Welcome to "Visionary Voices" the podcast where we dive into the minds of business owners, founders, executives, and everyone in between.
Each episode brings you face-to-face with the leading lights of industry and innovation.
Join us as we uncover the stories behind the success and the lessons learned along the way.
Whether you're climbing the corporate ladder or just starting your business journey, these are the conversations you need to hear - packed with visionary voices and insights.
Let's begin.
So welcome to the show.
Thank you for taking the time.
Can you give us a top level view of what it is that you do right now and your journey so
far?
Sure, I work with companies around culture and talent as the high level.
category you might call it.
And essentially we help companies attract, develop and retain the best talent that they
can and through inclusive practices ensure that everyone gets to work to their full
potential.
My background is learning and development, executive development and leadership and then I
moved into DEI and now culture and talent.
Amazing.
So I love to dig into the journey to get to this point.
So why did you enter the business world and start your own business?
What was the story there?
Sure.
I actually had a background in the nonprofit space, public administration specifically,
how not-for-profit large entities work.
And my first master's degree was in what wasn't called the glass ceiling yet at the time,
but it was that women rose to a certain point in government or institutional work.
and then seemed to languish there.
And so that was interesting to me.
And then I moved into learning and development, or talent as it's called today.
And I led talent for a number of companies, most notably probably American Express, the
card division.
And what I noticed very clearly was that people learn differently.
based on their background, based on their skill set.
Some people are visual, some are auditory, some people have to learn by doing.
And so I started to think more about how we could address the diversity of learning styles
and how we could support employees from the moment they get hired, you know, what they
call cradle to grave, but from the moment they get hired until they leave the company.
How do we ensure that
we have less what's called regrettable attrition.
We keep the people we want and that everyone gets to work fully and realize their career
ideally within the company through internal movements and development and opportunities
inside or moving from company to company as needed.
Yeah, one thing led to another.
Amazing.
I'd love to dig in a little bit about what you mentioned about how we can retain our
staff.
Because you know, there's that thing like you're quite quitting, right, where people are
starting to zone out and then eventually they're going to leave the role.
there's been some clients I've worked with where they do have that churn issue within the
company, and they're really struggling to retain staff.
So what you're seeing there in terms of common traits that managers or companies are
doing, which creates that type of environment within their company.
Well, I think the biggest thing is that we hear from employees that they leave because of
two reasons.
One is the boss.
And so is that boss someone who is
toxic or does not support all their employees.
They have one or two favorites and they play to those favorites, give them the plum
assignments, the opportunities for advancement, and everyone else gets the work and gets
to do the work.
There are so many people that told me I'm the cleanup person on my team.
Technology companies especially, there are people who do very well initiating and
innovating but don't carry
through.
And so there are a lot of people who end up doing the cleanup work or finishing projects,
but they languish in their career.
It doesn't move up.
So I saw, I think that's one issue.
The bad boss is a concern.
The other thing that's the biggest thing that we hear over and over again is I don't get
any development and my full potential is not being utilized.
So I know for my own
career I've left companies where I felt that they undervalued me.
They didn't give me work that would allow me to...
leverage my knowledge and skills.
And so that's the, those are two of the biggest.
And so we can see within the same company, one function where the leader takes the time to
ensure that everyone has a development plan.
That you ask people who report to you, what are your professional goals?
How does this work help you meet those goals?
And what else can I do to
ensure that this is a rich development experience for you.
And they do that and touch base at least once a quarter.
Then you have other leaders who just hand out the work and are you getting this done on
time?
And it's as though you are in a manufacturing widget.
And so just pump out the work.
I don't care about you as a human being.
I don't care about your aspirations for your career.
I just care that you do this job.
The caring about people doesn't mean you have to get involved in their personal lives, but
it does mean that you treat them as a human.
We used to say the human resource is human part of that title.
And it does mean that you take an interest in who they are and how they want to develop
and what they have to contribute to your organization because you're missing out if you
don't.
There people with great innovative ideas who stop sharing them because they feel as though
you're not going to listen.
I tried, and that's what I hear over and over again, I tried offering suggestions to
correct a flaw we had.
No one listened.
If I'm not the favorite person on the team, I don't get heard.
All I am thought of is someone to pump out the work.
And that gets exhausting because work is not eight hour days.
Work is
more than eight hours and so if you're going to spend your life doing it you want to feel
as though there is opportunity ahead and it doesn't necessarily mean promotions.
because we all know that pyramid gets narrower at the top.
But it does mean you're listened to, your opinions matter.
If you have some good ideas, they're considered.
Again, no one expects that all their ideas get implemented, but at least given some
airtime, some light, some consideration.
I hope I didn't over explain that one for you, but that's basically the two areas that we
hear over.
and over again.
Yeah, I completely agree because for me, I've definitely been in roles where the first
three to three to four months is great.
It's exciting.
It's new.
I'm using my skills.
I'm learning a little bit more, but then you reach that peak of, know, I'm not actually
learning anymore.
And then it's like, well, where do I go from here?
And I think it's a very difficult area, I think, for managers if they don't have those
systems in place, where, as you said, right, every quarter, they're sitting down and
working on that development plan.
I mean, I've got client I've been working with and they've just actually introduced this
into their company.
And within that development plan, it's not just professional development and goals, but
it's actually personally, okay, what do you want to achieve this quarter?
You know, whether it's fitness, whether it's some relationship, whatever that looks like,
what does that look like?
And then they've put together a plan on how they can support that and uplift that within
the company.
And already, even after the first kind of three, four months of them doing that, they've
seen a huge uptick in just people
having energy at work and it's been such a huge difference for them, but just a very
little addition into that, if that makes sense.
Yeah, absolutely.
And it's ironic, it's sort of paradoxical because so often mid-level managers who need to
do this work are swamped.
And so they say, I just don't have the time to do that.
I've got 30 or 50.
One time I had 120 direct reports.
So how could I take the time to ensure that I knew those 120 people?
There were managers in between me and them, but I still needed to know who they were and
what was going on for them.
Did they have a new child in their lives?
Were they, you know, did they have an
parent who was dealing with an illness, was that impacting their work?
But more than ever, if you spend the time to ensure that everyone has the opportunity to
work to that full potential, to feel as though they can grow and continue to develop while
at the company, you're to get greater productivity.
So we keep saying do more with less.
CEO's number one topic of concern
this year is productivity.
If you want to have greater productivity
Don't look to terminate the lower producers.
Look to see what motivates them.
Look to see what motivates every person on your team.
It's not going to be the same.
And look at how you might help motivate everyone.
Are you listening to your people?
Are you talking with them?
Are you engaged with them, again, as people, not just as direct reports or downstream
reports?
And when you do that, it pays off not only is it
a better workplace for you and them, but more work gets done.
Everyone's happier.
think the biggest theme there or takeaway I have is managers just need to ask the
questions.
That's the biggest thing, right?
You ask those questions about like what is going on, right?
And having that conversation from a point of empathy rather than that authoritative talk,
because I know whenever I've had jobs before and I'm, you know, with the manager
one-on-one having a conversation, it can be intimidating if they're asking certain
questions about my performance is slipping or whatever, but
starting that conversation from that point of empathy and asking, you know, what is going
on?
Like, what can we help with?
That type of questioning is where you're going to get the true answers.
And then you can figure out, okay, what's the plan to get us from A to B and get out of
where we're currently at, let's say.
So I think that's a very, very key element there and a very simple framework.
And I think that a lot of these things, it's always just, it's very simple fixes.
But it's not easy, as you said, you know, if you're managing a hundred people, that takes
work.
And so
One thing I did want to discuss a little bit about was the role AI might be coming into
these companies and maybe replacing some of this one-on-one time for managers, say,
because with AI, like, can people really connect with them and have an actual conversation
that's going to help them solve these problems with it?
Where is that right now?
Probably not.
But where do you foresee that bit of technology coming into this process?
You know, the benefits or the negatives.
think that...
AI can be incredibly supportive.
I've been talking with someone who believes that AI gets us back to our natural
inquisitiveness and our natural curiosity.
I think that there has been so much out there about AI taking away jobs.
But if we think about it, AI innate can also be seen as an enabler of true connections
because AI can take away the grunt work or the mundane tasks, but AI cannot replicate the
relationship piece.
So if AI removes some of the things that take up our day, let's just say we have an
eighth.
eight hours of work time plus breaks and lunch and whatever else there is that we hope to
do during our day.
If we save an hour or two hours because we can offload work to AI and our employees
also save that time, then we can use that time to come together to talk and consider
iteration around innovation, around making this a more productive workplace through
collaboration and things like that.
AI does not replace collaboration.
AI can free up time in order to collaborate.
And I'll give you a
a concrete example.
A colleague and I were writing content for a website reboot.
And ordinarily we would have done this in person.
We did it virtually.
And each of us was checking AI for wording at the same time.
Whereas normally we would say, okay, this is the shell.
Now let's go off and do some thinking and writing.
Instead, in real time, we put things into AI.
came back, two different systems, AI systems, came back, shared what we had while still on
the same virtual meeting.
and kept moving it forward.
so in this case, it was a woman.
So she would say, what do you think about this?
I said, I don't like that word.
Let's go back.
Let me try something.
And again, we iterated together with AI as the third person, if you will, and fourth
person in the room supporting us, not in place of our conversation.
And I think the same is true.
If you could free up an hour a day because of AI
scheduling, coding, taking things off your plate, writing, mundane tasks, the critical
piece is rededicate that hour to one-on-one conversation, which is not an AI practice.
Make sure that that one hour is used for brain, you know,
brainstorming session or a starting every meeting with the first five minutes or just
reconnecting what's going on in your life what's going on in mine people are worried that
they don't have time for that it probably takes three minutes but if you do that again
you've saved an hour from AI you now have an hour to spend with a person
find out why that poor performer is performing poorly.
Is it they're disinterested?
Is it they feel there's no challenge?
Is it that something's going on at home?
You're not going to solve their home problems, but you're going to at least understand.
this might be a temporary situation, you're dealing with an elder care issue.
Or you might find out that they want greater challenge and then you can put them on a more
challenging project.
I mean, you don't know until you have the conversations.
And that's this work is about.
Yeah, definitely.
And what you said there was really important, I think is, as you said, a lot of people
might be worried, AI is going to take my job, AI is going to do this.
But actually, it's going to increase the efficiency on certain areas within the role.
And the really cool thing with it is that the tasks that we just don't like to do, the
admin, the boring stuff, which isn't creative, which isn't helpful.
And we hate doing that, which is going to bring down morale overall.
Those things can actually then be replaced with AI.
which is a really cool thing.
And as you said, it frees up more time in the day to have those collaborative
communications, right?
Those meetings, know, talking one-on-one with people, which is really, really important.
And that's really what lights people up.
I mean, some people just want to be head down coding and, you know, heads down coding.
But I think of it like we have eye robots that vacuum for us.
We have all kinds of, which is the same thing.
So I don't have to vacuum if I have an eye robot because it's going to go around and do a
mundane task that I don't really want to do.
I can use that time to do something I do want to do that is enriching, is enlivening, that
brings me more joy.
The same thing is true at work.
Think about what are the iRobot type vacuuming tasks, scheduling, writing long pieces, you
know, a promotional piece that you've been struggling.
How do you get people to this event you've just scheduled and you're worried no one's
going to show up?
Have AI.
take a swipe at it.
Instead of racking your brain and coming back and feeling unsuccessful, start with AI.
Everyone knows it's easier to start by correcting something than it is to start with a
blank page.
Leverage AI for things like that and let your natural curiosity and your innovative
tendencies bubble up and take flight rather than thinking, sitting and worrying, AI is
going to take my job.
unless you like the boring rote stuff.
definitely.
And what you touched on there was, you know, with this technology, a lot of people are
going back to their natural creative self, natural curiosity, you know, that's within
everyone, which is really cool to see.
Cause as you said, right, if you are stuck on something, then you can be creative in the
moment, even if it's something technical, right?
Like, like how do I build this marketing funnel, this marketing strategy, you know,
something very technical.
you're using your creative juices, let's say by leveraging AI as a tool, by talking to it,
by prompting it with the right things and trying to figure out what makes the most sense.
And so I think that's a really cool shift that we're going to start seeing where, you
know, I think for many years, people were very much robotic, maybe in their roles and
didn't have that creative element because, you know, let's say in, I don't know,
accounting or something along the lines of that.
It's very much technical role, right?
Where you're just crunching numbers, whatever, but now
with AI, right, then these financial people, have new methods to cut and digest this data
and they can really think about how can we get the most out of this data in a very
creative way.
So it's a really cool thing that we're seeing in the marketplace, I think.
And that shift is really cool to see.
I did want to also talk about your journey itself on the entrepreneurial route, it's full
of ups and downs, there's always, always moving up and down.
So how have you found the overall.
journey itself and what are some of key challenges that you might have had and also
turning points I guess within it?
My journey from the corporate world, I went back to the non-not-for-profit world and so I
ran a large not-for-profit organization where I live in the Bay Area.
I continued to always look at and actually had a class that I taught on building your
network, that your network is like your net worth.
And because of the work that I did there, I had to go against my natural tendency, which
is just to say, your work stands for you and don't worry about who you're connected to and
don't worry about any of those other things.
Just stay heads down, do your work, do a good job, people will recognize you.
annual rise.
And that works to a certain degree, but after a certain spot in the corporate ladder, it
doesn't.
So I started teaching, in this case for me, because it was a women's organization,
nonprofit that advocated for women, women how to build and leverage their networks
intentionally.
And this course that I would teach to women
in corporate settings all over, probably 30, 40 different corporate settings, was also a
lesson for me.
And that lesson was to leverage my network.
And so my entrepreneurial journey has been
easy, smooth, frankly seamless, if you will, because I have a huge network.
And so I will say that the secret to not having to market my company or our services is
that it is built on my reputation, but it is also built, and I think we always want to
build
on our reputation of doing good work.
You can't just have a network.
You have to do good work.
But if you do good work and don't have a network that is supportive and aware of the good
work you do,
then I would not go and be an entrepreneur because you're going to struggle.
You're going to have to become a salesperson and go out there and just sell, sell, sell
yourself.
That's not something I ever wanted to do.
All I wanted to do was make a difference in companies that I worked with, which is what I
was doing as the CEO of a nonprofit.
And so my consulting practice and the company that I've co-founded has had work, people
are come to us because
they know me by reputation and they know me because of the network that I've built.
And my network is built on my reputation.
And so I would say to people who are thinking of becoming an entrepreneur,
focus first on ensuring that you have a solid reputation, that you do what you say, and
that your work can stand for you, and that people say, I know that person.
They did a great job working with me or my company or what have you, so that you have
testimonials, if you will, but personal stories of how you've been of service to others.
In my field, that has
has been what has drawn people to come work with our company.
People know me, they know my reputation as a pioneer in the work that I do, and that I
continue to learn and grow.
It's not stagnant by any means.
Every day I wake up and read some new information that informs how we do the work and what
we do, what the work is.
And so I think if you start with building your network,
your reputation and your network, then becoming an entrepreneur is a lot easier because
you have that network to draw on.
Then you need to just let people know, I'm now doing this full time.
If you know anyone who you think could be, who you think would find value in my services
or my consultation or my executive coaching or whatever it happens to be, whatever your
marketing.
they come to you and one shares the story with another.
One coaching client tells three more people that it's been transformative working with you
and you've got four more clients at four more companies which opens four more doors.
To me, that is the way to become an author.
That's a smoother way than just having an idea for a product.
I had an idea for a product.
People liked part A and B of the product.
They liked part A, they didn't like part B.
The product didn't take off.
said, okay, that's not going to work.
Let's go to something else.
And so I think it depends on what you're becoming an entrepreneur on.
If you're selling a product, then it has to be about the product too.
It has to be a good product with value.
it.
For sure.
And that's such an interesting view on, on the journey that you've had because, you know,
I speak to a lot of entrepreneurs and a lot of the times they're like, this journey has
been, it's been terrible.
Like there's been so many, you know, huge ups and downs within it.
And, um, a lot of them built the company initially, you know, not from that network first
approach, right?
Where they didn't quite have that network to support them, as you said.
And so, so interesting that you have that insight there where, you know, when you decided
to pursue starting your own business, well, you had the support of a huge network.
Of course you have the authority within that network because you're so good at what you
do.
But then you had that network to support you.
And, cause I know when I first started the first company that I had where I was actually
working with dentists doing lead generation and paid advertising, I had no reputation in
that area.
had no network in that area as well.
And it was just an uphill battle every single day.
And, was a big struggle, but it's so interesting and refreshing to hear that, you know, if
you are really good at what you do and you do have a network, then you are going to create
that word of mouth flywheel.
As you said, you you service one person, they have a great experience and they tell three
more and then they come to you and then they tell three more each and that's nine.
And so you can grow exponentially, right?
With that word of mouth, but it all starts from obviously being good at what you do for
starters, but having that network to support you as well.
So I think that's such an interesting take on that journey.
And I will tell you, I've given that advice to many people who start the entrepreneurial
path.
Stick with your repu- where you have a reputation, where you have a network, start there.
You can always branch out from there, but start where you're known, where you have that
reputation for excellence and where you have a network.
Yeah, no, no, I love that.
And then from the mindset point of view, I guess what some of the pivotal moments maybe
that you've had where you really had to maybe shift your mindset on this journey because
of course having the network and everything have made, I guess the growth of company
relatively seamless, as you mentioned.
But of course, along the way, there's certain shifts you have to make mentally to get to
this final destination.
So what shifts have you seen in yourself maybe over the last few years?
Well, we're in a shift right now.
I had a reputation as one of the founders of the work in DEI.
And now in the US, DEI is a bad word.
And I won't go into the politicization.
Oh, gosh.
or anything.
the politicizing of DEI.
And I'm not going to challenge whether it's right or wrong, but what I will say is that
you have to, it could be that AI is changing your world, your work.
It could be that there's new technology that's changing your work.
I was with Cisco for 11 years.
Technology is going to disrupt what we do, and it's up to us to decide if that disruption
gives us a new angle that's positive, or if that disruption throws us into havoc and we
can't cope.
My thinking has always been stay abreast of everything, both technology changes, cultural
changes, political changes, globalization changes.
All of those things are going to, if you are not aware of the
global political scenario, your business is going to be impacted in a negative way because
you need to be aware.
Mine is more directly impacted because of the current emphasis and light that's being
shined on.
some misinformation around DEI in the US, but that doesn't matter.
What matters is, is the work you're doing grounded in data and results?
And if it is...
How does this new technology, cultural shift, geopolitical shift, impact your work and how
could you help companies adjust, pivot, absorb, adapt, whatever the right modifier is?
Because it's up to us, outsiders who work with...
companies, startups to global multinationals to help them.
We are in service to them.
And so we have to figure out how do you understand the new geopolitical scenario and what
does that mean to talent and the war for talent and culture?
How do the new regulations in Europe on ESG versus the new regulations in the US on ESG
when you're a global multinational impact your business.
What do you do?
Do you go with one, you know, one geo or another when you're, when you're global, what do
you do?
So we have to be ahead of the curve interpreting, understanding point by point, what does
this mean for you?
And here's how you might adapt.
Here's what it's important for you to know.
Here's what's important for you to do.
Here's how you remain successful or
get even more successful.
Our goal is to help businesses be successful in whatever we're doing.
If we are a B2B, and most consultant companies like mine are B2B.
So then it's our job to be even more flexible and more adaptive so that we can help our
clients be flexible and adaptive.
If we're not, they certainly won't be.
So we have to be ahead of that curve.
We have to stay on top of what is the future of work look, what does it look like?
What does hybrid look like in the environments of the clients that we work with?
What's important?
What's not important?
Things are cyclical, but what do we need to do right now to prepare for the future?
And AI is a big piece of that.
I hope that answers your question.
Yeah, yeah, for sure.
And this reminds me of a conversation I had recently actually, where we were talking
about, you know, when you build a company, how rigid do you need to be in the processes,
the structure and everything in that realm?
And we'll talk about where, you know, yes, you do need to have some rigid processes, of
course, but let's say, you know, 60 % of the company is very much rigid in the way they do
things, but then you need to have a buffer.
which is flexible, which can shift and move a little bit.
Like when they build skyscrapers, right?
It needs to be able to shift and move a little bit and your company needs to be able to do
the same.
adding to that equation is the foresight, as you mentioned, where we need to be more
informed than our clients are so we can be ahead of the curve and we can foresee what the
changes are going to be and the potential ramifications and the changes we need to make as
a company in the process that we have.
so, yeah, just remind me, reminded me of that conversation because again,
I'm very much a technical person and I love building out complex systems, but the issue
with rigid complex systems is as soon as something changes, then the whole thing doesn't
work.
So you need to have that flexibility in the movement within it.
Yeah, and I think you make an important point in that as an entrepreneur, unless you are
Google, Cisco, a large global multinational, one of your advantages is your agility.
so it is our...
mandate, if you will, to stay agile.
Even though we might have processes and tools and systems that are supportive right now,
we need to build in that agility because the advantage we bring is that we don't treat
everyone.
I mean, if you want to go to one of the big 10 consulting firms, you're going to get the
same template for change no matter what your change is.
When my company works with a company on their change initiative, it's very much about
what's going on at that company.
We do have a framework for understanding change, and we do have a framework for building
trust and a framework, but we don't apply frameworks or tools or technologies across the
board because the advantage we bring is knowing
our client and understanding what will work for them and customizing it.
mean, people use the word bespoke all the time now.
It's not about a tailor anymore.
It's about the work.
The work has to be customized because otherwise you might as well just look it up online
and pull down a template.
And that we know doesn't work because that assumes everyone
is the same and we're all going to jump on the burning platform model or whatever the
model happens to be.
And we're not automatons, we're individuals.
so what works in one division of a company is not going to work in another division of a
company.
What works in Europe is not going to work in Asia or Latam or North America or Canada,
wherever it is.
We have a client based in Canada.
in Canada and their strategy in the US need to be localized and we pushed for that and
helped promote that.
Yeah, it's bringing that flexibility, not just in, you know, the business processes
itself, right, the operations, but also when you're working with clients as a service
based businesses, there's always going to be nuances with different clients, right?
They need to be served in slightly different ways.
And so like some of the services, yes, it's going to be very similar across the board, but
then you need to, as you said, make it bespoke to them.
So you're solving the issues that they actually have.
Because a lot of the time, I see it lot in the marketing world where
someone will heavily productize the service that they have, the issue with heavily
productized service in the, in the service industry is not every industry, not every
client is made equally, right?
They've got different problems, different responsibilities in different areas, as you
said.
So I think that's a very important, Point when we're adding that to the flexibility, you
know, talk around that.
So I think that's very, very cool.
so one of the final questions we always like to ask in this podcast is if you could go
back.
to your 18 year old self and you can only take three things with you, whether it's some
mindset, some philosophical information or some business knowledge, whatever it can be, it
could be anything.
What would those three things be and why would it be those things?
I would say one is don't be afraid to ask for what you want.
If you get a no, you get a no.
Ask again.
So I think that's the first one and probably one of the most important.
Ask for what you want and don't be turned off by no.
Because you'll get a lot of nos, but that's okay.
The second one is
is probably what I touched on earlier, which is that your network has a lot more to do
with your net worth than just your work itself.
I always thought if you're the smartest and the hardest working and those types of things.
your work stand speaks for itself.
Your work doesn't speak for itself.
You have to speak for yourself.
So that would be the second one.
Don't sacrifice putting time and energy into your work to build your network, but do be
intentional about your network in addition to putting time in.
Because your network, those people will be immeasurable in their help to you no matter
what you want to do.
I call them their personal board of directors.
So start early.
Get yourself a personal board of directors.
The third thing probably would be make sure to, well I'm debating between two.
One would be don't take yourself so seriously.
And the other is the fake it till you make it imposter syndrome part.
Yeah.
we all feel like imposters and the more we present ourselves as though we're not, the more
people believe we're not.
And so that old fake it till you make it saying is...
I wish I had thought more about that when I was younger.
was still in the prove it and demonstrate it, work 20 hours, you know, through the night,
over the weekend, doesn't matter.
I still do that, but by choice when I choose to, not because I feel like I have to prove
myself.
So I guess, think it till you make it.
Your network is just as critical as what you do.
And so put time and energy into that.
and and that would those were
Amazing.
You know, I love the messages there and the fagety of makers.
It's just so true.
Right.
Cause essentially you fake it and then you make it then you're not faking it anymore.
And that's the interesting thing with that.
Right.
Is, know, when you want to start a business, it's like, well, am I an entrepreneur?
Well, I guess I am now, you know, let's see.
And then you are an entrepreneur later on, right?
You've got a successful business and you're doing all these amazing things.
So I love the message there.
So thank you so much for taking the time to jump on this.
I've learned a lot myself and hopefully the listeners as well have taken a few notes from
this because yeah, it's been very impactful.
it's been my pleasure, Akil.
Delightful to speak with you.
And I look forward to seeing the podcast.
Thank