Author Recap: Making all Work Fair with Data-Driven Design

All right, you kick us off here. You sure we're going to air this one? Adrian, what a delight. Siri Chilazi. You know, it's so funny. You and I were talking when I was rehearsing this. Every time I said her name is Siri, my phone went off. And she goes, I know, I apologize. Everybody says that. How she got named after an app. I mean, that's cool. Anyway, this idea of fairness in the workplace and the little things that you can do, I really found interesting. I'm talking about timely right now with all the things you're talking about, DE&I and how it works, how it doesn't work. She's really saying, look, take all the social stuff out of it. Go to results. Look at the data. I thought of her example of the BBC. Yeah, they counted, which was a simple thing to do, right? How many men, how many women? To me, the real key though was the ratings went up. If they'd done all that stuff and the ratings went down, I'd say, well, you're nuts. She said, get the best people, get the best qualifiers, get the best results, look at the data, add it up. It's a better way to do business. And that's the best argument you can have, right? And it's so true. I mean, you and I did a big year long project with a big energy company. And I remember when we did the work with the employees, they said, look, we understand environmental things, sustainability, we know how to do that. D and I scares us. We don't know what to do with it. We want to do it, but we just don't know how to do it. And it was more anxiety inducing than it was maybe helpful. What her work is saying is look at small tweaks. Things you can really do like make a list, you know, like ours, you know, how many women to men do we have on our podcast? Simple things you can do. So think about, yeah, those little things you can do. It's the 1% rule, right, versus trying to make sweeping changes, make this incremental, and as you say, make sure it's benefiting your business too. Well, of course it's gonna benefit if you have more gender equality as your people are watching because women wanna see themselves represented when they're watching the news, et cetera. So that just makes sense. Yeah, I mean, I watch TV, I wanna see old, bald white guys. Yeah, with beards. Anyway, the other thing that I thought was interesting is she said, I understand that most systems are biased. They've come up through traditions and so on, and yet she didn't blame the system. She said, you can get to leaders. You can say, look, here's the data. Here's why it's better for our company to do that. When she got through her things that she does for her anxiety, isn't it interesting how many people say, go out for a walk, be near nature, take five minutes to do some breathing. I love that. It was five minutes of breathing. We've had guys go, I meditate twice a day for two hours. I go, yeah, I'm not doing that. Simple little things to make sure that you're right. What was your one big takeaway? A couple of things. You're asking for one. I'll give you two actually. One is that data runs our business, so let data run this. And that's when this becomes really powerful, is when, sometimes we work with D&I departments, which we think are doing some great work, HR departments that are doing great work, but they have to be data driven. You have to show the benefit of your work. That's when it goes from being a department to being integral to the organization. The second point that she made that is so important here about making work fair is that work is not fair for everybody. If I were the two of our managers, I would manage me very differently than I would manage you, you know? And she's saying, but this idea of remote work or D&I, everybody's the same. No, they're not. And people need to be managed very differently. My IT guys are probably going to be managed very differently than my customer service folks. They're just different personalities. Be aware of that. Find out what motivates people and as you always say, find out their stories. If you know their story, you're going to know what motivates them. My last takeaway is what you said, you've got more power than you realize. You know, take a look at your work, do one thing and take it from there. But yeah, the book, and we've mentioned it a couple of times, but I love it. It's a make work fair data-driven design for real results. Harper Business, we love them. They're our publisher too. It's coming out January 2025, pick up a copy. Adrian, I always give you the last word, so have at it. You know, big thanks to our producer, Brent Klein, who we think is always fair with us. Christy Lawrence, who is amazing and finding great guests to balance us out. And to all of you who have listened in, if you like the podcast, share it, let others know about it. We'd also love you to visit thecultureworks.com for some free resources. And Chester, there's a book that everybody should pick up. It begins with an A. What is that book? Anxiety at work. That's the one. You know, you put me on the spot like that, it made me really anxious. Anyway, by the way, we love to speak to audiences, whether it's virtual, whether it's in person, on all these subjects of culture, leadership, teamwork, and of course, anxiety in the workplace. Thank you so much for taking time to be with us on the podcast. It means a lot to us. Follow us on LinkedIn, go to our website, and thanks again for being a part of the show. Adrian, the big wrap up. Thanks everybody for joining us. Until next time, we wish you the best of mental health.