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The purpose of the IT Leaders Council is to bring together IT Directors and Managers for leadership training, educational content from guest speakers, and peer discussions in a vendor-free, collaborative environment. IT Leaders Councils are currently offered in Indianapolis, IN and Columbus, OH, with more cities coming soon!
00;00;00;00 - 00;00;29;01
Speaker 1
I'm the moon and I am Borg as an enterprise, as a coach at Optum. I am and try to be thankful for this opportunity. Thanks, Doug. And more so because I'll be speaking alongside with the leader who not only walks his dog all the time, but he's also a huge Harry Potter fan like him. It took you like 3 seconds to figure out how to bring my husband and I.
00;00;29;01 - 00;01;04;05
Speaker 1
We often talk about our worlds collide. So for those sinful fans, they know what I'm talking about. For those who don't know what I'm talking about, I can explain to you after this action, because. So, yes, this is me. Please do reach out on LinkedIn. But love your connection. Little about me. I am one of those privileged ones who has two homes about me from India and the United States has been my home since the past 17 and a half years.
00;01;04;07 - 00;01;28;29
Speaker 1
This is my cute little family here. I have a sixth grader. Love the mom life because he's really low maintenance. He supports me more than my husband spoils me. So I am. We had a coffee discussion. I am extremely loyal to my coffee as well. We had that discussion out on the table. I love reading love music. I have no pets.
00;01;28;29 - 00;01;59;11
Speaker 1
One of the most common questions. I get an idea when the slinky stands for. I'm sorry. Yeah. What does that slinky stand for? That's a hint. That's why I'm here. One of the reasons Dr. Agility rain the most. I like this, and you'll know why as we move on. So I'm not really here because I'm an Agile coach.
00;01;59;14 - 00;02;28;23
Speaker 1
I'm here because I have often experienced that. What you say or what you discuss or what you talk about is often forgotten. But the way you can make someone feel, it's something that you can never forget. And maybe share to get you in a different lens. And that bubble, that balloon that Doug mentioned about. So yeah, really, you might maybe a different points.
00;02;28;26 - 00;03;09;29
Speaker 1
And I'm here to make you a little uncomfortable, if I may. And hopefully at the end of this session, you'll walk out with some motivation and some real action items above the two mindsets that we always talk about. One of those diversity and agility. Right. And how do they come together? Well, I invite you to join me with an open mind and feel free to intra discuss, share your thoughts, because that's what I hope to achieve in the next train.
00;03;09;29 - 00;03;42;08
Speaker 1
6 minutes. So the first thing I want to make you uncomfortable about is stuff about privilege, right? There are certain words that just trigger these things within hours, and one of those words I've experienced is privileged. The very the very fact that you share your privileged get up point, you're a woman of color. You get a negative moment, you're a woman, you get a negative point.
00;03;42;11 - 00;04;19;18
Speaker 1
You have insurance, you have a positive point. You know what I'm talking about. And I want you to now just maybe please take a deep breath if you're comfortable and maybe close your eyes. If you're not comfortable and that's fine. Stick a deep breath and think when I say diversity, what happens within you? And there's certain words that cross up in your mind.
00;04;19;20 - 00;04;37;17
Speaker 1
Are the memories good or troubling associated with this word? Does this word generates some kind of feelings within you?
00;04;37;20 - 00;04;45;06
Speaker 1
What kind of emotions does this word stir up within you?
00;04;45;08 - 00;04;52;25
Speaker 1
I'm sure you have to experience those.
00;04;52;27 - 00;05;20;03
Speaker 1
Now, the reason, like I said, I'm sure, is because both of these topics, I'm really passionate about, and when I first entered this world a facility which was completely by accident and the Adult Manifesto came, I came across the Agile Manifesto and the four values, I think, Oh great, I love you now, because the first point on app, it talks about individual interactions and I love people.
00;05;20;03 - 00;06;02;22
Speaker 1
I'm an extrovert, I'm a people person in all this talking and thinking about cultures and everything great, But as in then I started getting more experience, self-awareness, and this journey, I noticed that the reason why I like that was tied to a lot of my personal experiences as a person, as a multidimensional person. In another country. And the deeper I dig into agility, agile transformations, I realized that along with the Agile adoption, there are so many agile challenges.
00;06;02;24 - 00;06;58;03
Speaker 1
And guess what? Almost 50% challenges. Where do they lie? According to the 15th State of Agile report, 43% of Agile challenges is because of culture clash is. And why is this being overlooked? Well, I wouldn't say it's completely overlooked. I'd say, why are we not having much successes in cultural changes as much as we hoped it? Right. So I'm going to help you hand this different balances that look out from outside in introduced you right that volleyball that is that this think about you just you as an individual.
00;06;58;06 - 00;07;30;17
Speaker 1
That's my first lens for you my first question for you and don't think about your teams or your organization or where you fit or your role or your title, just as you. Now, if you see me, when I introduced myself, you saw me as an okay, I'm an advocate, right now. Think about what would happen if you and I were in a conflict.
00;07;30;20 - 00;08;02;29
Speaker 1
What do you see me as? You'll see me as a grown woman. You'll see as a person from India, you'll see as a person who is maybe challenging in that conflict because of my bias. And we can say now, because this happens, this has happened to me before I came on my this awareness journey, our agility during do whatever you've all that.
00;08;03;01 - 00;08;43;18
Speaker 1
No idea how many times in case of conflict. Oh my God me shamanistic person and I, I even though if it feels like it happened like years back, I know what happened. And the reason why I'm sharing is right now, I'm not trying to fade. But when I think about that a little way back when it was justified that she would feel that way because I was in the minority, I still am in a male dominated society, but now I don't let that blindspot or unconscious bias drive my behavior right.
00;08;43;18 - 00;09;19;06
Speaker 1
We all have these blind spots, among them blind for a reason. We we can't see them. We have bled for them. Right? The unconscious bias is it is happens and coach, you see, I don't choose to go against someone consciously when they present a different view, which is I'm so unconscious of that behavior. So one of our challenges I what I noticed is we often talk about this mindset and say, Now I want you to win.
00;09;19;09 - 00;09;45;05
Speaker 1
I talk about this. I want to train to change diversity and agility. Because if you think if you take that to different lenses, it's true for both. We talk about agility mindset, you talk about diversity mindset and we recognize it. How often do we accept that? How often do we embrace that? Oh, she looks different than me. He looks different than me.
00;09;45;13 - 00;10;08;07
Speaker 1
He comes from a different place than I am. He might have something that I might not have experienced in my life. And how often can I do that when I don't agree with that person? You see them as a human being, right? For people who are familiar with psychological safety. That's been my favorite topic ever since I entered the world of fertility.
00;10;08;09 - 00;10;34;07
Speaker 1
And the reason why these are that I hope these are all pieces of puzzles that are starting to come together at the end of 20 some minutes. Because when I started learning more about psychological safety, I think all of you, all of these are the four stages. It starts with intention. And then, you know, as we grew and Gary and Challenger safety, feel free to challenge how many of us have heard leaders say, Oh, I want you to challenge me.
00;10;34;10 - 00;11;00;09
Speaker 1
Oh, don't be afraid of challenging the status quo. You heard that people said that. But there's still a lot of stand of creating that safe environment. The first step is inclusion. If you don't strike me as a human being, if you don't treat me as a person, how I'm going to be able to get through the next two steps and be able to challenge you.
00;11;00;11 - 00;11;32;06
Speaker 1
My personal experience and one of my places I was new joined the company. I had the typical first day interview training. My manager came downstairs, said hello, my goodbyes. I again went back into the room. They break for lunch and I'm standing in that unknown company not knowing what to do. No one came downstairs. I went into my car, into my car in the parking lot, and I made a protein bar and came back.
00;11;32;06 - 00;11;55;20
Speaker 1
Finished the first day of training, I found I was not included. No one cared that I was here at none. I'm better. I'm used to that, unfortunately, more than you would know. Right? So of course I showed up back again the next day. The reason why I showed up is because of this manager, because of who I was in the company in the first place, and the one who hired me.
00;11;55;22 - 00;12;17;14
Speaker 1
And I'm so glad I went there because I happened to casually share with them when they asked, How was your first day? And I'm thinking I had pretty much been curious and they made a big deal out of it. Suddenly everyone's coming in asking me, fearing, visiting. We've been asked to revisit our onboarding checklists or whatever processes. We wanted to be a part of it.
00;12;17;17 - 00;12;50;06
Speaker 1
And I'm thinking to myself, that's why I showed up. Mistakes are going to happen. I've made so many mistakes recognizing fix it when it comes to you know, let's talk about how how diverse, inclusive and agile your team is, right? We all talk about hiring new people. Hiring people are different ideas and everything. Do we create an environment for them to be a team and help them succeed?
00;12;50;09 - 00;13;16;26
Speaker 1
Right. You're in a group of we're in a room having a very sensitive discussion. How many of us have experienced groupthink? Hey, more hands go up than I would like to see. And we all know that that's the fray that happens because we're a mix of people. I'm an extrovert, I would say, before I think and George would want to think before they speak up.
00;13;16;26 - 00;13;44;14
Speaker 1
How often do we recognize that? And it's not just about extrovert and insured, given this particular situation. I may have different experiences back home because of my cultural upbringing. Right? I might give you a different perspective. We talk about polarization and then we talk about innovation. Oh, we are an innovative company. This is an innovative deep go innovate.
00;13;44;16 - 00;14;22;03
Speaker 1
Well, I guess what is the first thing that happens when the team thinks about innovation? What is the first thing that is involved? When we when we think about innovation, it's a risk, right? Innovations doesn't always it seem it could fail when the team we'll say is failing. Who's to say remember the first steps of that psychological safety you you tell people you go in there it doesn't mean they're always going to succeed.
00;14;22;06 - 00;14;58;20
Speaker 1
And research shows actually that stress is directly connected to stress producing muscles. It's true. In fact, no matter how much you're going to tell people what to do, it's not going to create the same effect as when people see that you're doing something saying with kids, right? I often use the example of my turn. I can build them, do this, do that.
00;14;58;20 - 00;15;29;09
Speaker 1
But he's always watching. So if I see something in my actions, John Line and there was an example in see when a security hack was caught by someone, it was a story that floated about, I think a couple of years back and instead of letting that person go, they actually embrace them. And they they were they could not stop talking about how amazing this person did just because he had done good or did he or she.
00;15;29;09 - 00;16;02;25
Speaker 1
I don't remember who did it, but they had the guts to bring it up. Their security flaw This is barely missed. Like, okay, you're going to fix it. And that's the culture that we're trying to build for the team to. And this creates a ripple effect with the organization. We all live in a book, A world. The world is just so volatile and one of my places when I came in as a new as this course, there was an existing coach and I started talking to it, were working with the leadership team and I was supposed to work with the leadership team as well.
00;16;02;25 - 00;16;26;10
Speaker 1
When the contract ended and they started asking me these questions about what is your change management approach going to be? And I started asking them questions about do that. So far, when I started asking them specific questions about what the leadership team had been through and a retrospective building that right, I think of a house. A house is built on a strong foundation.
00;16;26;11 - 00;16;51;00
Speaker 1
I'm not anywhere near a construction business, but I do know that if you don't spend enough time on the foundation of that house, that house is going to come tumbling down very soon. So I started asking, what does this leadership don't do? And did they talk about their personalities and everything? And they said, Oh, this is a fluff to me think is the most to me in a letter coach.
00;16;51;02 - 00;17;17;03
Speaker 1
And and that's why I have so much empathy for the leadership team, because not many people are ready. Do you help them take them on a self awareness journey? Right. So one is at that level, it's hard to challenge them because they don't have time and they have so many people to report. The board of directors and execute is and everything.
00;17;17;05 - 00;17;43;01
Speaker 1
I hear that, I get that. I feel that. But what happens if that foundation is not strong enough, if this is not self-awareness on how they can walk their dogs, that's one. And two is it's on us as their coaches. Not many people are ready to challenge them. We often are, yes, people, especially when we are working with the leadership team.
00;17;43;03 - 00;18;01;06
Speaker 1
They okay, you look, we can do that. But wrap it up in the box of agility and the game. Right. So again, try to try to think about this. When I say agility, replace it with diversity in your mind. When I say diversity, think about agility in your mind because teachers are so close to each other from what I'm seeing.
00;18;01;12 - 00;18;24;25
Speaker 1
And if I'm not given an opportunity to help others see that, they're not going to see that. So very useful. So in coaching and self-awareness actually said this level at the foundational level of any organization, how are you going to be getting interviewed and be asked about the culture? And you'll think, Oh, you're going to be a great culture fit.
00;18;24;27 - 00;18;58;00
Speaker 1
All right, But what does it immediately tell me? Like, okay, I have to fit into the existing culture. So what if I don't fit into that culture? Could any a culture add in addition to that culture fit? Because that tells me that I'm an OC asking questions for things that doesn't sit well with me. We often talk with why, and I think we're doing an amazing job with leadership and upper management.
00;18;58;06 - 00;19;20;01
Speaker 1
They start talking my wife right after we talk about why what needs to be done is the next step. Again, think about diversity and generally do okay. We want to be an agile organization. What are we going to do? We want to increase diversity. What are we going to do? How often do we stick to how? How are we going to do that?
00;19;20;01 - 00;19;51;05
Speaker 1
Well, just hiring people with who look different than you is not going to do it. Just hiring added coaches. It's not going to do it. And leadership and upper management often are unable to see or comprehend the cost that is associated with this. Ms. I read recently enough this is research as as current as September 2020 do goes on.
00;19;51;05 - 00;20;27;12
Speaker 1
How much money is spent globally in today's efforts. So that number one guess it's a huge hint but three numbers even and 10 billion. Anything else? Any other guesses? I'm sorry, I would say it was four more, 19 billion. B with a billion with a B. So if everyone is spending $19 billion and agility numbers are even higher.
00;20;27;14 - 00;20;59;09
Speaker 1
Right. Anyone care to look at that? Because we all know how it's the new insane, right? If $19 billion are spent into the Air Force, my question is why is it not working here doing what I have seen is it's not working because it's their checkboxes agility. Agile transformation is a checkbox diversity. I hired someone who looks different and comes from a different place than me.
00;20;59;13 - 00;21;29;20
Speaker 1
Check how many people are in divorce, in leadership and top level of your organizations. If you don't know that, I encourage you to look into it and find out for yourself. And then how has that made a difference other than those town halls or those talks or those unconscious bias trainings? Research also shows, by the way, that those trainings don't state the maximum, Diane, that the training, unconscious bias training stinks.
00;21;29;27 - 00;21;52;22
Speaker 1
Is he probably 4 to 6 weeks and then people go into that comfort zone back again? Yes, because of that conflict that I talked about when we first started. Remember, it is basic human nature that when you're put in a situation that is uncomfortable, you go back to your comfort level. That is what stress does to your brain.
00;21;52;25 - 00;22;18;27
Speaker 1
And that is exactly what happens in conflict. That training just goes out of the window and that's okay. That's not the people. So that's not what I'm trying to do here. I'm just saying that why can't we try to put in war torn in more effort and be more deliberate and be more intentional about why these things aren't working?
00;22;18;27 - 00;22;42;18
Speaker 1
Two is, okay, how can we fix it and then just do something about it rather than hiding more gorgeous. I, i i so we can didn't work okay with it. Go get down on the coach or we adopt another framework. You see now how I feel like I hope you're beginning to see what I'm seeing now on how they are Two peas in a pod.
00;22;42;20 - 00;23;06;20
Speaker 1
So my, my son Paleo last year we were talking about, well, maybe earlier this year we were having some conversations about people, right? I try not to be that coach for him, my gosh. But he's just such a curious brain. I love his questions. I love answering these questions. And we started talking about one of their teachers who people don't like is French.
00;23;06;20 - 00;23;31;29
Speaker 1
Or you say, Mommy, but I do like her. And then we started. I have no idea how we got to this discussion where he says, But mommy, everyone carries a backpack. Good are both things, I guess. But he didn't just write it down and then actually wrote it down in codes. So that it maybe because I can remind him and maybe three or five years or six years when he needs to feel that that this is who you are.
00;23;31;29 - 00;24;05;19
Speaker 1
Don't change, buddy. So my humble request to you is if there is nothing else that you can take away from this. You know how often we we attend all these talks and all these sessions and that's just on phrasing. It's great. But we have time and you have some papers and or you have your cell phones. Let's take about 30 seconds and write down some tangible next steps for each of those three dimensions.
00;24;05;21 - 00;24;42;00
Speaker 1
But we talked about what are you going to do about your own mindset? What are you going to do when you go back to your teams or when you have a team? And three, what does your contribution going to be towards the missions shift in your organization's? I invite you to write down some tangible steps so that when you look back in maybe three months, like who you are today and you look at yourself in three months, you visualize yourself, What am I going to do in three months on a Tuesday morning?
00;24;42;03 - 00;25;10;27
Speaker 1
And you see that, Oh, yeah, This isn't one of those sessions where I thought it was great, hopefully. But you know, in three months, this is one thing that I did what she asked us to do. I see several of you have started reading. I thank you for that. Let's state police think it's more I think many. Thank you so much for doing that.
00;25;11;00 - 00;25;33;25
Speaker 1
The other thing that I always tell my child, but team is willing to listen, right? He's leaving so a lot of my dunks is on him. Oh, he he's amazing because when I tell him things, he actually ask a question. And one of the things I told him the other day is, why do you upgrade your iPad? You'll have a new version that is comes out, right?
00;25;33;27 - 00;26;06;17
Speaker 1
You update your iPad, I update my cell phone. For the most part, iOS people should not be uncomfortable. And they are. I know I was when I got all these awareness around my own blind spots and it's just so terribly uncomfortable recognizing them one and then accepting and then doing something about that. And just like we upgrade our our devices time and again, we need to update our mindset and our behaviors.
00;26;06;19 - 00;26;34;28
Speaker 1
And it's okay to do that maybe just by yourself or maybe take a call or find a sounding board or find a mentor or a coach or whatever works with you. A lot of family members, but please pray, please, if there's just one thing you have to pick and choose from. This session is agility and diversity, not be a check box for you and for people around you.
00;26;35;01 - 00;26;41;14
Speaker 1
Thank you so much for being here. Thanks.