownership, and I'll restate
what I just said because I firmly believe that an
org should consist of a single leader across those new teams,
and ideally, and Sean touched on a little bit of this,
(14:43):
that leader should have prior experience managing these two teams together.
I'm not a fan of taking somebody from JAR and
making them the leader, or somebody from IT and making
them the leader, because you've got instant potential I'll call
it inflict. You've really got to have a leader who
(15:04):
can define ownership of accountabilities, set clear communications, goals, priorities.
These all start at the top. So I think that
you've got to combine in that leader somebody who can
manage that, and also somebody who's a good collaborator themselves
and can reach out to the organization and get feedback.
(15:25):
And in terms of ownership, everyone on that new combined
team needs to feel that they're a part of that
new team and not one owning the other. And I
don't think that this should result in, for instance, it
reporting to HR or vice versa. So ownership with single
leadership I think hits the first hurdle that you talked about.
(15:50):
The others are kind of combined communication and no offense
to my teammates or peers or or anyone in either
of these organizations, but as departments that serve the entire
employee base, both of these corporate functions can carry negative
(16:12):
opinions by employees. Not always and not everybody, but there
are times where these departments are the ones that you
love to hate.
Speaker 3 (16:21):
And I right, So.
Speaker 4 (16:23):
I wouldn't compound that problem by missing the opportunity to
communicate both to the new teammates. But you're also servicing
every employee, So you've got to community your communication goals
in your communication hurdle is not just with your new
teammates in these two teams, it's with every employee. And
the way I look at it is this in communication.
(16:45):
It doesn't solve everything, but a lack of communication can
break everything. So you've got to have a person and
a part of this merger and program that is solely
focused on communicating internally into the to the external population.
And the reason for that is these teams need information, right,
(17:09):
They've got to understand what the goals are, why they're important,
and how I, as an individual and my department contribute
to those goals. So a communication, I think is critical
and it comes from all areas and it can't a
lot like next thing, it can't be a hobby. It's
got to be part a core part of the project.
(17:30):
And I think the last one was was around.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
Priorities and goals and.
Speaker 4 (17:37):
Competing, competing, competing goals, and yeah, so I have experience
in this kind of a thing at my prior employer.
And like I alluded to earlier, it was not a merger.
Speaker 3 (17:50):
It was an acquisition.
Speaker 4 (17:51):
It reported to finance, and what happened in that merger,
in that acquisition is that it reinforced the fact that
it was a cost center with expenses that needed to
be controlled and managed and reduced. It didn't it didn't
form the basis for collaboration with finance, and it certainly
(18:12):
didn't improve the reputation with the business. It caused increased
stress in it because we were reporting to the being
counters and it wasn't about technology anymore. So you've got
to look at your combination of these teams in the
right way and in terms of kind of getting past
the hurdle of goals and priorities, you've got to just
(18:34):
you've got to make sure that you're not just setting
goals for the team, but you've got to talk about
and drive toward desired outcomes and shown the report does
a really good job at drawing these out productivity, onboarding, enablement,
adoption of new technology, training, engagement, retention. It's all the
outcomes that you're trying to drive for this. You need
(18:54):
to make sure that people understand that this is not
just moving the chairs the deck chairs around the Titanic.
This is a bigger deal, and you're doing it for
a specific reason. In all of those goals and priorities
that you set also help with decision making when you're
setting those priorities, and I think if you look at
it that way, you're able to then balance your goals
across the two teams, and everybody then drives to the
(19:17):
desired outcomes and not just participating in a new.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
Orchard comprehensively insightful analysis. There to many many thanks. Conscious
of time, and do not want to sign off about
getting Oriana's view of this. And last time we spoke
to Oriana in this context, or at least concerning report
installment Part one turned out, Oreana, you'd basically been pursuing
(19:42):
your own research in that very area. I don't know
as curious if there was any crossover all with what
report Part two looks at and anything you've done, and
then more specifically, there is a mention in the report
that AI could be leveraged to personalize on boarding and learning,
and we're definitely interested in getting you take on that
(20:03):
as well.
Speaker 6 (20:05):
Yeah, so this isn't necessarily material that I'm personally working on,
but it's definitely top of mind for the product product organization,
which means it is top of mind for me because
we are thinking a lot about how do we provide
people with the resources they need for things like onboarding,
learning and especially that kind of in app very contextual
(20:30):
information that helps people to smooth work processes, have really
tailored recommendations, be informed about what it is they need
to do without relying on sort of outmoded and clunky
systems like documentation that has to be kept up to date,
things like that. So I think there are really great
(20:51):
opportunities and next think is definitely investigating those. So I
would say when it comes to the question of personalizing
onboarding and learning, there's two specific applications that build off
of each other. The first one is understanding the persona,
So who is the end user, what are their needs?
And sometimes we think of that in terms of role, right,
(21:14):
like finance versus sales, versus engineering. But it can also
be things like new to the company versus very experienced, Right.
It can be new to a particular software but experienced.
And that type of nuance is something that you can
get at a much more sophisticated level today than you
(21:35):
could maybe in the past, where it was just you know,
new versus old and department based. So we start to
be able to understand people's needs much more specifically and
then address those in context. So that's applying those insights
to provide people with education and information that's hyper contextual. Right.
(21:57):
It's the little reminders in the product telling you something
has changed, something has improved. There's a workflow that you
can be using that sort of anticipates your needs. The
thing that I always think about is sort of what
we wish Clippy was. So anybody who was using later
in the nineties will remember Clippy, which was not particularly
(22:19):
useful but extremely cute and extremely annoying. But what if
it were actually useful? Right? I think the concept certainly
appeals to people on a very emotional level.
Speaker 5 (22:30):
Right.
Speaker 6 (22:30):
We have this idea of tiny unobtrusive guides that are
personable and relatable. We see it in video games, right,
we see it in science fiction. And I think that's
sort of the mental image that we have and that
we can use, as you know, not necessarily the end point,
(22:53):
but rather an inspiration for what it will look like
to have more contextual information and guidance.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
Imagine if Microsoft AI tool launch was Clippy Clippy, a
return of Clippy, I mean, I would have been fantastic.
Speaker 4 (23:08):
I want my own little R two D two follow
me around some a little droid that can help me
get through my day to day exactly.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
Are in a good great, great question for you to
finish it off? And it's possible many of the job
titles in the future hr I T department our positions
we can't articulate today. Sure, but what career advice would
you offer anybody interested in working in the intersection between
people and technology? And I have to say, what better.
Speaker 3 (23:39):
Person to ask?
Speaker 2 (23:40):
Because I in a way that describes your career en
role arguably or Oreana would use.
Speaker 6 (23:46):
Yes, absolutely, And I love this question. I love this topic.
I think there's always a need for people who are
genuinely excited by both people and technology and are able
to bridge those gaps. It's something I've talked about with
a number of our customers. So there are already starting
to be those roles right at some of our more
(24:07):
mature DEX teams or centers of excellence. I've spoken to
people who do focus on the easier experience of it,
for example, And when I worked in it, right, that's
where I first got interested in working technology. I had
a BOSSO called me the human computer translator.
Speaker 5 (24:26):
Right.
Speaker 6 (24:26):
Digital communications tay call me the product therapist. And I
think these are sort of joking terms, but they really
get at the heart of the matter.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
Right.
Speaker 6 (24:34):
You need somebody who is passionate about understanding what do
people need in order to interface with technology, what is
the relevant experience that technology can deliver? And I think
the people who are most effectively leveraging next thing and
are going to be able to leverage these new technologies
as they arrive are the people who are thinking about
(24:56):
change management from a human perspective, right, in terms of communications,
like you were saying earlier, and really leveraging that ability
to connect those dots and to bring those teams together
and to come up with scotto chees for making that
(25:17):
technology more human.
Speaker 2 (25:21):
Beautifully said Oriana and beautifully said everyone and special shout
out and thanks Sean for not only joining us today
but as ever, but for writing both fantastic reports they've
they've really done phenomenally well. It generated so much interest
and engagement and input from customers and from listeners. They've
been a pleasure to kind of delve into as well.
(25:45):
And if you haven't yet downloaded Part one and all
Part two, just check the show notes. You can get
them both right now for free, along with the latest
Gartner Magic Quadron, which I don't think if you even
had a chance to discuss it. Yeah, I mean it's
been as your time. But next thing did pretty well
spoiler all that along with along with what else along
(26:06):
with you can get you you can book now for
Boston or London experience and of course you can listen
to You can go over you can find a link
to the Parallel Special podcast feed, or you can listen
to the first two installments here, released over the last
few weeks if you haven't yet heard it, and be
(26:27):
sure to let us know what you think as well.
Speaker 3 (26:31):
So it just.
Speaker 2 (26:31):
Reminds of me to thank everybody once again for listening
and of course for joining.
Speaker 1 (26:37):
Bye. To make sure that you never miss an episode,
subscribe to the show in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your
favorite podcast player, and if you're listening on Apple podcasts,
make sure to leave a rating of the show. Just
have the number of stars you think the podcast deserves.
If you'd like to learn more about how next Thing
can help me improve your digital employee experience, head over
(26:58):
to next think dot com. Thank you so much for listening.
Until next time,
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