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Exploring how humans connect and get stuff done together, with Dan Hammond and Pia Lee from Squadify.
We need groups of humans to help navigate the world of opportunities and challenges, but we don't always work together effectively. This podcast tackles questions such as "What makes a rockstar team?" "How can we work from anywhere?" "What part does connection play in today's world?"
You'll also hear the thoughts and views of those who are running and leading teams across the world.
[00:00:00] Dan: Did you know that 82% of managers have no training at all on becoming a manager? That's a surprising number, but it shows in our teams and organizations, right? How can managers be expected to develop their own teams when they haven't had the development themselves? And if they could imagine the impact it would have on employees, teams, and organizations.
[00:00:21] Dan: Our guest today has cracked the code. Jen Dsky is founder and CEO of Rising team, and they offer software guided interactive learning sessions for managers to deliver to their teams, and it really works. Hello and welcome back to We Not Me, the podcast where we explore how humans connect to get stuff done together. I'm Dan Hammond.
[00:00:45] Pia: And I am Pia Lee.
[00:00:46] Dan: And in this episode, Pia, we're doing a little bit of a, a nice, return to our trip to the States in, in, uh, in, in, in October. And, um, a wonderful meeting we had in Palo Alto. I felt we were very Silicon Valley then, weren't we? Meetings in the cafe and in Palo Alto, everyone's got their MacBook Pros out with stickers on them. And you, you know, all the badges of honor
[00:01:10] Pia: And having earnest conversations.
[00:01:12] Dan: Exactly, exactly. Um, while self-driving taxis, uh, drive past, But yeah, we met, um, Jennifer Dulski, who's our guest today, uh, c founder and CEO of Rising Team. And it was just such a refreshing conversation, wasn't it? I have such, uh, fond memories of that.
[00:01:30] Pia: I do too. I felt, I felt like we have, um, searched the planet to find. An organization that has this very similar purpose to what we're trying to achieve in that, that that whole democratizing and scaling of teaming and leadership, uh, and across the many, and, um, we found a sole absolutely aligned with us in, in terms of, of Jennifer Dsky.
[00:01:56] Pia: And, um, and Jen's got such a, a depth and breadth of experience that. We just felt we have to get her on. We are not me because there's, we're at different ends in the, in a, if you like, the assessment and the development of managers and their teams we we're, we're at, we're at differing ends of that. So this is a, this is a conversation that kind of links it all together and taps into her experiences and thoughts. So let's get over that.
[00:02:28] Pia: And a really warm wElcome to the CEO of Rising Team, Jennifer Dsky.
[00:02:33] Jennifer: Thank you for having me. It's great to be here.
[00:02:36] Pia: Oh, it's fantastic. And we met in person in Palo Alto. We tracked you down, hunted
[00:02:41] Jennifer: You did. I can't believe you came that far.
[00:02:44] Pia: We were just, just passing, you know, from, from Yorkshire and, and, and Australia. We were just passing by Palo Alto. Um, but yeah, we had a fantastic conversation when we met. We've got an awful lot in common in terms of our.
[00:02:56] Pia: Our passions and, uh, and our experience and expertise. So this is gonna be, um, a really rich conversation where we sort of really understand from your perspective, the challenges, the opportunities for managers and their teams, and particularly today when things are quite tough. But before we launch into that, it is standard practice for you to answer the conversation starter card, which Dan has shuffled,
[00:03:24] Dan: I think our listener doesn't, probably, doesn't trust what goes on behind the scenes here, but I've literally cut the, uh, that, well, that's from years of experience. It's the ins it is the, it's the lack of trust with no, no evidence that I don't like. Um, but, um, so the best film ever made, Jen, is the question,
[00:03:42] Jennifer: I love films. I will tell you, my family will say that I cry in every movie I watch. I am one of these people who gets so into movies that I like. I have embarrassingly. I'm that person who like claps when they do a performance in a movie because I just am so deeply involved
[00:04:02] Jennifer: in the movie. Exactly. Um, I don't have a greatest film ever made because I love too many movies, but I will say that I am a huge fan of the Top Gun movie franchise. I saw the first one as a teenager too many times to count. And then the second one is actually, I think a great film and I wrote a piece about it called, I think Six Leadership Lessons We Can All Learn From Maverick. And it got picked up by the Financial Times actually.
[00:04:32] Jennifer: So it was a lot of people actually agreed with me. There were great leadership lessons in that movie.
[00:04:38] Pia: I, Yeah.
[00:04:38] Pia: I watch both.
[00:04:39] Dan: they managed to pull off a sequel, didn't they? That which was impressive. They,
[00:04:44] Jennifer: The sequel was, great and it came 30 years later, which is very atypical for a sequel, as you know. So
[00:04:50] Pia: Yeah. Yeah. And he still did most of the stunts himself and, um,
[00:04:54] Pia: and, and managed to, yeah, carry it off.
[00:04:57] Jennifer: Which is yes, and we won't say anything about his age, but it is even more impressive. And I often cite this movie actually because it's so relevant in our work, because I don't know for those listeners who have or haven't seen it, there is, you know, they are working on this very intense mission and.
[00:05:15] Jennifer: One day he takes the whole group to the beach to play, you know, some version of flag football. And the admiral comes to the beach, very angry at him and says, what are we doing here? Playing games? We have this critical mission. And Tom Cruise turns to him and says, you told me to create a team, sir. And the truth is that we all have to be intentional about how we think about creating high performing teams and just focusing on our goals. 24 7 doesn't actually do that.
[00:05:44] Dan: Great, great setup and I'm, I can see you clapping as he says that line Jennifer as
[00:05:50] Jennifer: Oh, I have, I have waved back to people in the movies. It's, it's really embarrassing. Especially for my children who find it extra
[00:05:58] Pia: I know that it it doesn't go well with teenagers when you whoop whoop at something in a, in a, in a public space.
[00:06:04] Dan: Um, so Jen, that is a, that's a lovely insight into you and I'm tempted to sort of segue into our main conversation, but we're gonna just hold off for a second and just, uh, ask you to give us a little bio of, uh, Jen Dsky. How, how did you get to this point today?
[00:06:18] Jennifer: Sure. It's actually a fairly circuitous route, I will say, because I started my career as a secondary school teacher and I started a nonprofit to help. Students become the first in their families to go to university. And so it was a pretty atypical start to a what then became a long career in tech. Um, basically my whole career has been in search of creating impact at scale.
[00:06:43] Jennifer: And so I started at, at a high impact career point, and it just, it wasn't quite the scale I was hoping for. You know, I thought, well, we could raise twice the money and we could serve maybe just a little bit more than twice the. People. And so I, I left that role looking for a way to scale more exponentially, and that's what brought me into tech.
[00:07:04] Jennifer: I will say that I, um, I handed off that program to someone else and in 2024 it had, the program had its 30th anniversary, so it's been running for 30 years. It didn't take me to run it for 30 years, but thousands of students have gone to college through that program, which is something I'm actually quite proud of.
[00:07:23] Jennifer: And it's funny because. During the, so I ran this program in the summers and during the school year I taught high school. And I, one of the classes I taught was ninth grade co-ed sex ed, which is, you know, as I say, like if you would like to get comfortable with public speaking, like when you pull a card out of a stack, and I don't know the.
[00:07:41] Jennifer: Question. There is no way that that is worse
[00:07:44] Jennifer: than anonymous question box day of sex ed. So no question you could have asked me, would've been tougher than the questions I've had. Um, this, the short version of the rest of my career is I, I spent the next 25, 30 years working in tech at, at both many of the big tech companies.
[00:08:02] Jennifer: So. 10 years at Yahoo and several years each at Google and Meta and in between there I spent five years, um, helping to lead and scale change.org around the world. And I am now on my second startup that I've, uh, where I've been a founder. And so I've done lots of big things and smaller things and scaling things, uh, quite a range over the years.
[00:08:25] Pia: And I, I too had a, started my. My career back as a teacher. and the other thing that I'm, that I think about that is the fear that I had about some of those I taught high school kids and some of the stress of teaching those 14, 15 year olds that would go rogue. And I did that stand in teaching, you know, where you go into a school and they ring you up and the teacher's sick and you take over and literally you are counting the, the minutes They had to lock us in the classroom in some of the schools because they were so rough, the kids would try and get out, so you were locked in there with them, which was always an interesting experience.
[00:09:04] Jennifer: It is interesting because I've kind of come full circle now. I, you know, I started my career teaching and now in addition to Rising Team, I teach at the business school at Stanford. And it's really, I love being back in the classroom and spending time with students and those students, unlike the high school students, we, we had, um. They are, they create anxiety in a different way, which is that their expectations of me are extremely high. So I sometimes, my, especially my first few years, I would have crazy nightmares before class that I forgot to prepare or all the students walked out or fell asleep or something and took me four years to, to stop having nightmares about it.
[00:09:41] Pia: there's quite a bit of imposter syndrome, isn't there? There's, my gosh, I've really, how am I gonna be able to, to, to meet that demand? so talk to us about Rising Team this. So your latest. Organization that you've set up. Startup. So tell us what the, the mission and the purpose is and then and, and then tell us what you're finding out on that journey.
[00:10:01] Jennifer: Rising Team to me feels like the company I've been meant to build my whole career. So I've done a lot of things and all of them really have been leading up to this point. And as is the case with many founders, I essentially built the product I wish I had had that I didn't feel like I had as a leader of teams.
[00:10:20] Jennifer: So if I think about it, you know, I was always that. Person who loved going to trainings or reading books on leadership. I ha was lucky to have a few executive coaches and I would soak that stuff up and then I would go back to my team and I say it was kind of like being taught to fish and then having to go back to the lake with the binder on how to fish instead of a fishing pole.
[00:10:41] Jennifer: It was just very hard for me to translate the things I had learned back to my team on a day-to-day basis. And so. Over the years, I started building these tools, things like a user manual or a motivator's pie chart to really try to understand my team better, and I could see them working and I could see them starting to spread within my organization, but I still really couldn't scale it.
[00:11:04] Jennifer: And so Rising Team is meant to help leaders at all levels. Build insights and deeper connection with their teams at scale. So it takes all the concepts that we know, drive high performing teams and great leaderships, and we break them down into what we call kits that are software driven team sessions that leaders run with their teams synchronously, and they learn about each other.
[00:11:32] Jennifer: They learn new skills, they build connection. And as it turns out. It's highly effective. So that is the, the most, um, fulfilling part of what we do. When you asked Pia about our, um, mission and vision, we imagine a workplace where everyone in the workforce feels deeply understood, supported, and empowered to reach their goals.
[00:11:54] Jennifer: And the truth is that that cannot happen. Without managers being equipped to help them deliver that. So our mission is to equip every manager on earth to build more connected, engaged, and successful teams. And what we've been able to see so far, we're using something I now call the impact pyramid. we, because one of the things we wanted to make sure of is, okay, we know we everybody can run these sessions and that people enjoy them because they say, you know, at the end that they really liked it, but is it actually driving any of the things we care about?
[00:12:29] Jennifer: And so we have this impact pyramid we look at, at the bottom layer. It's kind of like Maslow's hierarchy. The bottom layer is psychological safety. So. People, um, just like in society in general, you want people to feel safe and feel trust in their teams. The second layer is connection. So do they feel connected to each other as a group?
[00:12:50] Jennifer: The third layer is engagement. So do they report back that they are engaged, that they recommend their company, that they feel appreciated? You know, all the things that engagement surveys measure. Fourth layer we put on is retention. So do they actually stay longer at their companies? And the top of the pyramid is team effectiveness.
[00:13:11] Jennifer: And I know that this is an area, all of these are areas of passion for you too. We now have data to prove, without a doubt that we're moving the first four layers of that pyramid. And so as we head into 2025, the real question we're asking is how do we measure effectiveness? Because I know we can move psych safety and connection engagement, and now this year we got data, we move retention. But how every team measures effectiveness is a little bit different. So we can
[00:13:37] Jennifer: talk more about that if
[00:13:38] Dan: Yeah, it's an interesting, we could dive into that. So, um, Jen, just paint a picture. Could you, if I'm a team leader, what, what experience am I going through and what is my team going through?
[00:13:48] Jennifer: So the core of the product is something we call development kits. We started with all the drivers of high performing teams like psychological safety or appreciation or clear expectations. And a development kit usually takes somewhere between an hour and two hours and the leader will do a little bit of preparation, which means.
[00:14:09] Jennifer: Reading a couple articles or watching a quick video so they understand how to facilitate the session, and then they click go and the team joins for the session. It's synchronous and it can be done either in person or virtually. And from there, the software guides them on how to facilitate. So we all know if you hire an outside facilitator, they do pretty much the same things.
[00:14:32] Jennifer: They start with learning goals. They cover some ground rules, they have an icebreaker, a warmup of some kind, and the software essentially guides the team lead to do that. So they do exactly that. They. Talk about what they're gonna learn. They have a warmup, they do an activity and they're learning about each other and learning new skills the whole time.
[00:14:52] Jennifer: And then at the end, all that data, 'cause this was my other problem as a manager, is even when I would, you know, hack together these kind of sessions and do them with my teams, they would tell me all these things. Like two days later, I would forget everything they said, which, you know, it was still good that I talked to them about it, but it was bad 'cause I couldn't remember it.
[00:15:13] Jennifer: So now, because it's all software based, all of that content goes also into an AI coach that has perfect memory, which I definitely do not. And so it remembers everything my team ever told it. And then I can go ask it questions like. How do I give constructive feedback to Susan on X, Y, Z, or how can I appreciate Jeff for the great job he did on such and such, and it knows everything about Jeff and it will make custom suggestions to me about Jeff.
[00:15:39] Jennifer: So that's the, the core product. We have other types of kits that are for different purposes. Some are more just based on getting to know each other as humans, so not work insights, but things like life experiences that shaped you. And then we have much shorter kits we call minis, um, 10 to 15 minutes long.
[00:15:58] Jennifer: They're designed for either just to use in your ongoing meetings and actually. Specifically, we designed them for frontline and hourly workers because if you work in a bank branch or a retail store or restaurant, you know, you don't have 90 minutes to sit down with your team and probably you don't have a laptop.
[00:16:17] Jennifer: So they're mobile based and they can be done at starter end of day huddles and still help those teams feel valued and connected.
[00:16:24] Pia: What do you see for, and I guess that would be people maybe listening to this. I, I'm sure there's a, there's a thought track that goes through their brain going, gosh, that sounds amazing, but I'm really busy. cause, and sometimes that might actually be the, you know, lack of confidence or knowing how to do it or fearing, looking a bit silly in front of your, your own team or not doing it perfectly, you know, all these reasons, and then the busyness just takes over. So how do you see that and how, how, how do you try and overcome that,
[00:16:56] Jennifer: Yeah. Well, you just named perfectly all the objections we get from people. Number one is, I'm too busy.
[00:17:03] Pia: we're in the same business.
[00:17:04] Jennifer: Yeah, so you know the objections. I'm too busy as number one. I am, you know, my team will think it's cheesy or too touchy feely. They won't like it. I've never done this before. All of all of those are obje reasonable objections.
[00:17:17] Jennifer: And you know, I, I say there's really two big mistakes I see managers make for the most part. One classic mistake is everyone's just like me. And this, honestly, I made this mistake so often earlier in my career. It's actually why I created the first version of this tool because I had a woman on my team and she came up to me one day and she said, you know, if I ever do a good job, I.
[00:17:41] Jennifer: Please just pay me more money. Like I don't care at all about being thanked or public recognition of any kind. I would just like a spot bonus or something else. And at first I was so taken aback by that 'cause I just thought it was kind of crass that she asked me for more money. And then I slept on it and I was like, oh God, if she hadn't told me, I would never have known and I would've just rewarded her the exact way I want to be rewarded.
[00:18:07] Jennifer: Which by the way is not cash. It's like a very nice, handwritten thank you note is my preferred, you know, version of appreciation and. It was so eyeopening for me, and I just realized that it's all over. So in Rising Team, we ask people their preferences. We started with a user manual, which is things like, what hours of the day do you like to work, and when is it okay to interrupt you and so forth.
[00:18:29] Jennifer: And people are widely different. And then we went to appreciation and it turns out they're really different. And then it just surprised me. Every kit we do where we ask about insights like. We have a kit on unconscious listening, and it turns out people differ in the way they want to be listened to. Some people really want you to make lots of eye contact.
[00:18:47] Jennifer: Other people don't want you to look at them at all, and right. Exactly. And you know, we have one on prioritization that's about to come out and, you know, some people love a deadline and thrive on a deadline and some people hate a deadline. And so it is, um, just fascinating and that's one way that we help managers.
[00:19:07] Jennifer: So, so that the managers who have this objection of like, will my team like it, the, the number one thing we say is like. the key here is just understand your team. Just take a tiny bit of time to understand them because there's a fatal flaw in that you're actually assuming they won't like it, maybe because you're worried you won't like it or something.
[00:19:24] Jennifer: And the first thing is like, just try it. And the very first time they try it, it goes extremely well. Like, you know, we have this in use in tens of thousands of teams and. The average top two box score or average likely to recommend score is like nine out of 10. So as soon as they do it, the team loves it and they get very, very positive feedback.
[00:19:44] Jennifer: So classic mistake number one, everyone's just like me. Classic mistake number two is I don't have time. Just in general, this goes back to the Maverick point we made before is most leaders say you don't, I don't have time for connection or team building of any kind because I'm a hundred percent focused on my goals.
[00:20:01] Jennifer: But what they forget is that people are much more effective at delivering on their goals if they feel valued, appreciated, trusted, and connected to their team. And so we have broken it down and all the data I talked about, which shows we move engagement, retention, et cetera, we move it in three hours a quarter.
[00:20:21] Jennifer: That's the only amount of time we ask people to spend is three hours a quarter. It's less, way less than 1% of your time. So what I say to them when they say I'm busy is. Are you telling your team that you don't have sub 1% of your time to listen to them, understand them, et cetera? Because if the answer is no, you don't, then it's no surprise that they don't feel valued by you as a leader.
[00:20:46] Pia: A a hundred percent. And I, I, I'm, I'm interested that we use busyness sometimes as, as an excuse. And we're, and we're sometimes addicted to it, to, to, to deliver. 'cause then it means we don't have to do something that we feel maybe a little uncomfortable about or it's different or, The manager has to demonstrate a leadership capability in the team, and that sometimes is a big step. You know, that's, it's okay to do the sort of run of the mill stuff, but, but I think what you're asking here is to take a step to lead their team, to, to connect them, to develop them, to facilitate an outcome. And that's sometimes a big step.
[00:21:26] Jennifer: Yeah, I agree with you completely here, Pia. I think the, um. You know, so many times we put people in management and leadership positions without any real support about what it takes to lead a team. And I always say that in my mind the best managers are a lot like the best sports coaches.
[00:21:46] Jennifer: They really great ones. They do. I, what I call the four Cs, they clarify, which is create a sense of purpose. Where we're going the what does winning look like, what's your role in it? They coach, meaning they understand the talents of each unique person on the team. They help them leverage those talents and grow over time. They connect, meaning you make people feel like part of a team and they do it consistently. So the thing is, you can't just, it's not a one and done. You have to do it on an ongoing basis.
[00:22:16] Jennifer: The truth is that not everyone either has that capability or wants to do it, and that is okay. So when people ask me about, you know, what we do at Rising Team, I say we will turn good managers into amazing ones and pretty good ones, into really good ones, and then we will help people who are not meant to be managers understand that they're not meant to be a manager because.
[00:22:41] Jennifer: This is what it takes. If you want to be great and have a really high performing team, you have to take time. Aside from 24 7, focus on your goals to a real sense of leadership and understanding of your team. And if you don't want to do it, it's okay.
[00:22:56] Pia: I think that's a relief for some people because I think that, you know, you get promoted into managerial positions, and sometimes it's based on your track record of what you achieved as an individual contributor, and then, then you're given all these onerous, onerous tasks. Do you think it's also changed post covid and, and the working world do, do you think there's different pressures for leaders and managers now?
[00:23:20] Jennifer: Yeah, it's so interesting. So I started Rising Team in February of 2020, not knowing that there was about to be a massive global pandemic. And I would say the workplace has just changed so dramatically since then. Because we have now 75% of all tele workable jobs are hybrid, at least if not fully remote.
[00:23:41] Jennifer: So managers are dealing. With far more, you know, employees that they don't see every day, whether they're just distributed in different locations or not coming in the office all the time. The economy is really d difficult and has, you know, the vast majority of companies have done. One, if not multiple rounds of layoffs, which means that often that middle layer ends up getting cut.
[00:24:03] Jennifer: So the managers have way more scope than ever before. We have, um, gen Z also entering the workforce. So, you know, I have two Gen Z daughters and I love them dearly, and I know that the expectations they have for feeling valued and connected in the workplace are different. So now managers are having to manage these very multi-generational teams.
[00:24:25] Jennifer: And then we have ai. And you know, four years ago we did not have gen AI that every manager now has to deal with understanding, is it going to take my job? How do I have to learn it? Why do I have to integrate it? And so they are more overwhelmed than ever. I think Gartner has a stat that says 75% of managers report being massively overwhelmed at work and, and, yet they're expected to do more as well.
[00:24:49] Dan: it, it just seemed it is a huge leap for a lot of managers to not just go from leadership, but to actually doing the development of their, I mean, if you, if you are interested in leadership as we are and we spent, you know, that's just part of it. But talking to, you know, using the leadership pipeline idea that when you're a leader of leaders, a manager of managers, that's your job is to develop leaders and it's sort of. That's crazy, crazy talk, isn't it? So I'm, I'm imagining you must hit a lot of, a lot of, um, a lot of challenges along the way in in that, if you think about the sort of toughest cases, can you think of one that you are most proud of where you've seen someone really blossom into this from someone who didn't feel they were really in a leadership position to actually really loving that? Just if, do you have a story in mind that inspires you?
[00:25:37] Jennifer: I mean, I, I have a lot of these. I think in general I tend to see potential in people that they don't always see themselves. So I've seen lots of people, um, develop from. You know, individual contributor to manager, to leader of leaders. I think about, you know, when we built this product, the goal was to say, could we just put in every leader's hands the tools to make this easier?
[00:26:03] Jennifer: Because as we said, like it comes naturally for some people. And that was me. I also, like one of our, um, customers is this amazing woman who runs a content engineering group at Yahoo. And she. She was doing this anyway, she was making book clubs for her team and doing all of these things, you know, spending a lot of her time on it.
[00:26:24] Jennifer: And when she got Rising Team, she just said, oh my God, it's like a huge weight off my shoulders. Because she was doing it anyway. And now she just spends, you know, a tiny percentage of the time she used to. And also she didn't have anything to pass down to the layer of managers underneath her. So now she can very easily roll it down across her team instead of just do it with her layer of direct reports. So that's a one example.
[00:26:50] Jennifer: The other is sort of at the opposite end of the spectrum. So sometimes you know this question of like, can every manager really do it? I truly believe the answer is yes, as long as you want to and you try.
[00:27:01] Jennifer: The answer is yes and. You know, we test every kit before we launch it. So before we ever give it to customers, we live test with real teams and we observe them doing it to make sure it works okay, and they don't get stuck and everything's clear. And sometimes I will observe people who just don't. Do things the way we intend.
[00:27:22] Jennifer: They don't really follow our instructions. So as an example, you know, a technical leader who, even though we say keep cameras on, they'll keep their cameras off the whole time. And even though we say read this section aloud, they'll just read it in silence to themselves. And I get to the end of those sessions and I think, oh my God, they must have hated that.
[00:27:41] Jennifer: Like that went awful. And then we ask them, what did you think of that? And they say things like. I can't wait to do this again. We never have conversations like this, and so it's just been so surprising to me that it doesn't really matter. It doesn't really matter if you're perfect at it. It just matters that you try basically.
[00:28:00] Dan: It's quite interesting that, and, and developing a product as we do, it's fascinating to see how people use your product. And, you know, I'm, I'm, I've become really interested in these desire paths. You know, when there's, when you see um, grasp being has been worn away by people walking across the grass where it wasn't planned, you think, well, that's where they want to go.
[00:28:21] Dan: I think some cultures call them elephant paths 'cause that's the way they'll go. But you know, that's what you have in product. As well, isn't it? People make their own way and, and, and enjoy it in their own way. And you know, when you, when you've designed a product, you think, no, you're doing that wrong. But actually they're just finding their own way to to own it.
[00:28:37] Dan: Yeah. It's fascinating.
[00:28:38] Jennifer: Yeah, the, um, Nick Christophe wrote this great book called A Path Appears for that exact
[00:28:44] Jennifer: reason, and I, Yeah. I love that concept and it is true. You know, we started with, um, the core idea that we could develop a kit that people could follow, but everything we've done since then has come from things customers wanted or needed, or ways they were using it that we hadn't thought of.
[00:29:02] Jennifer: So yeah, I absolutely believe those things do appear.
[00:29:05] Pia: And there is, there's like shifting sands. I think as you know, probably in both of our businesses we've, we we're, we are growing businesses in probably the most dynamic time. In the working environment, not, not only from a macro level or an economic level or a geopolitical level, but also from an understanding ourselves.
[00:29:25] Pia: I mean, we, you know, neurodiversity didn't feature as an understanding of inclusion and, and so, you know, to your, we, we now understand people are more, much more open about it and then it's, rather than thinking, gosh, this isn't working very well, it's just that's the interpretation and the way that. That they see information and that They process it. it's much more colorful. It's much more interesting because you've got that diversity.
[00:29:50] Jennifer: It does really change the way I, I agree that we build things like when we first built our product, the idea was everything was synchronous. So nothing should be, other than the training for the leader, nothing should be done ahead of time. Because our, our belief was people will write and say different things in the moment, then they would do if they did it ahead of time.
[00:30:11] Jennifer: So if a leader says something vulnerable, the team is more likely to share something vulnerable. We actually had to change that. Because when we watched actual customers use it, and when we got feedback from our customers, there were a lot of people who were neurodivergent or who didn't speak. You know, this is a first language and they just needed more time.
[00:30:30] Jennifer: So we changed it so everybody could do the ex activities ahead of time if they want to or need to. And that's a good example of something that probably wouldn't have happened 10 years ago because we weren't paying attention to everybody's needs.
[00:30:43] Pia: Yeah. We had a similar thing that, you know, I think many reports historically have a big reveal and there's something in it, sort of like, you know, you're taking the tablecloth off the, off the food to, to sort of show what's there. And, and actually we have a similar thing. We share the report. Of the debrief intentionally so that everyone has time because it should, it is, it's pretty self-evident how to understand the data, but it's also the interpretation.
[00:31:12] Pia: It might happen on a dog walk or in the shower or in a, that's, that's where you need, need to give people time to be able to do that. And I think that's, otherwise it's you, you don't have time to own your own data. You don't have time to own the, your own process. You're just, which defeats the whole point. Because I think what we're both trying to do is actually give that autonomy into the hands of the, of the leader in the
[00:31:35] Jennifer: Exactly. It doesn't matter how we interpret it. I love that you give the data out ahead of time because yes, people might find interpretations that you didn't even see, and that is the very premise of everything we do is just like I said, I should never assume that everyone will see it like I do. The whole point is give it into the hands of the people so they can say what they believe and and what makes sense for them.
[00:31:59] Dan: it's really inspiring what you've done, Jen. Now, I, I, I, as I say, I feel like you've managed to sort of leap over a huge chasm to get leaders to actually, um, to actually do that development piece. And, and I can see that everything else will fall, fall outta that include right up to team effectiveness.
[00:32:17] Dan: Absolutely. So if someone wanted to get started. Uh, in someone's listening to this and they're thinking, okay, I'd like to do that with my team. What, um, what would you recommend they do as a baby step? What's a, what's a good way to dip a toe in the water?
[00:32:30] Jennifer: Well, I would say the, the dipping, the toe in the water is. Finding out more about your team. So you might, you know, again, people are welcome to use Rising Team and they can find out more on our website. But if they, if you wanna start on your own, try creating something I call a user manual. And many people may have done this before, but the, the concept is if you were an appliance, how would you operate?
[00:32:52] Jennifer: Like what should I know about how you operate at work? And there are, um. And in fact, at the top of our website, there's a free guide called Psychological Safety Blueprint, which has an outline of a user manual in it if they want. It's free. the idea is you ask questions like, you know, basic ones, like what times of day do you prefer to do deep thinking work versus meetings.
[00:33:14] Jennifer: Um, and then some questions that are a little bit deeper. Like I have one that says, how do you prefer to receive constructive feedback? And there are three choices. One that says. Straight on. One that says directly with context and a third that says with some encouragement. And it would surprise you how people divide themselves in those three buckets.
[00:33:36] Jennifer: And they're really different. You don't wanna be encouraging the person who just wants their feedback straight on, but the person who wants encouragement, you don't wanna give it to them straight on. You wanna be a little bit. Warm about your belief and their potential and so forth so that, you know, set, creating a set of questions and asking your team them would be a good place to start. And then if they wanna learn more about how to go deeper than find us@risingteam.com.
[00:34:02] Pia: I mean that, that shows you, just how we are also different as humans and I think it's fantastic to have that, um, have that. That range. Um, the, one of the last questions I wanted to ask you was, and maybe this, there will be some listeners who are CEOs and execs and business leaders themselves.
[00:34:22] Pia: Do you find that their experience of the workplace and their understanding of what their managers need today in the workplace. Are they slightly dislocated from it or are they experiencing the same thing? Because ultimately, the leader of the organizations responsible for creating those conditions that enable their people to thrive.
[00:34:45] Jennifer: Yeah, it really depends on the leader. So I am sure there is a range of leaders here, some of whom are still very connected to their frontline teams and some. Some who are less. So the, you know, if you look at the data though, as an example, we know that very senior execs are the most likely to say, my team should be a hundred percent in the office, right?
[00:35:06] Jennifer: They req want to require the full-time return to office mandate, and yet only 12% of executives are themselves full-time in office. So it is definitely the case that many executives are disconnected. What I would say is that the most success we see for our platform is when a senior executive champion believes that this is important.
[00:35:31] Jennifer: They don't actually have to do it with their teams, although many of them do, and I believe they are also higher performing leaders when they do, and they don't have to self facilitate. They might have a chief of staff or an HR person who facilitates for their team. The people, the CIOs, the CMOs, the CTOs or heads of engineering who say, I believe this is important and my team should do it.
[00:35:52] Jennifer: They end up with the highest performing team. So for instance, we have a CIO at a global IT company. She said to her whole global IT or org. HER org does it for the IT company. It's a little meta there. Um. Her engagement is now a full 10 points higher than the whole rest of the company, her org. So any given leader who sees the potential and says this is important, can massively drive the performance of their own org, even if the broader company isn't yet ready to do that, and they can show the way to the rest of the company. And so I, we tend to sort of look for those forward thinking folks, and there are lots of them out there.
[00:36:32] Pia: I mean, in any situation you've got early adopters who can see, read, and see the situation, and are willing to make that first step. And then they'll take the middle, the middle chunk of people that maybe, maybe a bit slower to adopt, but, but then having seen the proof in the evidence, then, then, they, they will feel the motivation to do it.
[00:36:51] Jennifer: Yes, it's the classic crossing the chasm. And yeah, those early adopters I'm sure are helpful for, for all of us. And, and the good thing is they get the, a lot of the benefits, right? So.
[00:37:02] Dan: Yeah. Sooner than everyone else. Um, we always end, we always finish with this media recommendation, so it's a very open question about. We are recommending a book, a podcast, a Netflix series. Again, it could be something that's entertained or educated you. It doesn't matter what's, what would you, what would you say to our listener?
[00:37:21] Jennifer: So we are. Starting and ending on the media for this one since we, that was the card you pulled out of the stock too. so I'm going to pick selling completely, not really work related, um, which is a, a TV show that we watched recently, even though it's not a new show, but it was lessons in chemistry of either of you watch this, uh, series. I just. I love it because, um, you know, we are, as much as I wish we weren't, we still are in a world where women leaders are still making their way in the world. You know, we still have a tiny percentage of the Fortune 500 and, you know, way lower percentages of women on boards and so forth, and this series is about a.
[00:38:05] Jennifer: Very smart, talented female chemist and her journey in the world in the 1950s where she had to navigate a, a slight, you know, an even harder environment for women and just her story of her moxie and courage and smarts, and it's just a great series.
[00:38:24] Dan: Excellent. Well, thank you so much Jen, for joining us from Hawaii, um, for this, uh, for this episode of We, not me. Um, it's been, uh, yeah, a delight and, um. Really just so inspiring to hear your mission and, uh, it's great to hear that you are making good progress on this because it's a, it's a tough nut to crack, but harnessing technology to, um, to do this at scale is just a wonderful thing. So thank you for sharing that with our listeners today.
[00:38:50] Jennifer: Thank you and glad to be in this line of work with you all too and impressed by all the work you do to move this ball forward too.
[00:39:00] Pia: I thought it was interesting the conversation to think about the role of, of the executive leaders and executive team in really building out that those conditions for the success across the whole organization, they can, they can stop that immediately or pay lip service to it or not promote it. You know, it sort of slightly reminds me like when you leave Sydney Airport, there's.
[00:39:23] Pia: Two lounges next to one another. There's the Qantas, um, business lounge, which is only open to platinum. Platinum and above, and then there's the Qantas lounge, yeah, and it is quite a different, I've been in both, and it is quite a different experience, but when you've been in one, you don't really want to go in the other.
[00:39:41] Pia: So that's quite an interesting one and I, I wonder whether there is an exclusivity of being an exec that actually insulates you with what's going on at the coalface and you lose touch a little bit and, and that's actually a leadership challenge right across the board that's happened across. History to many, many monarchs, peril,
[00:40:00] Pia: you know, you, you lose your head if you're not careful, but it does cause that, and I, and, and I think as we go into these pressurized times, and this has been sustained, there's a degree of humility that execs have to look at their, and humanity at their workforce and think, what is my role? To scale the support for these people to maximize the way that they can thrive in their work.
[00:40:27] Dan: it's so much there actually and, um, what Jen is doing is giving the opportunity to organizations to really, to have not just the wiring of KPIs going up and down. You know, that, that, that seems to be really well established in organizations. I mean, not, not done well, but Right.
[00:40:44] Dan: We're going to have goals and objectives and they're gonna come down and we are going to be bonus on this or that, that, that sort of wiring system is there. But the human wiring system is often. Really missing and, and I think you are right. Um, while Jen is doing everything she can to solve that and has an elegant solution to it, there is something about senior leadership that sort of lacks, I, I have many reflections on this from my corporate career.
[00:41:08] Dan: Well, the first one is when I was in, uh, working in the States, you go up to the executive level. Sort of thing in the building, and suddenly you are wading through shag par carpet. you, you know what I mean? It's sort of, you can hardly make progress. And then you've got a line of offices and a line of EAs and all of these are just barriers and barriers and, and I think though, as you say, even in the hybrid world, they, they exist today, they, these badges of rank, but they're of separation as well..
[00:41:38] Dan: And I really noticed, um, how you get to a certain point, and I did get over this, this invisible line in organization where, where you are on your own, you are not gonna get coaching, it's sink or swim. And so you also as a leader, don't get that human support, the development support that you could do with it.
[00:41:57] Dan: Literally, I remember it very clearly that you step over a line and you're on your own. And that engenders that, that sort of perpetuates that sense that the human wiring is not, not important in organizations.
[00:42:09] Pia: and that's what makes her solution and, and her approach, and that's based on her own experience. So exciting because what she's using is a. Technology and AI to, to really take that information, democratize it for many, but you still need a sponsor. You still need somebody in at the top that's gonna go, do you know what, this is a really good, this is a really good opportunity.
[00:42:32] Pia: Um, let's role model it. And I, I've seen some amazing leaders this year that I've worked with that have role modeled. That leadership and, and it has an exponential effect on the rest of the organization. No one thinks, oh, you are an idiot. You are leading. What are you doing?
[00:42:47] Dan: yeah, no, absolutely. But it's a weird thing where, as you say, the, the sort of task is the thing. And you know the question, particularly in it, in these perilous times, we have, we ask ourselves what is seen as important, you know, what is, what's being rewarded? What's what am I being asked about? and um, and yeah, this is still missing in a lot of cases, but you say the courageous leaders are doing something about this and, uh. Coming to, uh, coming to Rising Team and obviously, and, uh, other great approaches to really sort of building out that human side.
[00:43:18] Dan: The, um, the thing I, uh, the, the link I'm making a little bit to, to sort of, um, as I'm thinking about the conversation with Jen is she recommended lessons in chemistry as a, as a sort of, as as her media, uh, yeah, recommendation and of course. This is a slightly long bow, but that's exactly what her business does, is it isn't. It gives lessons in chemistry and team chemistry for people. So, with that incredibly clever remark by me, I'm going to close the episode.
[00:43:44] Dan: We, not Me, is supported by Squadify. Squadify helps any team to build engagement and drive performance. You can find show notes where you're listening and@Squadify.net. If you've enjoyed the show, including my brilliant link there, please share the love and recommend it to your friends. We Not Meet is produced by Mark Steadman. Thank you so much for listening. It's goodbye from me.
[00:44:05] Pia: And it's goodbye from me.