Click here for this episode’s show notes.

This transcript was created using an automated transcription service and may contain errors.

JoDee 0:08
Welcome to The JoyPowered® Workspace Podcast, where we talk about embracing humanity in the workspace. I’m JoDee Curtis, owner of Purple Ink, an HR consulting firm, and author of “JoyPowered®” and “The JoyPowered® Family.” With me is my friend and co-host Susan White, a national HR consultant.

In today’s episode, we’re talking about how great companies make people better. In a 2014 study by Harvard Business Review, they revealed seven things that great employers do that others don’t, and those seven include…

Susan 0:48
Number one, have involved and curious leaders who want to improve. So you know, how the leaders – how inquisitive they are, how much they want to do really makes a difference, because they say that leaders’ own attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors have powerful trickle down effects on the organization’s culture. Leaders of great workplaces don’t just talk about what they want to see in the management ranks, they model it to be the change in the world you want to see.

JoDee 1:12
Right. Love it, love it. Number two, which of course we love, and remember, this was Harvard Business Review, not just the JoyPowered® podcast co-authors, but they said have cracking HR functions. I love that word “cracking.”

Susan 1:27
I do too!

JoDee 1:28
It really gets your attention, but they were very… went on to say about how important that can be to the entire organization, to have a strong HR team.

Susan 1:39
Number three, ensure the basic engagement requirements are met before expecting an inspiring mission to matter. So when employees know what’s expected of them, they’ve got performance goals, they have someone who cares about what they’re producing, that they really want, knowing that they’re a good fit for the role and feel their managers have their backs, then they’re really ready to commit to almost any, anything that company is trying to accomplish. People simply don’t connect with proclamations of the mission, vision, values without really feeling that it applies to them.

JoDee 2:11
Number four says never use a downturn as an excuse. I think that’s important too. It’s an excuse we hear most often, is people say we have a lousy workplace because the economy’s down or because the market is tight or blaming it on someone else. Right? But when… strong companies, I think, really lead leaders and lead people through those periods. Of course, there’s times when we may have to let people go, or put hiring freezes on, or ramp up really quickly, but great employers recognize this and they go about managing it in the right way.

Susan 2:52
I think you can learn as much in a downtime as you… maybe even more than you can when things are going really well in the economy.

JoDee 2:58
Right. Right.

Susan 2:59
So number five, trust, hold accountable, and relentlessly support managers and teams. The experiences that inspire and encourage employees are local. So strong teams are built when teams themselves size up the problems, face them head on, and they take a real hands on approach to solving them.

JoDee 3:18
Yeah. Number six was have a straightforward and decisive approach to performance management. We know the importance of that one, right, Susan?

Susan 3:27
Yes, we do.

JoDee 3:27
They talk about recognition and how important that is, and that a tolerance of mediocrity is always the enemy. Any action or inaction that doesn’t produce appropriate consequences adds to workplace disillusionment and corrodes commitment.

Susan 3:44
Yes, well, number seven, and the final one, is do not pursue engagement for its own sake. Great employers keep their eyes on the outcomes they need greater engagement to achieve. It’s not just about engaging, it’s about what does engaging get us.

JoDee 3:57
Right, absolutely. Well, one company that we know specializes in many of these concepts laid out by the Harvard Business Review. With us today are our friends and partners from trueU, Kyle DeFur and Gretchen Scott. TrueU is the resource for purpose-driven companies to grow their people, as a community of like-minded organizations devoted to helping people grow through self-awareness, personal development, servant leadership, and connection. TrueU supports thousands of leaders who believe there is a greater purpose to business beyond profits and paychecks. Welcome Kyle and Gretchen

Kyle 4:38
It’s great to be here. Thank you for having us.

JoDee 4:40
Yeah. Thanks for being here. Well, please, if both of you would start by telling our listeners about you and how your career path led you to trueU.

Gretchen 4:47
You can go first.

Kyle 4:52
Well, this is Kyle, and thanks again for having us on the podcast today. Excited to be here. I’ve been with trueU now for a little over four years, and I joined about six months after it kicked off and was actually the first president of trueU. I had been in hospital administration for 25 years prior to joining trueU and had been President at St. Vincent Indianapolis hospital for seven years prior to coming to trueU. The last year or two that I had been at St. Vincent, I had, I just referred to it as a restlessness about I’ve done this, you know, 25 plus years, do I want to continue doing this the next 10 to 15 years? And if I wasn’t doing this, what would I do? And so I went through the process of identifying my own passions and gifts and things I really feel strongly about and really settled on mentoring, leadership development, creating healthy cultures and organizations, connecting purpose to work. And ultimately, long story short, became aware of trueU, and it was just kicking off at the time, and I remember meeting with Mike Lance, who was one of the co-visionaries, together with Dave Lindsey, regarding trueU and I walked away from that meeting saying, “You got to be kidding me, this would be awesome.” I bit the bullet, made a change, and left my healthcare career and haven’t looked back. I’ve really enjoyed this work.

JoDee 6:13
What about you, Gretchen?

Gretchen 6:14
So I came to trueU… I was really blessed, I had a very lovely and wonderful career, was working for Salesforce and prior to that ExactTarget, and had worked with a couple other technology companies. And we through the acquisition, I really was, I loved working for ExactTarget, and Salesforce was also a wonderful company, but I just kind of struggled finding my role and my place there. And as I started talking with a couple coaches and thinking through like, what’s my next step, I had considered maybe I should start my own consulting practice. And so I was introduced to Kyle and I was learning more about trueU and I thought, “Okay, I’m gonna make you one of my first consulting clients, how does that sound?” And he said, “Well, why don’t you come work for me instead?” And I said, “That sounds so much better!” So, so…

Kyle 6:58
I’m glad you said yes.

Gretchen 7:01
Yes, so, so that’s how I came to it. I just, I’m really excited, because I feel like I get to do my best work in my career, get to innovate and just create wonderful programs and help leaders be their best self. So.

Susan 7:11
Ah, that’s great. And can you give us a brief description of what does trueU really do? Like, what is your work scope?

Kyle 7:18
Yeah. So we’re, trueU is, we’re a nonprofit organization that companies join. Our tagline is “great companies make their people better.” And so the business owners that join trueU, the senior leaders that are part of these companies that join trueU, they want to hear their people say, “I’m a better person because I work in this company.” Right? That, that resonates with them in a powerful way. So they, they’re growth oriented companies, they want to be highly profitable. But the commonality those companies that join trueU is they want to hear their people say, “I’m a better person because I work in this company.” And so even if that resonates with you, oftentimes there’s frustration with, you know, how do I, how do I bring that to life. I don’t have the tools, the resources that I need to be able to provide that for my people, and so they join trueU. And then we provide a whole array of forums and digital content resources and leadership training that’s made available to their employees, as well as their family members so they can take advantage of them, too, help them to grow, develop and be the best version of themselves that they can be.

Gretchen 8:22
Because we believe great companies make their people better.

JoDee 8:24
That’s such a unique benefit, I think, that you have, that companies are able to offer that to spouses and children and the whole family.

Gretchen 8:34
Well, how many times have you gone to some kind of leadership workshop, gone to a great talk, or seen someone speaking, you go home and you tell your loved ones about it? You think “Oh, I just wish you could have heard this speaker,” “Oh, I wish, I took this assessment and I want to get you a copy of it.” Right? And so, you know, how we show up at work is how we show up at home. It’s how we show up in our community and, and, you know, we believe everyone can be a leader in, in all areas of that and just bringing that back into your your family is just super important.

JoDee 9:00
Yeah. It’s funny, my husband works in healthcare, Kyle, and he frequently says, when I come home and say “I heard the greatest speaker,” he said, “How come all my learning is compliance or assault this month?”

Gretchen 9:14
My husband always says, “I’m constantly in training, honey, with you.”

JoDee 9:21
That’s funny. So, so you’re kind of talking to the choir with Susan and I, because we love this kind of stuff. Right?

Susan 9:27
Exactly.

JoDee 9:28
Where do you find resistance in providing this development to companies? I mean, I know that not all companies buy into this concept.

Kyle 9:37
You know, there’s a myth out there that you can separate professional and personal development. And it is a myth. It’s not right. Oftentimes, when you’re talking to companies, they’re very interested in skills based training, you know, professional training and development. And they see that as their role as an employer, to make sure that their employees have their functional skills up to speed, and they’re doing well in that area. But oftentimes there’s pushback on the personal development saying, “You know what, that’s, that’s not really in our bailiwick. If you want to do that, that’s up to you, but it’s not really an investment that we’re interested in making,” and the truth is they’re… you can’t separate those. We’re really one person that we… it’s at home, it’s at work, it’s all about integration. Ultimately, I frequently tell an embarrassing story of myself early in my career

Gretchen 10:27
I love when he tells this story, it’s so funny.

Kyle 10:30
Gretchen likes this story. I hate this story.

Susan 10:34
Must have been personal growth happening, right?

Gretchen 10:36
So much growth, so much growth.

Kyle 10:38
So my, my first job out of graduate school was at a hospital in Lexington, Kentucky, and it was really my first job, you know, and, and I was system administrator at a hospital there, small hospital, and my wife… I think it was around the end of the first week that I started this job, before I left for work one morning, she brings to me a five by seven framed picture of herself, she said, “Hey, here, this is for your office.” And I responded to her and I said, “You know what, honey? Thank you. But work is work and home is home.”

Susan 11:11
Oh!

JoDee 11:12
Oh!

Gretchen 11:12
I love that they just made that noise!

Susan 11:15
So this was your first wife, right?

Gretchen 11:16
No, his wife is an angel. Wonderful.

Susan 11:22
So you recovered. Okay.

Kyle 11:23
That was the wrong thing to say. But you know, I, I was of that mindset that you know, I want to, I want to wear this hat, this role of work, and when I’m at work, I’m gonna be all about work, and when I’m home, I would be all about home. I was, I was trying to… early in my career, I didn’t know how to manage that. But the truth is, what happens at home you bring to work, and what happens at work you bring home, and so it’s about integration, is we grow as people as well as professionally. That’s good for employers, if you have people who are moving in the right direction in their lives, in terms of their finances, in terms of their relationships, in terms of their health, they’re gonna bring an energy to the workplace that really benefits the company.

Susan 12:03
Yeah, I think that is so healthy. I can think about, early in my career I was in banking, it was really important that I was trying to be a professional woman in the workplace, especially around a lot of… all men in suits, that anything that going on in my life, like my kids, or, you know, my husband or any worries, I’d try to check it at the door, I’d put on that professional face. How much better would it be if you come in with the authentic self integrated, right?

JoDee 12:24
Yeah.

Susan 12:24
I love that you’re promoting that with companies.

JoDee 12:26
Right. Right. If I can put in a selfless plug about that concept, you know, when I wrote the book, “The JoyPowered® Workspace,” it – that’s why we turned right around and followed up with “The JoyPowered® Family.” Because we wanted to connect those, too, that you can’t just be JoyPowered® at home or at work, you need both of those.

Gretchen 12:48
You need them together.

Susan 12:48
Good point.

Gretchen 12:49
You asked about resistance. The other thing that I think we see often, too, is that we talk with a lot of businesses that are interested in growing, and that’s a trait within our community. These businesses that want to grow, but they think that, “Well, we’re growing so fast, we don’t have time to develop people right now, you know, we – this sounds great, but we’re gonna, you know, we’re gonna focus on professional skills right now and then we’ll do the leadership stuff later.” And the reality is, I don’t know how businesses think that they’re going to keep those people if they’re not growing their people right along with their business. You can’t gain loyalty, you can’t gain and attract people, you can’t retain those individuals. And so I think that’s another resistance, is that businesses and business leaders think, “We’re growing so fast, now’s not the right time.” But that’s exactly the right time.

JoDee 13:29
Yeah.

Gretchen 13:29
You know, as you’re growing in your business, what a testament to your employees that my business is important, but you are part of that future, and I’m developing you right along with it.

JoDee 13:38
That reminds me of a story I heard once about a business author who was on an airplane sitting next to a young person and the young person said, “What do you do for a living?” And he said, “I write books about leadership.” And she said, “Oh, maybe when I get to be a leader, I’ll read your book.” And he said, “No, maybe you could read my book…”

Susan 14:06
So, what – how would you describe the relationship between the individual health and growth of the leader of a company and that of the culture of that organization?

Kyle 14:14
Well, you know, I guess I would respond with the question you – have you ever worked for a leader who was stuck, or a leader maybe who was at a bad place, that maybe unhealthy place in their life. It’s frustrating. It’s frustrating to work for somebody who’s who’s stuck personally or isn’t in a good place, you know, in their life. There’s, there’s a degree of unhealthiness personally, that bleeds over into, into the workplace. The opposite of that is true, too, you know, if people are moving in the right direction, their relationships are good, if their health is good, if they’re financially moving in the right direction with their life, they bring an energy that if – it can’t help but affect the culture in a positive way in an organization. So organizational culture really is the sum of individual health or non-health of the individuals, right? So individuals bring with them to the workplace their health, or their lack of health care, and that affects the culture. The cultural organization really is the aggregate of the health of the people who work there.

JoDee 15:21
Yeah. Yeah.

Susan 15:22
Makes sense.

JoDee 15:23
You know, and you talked a little bit, Kyle, already, about separating personal life and professional life. Do you think at any point is an employer crossing the line when they start engaging with employees about their personal growth?

Kyle 15:37
I think, you know, one of the things that, that employees want in the workplace, something that’s important in terms of being an effective leader is, employees want to know that their leadership cares about them as a person, right, that you care about them not just for what they bring to the workplace in terms of their functional skill or their technical skills, but you care about them as a person, their family and their other goals that they have, and things that are important to them in their, in their life. And so I think there’s, it’s good for an employer to be intentional about reaching out to people and saying, “You know what, if, if you work in this organization, we’re gonna provide opportunities for you to grow professionally, but we also care about you personally. We want you to be in a good place professionally.” Sometimes there are, you know, employees that say, “Work is work and home is home.” That’s a mistake, right? You don’t want to say that. But it is true, some people, they just want to, you know, want to come, they get their, they want to get their paycheck, they’re…they’ve got that hat on, and they want they want to create real division and separation.

JoDee 16:41
Right, they want to take the hat off. Which is so difficult in these times, I think, with our computers and phones, and there’s some value in making some separation there, but it’s difficult to just say, this is, this is me at work and this is me at home.

Susan 16:59
If you do have an employee like that, would you recommend that the employer just respect that and back away, or what would be your advice? If you have an employee says, “Listen, I’m not interested in all this development stuff. I’m here to work. I don’t want…”

Gretchen 17:11
Yeah, we’ve actually had some of our trueU member companies tell us that, you know, hey, we’ve got some of these employees that just really feel like, I don’t want to be a part of all this stuff. And, sure, I think it’s… you have to lean in with invitation, and you have to have a growth mindset, and I think you do need to respect individuals’ privacy, and… But just because they say no right now, I don’t think no is always true. I think we just need to continue to invite people into conversation and, you know, maybe what you’re trying to produce to them right now, maybe they feel like “get out of my finances, like, I don’t need to know about financial wellness, I’m great,” you know, but if they’re not physically healthy, and they have nowhere to seek out resources, that you don’t provide those types of things, I just, I think that we have to continue to invite them into dialogue and conversation about that. And we have to model that too. It’s, you know, if a leader is telling its – their employees, we want you to grow and we want you to be your best self, and that individual isn’t healthy and isn’t taking care of themselves in their, their relationships, and I think it’s harder to say that but…

Kyle 18:08
We do have some companies that are really intentional about saying, part of our culture is personal growth and development of our people. You know, and so that’s just who we are. MJ Insurance one of our member companies, they – with John Lofton.

JoDee 18:21
Right.

Kyle 18:23
Yeah, he’ll, he’ll say, “We want MJ to be a place where it’s uncomfortable to work here if you’re not on a personal growth journey.”

Susan 18:31
Wow. That’s a huge commitment.

Kyle 18:32
So you’re surrounded, surrounded by people who are sharing their own journeys, you know, what they’re learning, how they’re growing, things they’re working on, and it becomes uncomfortable to work in the environment if you’re not doing the same thing, right? So it’s, they see it as a key strategic advantage of their business and a core to who they are. And so you want to invite people to join you. “Join me,” there are two really powerful words in the process. But ultimately, if people say “I’m just not gonna do that,” it may not be the right place for them to work.

JoDee 19:02
Yeah, yeah. And so many times it’s about learning about both of them at the same time, right? When you’re learning about time management or delegation or communication skills or, you know, learning more about yourself via StrengthsFinder, or DiSC, or Myers Briggs, I mean, those are, you’re just doing it at the same time innately. Right? We’re helping ourselves and, and through personal growth, and that makes us a better performer professionally as well.

Susan 19:30
Wherever you go, there you are.

JoDee 19:32
Right.

Susan 19:32
Be the best you, right?

Kyle 19:34
Exactly.

Susan 19:35
So what are some of the things that leaders are doing to build great cultures in their companies? What are the things that you’re seeing?

Kyle 19:41
You know, one of the one of the things that, I’ll ask Gretchen to talk about this, but we have some companies that are doing these really innovative, cool culture boards. And, Gretchen, why don’t you… because Gretchen, she’s the one who really takes the lead on this, does a fantastic job working with our member companies. She’s put a kit together on how to do this. She’s kind of the guru.

Gretchen 19:56
Well, we’ve had a… thank you, Kyle, that’s so nice. We’ve had a number of companies come to us and say, “I want my employees to feel loyal, I want them to stay, I want to know, I want them to know what our culture looks like and feels like and, and can be ambassadors.” And one of our companies, Defenders, was kind of the champion with this, and Defenders had created their their culture board, and it was in the shape of a Monopoly game board. And the idea was that an employee would start with the company, and they would get their board, and they would have a year on each side. And there were things that every employee in the company did, and, you know, it’s kind of the tribal knowledge and growth in that company, right? So it’s, we read these books, and we watch these things, and we have these experiences. And they talked about it lots and lots, and they had all this great retention as a result of that. And another company, Touchstone, saw the same thing. And so they took the same idea and created the Touchstone Life game. Right? And so they have experiences and books that they want to read and learning opportunities that they provide. And then we had a great opportunity with Freije-RSC, another one of our companies, who took the same kind of idea of a game and turn it into Trivial Pursuit, so The Pursuit of Success. And all these really wonderful ideas that really just tie in to your company’s mission, your values, and really living that out. And when I talk with our members, I, I say, like, having a mission and a value is kind of like table stakes. If you don’t have that, then get that first. Let’s get clarity on that. And then we can talk about what are the experiences that you want your employees to have over and over and over again, that you want people to be talking about. And, you know, if you’re having a holiday party, why do you want to allow a party, and what is it about that experience that makes it part of your culture? And so it just, through those conversations, they get this wonderful feeling of, this is who we are, and it’s a wonderful way to attract individuals. We’ve seen, I could name a whole bunch of other companies that are doing great – Kenney Corporation has a wonderful board. They’ve created a golf course as part of their board, because they are reseller of Toro and lawn care and those types of things. And so, really tying in these really creative ways, and I think people see the boards and they’re like, “Oh, I love the idea,” like, they look at, the picture of it’s really great. But it’s the depth that really was behind it that makes it super special. And that’s, that’s what allows their employees to become ambassadors of their company and champions. And this gives them pride as to why they want to work in those companies. And so it’s been beautiful to see our organizations kind of adopt that and take that on.

Kyle 22:16
Some, something else that Kenney Corporation does is they, every year, they ask all their employees to identify their word for the year. So every employee has identify what’s your word for the year. So for 2019 is it, you know, it could be anything, it’s their choice, it’s their word, right? But it’s something that they want to focus on the next year, something that is really important that they want to get better at or something that is just especially meaningful to them, or it can be you know, whatever they, they want it to be.

Susan 22:45
Give me an example of a word that someone might pick.

Gretchen 22:48
So we actually do this at trueU too, and so, like, my word this year was “faith.”

Susan 22:52
Okay.

Gretchen 22:52
So as we share that as a team, as everyone knows, that’s my word. That’s kind of my life theme. I like to think of it that way. And it’s just a journey for me of, for me, I chose “faith” this last year because I wanted to grow deeper in my faith and also have better faith in individuals. And so Kyle and I and the rest of our team all know that, but then on a periodic basis, “how’s your word of the year coming,” you know, touch base on that, and so, you know, I’ve read a lot of books and I’ve had a lot of great prayer practice, and, and just for me personally, so an individual at one of these companies will have their word, but the really cool thing is that they make it into a big poster that everyone in the company then sees these, these are the words people are focusing on this year.

Kyle 23:30
Like a banner that they put over their, their boss, when you walk into Kenney you see everybody’s words. You see all these words there up on the wall, and then at the end of the year, they give their, their employees the opportunity, completely voluntary, but when they have their annual meeting, they give their employees the opportunity, who wants to share about you word this year. And you hear the stories about people that…

Gretchen 23:46
Transformational stories.

Kyle 23:48
Yeah.

Susan 23:49
I was thinking of the word “alligator,” but I realize I would probably have…I’m coming at it a different way. I’d probably have a fun time, telling a story about it.

JoDee 24:04
Well, what else? What else should our listeners know about trueU?

Kyle 24:09
You know, we’re really a learning community. We’re not a consulting company. We don’t go in, do assessments of companies, and make recommendations. We’re really an organization that companies join, and then we invite them to participate in these learning opportunities. So we, you know, we say when you join trueU, you come as a student, and you come as a teacher. Yeah, so a lot of the events that we have, the people who were speaking at these events are the CEOs or elite senior leaders of these different member companies in the audience, or the leaders… and so we’re learning from each other. We do CEO roundtables and People Ops roundtables and a whole variety of – we have an online learning portal that we make available to all employees and family members on all kinds of areas of personal growth and development. And really, our flagship program is our Leader in Training program. And I’ll let Gretchen touch base on that, again, she runs that, does a fantastic job.

Gretchen 24:56
Yeah, the, the Leader in Training or the LIT program. It’s a six month program. It’s designed for leaders who are high potential looking to grow. Over that six months, they’re introduced to topics on DiSC, situational leadership, coaching, trust, conflict, that transition from manager to a leader, strategic thinking, and presentation skills. And then we put them into a capstone group for a group of five or six individuals, and then they identify a theme of something in business that they want to improve in their company. Might be employee retention, it might be motivation, might be working as a team, it might be the different generations in the workplace. They research companies that are doing that well and identify best practices they want to adopt in their company. And then to graduate, they make a group presentation in front of their managers and executives on what that idea is that they want to implement, as well as, they write in an individual reflection. But we’ve seen leaders, we’re actually getting ready to start our, our 18th class of that program, and we’ve been measuring that all along. So we have them, we assess them before and then we do an assessment after, and they, and they self-rate themselves of where they see themselves and their competence and their confidence as a leader. And we’ve seen growth over growth 30 to 35% higher rating of their own confidence and competence after completing the program.

Susan 25:40
What is so great is if you’re not a firm that could, you know, really afford to put together your own program, tap into yours. What a beautiful idea.

Gretchen 26:15
Yeah, we love it. And it’s a great, they get to work with a lot of diverse leaders too. It’s – I love the class, because I’ll have people come in, and they’ll say like, “My, my business is so hard, you know, nobody has the hiring challenges that we have.” And then they’re sitting across the room, they’re like, “You think you got hiring challenges?” Right? Or, “You’ve got this problem, we got the same problem. I work in health care, you work in construction. What? This is the same problem!” So that synergy that comes, they’re really able to build a network of individuals that they would never go out and find on their own, right, so it’s great. I love it.

Susan 26:47
Wonderful idea.

JoDee 26:48
And how can our listeners who are interested in learning more about trueU or joining trueU, how can they reach out to you?

Gretchen 26:56
Go to the website.

Kyle 26:57
Yeah, we have a great website, trueU, that’s T-R-U-E and the letter U dot com, and we’ve got all kinds of information on the website, and you can also reach out to us through the website.

JoDee 27:06
Okay.

Kyle 27:07
Or you could email Gretchen or I, my email’s Kyle dot DeFur at trueu.com, and Gretchen?

Gretchen 27:14
And I’m Gretchen dot Schott at trueu.com, but if you go the website, you can see our profile pictures and click on that, and we can get an email right from there, too.

Susan 27:21
Terrific.

JoDee 27:22
Fantastic.

Susan 27:23
So interesting. Thank you so much.

Gretchen 27:24
Thanks so much for having us.

JoDee 27:25
Thanks for sharing.

Kyle 27:25
Well, we think – we see ourselves as kindred spirits with JoDee and Susan, thank you for the great work that you’re doing with this podcast and spreading the word that, you want to grow your business, grow your people.

Susan 27:36
Yeah. Yeah. Good last words. So JoDee, it’s time for our listener question. This question is from Kira in Indiana. “How can HR best communicate change to employees who have had a hard time coping with it?”

JoDee 27:51
Well, Kira, I think there’s several things that HR or even organizations in general can do. Number one is think about how the change will affect the organization as a whole, right? Sometimes change is needed for the good for the whole company. That doesn’t mean it’s always good for each individual employee. Right? But if we can get people to focus on the greater good. Another one, I think, is what their role is in the change. So in first speaking to Kira, specifically, how will this change affect her, her personally, her particular role, her particular department, so she can have an understanding of that, and then also how what they are doing will affect others in the organization, like, not just your department, but as a bigger scope, and how it might unfold over time or… Example: What’s the timeline for it? Yes, we might be changing software, we might be getting new benefits, we might be changing a process. But how long… is this going to be done in a week or a month or two years, right? So that people have the opportunity you need to sort of think through it or walk through the process. Typically, change doesn’t come overnight to that, so.

Susan 29:09
I think I would jump in to say that I think so often when there’s a change that has to be announced, manager puts a lot of time into that initial, here’s what we’re doing, here’s why we’re doing it, that type of thing. But then they go silent or they go dark, you don’t hear from them again. And what’s really important at the time of change, Kira, is to make sure that managers are even more visible, that they’re available so people have Q and A’s, that they can respond to them, you know, in the moment and just, even, if you’re going to ever over communicate, now’s the time to do it, I think, in time of change.

JoDee 29:40
Exactly. Communicate, communicate, communicate from beginning to end.

In our in the news segment today, according to Bloomberg Law, claims of sexual orientation discrimination against federal contractors more than tripled in 2018 and gender identity discrimination claims doubled. It was just over three years ago, tf you remember, if you are aware that the OFCCP, which is the Department of Labor’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Program, began enforcing LGBTQ protection. Now, what’s interesting about this particular study, although it’s only focused on federal contractors, it was interesting to me to find out that federal contractors employ almost 25% of U.S. employees.

Susan 30:32
That does surprise me, that it’s that large.

JoDee 30:34
Yeah! It was fascinating. But it was just in 2014, when former President Obama issued this executive order prohibiting federal contractors from discriminating against workers and job applications based on sexual orientation or gender identity. Again, it was fascinating to me that we didn’t even have any protection against this population until 2014. So for me, I kind of took this as bad news. Bad news, good news. The bad news is the claims are rising, but the good news is that this population is being protected. And so… likely not that the claims weren’t there before, people probably just didn’t make the claims, and now they can make them and be protected by them.

Susan 31:21
Yep. And I think we’ll all be happy when it applies to 100% of the workplace.

JoDee 31:25
Right. Right. Right.

Susan 31:27
Please tune in next time. Thank you for listening today. If you’ve missed any of our podcasts, you can catch all episodes for free on iTunes, Google Play, Podbean, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts by searching on the word “JoyPowered.” If you like our podcast, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss any upcoming episodes. And we’d love for you to rate and review us on iTunes. It helps people find our show. If you have any questions on any HR topics, you can leave us a voicemail at 317-688-1613 or email us at joypowered@gmail.com. We’re also on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter @JoyPowered. We welcome listener questions and comments.