EXPERT SPOTLIGHT - Creating a Human Culture with Mel Rowsell - Episode 32 of Better Business, Better Life!

Mel Rowsell is a leadership coach & facilitator, as well as co-founder of Vend, a tech startup with rapid growth. Affectionately known as camp mother, she managed People & Culture as Vend grew from 0 to 250 employees.  

In this episode, Mel discusses the constant feeling of imposter syndrome while wearing the many, many hats founders & entrepreneurs are required to wear. After leaving day-to-day operations to start her coaching practice, she was surprised at her own resilience and resourcefulness. She shares how she overcame imposter syndrome and the ups & downs of a founder's journey.

An expert at human connection in the workplace, she also shares tried and true advice on creating a curious & empathetic workplace culture. Find out if you're inadvertently rewarding behaviour that's harming your company and how to lead in the Fourth Imagination Age.

Mel's Top 3 Tips

1. Hire for culture add, not just culture fit

You need to be very careful with your hiring. Don't just hire for culture fit, because then you can get a whole lot of people who are all the same, but hiring for culture add and trying to get that diversity. People who share those same values as the organisation who really dig the things that the organisation digs, but who don't all look the same. So that's the most important thing in hiring, and not being scared to hire people smarter than you.

2. Onboard new employees carefully

People would come into Vend with very different stories and different experiences of how to work in an organisation, especially as it was growing. We were at maybe 150 people plus. So we were kind of larger, but we acted very differently to other organisations of a similar size. We had a really intensive two week onboarding process, where people would learn about the organisation, learn about how we did things, make friends, learn about the entire ecosystem, about customers & the customer perspective. It was a real hard and fast introduction to everything to do with Vend. So we didn't leave them to get this idea of what it was like to work at Vend through osmosis. We managed that really, really carefully.

3. Develop your leadership team

Leadership is so important. So that's why I think development in startups are so important because when you have your founding team, and especially if you are being driven by investment, so you've grown really quickly, it's a race to try and develop your founding team to the same velocity as the organisation is developing. So for example, let's say your Chief Revenue Officer or Chief Marketing Officer or whatever, comes on board when you are at 30 people. Then you grow to be 250 people, in multiple markets and in multiple countries, and this person all of a sudden, has a much bigger remit, a much bigger team, having to think much more strategically and deal with large, multi-national partners. The stakes are considerably higher. Yet this person has grown with you and they might be a really great cultural fit. However, there's a real risk that they're not going to be able to grow fast enough to be able to do the job competently, when the organisation is much bigger. If you bring in someone from the outside, then you have all the risks of, are they going to be a good culture fit? What dynamics are they going to bring into the leadership team? Or you've got, can I grow this person so that they can do this role competently? With mentorship, coaching, training, education, etc.

Head to our website - https://www.debrachantry-taylor.com/podcast

Debra Chantry-Taylor

Professional EOS Implementer | Entrepreneurial Leadership & Business Coach | Business Owner

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