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Welcome to The Culture Code podcast. On this podcast, you’ll learn how to grow, shape, and sustain a high-performance culture with the CEO of LEADx, Kevin Kruse. From designing and delivering highly effective leadership development programs, to measuring and improving the employee experience, you will understand what it takes to cultivate a thriving company culture. Through interviews with Chief People Officers, deep dives into key topics, and recordings of our invite-only community sessions, we bring you cutting-edge, data-backed insights from the most desirable companies to work for in the world.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Hello, everyone. I'm Kevin Kruse. Welcome back to another episode of the Culture Code. I'm very excited. Our guest today is the Chief People Officer at Dave, Shannon Sullivan. Shannon, welcome! And where are you joining from today?
Shannon: I am in not sunny Columbus, Ohio!
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: For those who might not be familiar with Dave, how big is your organization and in plain language, what do you do?
Shannon: Yeah. Dave was born because incumbent banks poorly serve everyday Americans. So our mission of the company is really to build products that level the financial playing field, particularly serving millennials and Gen. Z. Americans, who, frankly, have long borne the burden of fees from traditional institutions. And one of the things I was shocked to learn when I joined Dave a few years ago is that fees can total up to $400 a year, which is incredibly burdensome for most Americans living paycheck to paycheck. So we really believe here at Dave that basic banking should be free. We build products that circumvent the traditional system and are really focused on enabling a better banking experience, regardless of, you know, your income or financial strata that you exist within. And so we have a free model where we offer free banking to, at this point, we're at over 9 million customers, no overdraft fees, minimum balance requirements. And so I think what's awesome to be part of Dave right now, and what I think all of our employees feel is that our company is really relevant in a high inflation market, high-interest rate environment, where everyday Americans are struggling to buy gas and groceries. You know, Dave is a great service and solution for them.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Shannon, that's great that you shared that. And it's an important mission. Most people don't know this, but for about 5 years, I and some of my friends, we owned a bank, a community bank, so we grew it to 1010 branches, and then we sold it to a bigger bank. I don't pretend to be an expert in banking. I try to be an expert in leadership and culture. But I saw from the inside what banks need to do to try to pay bills, especially in, from their side, a low-interest rate environment. If I'm not making money on interest, my fees, my ATM fees, my bank account fees, my savings fees, it would be pretty crazy. And things, I think, have gotten worse. And like you said, everybody, but especially younger professionals just getting in, those fees add up, they make a big difference. So I think the mission you're on is an important one. But tell us, where's the headquarters? How many employees do you have?
Shannon: Yeah. So we're headquartered in Los Angeles, but we're a remote-first employer and have been ever since the pandemic of 2020 started. So we have employees or team members located all across the country. At this point, we're in almost every state. So we're highly distributed. And there's about 300 of us. Right now, I think one important note is that even though we're remote-first, we bring the company together often. And it's really by choice. There's no expectation. But we find that our team members still like that in-person connection. So we have quarterly QBR meetings where we get people together, and a functional team off-sites. We have company parties, which are a lot of fun. So we hear from our team members that they love the remote-first environment but also the opportunity to get together and still connect in person.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Yeah, it's great that you shared that context because I talked to Chief People Officers from all kinds of companies, including some with tens of thousands of employees, some that have people in the office. How would you describe your company culture in just a few words?
Shannon: Yeah, yeah. So we are a values-driven culture. If you were to come here and be within our walls and meet with some of our team, I think one of the things, Kevin, you'd immediately feel is that folks that join Dave really care deeply about our members and the mission and approach our work with a customer-first mindset. We also, you know, the other two things I point to often with our culture, especially when I'm interviewing candidates, and they wonder what it's like to work here. As I say, this is a culture where everyone is helpful. There is no love. There's no "I don't." I don't like it. Just everyone is helpful. You start here, and everyone lends out a helping hand. They want to help you get on board, help you feel part of the company, and we're also really, really transparent. And these are things that I would hear is kind of a differentiator and a bit of a moat for us when I talk to both our long-standing Dave employees who have been here for a while as well as our new hires.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: You may be the first CPO that's used, and I love it, that uses the phrase "moat" like culture as a moat. What are some of the ways you foster or sustain this culture? Any unique rituals or traditions related to your culture?
Shannon: Yeah, so one of the things that I've been most passionate about in my career is culture building. And I'll get back to that moat because really, I like culture and building a really authentic culture that's real and not just values on a poster that you, you know, remember every once in a while when you look at it. Building real authentic culture is a moat because it's hard to replicate. Other companies can try, but it's hard to do it authentically. But you've got to be really deliberate about how you do that. And so there's a few things that I guess I could share that I would point to that, I think, really help us sustain our culture. So one of those is, ever since the company was given to us, we committed to doing all hands weekly, and that hasn't changed as we've grown and scaled the company. We've gone from everyone being in the office to being remote. And so every week, we gather the entire company for an all hands. It's more than just a meeting. It's a really important touchpoint for our team. As I mentioned, this is a team that's really deeply connected to our members and our mission, and each week we kick that off with a member testimonial. So a live video interview with a customer where they tell us how they use their product. And I think, most importantly, they tell us what we should do better, and that could be something we need to build that they want, and we haven't done for them. That could be an experience they had with us that should have been different, and that just really brings you immediately back to why we are here? And we do that every single week. We then, within those meetings, we move on to, this gets to the transparency of our culture. We highlight something in the company that's really important for people to know. It could be work that recently shipped and our learnings, like what went well, what didn't last, or yesterday at our all hands, we shared a deep dive into our most recent engagement survey results and shared again what's working, what's not, what are we committed to doing better. And so I think those are just re- that's just like a really meeting that's emblematic of our culture. Other things that we do, so we have affinity groups and monthly cultural events that I think, as we've expanded the team from this homogeneous LA-based team to being in almost every state across the US. That brings up just different people, different walks of life backgrounds. And so those events bring people together, and I think are emblematic of a value that we have, which is "better together." I know I've said a lot, but one more, if I can slip it in, because this, I think, is one of the most strategic things we've done that supports our culture, is we run the company through a framework called OKRs. So most people in tech use OKRs, so that's Objectives and Key Results. And they use it typically to run the business. But people are part of the business. We exist because of the team we have. And so one of the things I'm proud of is that we have an objective focused solely on our people. And it's about empowering Daves to do their best work. And this is not just an objective that's owned by me or the leadership team, or just the people team. Every department creates action plans against supporting that objective. And then we measure how we're doing that in our biannual engagement surveys. And then we like to re-plan at a department level how we're gonna change those, you know, change what's not working and keep reinforcing what does. And I think it's really become part of our, the way we work here at Dave and intentionally building culture.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Yeah, it is certainly intentional, and it is rare for me to hear about weekly all hands because those are a lot of work, right? 70% of engagement is correlated to the manager, and front-line managers touch more employees than any other leadership group. What are some of the ways you develop your front-line managers?
Shannon: Yeah. So when I joined Dave 3 years ago, at that time, we're between 100 or 150 folks. While I asked a ton of questions in my interview process because I wanted to know what I was walking into, one of the things that I thought was, you know, probably not gonna have great managers. It's a startup. It's probably not something that's been, you know, prioritized, but it was. I feel so lucky because I was so pleasantly surprised. So when I came in today, a few months later, we started implementing the engagement action planning and surveying to get some, you know, again, strategic data on our workforce. And from that first survey to 7 surveys later, one of the dimensions within engagement that consistently scores best in class, 80 to 90% favorable, are all of our questions related to people's experience with their direct manager. And things we hear or see is the majority of the company believes their manager gives them useful feedback on their performance. They feel their manager keeps them informed about what's happening across the company. And this is just so critical because we're in a remote-first environment. And managers are so important in that environment to keep their teams together, motivated, and all of that. And so the thing I'll say there, Kevin is, so while I, when I walked in, we were already doing pretty well. But I'm like, you can maybe get, you'll maybe get this sense there, this interview. I don't like to leave anything to chance. Some people call me a control freak. I call it intentional. And so one of the things when I came in, as I said, let's spend a little bit of time, like defining what great leadership looks like here at Dave because that needs to be the foundation, then, of everything that we build upon, how we train managers, hire, etc. And so we developed, like, in a kind of a groundswell, a set of what we call People Leader Commitments. And there are 5 things that we expect our people leaders to role model or work towards role modeling. And so those are: We expect our leaders to connect to purpose, foster growth, lead through change, prioritize Dave. Wide success, not just what's good for their own organization, and then to communicate with clarity and consistency. And we screen all of our leadership candidates, people leader candidates, against those. If you're being promoted internally into leadership roles, we assess you against those. And you know, things don't always work out. So we make tough decisions when people leaders aren't living up to these commitments. I just think that's so important to get that common, unifying language of what great looks like here at Dave so that people can aspire to and be accountable to. We think this People Leadership I share. I think it's like, I think it's everything in an organization.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: There's a lot I wanna kind of underscore for the listeners there. Great answer.How do you solicit feedback from employees about the culture and their engagement (e.g., engagement or other surveys, town halls, ?)
Shannon: Yeah, that sounds great. So, yeah, I can talk about this for a while. So I'll try to be as succinct as I can. So, like I said, so transparency. The way I'd answer this is, first of all, transparency is one of Dave's core values. Transparency being a core value of a tech company is not innovative. A lot of people have that. It's pretty common. But at Dave, we don't want that to be lip service. We want that as an intentional choice to have that be one of our values, and then to have it be evaluated. One of the ways it has to show up is through back-and-forth feedback channels. And so that's something that we really prioritize, and we've absolutely prioritized it in a virtual-first or remote-first environment. So how we get feedback from employees, there's a few ways I can point to immediately. So one is that biannual engagement survey. The most recent one we did, 95% of employees responded, and that's consistent. We're always in the mid-nineties for a 300-person organization. We had 646 comments. So people are not just putting the numbers in there; they're writing their opinions and thoughts, which is just awesome. And then through that survey, we hear about managers. We also hear about how transformational remote work has been for people's, I mean, actually, their life. I mean, I teared up reading some of the comments, and I kind of, you know, I feel the same way. So that's one way. At the end of all our hands, every week we have an open Q&A. You can submit anonymous questions. You can attribute yourself to those. And then, a couple of years ago, we implemented an always-on anonymous feedback tool. So team members at any time can ask a question or submit feedback, and it goes directly to me. Can I filter them through different leaders? And through this vehicle, we can have a back-and-forth dialogue with someone, even if they want to remain anonymous because our belief is like we want feedback by any means possible because if we don't know what's going on, that is the first step to turning into a road culture. And so we want to just create these different mechanisms so that we kind of know what's going on in the organization and give people those avenues.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Great mechanisms, and what I loved is the way you, like when I asked about employee leader development, you immediately talked about looking at the data, the scores, so we would call them like manager effectiveness scores, you know, for your managers. The fact that you know you're not just doing it once a year, and probably most of the listeners know this, but maybe not all. Like most annual employee experience surveys, a lot of those questions are about the company, you know, compensation benefits, work, work, work from home, whatever that might be, and those are great, but ideally, in the same survey or a separate survey, there's manager effect. My manager does this. My manager does that. So it's really because 70% of engagement is tied back to the manager, and in some ways I think you have an advantage. Smaller companies have an advantage because large companies, these big departments, like every quarter, or certainly every year, there's new programs. What are we gonna train this year? So you've got your values. Then you've got your competency model. Then you've got your commitments. Then you've got your SL2 and your bro coaching, and then you've got whatever. Everyone's confused. And you're saying, look, we're measuring, you know, whether you're an effective manager or not, and we know what the commitments are. I mean, it's a really clear, really clear model, and congratulations on that 95%. I've looked at, you know, I don't know, hundreds of engagement surveys from a hundred companies in decades. And before I look at the actual scores, I go right into that participation. Because if it's, you know, you got a 50-60% participation rate, like, okay, that's a disengaged workforce. They either don't even care enough to take the survey, or they don't trust you that it's confidential. Anything 80 above is good. 90 is unheard of, so I mean, that is incredible that you're maintaining that. So good job on that.
Shannon: No, thank you. I mean, that's, I mean, we share similar thoughts there. It's the number I care the most about, even before I care about actual engagement, because I feel like, in addition to what you said, if folks are taking the time to respond, then one other thing that's happening is they believe there's gonna be a change or something sustained because they did. And so that's my first thing. If, is that, that's what my team is always focused on, like, how do we get in the leadership team? How do we maintain that level of participation? Because that's our first gauge, like, are we doing something right? And then, obviously, we drill into all the data. So yeah, I'm, like, I'm pretty proud of it, too.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Yeah, it's great. Related to culture, are there any special initiatives or results you’re most proud of?
Shannon: I think two things I think they could share. So I had mentioned, we have that very specific people-focused OKR. And so I guess what I could share is one thing to have an OKR, there's another thing to actually deliver against that. And so I'd say the other thing that I'm pretty proud of is that we've really made significant progress since putting that goal in place. Since having that goal in place, engagement is up, company confidence is up, turnover is employee turnover is way down relative to last year. And so what I'm proud of is that it didn't happen by chance or because of one initiative or because the people team got really focused on engagement or reducing turnover or anything like that. It gets back to departments. All the departments, the leadership team committed to taking action aligned with the OKR, just like we do against revenue or driving profitability. And so I'm proud of that. I'd say the second thing is, you know, I've been in a mission-driven organization. One of the challenges as you grow and change or you become a public company from a private company is making sure you keep your mission front and center and you stay honest to it. And so I'm pretty proud that, you know, a company like Dave has been able to build such a strong foundation relative to our mission. That people feel we are authentic to that. They can see how decisions around our products and what we're making are aligned to our mission and what we're trying to do for our customers. So I would say, not an initiative, but something that we just, like, are constantly focused on is like, are we hitting all our company goals and at the same time achieving our mission? Are those mutually supportive of each other? And I think so far we've been able to, like, we've been able to do that, and I'm pretty proud of it.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: That's great, Shannon. What book would you recommend that your colleagues read? (or podcast, video, etc.)
Shannon: So I'm going to out myself, and if I could ever get my family to listen to this when it goes live, they'll appreciate this. So I'm not a big book reader, never have been, but I am a podcast listener, as clouds and podcasts come around. So the one I would say that I listen to most frequently, that I think others can benefit from is, it's a very popular one, it's "How I Built This" with Guy Raz. And so what I like about that is, it's a podcast that interviews founders and talks about their story in building companies. And so what I get from that is, it's a really good reminder that success, whether you're building a business, you're building your career, or whatever you're out to achieve, it's often not linear. And there's going to be setbacks. And so when I listen to it, I can't help but think about the journey I've had here at Dave, which has not been linear, and it's not been without setbacks. And so, you know, I really get the energy for what we're building here at Dave, listening to this, because I realize the challenges that we're facing, they're not unique to me, they're not unique to Dave. And it's really just about cutting out the noise, being focused on what we're trying to do, being a really persistent problem solver, and also cutting myself some slack when things don't go exactly my way. And I just really think these are all valuable lessons, but it's good for me to be reminded of time and time again, or time and again, especially when things could be a little challenging as you're building a company.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Shannon, that, I mean, that's going to be inspirational to so many people and is to me. Just yesterday, I did the LEADx Quarterly Sync meeting, and this was actually a theme because I think, I mean, not just this year, which in the tech industry has been a little challenging, but the last few years, you know, the covid pandemic, work issues, remote issues, etc. And so I think on any given day, we can personally or organizationally feel like, "Oh, we're behind," or "Oh, that didn't work out," or "I could have done a better job of this." But if we can just sort of look at what else is going on and realize this is life, this is work, this is an organization. Like, if we're doing anything worthwhile, we're going to take two steps forward, and then one, or even one and a half, sometimes backwards. It's not a straight line. It's good to just cut ourselves some slack, some grace. Give us some grace.
Let me ask you this question. What's something that you know now as a Chief People Officer that maybe you wish you had known on day one? If you could send a Slack message to a younger version of yourself, what would you say?
Shannon: Yeah, there's a few things. I think the thing that sticks out the most, and I've actually used this to have coaching conversations with others, is I wish earlier in my career I had prioritized developing the kind of crucial cross-functional influencing skills that are so essential to being a Chief People Officer. So to put that... So today, I spend, on average, probably 30% of my time each week coaching my leadership team peers on how to have difficult conversations, how to share tough feedback with each other, how to navigate the business, not just as what's good for marketing or what's good for tech, but what's good for the entire organization? And how can we lead in that way? So influencing difficult decisions, making hard people decisions, communicating with authenticity is something I'd encourage everyone to do, regardless in practice, regardless of what level you're at.
If you're an HR professional coming up through the ranks, you all have peers. Even if they might not be C-suite, but you have functional peers in other areas of the business, and get comfortable providing feedback, building trust, because that can lead to building trusted relationships with them. And again, I had a sense for this, obviously, coming into the role. But I didn't realize just how critical a linchpin this role has to be in being the one that sometimes, when no one else will do it, you have to provide that feedback. You have to get two people to see eye to eye when they don't. You have to coach the CEO to have a difficult conversation, and like, if you don't do it, no one else is going to do it. It doesn't make you a hero. It just means that's like the job. And that's the job of the strategic CPO. So practice it, because you can't read about it and just learn it. You gotta learn through doing.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Yeah, we're doing this interview. I'm chatting with you here in October of 2023. So the New Year's only a couple months away. What's going to be a priority for the people team at Dave.
Shannon: Yeah. You were hinting at a few minutes ago, Kevin. You know all the layoffs, and I think it would like to turn over in the tech industry and all that, and so I guess I'd pivot off of that. So you know, as CPOs folks focus on understanding what's going on in businesses and leadership, we witness so many significant changes in a short period of time. There's the pandemic. We got the remote work revolution. Then everyone resigned. It was like a great resignation. Then companies decided to resign you. So everyone got laid off. And now, most recently, we have this reversal of the remote work. Revolution doesn't work anymore. Now, everyone has to come back to the office. Each of those changes is in that period of time a few years. Honestly, it's a bit head-spinning. For me, what's been really clear through all of that. Where I'm focused, where the leadership team, where my people team is focused is really around, regardless of what's going on in the macro environment. We've got to continue to really understand our workforce. We got to know exactly why they stay with Dave. And what's going to put them at risk for going elsewhere? Because we've built a really good team with some really high caliber team members, and we need to retain them. And so retention is a key priority. It's great. I love that we have really solid managers, because managers are a linchpin to that. We also have a powerful mission. Our mission, I think frankly, is a moat. But it's only a moat. So long as team members continue to believe that we are delivering against our mission for our customers, and that they have a role in that and a part in that. I think there can be an inherent tension sometimes that creeps up between. You're a for-profit public company marching towards profitability. And you know, we need to ensure that this mission remains a top priority. So I'm really focused on ensuring that those two folders are additive to one another that when we win, our customers win and get it and helping everyone see that, and ultimately really focused on retaining, you know, and getting the most of the great folks that we have here at Dave.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Yeah, you bring up that issue, which I think is amazing. What excites you the most about your company right now?
Shannon: Yeah. I've been here for just over 3 years. There's been tremendous highs. I mean, we've had a lot of fun and accomplished a lot. And there's definitely been some lows we've led through. But when I really, when I zoom out, what I'm most excited is, and why I stay is, everything's like up and to the right. I feel like we're more clear than ever on our mission. And specifically how we're gonna get there. We're really putting points on the board, as it relates to our key metrics, business metrics, people metrics. And like I mentioned earlier, I look around, and we've been able to hire and retain a really good team. People that are not only excellent at their roles, but they're deeply committed to the culture that we're building and being a part of that. So, you know, just it all boils down to what excites me is like, I'm just confident. I'm confident in the future of this company and what we're gonna be able to achieve and that's why I stay. That's why I'm having fun.
Kevin Kruse - LEADx: Love it. Chief People Officer at Dave, Shannon Sullivan. Thank you for spending some valuable time on a late Friday afternoon for both of us, and thanks for the fighting, the mission that you're pursuing. Thanks for investing in culture and thanks for sharing some of your wisdom.
Shannon: Yeah, thanks, Kevin. This has been fun.