The Modern People Leader: Forward-Thinking HR

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

Sara Gorjão, Chief People Officer at tb.lx, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about the Human Energy Crisis we’re facing, tb.lx’s experiment with the 36-hour workweek, and why being a perfect people leader isn’t possible. Timestamps: (14:50) why we should be jealous that Sara gets to work at tb.lx (19:50) Sara’s mission and how it’s connected to her role (22:52) How Sara checks in with herself and manages her energy (30:45) The flashlight system for examining ourselves (33:51) tb.lx’s experiment with the 36-hour workweek (41:21) How they measured productivity during the 36-hour workweek (49:40) Being a perfect people leader isn’t possible (52:44) How Sara defines a Modern People Leader (56:30) The career advice she 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

Amanda Ono, CHRO at Kroll Digital Services, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about 2023 planning, her biggest learnings scaling a company from 90 to 250 employees in one year, and navigating change as a leader. Timestamps: (10:27) Amanda’s experience as both an operator and HR leader (14:00) Why we should be jealous Amanda gets to work at Kroll (16:39) Budget season and 2023 planning (19:11) Taking the best of both cultures when integrating after an acquisition (23:11) Lessons learned growing from 90 to 250 employees in less than a year (24:59) Who should be on your “change council” (27:05) The importance of a strong communication plan (42:00) Her definition of a Modern People Leader (42:29) 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