The Modern People Leader: Forward-Thinking HR

Josh Bersin, HR Analyst at The Josh Bersin Company, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about the most impactful events he’s seen in HR over the decades, the network of teams operating model, the highest predictor of top performing HR teams, and the two lessons he hopes everyone takes away from reading his book, Irresistible. Timestamps: (4:45) Do what you love and worry about the promotions and money later (10:00) Why we should be jealous of his day job (12:05) The most impactful events he’s seen in HR over the decades (16:38) Irresistible: The Seven Secrets of the world’s most enduring, employee-focused organizations (20:06) Network of teams operating model (25:07) The symptoms of not operating as a network of teams (30:30) The mythical man-month and the agile manifesto (34:40) The Nestle innovation center (36:00) Characteristics of high performing teams (38:29) The highest predictor of top performing HR teams (42:06) The two lessons he hopes everyone takes away from reading his book (45:16) AI in HR (48:47) Josh’s definition of a Modern People Leader (49:16) The career advice he’d give his 22-year-old self Come hang out with us at Transform. Get $200 off your ticket here: https://transform.us/modern-people-leader/ Subscribe to the MPL Weekly Digest: https://forms.gle/qdt6YaWULfoEHb6n8 Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-modern-people-leader

Femily Howe, Gender/Equity Advisor at Femily On The Go, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about her work advancing women in the workplace, leaning into the awkward conversations about diversity, and using ERGs to solve business problems. Timestamps: (13:24) Why we should be jealous of her day job (15:30) Her work advancing women in the workplace (18:12) Addressing the statement, “I want to be more gender inclusive, but I don’t want to lower the bar” (25:38) Misgendering and microaggressions (28:30) Explaining privilege to someone that doesn’t get it (38:13) Focusing on actions and behaviors instead of changing hearts and minds (43:23) How to hold recruiters and hiring managers accountable for diversity targets (47:45) People would rather avoid awkwardness than reach out to diverse talent in their network (49:12) Getting more out of your ERGs Subscribe to the MPL Weekly Digest: https://forms.gle/qdt6YaWULfoEHb6n8 Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-modern-people-leader

Allison Baum Gates, General Partner at SemperVirens, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked what led her to the intersection of VC and work tech, why the future of work is the single most important problem to solve, and her upcoming book, “Breaking into Venture”. Come hang out with us at Transform. Get $200 off your ticket here: https://transform.us/modern-people-leader/ Pre-order your copy of "Breaking into Venture": https://www.amazon.com/Breaking-into-Venture-Capitalist-Life-Changing/dp/1264698941/ Timestamps: (7:51) Arriving at the intersection of VC and the future of work (14:38) Biggest changes related to the future of work from a VC perspective (19:08) Why making work better is so important (21:15) The 5 D’s of the future of work (25:46) Leaning out (28:21) What makes SemperVirens a unique VC firm (30:23) The 3 A’s of being successful in Venture Capital (32:15) The difficulties of being a Work Tech founder (34:44) Predicting what’s coming for the future of work (39:18) Need to haves versus “vitamins” in HR tech (44:32) Her upcoming book: "Breaking into Venture" (52:36) The career advice she’d give her 22-year-old self Subscribe to the MPL Weekly Digest: https://forms.gle/qdt6YaWULfoEHb6n8 Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-modern-people-leader

Mindi Cox, Chief Marketing & People Officer at O.C. Tanner, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about moving from employee engagement to employee fulfillment and the work required to change culture. Timestamps: (17:37) Why we should be jealous Mindi gets to work at OC Tanner (19:38) Moving from employee engagement to employee fulfillment (25:00) Looking at the value of your work situation beyond just your salary (33:41) The self determination theory applied to work: autonomy, mastery, and connection (39:00) How to change your company’s culture (42:15) The Southwest Airlines culture (47:35) Her definition of a Modern People Leader (48:00) The career advice she’d give her 22-year-old self Subscribe to the MPL Weekly Digest: https://forms.gle/qdt6YaWULfoEHb6n8 Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-modern-people-leader

Today we shared MPL updates for 2023 and our 8 biggest learnings from 2022. Timestamps: (2:55) MPL updates for 2023 (5:40) MPL origin story (17:08) #1 Flexibility (plus trust) is the name of the game (24:06) #2 DEI & the future of work are connected (31:13) #3 Everyone would benefit from therapy (especially HR) (37:52) #4 Think of the employee experience as a product (42:51) #5 The role of the CHRO is really f****** hard and not going to get any easier (51:40) #6 Gen Z isn’t afraid to ask for all of the things we’ve always wanted (1:03:15) #7 People are rethinking their purpose portfolios (1:09:46) #8 Career advice for HR practitioners Subscribe to the MPL Weekly Digest: https://forms.gle/qdt6YaWULfoEHb6n8 Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-modern-people-leader

Julia Soffa, Principal Internal Communications Manager at Guru, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about information overload, the golden rule of communication, how to build an attention audit survey, and why we should all embrace JOMO. Timestamps: (10:03) When Julia started noticing digital debt in her personal life (15:00) Why we should be jealous she gets to work at Guru (16:47) Her role as Principal Internal Communications Manager (19:00) Information overload is hurting our bodies and the businesses that we work for (23:41) The attention audit survey (28:01) Going from 6% remote to 65% in just two years (30:45) The golden rule of internal communication (36:36) How to structure an attention audit survey and the surprising responses they’ve gotten (39:22) Why we should all embrace JOMO (43:22) The 4 P’s of meetings (46:47) How she thinks about digital rituals (50:54) Her definition of a Modern People Leader (52:01) The career advice she’d give her 22-year-old self Guru's information overload survey: https://app.getguru.com/card/TaArybBc/Information-Overload-Employee-Survey- Guru's resources for managing information overload: https://app.getguru.com/card/cdApaoqi/Resources-for-Managing-Information-Overload Subscribe to the MPL Weekly Digest: https://forms.gle/qdt6YaWULfoEHb6n8 Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-modern-people-leader

Lars Schmidt, Founder of Amplify Talent, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about what you should know if you plan to make the jump into HR, the 2 most important things for HR practitioners to prioritize their careers around, and the ways HR will look different in 2023. Timestamps: (3:20) Recent launch of Amplify Academy's Diversity Council (4:37) Lars’ career story and how he started Amplify (9:36) What happened in 2015 for the open sourcing of HR (15:20) Getting out of the zero-sum mindset that in order to win everyone else has to lose (18:45) HR is now a destination function (20:00) Where there’s room for disruption within HR (22:20) What you should know if you’re making the jump into HR (30:00) The 2 most important things for HR practitioners to prioritize their career around (34:00) The importance of having peer networks (39:36) On whether the economic uncertainty will hamper progress made over the last few years (43:03) People moving away from the startup scene for more stability (46:25) The current state of HR tech (52:05) 7 ways HR will look different in the new year (57:00) The idea of choice (1:00) Built For People (1:01:38) Lars’ definition of a Modern People Leader (1:02:16) The career advice Lars would give his 22-year-old self Subscribe to the MPL Weekly Digest: https://forms.gle/qdt6YaWULfoEHb6n8 Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-modern-people-leader

Amy Lavoie, VP of People Success at Torch, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about Torch’s people success scorecard, the importance of measuring your people programs, and what their research uncovered about how different groups perceive progress on DEI efforts. Timestamps: (8:48) Why we should we jealous Amy gets to work at Torch (9:44) Torch’s people success scorecard (15:45) The biggest surprises in 2022 from a people perspective (18:11) The biggest challenge for people teams in 2023 (24:50) Is HR making progress in measuring the impact of their programs? (29:27) The indirect signal that HR sends when they hold engagement data captive (33:22) Feedback doesn’t define your company, it helps it continuously improve (36:06) Executives think they’re doing better on DEI efforts than managers (38:10) We can no longer rely on one-size-fits-all programs to make a meaningful impact on DEI (48:47) The discrepancy between how men and women perceive progress on DEI initiatives (50:30) The over reliance on benchmark data (52:23) Amy’s definition of a Modern People Leader (53:58) The career advice she’d give her 22-year-old self Subscribe to the MPL Weekly Digest: https://forms.gle/qdt6YaWULfoEHb6n8 Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-modern-people-leader

Kelly Keegan, VP of People at Built In, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about how she’s thinking about building the people function of the future and why everyone in HR could use a therapist. Timestamps: (12:17) How she’s thinking about the future of the people function (16:26) What companies can do to make the recruiting function more sticky during economic downturns (22:34) Why Built In scrapped their HRBP model for something new (28:30) What’s going to separate the best people teams from everyone else (33:23) The strongest leaders are the ones constantly observing and looking for trends (40:40) Everyone in HR (and everyone else) could use a therapist (45:00) How Built In uses Modern Health for their people (49:00) Most common fears for people going into therapy (52:02) How she defines a Modern People Leader (52:20) The career advice she’d give to her 22-year-old self Subscribe to the MPL Weekly Digest: https://forms.gle/qdt6YaWULfoEHb6n8 Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-modern-people-leader

Recharge’s Michael McArthur (SVP People) & Ashley Grech (COO) joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about why Recharge is focused on reducing toil, the 3 pillars of what it means to work for a great company, and the work they’re doing on the career development front. Timestamps: (5:00) How Ashley and Michael would describe one another (7:30) Why we should be jealous that they get to work at Recharge (9:20) Building the people roadmap from scratch at Recharge (12:13) Recharge’s journey from a self-funded startup to a series B startup (15:33) How a COO and SVP of People look at the employee experience from a slightly different lens (19:48) How Recharge has managed change these last couple of quarters (21:13) The 3 pillars of what it means to work for a great company (24:50) Why reducing toil is something that they’re focused on (28:30) How Recharge is looking at career development (34:18) What manager development looks like for Recharge in 2023 (37:20) How Ashley’s sales career has helped her become a better COO (45:49) How Recharge is being more intentional about culture as they grow (47:28) Michael’s definition of a Modern People Leader (47:55) The career advice Ashley would give to her 22-year-old self Subscribe to the MPL Weekly Digest: https://forms.gle/qdt6YaWULfoEHb6n8 Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-modern-people-leader