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JoDee 0:12
Welcome to The JoyPowered Workspace Podcast, where we talk about embracing joy in the workspace. I’m JoDee Curtis, owner of Purple Ink, an HR consulting firm, and with me is my friend and cohost, Susan White, an international HR consultant. Today our topic is boss to coach. Gallup tells us that the single key to maximizing human potential and organizational growth is to improve the quality of the manager. Today’s workforce craves consistent and meaningful feedback and needs managers that will motivate them to make productive and meaningful decisions. Coaching requires establishing clear expectations, continually coaching, and creating accountability with one’s team members. Their research suggests that employees are more likely to be engaged and stay with their organizations, if their managers give them daily feedback, and assist in their goal setting process. However, helping managers go from boss to coach can be a big challenge for organizations. Studies show that many current team leaders do not find managing people easy or natural.

Susan 1:26
That doesn’t surprise me at all.

JoDee 1:27
Yeah, I was thinking a big aha moment right there, right?

Susan 1:30
Yeah. And we know that people quit their bosses, they don’t quit their companies.

JoDee 1:34
Exactly.

Susan 1:35
So this topic is really important today. Some consistencies in managers that use a coaching approach are focusing on strengths instead of weaknesses, which we both love. Celebrating successes and guiding employees through failure, I think that’s just as important, right? Active listening, providing development opportunities, empowering employees, and trust. Some tips to manage like the coach are:

JoDee 2:00
To set up a standard weekly or bi weekly one on one meeting with each employee. In these meetings, you might discuss key weekly tasks and projects, goal progress, and what is next for the employee.

Susan 2:13
Second tip is ask good questions. The best coaches spend more time listening than they do talking or directing. Let your employees do the majority of talking in your conversations, but ask questions that guide the conversations along or allow you to dig deeper or allow them to think more broadly. Asking open ended questions is a great way to guide employees to self reflection and ideas. Think idea generating and problem solving.

JoDee 2:40
And here’s a good one. Ask your employees to give *you* feedback on your performance as a coach. Ask them how you can be better at supporting them. If there are things you could be doing differently and more.

Susan 2:54
And then finally, make feedback simple, direct and actionable. And I think the thing to be most conscious of is the timeliness of it, you know, not waiting until three weeks later to talk about something that didn’t go right, or even waiting for a month or two to reflect on or debrief things that didn’t go well. Think about being really timely with it.

JoDee 3:12
Yeah. just share it in the moment. One of my favorite authors, Brian Tracy, once said management is transactional while leadership is transformational. This is something we agree with and feel is the difference between a boss and a coach.

Susan 3:30
A coach spends time listening and asking questions, where boss spends time speaking and giving directions.

JoDee 3:36
A coach invest time in observing while a boss makes quick assumptions.

Susan 3:41
A coach uncovers issues to get to the root of a problem, while the boss takes the quickest route to deal with the surface symptoms.

JoDee 3:49
A coach helps direct reports accept responsibility while a boss assigns blame.

Susan 3:56
A coach supports employees and developing their plans while a boss gives the plan and tells them to follow it.

JoDee 4:01
Oh, that’s nice. Our guests today are Diane Brown and David Graham from Archos Advisors. Diane is experienced in helping organizations bring the best out in their teams, creating high performance cultures, growing sales, perfecting client service, and being relied on for problem solving and execution to create results. Diane is a Prosci Certified Change Practitioner and certified as a Foresight Practitioner by the Institute For the Future. David is passionate about helping organizations and professionals achieve their full potential. He is an accomplished executive coach and sales manager with experience in both financial and professional services with a reputation for turning around struggling business units and making them both profitable and sustainable. David is a Gallup Certified Strengths Coach and an employee engagement champion.

Susan 5:02
Welcome.

JoDee 5:04
All right, Diane, tell me a little bit about this topic, shifting from boss to coach. What do you mean by that?

Diane 5:12
Well, you know, it’s interesting. You all mentioned the word transformational earlier because that is ultimately what this is about. When we look back at our workplaces over the last 30 years, so much has changed about them. Technology, workflow processes, focuses on quality and efficiency. But what hasn’t matched that pace is management. Management really hasn’t changed that much. And when you look at the impact of all of those workplace changes, the other thing that’s interesting is that they haven’t yielded the level of performance or productivity that was expected. So, Gallup does a lot of research in this area, and, actually, productivity over the last 30 years has been relatively flat, or even sometimes declining and so their conclusion also is that, you know, we really need to address management as a part of that performance equation, and our traditional management practices aren’t working. So, part of this whole transformation idea is, as you mentioned, taking those leaders and helping them really understand that not only is it a mindset shift and a focus shift, but it’s also a shift in how they’re interacting with their people to really bring out the best of them. And that’s having that coach mentality. So for us, that’s what it’s all about.

JoDee 6:32
I love it. Love it.

Susan 6:33
So David, what are you hearing from your clients that’s prompting their need or their recognition of this need to shift from boss to coach?

David 6:41
Well, Susan, I think it starts with the need for clients to achieve organic growth, right? I mean, most organizations are trying to grow in some way. The best organizations are trying to get that growth in a healthy way. And so when they start to think about that, then they start to back track into how do we accomplish that? Well, our belief is that you accomplish that who do people people, right? Hire the best people, retain the best people, develop them in place. And so, if you want to grow well, sort of go to the tagline of our company, “grow, well go far.” It’s really what we believe. If you want to grow well and go far, it really starts with building that foundation around your people. Some interesting stats around that though, so, if people are really important to the long term, you know, having the right people in the right seats for a long time are really important, how we doing at that, right? And how we’re doing at that right now is… Gallup’s latest research says that about 51% of people are either actively looking for a new job, or open, or pursuing new opportunities. So they’re out there in the marketplace. So that has really broad implications. Right? If on average, every company, about half of their people, are out there thinking about something different… then we have to start get to the why. And so, that’s something we’re passionate about. For us, a lot of the why comes back to Gallup’s research. And what the research says is, the number one reason people are leaving their organizations is they don’t see an opportunity to develop and grow in their role. Okay, so that’s the number one reason people are deciding to leave. And so, that gets back a little bit to the thesis of the book. If they’re not being developed, if they’re not seeing opportunity, what is it that’s getting in the way, right? What’s the barrier? Well, we think a lot of it comes down to what that manager is doing on a day to day basis, how they’re interacting with that employee. So a fascinating statistic, another stat, and I won’t overwhelm you with stats. This will be maybe the last one… but probably won’t be the last.

Diane 8:55
It won’t be the last, but it’s quite all right.

David 8:58
When they surveyed people that left their job, 91% of people said they had to leave their current organization to change jobs. Think about that. So said differently, they didn’t see sufficient opportunity inside their own organization to change to a role that leverage their talents that let them bring their best. So they had to look outside. I mean, to me, that’s kind of a tragedy, right? Like, think of the resources wasted.

Susan 9:27
I used to work for a company that had like 275,000 employees, and our employee engagement survey, every year, I was just startled when people would give us the feedback that they felt there was nowhere to go in the company, that they were going to have to leave. Are you kidding me? 275,000 other opportunities, but people do believe that, we’ve got to help them change that thinking.

David 9:45
Yeah, I think that starts at the top.

JoDee 9:48
Yeah, yeah. And so just to repeat Dave’s comment about 51% of your employees are actively looking for a job right now. That’s scary to me, even, to hear that number, and there’s so many opportunities out there for people to find jobs. So why not be looking, right?

David 10:10
Five decade low for unemployment today, right? That’s a challenging environment.

Susan 10:17
Right. That is.

JoDee 10:19
Diane, how does the role of coach meet employee’s needs differently from the traditional boss?

Diane 10:26
Well, as Dave said, you know, so much of the employee experience comes down to that experience they have with their manager, and what the research shows… there are really four critical needs that an employee has from their managers. One is that role clarity and expectations is significant, so that they really understand what they’re doing. Second is ongoing feedback and communication, so that they have a sense of if these are the expectations, am I meeting those, how am I doing? Third is that significant… and it’s more of a priority now than ever, that opportunity for learning and growth and development that Dave just talked about. And then the last one is accountability. You know, people really do look to their managers to be held accountable, and so when we think about how is that being met differently by a coach, I could summarize it in in two words, essentially. It’s collaboration and partnership. So, if you look back at the traditional management around, you know what it meant to be a boss, it was more directive. It was more I’m going to tell them what to do. I’m going to hold them accountable to my expectation of how things were going to be done. When you look at a coach relationship, it is much more collaborative. In that expectations piece, it’s really working with somebody to help them understand, but if there’s an opportunity and flexibility to work with them to set goals, have them really come up with some of the things that they’re going to do within the scope of those expectations. So,it’s more coming alongside someone to really set them up for success in the role, and then working with them more continuously and regularly to have ongoing conversations about how they’re doing in that role. So, there’s a very distinct… you know, we mentioned the top down approach, you get very directive, you know, almost that telling mentality in sort of the traditional boss definition. Whereas a coach, you can even imagine somebody just coming alongside you and saying, and really partnering with you to achieve the best performance that you can achieve. So that’s really the difference. It is how they work with the individual to achieve those things, and meet those four needs.

JoDee 12:34
I have to tell you, I had a conversation with several members of my own team last week about rule clarity. That was a real eye opener to me in that I thought their role was very clear to me, but understanding it wasn’t so clear to my own team members, and how that the end result of it now is I believe I can be a much more effective coach to them by really working together with them to define their role. And something that I thought… I even said to them “Oh, I think we have a couple people on our team that their role’s not that clear, but you guys are all good, right?” And I looked at me like, “Uh, no. We need more queues.” And I thought, wow, I’ve missed the boat on this. So, so important.

Susan 13:25
David, who plays the coach role, and what does it entail?

David 13:29
Well, from our seat, the coach is really the manager, right? In most organizations. And so, when we think about it, I would zoom out. I said I wasn’t gonna give any more stats, but…

Susan 13:41
No, please! We love your stats. Yeah.

David 13:43
But think about this, right? We’re talking about the book “It’s the Manager” and some of the research in there, and Diane and I had a chance to see Jim Clifton and Jim Harter talk about this back in the summer. And those are the two really top people at Gallup in terms of research and what’s going on there. They said their number one finding, over literally 70 years of studying human behavior in the workplace around the world, right? The number one finding is that 70% of the variance of engagement from team to team directly attributable to the actions of the manager.

Susan 14:19
Wow.

David 14:19
You mentioned it, Susan. People don’t leave companies, they leave their managers. And so we see it all the time, people join a company, they’re excited about the vision, and the perks, and the cool things they’re going to be doing, and the recruiting process. They get there, and within a year or short period of time, they’re disenchanted with their manager, and things go south from there. And so, our belief is that what has to happen is managers have to transition over to this role of becoming more of a coach. And that implies a change in the way they operate, right? So JoDee, you mentioned at the beginning, are our managers transformational, or are they transactional, right? We believe that far too much time is spent in this transactional mode, focusing on things like filling out forms and performance reviews annually, and giving someone a rating, and you know, those things aren’t necessarily bad. But did they really contribute to the development of that employee, right? We said at the top the performer, the number one thing they want is development, right? And so, a great manager is going to be very different than a task oriented or a transactional boss. They’re going to do a lot of the things you all said at the outset, right? Have ongoing conversations, give meaningful feedback. You know, a great coach is going to be an expert on their employees strengths, not an expert on their employees weaknesses, right? And we see so often, and I don’t think… it’s not a malicious thing on the part of managers. It’s just the way that management has evolved. And so they’re lacking lot of tools, but we view that coach as being much more hands on, much more engaged in the day to day activities of what’s going on with their performers, not necessarily in a micromanaging way, but in a forward looking way, in a developmental way. And yeah, sometimes they have to talk about weaknesses and mistakes. But hopefully, the overall tenor is more broad than that. And so we think that’s what’s missing.

JoDee 16:28
Yeah, I agree. I agree. Diane, one key aspect of coaching seems to be the ability to have effective performance conversations, just like David just mentioned. So if I’m a coach, and I am a coach… what can I do to ensure that conversations are the best they can be?

Diane 16:51
Well, there are there are three key things when we’re working with people around coaching, that we really emphasize. Kind of three key skills that sort of carry you through all of the different types of conversations that we’ve referenced today, the setting, the expectations, through giving feedback, through accountability and progress review. And those three skills are, first: asking great questions. So when you want to have a great conversation, it has to be a dialogue. It has to be two way, not just one way, that’s another way it’s different from a boss, so to speak. And so, part of the way you really have rich dialogue is to ask great questions. So, if you’re a coach, we would challenge you to think about what are some of the questions that you need to ask in each of those areas? What are the questions that help, you know, is this person clear about their role to use your example earlier.

JoDee 17:41
Apparently I didn’t ever ask that question.

Diane 17:44
Well, you still have time. You still have time. That’s the good thing. So questions, that’s really the first piece, the second, then: if you’re going to create dialogue, you have to really be able to listen very actively and empathetically and listen to understand, not just to hear. And so, when we work with coaches in this area, it’s really helping them practice. What’s it mean to listen intently? And then the third piece in terms of skill development, or attentiveness, or focus is to be able to individualize. And that’s maybe a different, or a new element to this whole coach equation that we’re seeing… that people who have traditionally played this role of a manager or team leader, really don’t recognize that part of the shift in the workplace is this being able to individualize. Really get to know your people, know the talents and skills that they bring, know that the innate talents that they have and strengths for the role, Because as a coach, and we caution, a lot of the people we work with, it’s not about you creating a clone of yourself because you’ve been successful in that role or you’ve been successful on that team. It’s about you helping them unlock what they naturally bring to be the best in that role. And so that ability to get to know them, to really understand them to build a relationship so that they will come to you with questions, and they will come to you with “Hey, you know, I know it’s been done this way in the past, but here’s an idea that I have.” Being able to individualize your approach is a really powerful aspect of it. So those would be the three things that we really challenge people to think about, as they’re stepping into that coach role.

JoDee 19:25
So asking good questions, listening to their responses, their input, and then individualizing it, and that takes time, right? That takes time for us to stop and do that. Good lesson.

Susan 19:39
I was just thinking one of my top five Strength Finders Strengths, or talents, is individualization. And I’ve often wondered, how can I use that? Well, I do executive coaching and I’m thinking… the power of really helping each of those individuals unlock their strengths, I’m going to take that and think on it. Yeah. Thank you.

David 19:56
I’m envious, always, of individualization.

JoDee 19:59
I am too, I think that’s such a beautiful talent.

Susan 20:05
So David, what steps can an organization take to start to help leaders make this shift from boss to coach? Yeah, I think about it, Susan, in terms of sort of four big steps. And I think there’s a lot underneath of it, but I’ll just talk about that at a high level. First, it starts with leadership, it truly does. And if you are committed to organically growing your company, right, to providing a great customer experience, you’re gonna have to then ultimately commit that the most effective, sustainable way to do that is by investing in your people. So first, it really takes that leadership commitment at the top we hear organizations all the time that say they want to do that, but what we find out when we sort of peel back the onion is perhaps sometimes they view employees more as an expense than as an asset, right? And so the truth is, you know, if leadership doesn’t believe that way, it’s going to be hard to take the next steps. So that’s one. Two, I think you’ve got to take a really hard look at your development programs for your managers. If the manager will call it manager coach, right? We want them to be the coach, if they’re responsible for 70% of the variants of engagement, from team to team, and they’re touching all the people in the organization, there’s a lot of power and sort of force multiplication in what those efforts translate into across the whole organization. So you’ve really got to take a look at those development programs. And are they really investing in the skills and the tools and manager needs to become this coach? We find a lot of them are. We find that although management science is kind of progressed, Diane hit on that, that the way we do it day to day, just hasn’t. So you’ve got to take a critical eye, right? What are we training our managers to do? Interesting stat, I’m going back with my stats. But, what we find and what we hear about is about one in ten managers has the natural ability just to sort of do some of the things Diane talked about. Just it’s innate.

Wow.

David 22:11
One in ten.

Diane 22:12
It’s pretty shocking.

Susan 22:13
That’s scary.

David 22:13
Another two in ten can pretty effectively get there with some help. The other seven, not necessarily cut out for it, and probably don’t want to be managers. But if you think about it, that that can work, if three out of every ten are qualified to be a manager, that math works if you select the right people. And so, that’s my third step, you’ve really got to select the right person as manager, right? And so, an old way of doing it might need some analysis or some more critical thought, because of the way we do it right now, the way I became a manager was I was really good at my old job. And they said, “Well, you ought to be a manager.” You know, nobody asked me if I had any worldly clue about what that really meant, right? And so I spent a couple years making mistakes, and over time, I had the help of a lot of people, and I found out I loved it. But that experiment can be really different for others, right? And so so that’s the number one way, the number two way that people select the manager is they’ve just been with us for a long time. It’s their time. And so we’ve got to figure out a way inside organizations of, can we have alternate career paths that don’t include managing people? You know, we work with a lot of CPA firms. And so what we find in in CPA firms is, they absolutely have a need for people who are unbelievable technical experts. And they have a need for people who are unbelievably talented at managing people. But what they do most of them right now is that role has to be all the same person all the time. If you could separate those roles, back to this idea of talent, and let the people who are really gifted at being a technical leader or an unbelievable resource in an important area for the company, let them grow, right? Then let the people managers grow equally. I think you can really have a shot at this. That’s kind of scary, though. Yeah. Right.

JoDee 24:09
But probably so much more success for people in both sides.

David 24:13
Yes, yes.

JoDee 24:14
Technical people who, that’s where they want to grow and excel, right?

Susan 24:18
I believe that those seven out of ten, who really don’t have the inclination to be managers, they are drawn to it, because they feel like to keep being rewarded for being that you have to keep managing more and more people. Yeah, so really, we’re hurting ourselves, right, by not having a separate career path where a technically sound person can continue to be rewarded equally.

Diane 24:36
In a lot of organizations prestige is associated with that. So really, it requires a culture shift, to honor both roles and success in both roles and see what that looks like. But we don’t have a lot of examples of that.

Susan 24:49
That’s really right.

David 24:49
It takes a lot of courage to do that. You know, the last thing is, the fourth thing is… it really comes down to you’ve got to hold managers account for the engagement of their teams. Not just talk about it, not just take surveys, but hold them accountable, not in a punitive way. But it’s back to that 70% being the most staggering finding are the most monumental finding, you know, who’s responsible for that? It’s the manager, and we’ve got to hold them accountable for that. And we’ve got to support them, give them the resources to be better at it. But if we just take surveys, and then, you know, tinker around the margins, and don’t ultimately say, “Hey, manager, you know, this is up to you, you’re going to be held accountable,” I think we’re missing a huge opportunity. And so, honestly, that’s how I kind of came to all this. I worked in, you know, you said you worked in a large organization, I worked in one not quite as big, but a large financial services organization, 64,000 employees, and, you know, there were 24 people that did what I did across, you know, a big geography and are engagement was you know, variant, very greatly from area to area. But as soon as I took that role, they said one of the number one things your job is to do is to drive engagement, because engagement’s directly linked to performance. Wellbeing, retention, right? That’s your job.

Susan 26:18
Yeah. Good for them.

Yeah, I know. It was great for me too, because there was so much development for my own management skills in that role. Yeah.

JoDee 26:26
So David, you talked about your experience in doing this within a company, how have you, both of you, helped organizations tackle this with their leaders and managers?

Diane 26:37
Yeah, I think it’s a great question. And a lot of times when we get brought in on a topic like this, it’s because leadership says, you know, they want to do something different with performance, or they just want to get to the next level. I mean, sometimes It’s not wrong, there’s nothing wrong, but they just say, you know, “we sense we could be better, we’re not achieving our potential.” So when when an organization reaches out to us like that, we always start with where they are. So we go through a discovery process with them to really learn, like, what’s going on, what are they trying to accomplish? What are the outcomes that they’re looking for? And then the second piece is really collaborating with them to talk about based on where you are and where you want to go. What does it make the most sense to put in place? So, Dave talked about, you know, sometimes that’s tools, sometimes it’s skill building, sometimes it’s process adjustments and how they’re, they’re working with their own people internally, and in how they have it designed, so we work on that piece of it with them, come up with a desired approach that is shared, a shared vision, and then we really drive execution. And so we never want to work with an organization to set up something that’s consultant dependent. And so we really work with, you know, what are their resources internally, and what’s the plan that needs to be put in place to help ensure sustainability. Because if they’re wanting to truly make a change, it’s really important for us to not only design, like, what that could look like, but how do we help you make sure that once you start down this path, you can continue on it. So, I can use an example of an organization that we’re working with right now. We’ve been working with them for about 18 months, and it’s an interesting organization in that it’s not one that I would have said, wasn’t… I mean, they were they’re very performance oriented already. People. Hi, we’ve talked about the importance of leadership, really valuing people as a part of their culture and really wanting to invest very significantly positive in that organization. And they’re even known for that. And so what they came to us for was they said, you know, what, we have this coach role, and it is a lot of their managers and leaders play the role of… formal role of coach, but we just don’t feel like it’s kind of hitting on all cylinders. We’re not getting out of it what we want. And so we sat down with them and said, Okay, so what are some of the strengths, what are some of the things that you’ve already built, and how can we build on those? And where are some of the gaps? Well, what we learned was that going back to where we started today, a lot of their performance development process, while they value people deeply, and they’re hugely invested in developing their people, a lot of their process around it was very transactionally oriented. So they were meeting quarterly, but the quarterly conversations between the coach and their performer were very transactional around the performance review, and not necessarily development. And so with them, what we’ve done in the last, what they’ve done, actually, in the last 12 months, was just tweak, what were those expectations for those coaches, and we’ve reshifted reset them, we redefined the role, because a lot of the coaches thought they knew what it was. But in reality, that was one of the biggest shifts for them was like, “Oh, this is really what you’re asking us to do or what we need to do to have the best results.” So they shifted the expectation. We did provide a little bit of training, but mostly around that individualization piece. Because that’s the part that was kind of missing. They were good at the conversations. And then the last piece was really establishing a regular cadence, much more regular than quarterly for them to get with their performers. And what they have seen in just 12 months, has been really remarkable. And as I said, it’s not us. They’re the ones executing. We’ve provided a little help along the way, just with tools and resources and ideas. But they have seen a significant shift in engagement of their staff, very significant engagement gains, they have seen a shift in just the information being shared back and forth. And I think one of the most remarkable comments that was made to us when we were down there, during one of our visits, was that one of the coaches said, you know, I’ve worked with this young lady since she started with our organization, and I have learned more about her this year than I learned in the last eight or nine years, as a part of working with her, and he said “I just never realized that I wasn’t quite doing it the way that was going to be most impactful for her, and for us,” and so yeah, so they have seen our big results in a lot of different ways.

JoDee 31:12
Yeah. You know too, I keep thinking, as I’m focusing on listening to what you’re saying… that although this is great advice for coaches and managers, it’s really great advice for everyone, right? No matter what your role in the organization to think about, how can I ask good questions? How can I better listen to those answers? And how can I individualize even as a, say, a new hire staff person in an organization. How can they think about individualizing the conversation around them and or individualizing it around their manager and what they’re looking for as well too,

Diane 31:55
Right, right. Yep.

Susan 31:57
That’s great.

Diane 31:57
It’s a relationship.

JoDee 31:58
Right.

Diane 31:59
It ultimately is, and so that goes both ways. Yeah.

Susan 32:02
So David and Diane, is there anything else our listeners need to know? Any other statistics you have not shared?

David 32:11
I’m sure there are a lot of them. Here’s the way I would look at it and, you know, in our business, a lot of people always ask like, what do you do? It can be hard to describe, right? One of the ways I explain it to people, and I think this is a message for everyone is that, like, what, we need to do in our organizations, is stop fighting human nature, and figure out a way to start harnessing it. Okay. And what I mean by that is like, I feel like so much organizational effort is put into, let’s keep everyone corralled and in the boxes and doing exactly… and putting our shoulder into it, and we’re getting only marginal results from that. What we need to figure out is how can we find out where people are best, what they’re most inclined to do, and let that flourish, right? If we can harness that human nature, there’s so much in that. The other thing that just strikes me as, maybe it’s the older I get, I won’t say wiser, but maybe more reflective… is back at the beginning of the talk, you know, you just sort of laid out here some real simple things you need to do. I think we have this bias for overlooking the simple, those fundamentals. Like, this isn’t necessarily new and world changing in my mind, it’s really saying we need to get back to focusing on some of those fundamentals, relationships, and trust, and listening, and caring, and it is all those things that add up to high levels of engagement. And so I don’t think any of those are particularly onerous to learn, it’s just we have to redirect our attention and our focus to what matters and maybe let some of this other stuff go.

Susan 33:58
Make sense.

JoDee 34:00
Good advice. And how can our listeners reach out to you if they are interested in helping you help their business?

David 34:08
Well, we have a website, which probably like most is always under revision, but www.archosadvisors.com, and that’s www.archosadvisors.com. And so you can reach out through our website. And our process really is… we start with a discussion. We don’t really necessarily come with services in mind, or here’s exactly what we’re going to do. It really is what Diane describe the process, we sit down, we try to figure out where the pain is, if you will, and then we see if we can help. And so we’re passionate about that. And I think sometimes we feel like we’re a good fit. And sometimes we’re willing to say, you know what, maybe we’re not the best solution. And we’ve worked together with you, JoDee and Purple Ink, and we’ve loved that relationship. Sometimes we find you’re a better fit, right? And so we’re happy to get people in the right spot.

JoDee 35:00
All right. Well, thank you so much for joining us today. Great insight, great advice, and even great statistics.

David 35:09
You know, I’ve got more, but we’re just we’re just pressed for time.

Diane 35:11
Well thanks so much for having us. It’s just a joy to be able to talk to you.

Susan 35:14
Thank you, it was very fun.

David 35:16
Thanks.

Susan 35:19
JoDee, our listener question today is: what part time opportunities exist in HR? Both from the employer and the employee perspective?

JoDee 35:28
Well, I’m not sure if my answer to this is any different with regards to HR than with any profession. I think, especially in our economy right now so many companies are looking to hire good people, and might be more willing to take on part time people that they might not have considered before if they were only looking for part time people. But I think part time roles could exist in any area from benefits to recruiting to generalists. I do think it’s easier sometimes to find a part time opportunity once you been full time in an organization. I know some organizations just kind of have a stigma or thought around all their people have to be full time. So sometimes it might be creating that business case for how you can still accomplish your role or be more of a specialist in a part time area. What about you, Susan?

Susan 36:28
Yeah, I have a number of people who say, “You know what, I’d like to kind of take my foot off the pedal a little bit, my kids are an age where I’d like to be home with them, or my parents need some extra help. I’d like to work maybe two days a week, three days a week,” whatever. And they say like, where do I go? I always say go to your employer first because they know your value and the flexibility that you might need. They might say, you know what, I’d rather have 60% of you than none of you. So I would say start there. But if that’s not going to work, that’s not an option. Then there are websites that really specialize in part time or flexible types of jobs. There’s flexjobs.com, which I do think you have to pay a fee for. So do look that up before you make sure it’s something you want to do before you commit. There’s Upwork, which is really popular for freelancers, people who want to do maybe project assignments. It might be that you know, a time in your life that you say, I think I’ll just go on a 1099, I’ll just consult and I’ll do project to project work. Doesn’t necessarily have to be with an employer, which gives you all the flexibility that you might want,

JoDee 37:31
Right, Good advice.

In our in the news section today, we have talked before in the podcast about artificial intelligence and hiring. But according to a recent article in HR Dive, Career Builder is utilizing artificial intelligence in their hiring and job hunting platform. This improved software will allow employers to post jobs in less than five minutes, and we’ll give recruiters insights on whether their posts will appeal to candidates. Other features are the ability to rate gender and tone neutral job descriptions, career path insights for the candidates next 20 years, which is interesting, and a salary estimator. So you might check that out.

Susan 38:19
Sounds useful.

JoDee 38:21
Thanks for listening today and make it a JoyPowered day. Thank you for listening. We hope you enjoyed The JoyPowered Workspace Podcast. If you liked the show, please tell your friends about it. And let us know what you think of our podcast by rating and reviewing us on Apple Podcasts, it helps new people find our show. The JoyPowered Workspace Podcast can be found on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Susan 38:53
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JoDee 39:08
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