Transforming Work with Sophie Wade 107: Tom Hunt — Leading with Intention in the New World of Work
Tom Hunt is the Founder and CEO of Fame which builds profitable podcasts. Tom is also host of the podcast “Confessions of a B2B Marketer”. He leads a fast-growing fully-remote company and shares his journey intentionally learning effective leadership styles, management methods, and organizational practices. Tom discusses what he looks for in successful leaders and how he purposefully develops and upskills inexperienced employees.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
[03:01] Why Tom goes from studying chemistry to consulting.
[04:11] A pivotal role working on outsourcing projects happens by chance.
[05:19] Tom realizes being employed is not his thing and focuses on selling online.
[06:32] Tom's first venture leverages his experiences outsourcing for large companies.
[07:33] Tom focuses on what he enjoys doing and is good at.
[08:41] The ability to fail and keep going is one of the best predictors of success.
[09:53] The genesis of Fame and how they landed their first client.
[11:19] Tom shares the multifaceted benefits of being transparent about Fame’s earnings.
[13:36] Empathy is a crucial skill for leaders which takes more effort in distributed settings.
[16:14] The benefit of paying attention to signals in asynchronous communications.
[16:50] Continuing to explore how best to nurture distributed culture and connection.
[17:56] Building culture through values awards.
[18:29] Impactful for remote cultures: client-focused operational excellence and engaging elements in team meetings.
[20:51] Employees are trained in interviews to assess for specific work history criteria.
[23:19] Office space has been considered and Tom explains what issues it would create.
[25:00] Fame's business is output-driven and well-defined effectively supported by strong, positive performance management.
[26:59] intentional training and management engages and retains employees and adds value to less experienced hires.
[27:45] Multi-touchpoint, frequent check-ins—with superiors and peers—help account managers grow.
[28:35] The intentional approach to help supervising managers improve too.
[30:45] The onboarding process is a key value add driver for Fame, continually evolving and being improved.
[31:34] One employee's career development and why upskilling people builds strong cultures.
[33:03] Tom promotes employees’ proactive and self-determined progression.
[33:57] Study of leadership focuses Tom on creating cohesion, communicating with clarity, and reinforcing the clarity.
[36:24] IMMEDIATE ACTION TIP: For leaders of fully distributed teams, use live interaction time with team members wisely to collect and convey information to improve people’s work lives. Don’t take those meetings for granted. You have to do your best work as a remote leader.
RESOURCES
Confessions of a B2B Marketer podcast
Top Grading by Brad and Geoff Smart
High Output Management by Andy Grove
The Advantage by Patrick Lencioni
QUOTES (edited)
"The thing that I was looking for most with angel investing was founder resilience. Had this founder failed before and kept going? The ability to pivot, tweak things, and then go forward is probably the most important at that very early stage."
"Empathy for each individual is one of the crucial aspects of leading. If you understand how each person is feeling, you can tailor your approach to working with them to maximize the output for both them personally and their group."
"We decided that if a team member meets another team member in person, whether they’re doing work or not, they get an allowance for that meeting to be spent on anything. It’s a decentralized campaign that promotes in-person interaction, which benefits the company and the individual."
"It’s not a process in which we try to fire somebody. It’s a process in which we’re looking to support someone to perform better."
“The monthly chat with managers is the review of: ‘What’s gone well this month? What’s not gone so well? What do you want to more of?’ and we’ve added in ‘How can I be a better manager for you?’”
"If you have something that you want to learn or do and there’s a business need for that thing and you’ve mastered your current role, then you can do it. You just have to find the person who’s going to replace you."