Engage and Empower

In this episode Sid Pandiya talks about the story and inspiration behind Kona, his company that provides companies a tool to drive conversations around how teams are authentically feeling, and how to best support one another. Sid shares many tips around how managers can generally build trust and psychological safety on their teams, and how Kona leverages their learnings through their platform as they internal build their own company culture. Sid talks about his journey as an entrepreneur and what he's learned as he has built Kona through a time where more and more companies are moving towards distributed or hybridized work.

In this episode, Emma talks about the evolution of the interview process over the last few years, and discusses what types of qualities employers should be looking out for as they evaluate talent. She gives advice to candidates that are contemplating a career pivot, and shares her personal story around how she managed the pivot from marketing to people operations. Lastly, we talk about strategies to build authentic employer brand, and how to think about creating that through the lens of how you think about branding your product.

Sean Cervera has been in the diversity space for over 10 years and has a wealth of experiences leading diversity and recruiting initiatives from LinkedIn, Twilio, Uber, SpaceX, Google, and most recently, Curology. Sean talks about the distinction between Inclusive Recruiting, vs. Diversity Recruiting, the former being a philosophy and process towards enabling all candidates to have equitable opportunities, and the later focusing on key outcomes. Sean also talks about the challenges of developing diversity strategies for large globalized companies, and shares insights into how he has approached this in the past.

In this episode, Claire talks about her inspiration to found AllVoices, a powerful platform geared towards enabling employees to anonymously share feedback with their company's leadership and people team. AllVoices also provides leaders and People team members the opportunity to respond directly to employees around feedback, opening up conversations and dialogues that may not otherwise have surfaced. AllVoices captures everything from culture feedback, to harassment related feedback, to even Covid19 Health and Safety Related feedback. Claire talks about everything AllVoices has learned about harassment prevention and enablement as her team worked with many companies over the last few years through her product.

GitLab was early in the game in building a fully distributed work experience. In this episode, Darren shares insight into what guided GitLab's initial decision to be a fully distributed company, along with best practices around scaling your remote culture and experience. He discuss the importance of enabling asynchronous work, the value of in transparently sharing your philosophies, and the importance of discussing core values in your hiring process.

In this episode, Aubrey talks about the power of Equitable Design in making meaningful, impactful, systemic change, and what this looks like at CultureAmp. She also talks about how companies can cultivate belonging as they transition to distributed models for the longer term. Lastly, Aubrey touches on diversity fatigue, the future of DEB, and the role that her own identity plays in this work.

In this richly packed episode, Archana reflects on her discoveries after sorting through thousands of data points through 2020. She talks about the drivers of burnout risk and how companies can place focus around learning and development to prevent burnout. She talks about the plateau of Diversity Initiatives through the last decade, the re-invigoration of this work in 2020 and the role executive leaders will need to have in driving more change around DEB work moving forward. She talks about the ongoing transition organizations are having from managing through command and control to trust and empowerment and why that's becoming increasingly important. Lastly, we touch on her experience working abroad in Singapore and how work culture and conversations around work culture are similar/different to her experience in driving this work in the US.

In this episode, Heather Dunn talks about the distinct role that a Chief People Officer plays in an organization as compared to other Senior People Leader roles. She talks about the role the people team plays in building resilience through an organization and the importance of leading with empathy as exemplified by the distinct approach they took to their performance and compensation review process through the pandemic year. Heather also talks about the tailored support people teams need to consider for their various employee groups and highlights some really great programs they kicked off this year.

In this episode, Ashley provides insights around how people leaders and people initiatives can actually have an effect on the end experience your customers have, ultimately impacting your bottom line. Ashley talks about the balance people leaders need to have in leveraging broad trends and people analytics to inform strategy, with the value in creating individualized experiences for each person within your company. Lastly, Ashley touches on the role people leaders have in helping employees find their "purpose" and "meaning" in their work - and how that can be an incredibly powerful mechanism in driving engagement and overall culture.

In this episode, Erica Johnson, Head of DEB at Chime talks about the role of the DEB leader within the organization. It goes far beyond internal work - DEB leaders partner with all leaders across the business - marketing, product, tech, people, sales, etc. and centralize conversations around diversity and how these concepts impact every piece of the organization. DEB leaders provide insights around the effects of how you're positioning your product, how you're connecting with your customers, and how you're investing in your internal employees. She also talks about the importance of prioritizing diversity in hiring, building mentorship programs, leveraging data, and celebrating incremental milestones.

In this episode we dive into the adventure Michelle has had through her career up until her most recent venture of cofounding her own company, Eager Labs! Eager Labs serves to provide organizations and individuals tools to learn together and lead better. Michelle shares some great insights around how to give and receive feedback across all levels - to your own peers, to your manager, and direct reports. She also talks about the importance of cultivating your own authentic leadership style, and how she works with leaders to help them find their own.

In this episode Kerry talks about the transition from Counseling Psychology to the People and Culture world. She also talks about the people team as being a steward of culture vs. as a creator of culture, and how you can enable your organization to drive and take ownership of building something together.

In this episode we learn more about how Wistia approached responding to the pandemic by leveraging a team oriented approach to making decisions and supporting their people. We also talk about strategies to drive inclusion across your organization, and the importance behind finding founders that give people and talent leaders a true strategic seat at the table.

In this episode we dive into how to coach executive leaders as new Head of People. We also talk about what it was like to move from the startup world to joining a company that recently went public! Lastly, we talk about the importance of focusing on your internal inclusion and belonging efforts and before doubling down on your external diversity recruiting efforts.

In this episode, we talk about the important distinction in coaching vs. consulting, and the ability that coaching has to unlock the potential in your employees. Ellen also talks about what MeUndies has learned about distributed work through the pandemic, and how they've decided to build a return to work plan for the future based on those learnings.

In this episode, we talk about the story behind She Geeks Out, an organization founded by Felicia and her cofounder Rachel Murray geared towards giving other tech and tech-adjacent womxn and their allies an opportunity to network, learn, and connect with each other as well as with companies who want to hire them. Felicia talks about the evolution of diversity related initiatives over the last 10 years, and advice she has to companies that are just getting started with this work.

In this episode, we talk about how to build trust and psychological safety as a distributed team by focusing on building strong value touchpoints through onboarding, driving a collaborating vs. co-acting culture, and through intentionally creating forums to have conversations that go a lot deeper than your traditional Zoom happy hour. We also talk about how to provide constructive feedback that is clear yet kind, and how to leverage feedback to build people up vs. create a culture of fear, in a distributed environment.

In this episode, we talk about how to build leadership development programs that are sticky and effective, whether you are designing for new managers or seasoned executives. We also talk about how Gabriela approached her role as joined Drizly, and how she worked with the Drizly team to define their core values, the Drizly DNA.

In this episode, we talk about how leaders can empathetically support their organizations through change by leveraging the change curve. This curve describes the predictable process we all go through of transitioning from denial, to doubt, to acceptance when faced with new changes. We also talk about how leaders can be more meaningful and effective delegators by using Blanchard's situational leadership model.

In this episode, we talk about the role of equity centered design and democratic decision making in building a culture of inclusion. Diane shares the importance of reflecting on where power resides within your organization, ensuring that your programs are built around the needs of your employees, and shifting power where it feels unbalanced.

A quick background on me, how I got into this field, and why I decided to start this podcast!