I think this whole pandemic is just really humanized everyone. You know, before when you were at work, you had this persona you had to put on. And now that you're at home, you have your dog running into the camera, your cat walking across the laptop, the kids in the background. So it really has humanized and I think taken away this this element, and you really do get to start to know people better.
Hello, friends, and welcome to the block, the building learning and organizational culture podcast. I'm your host Heidi Kirby. On today's episode, I have my former manager and dear friend Jenifer Johnson talks to me about organizational development, how to manage teams virtually, and how we can keep the flexible work environment momentum going after the pandemic. But this episode is special because it airs on my
birthday. Not only does it air on my birthday, but it's also Jenifer Johnson's birthday as well. In fact, we were even born the same year, five hours apart. So I had to have her on for this particular episode. I hope you enjoy this birthday celebration episode of the block after a brief word from our sponsor, bear Asana.
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Hey, Jen, how are you today? Hey, good
morning. I'm good. How are you?
I'm doing good. So first of all, I want to have you tell me a little bit about yourself about your career background, and then any fun facts you want to share to Ooh, fun facts.
So Jennifer Johnson, I'm the Senior Manager of associate experience at Dealer Tire. I am a self proclaimed nerd travel wonder actually annato loved it to travel, love to explore the world, just a lifelong learner. So always looking to grow develop not only myself, but just anyone I interact with. My career has been a blend out of a
lot of different industries. I started in education and higher education, how working with a high school program moved into the airport industry than pharmaceuticals, and now tires of all things, you know, certainly a mixture of backgrounds. But one thing that has been consistent is that I've always been an organizational development, always working with people developing people and helping them on their career path.
Great. So let me ask you this, because a lot of our episodes have been geared really towards instructional design. If you had to define organizational development, how would you define it?
So for me, organizational development is all about change. It's driving change, managing change, it's helping organizations grow, and it's through their most important asset, there are people so there's a lot of functions under OD and every company, those functions will look a little bit different. But it really centers around learning and development, performance management, talent management, coaching
development. And what I love about the field is that it's truly a blend of so many different fields, it's business, it's HR, it's psychology, it's, it's all these different things, putting it together to really just help the organization and its people grow and develop and become more effective and efficient, long term.
Absolutely awesome. So is employee engagement under that as well,
for some companies, yes, other companies, they'll have, you know, their own separate person, a Dealer Tire, it is very much a part of that. And I appreciate a company where engagement is part of their od umbrella. Because I think you can't be effective and OD. And you can't have effective learning and development if you're not also looking through that engagement lens.
Sure. So could you share with me some different ways that you might measure employee engagement as an organization?
Absolutely. So we actually partner with culture amp, who is just a phenomenal vendor in the space, they employ a lot of psychologists that actually really think through and design the survey very thoughtfully so that when you're looking at the results, you you really have actionable items to look at. So we look at a lot of different factors. So we certainly have our engagement questions that measure
engagement. But then we have about 12 to 13 different factors that that's telling us how that engagement number is being formalized. That's our managerial skills. It's our learning and development opportunities, our career growth this year, we have added an inclusion section. So we're looking at our inclusion drivers for the organization, D and I. And so just trying to look at it through as many lenses as possible, because obviously what engages you is different than
what engages me. So try to look at it as holistically as possible to make sure we're offering the best experience for everyone.
Sure. And how often do employees take that survey? So officially, our
engagement survey is once a year and we tried going to a two year mark, but we actually heard from our associates that they really love being able to share that feedback with us more often. So we are in a one year cadence. But we've also started employing pulse surveys, especially through COVID. We found that it's it's so important for us to be able to check in with associates and just understanding how they're feeling because the world was
changing so fast. And our action plans from last year survey, just you know, weren't applicable anymore. Right. So much changed. So we started applying pulse surveys and trying to find the balance of hearing the voice and checking in without, you know, survey fatigue.
Sure. So a pulse survey would just be a shorter version of that employee engagement survey, absolutely, usually
five to seven questions where your engagement surveys typically are between 30 and 60s for a little longer. So just real quick, you're kind of testing a hypothesis or just very targeted questions to check in.
Sure. So as a result of employee engagement surveys, you obviously probably find some strengths and some weaknesses in the company, when you go to make an action plan. Is it kind of like the LSAT, where you should focus on your strengths? Or is it one of those things where you should focus on the weaknesses? Or is it some combination of both? How do you determine that?
Absolutely. So and not to plug culture too much, they are phenomenal partner. But one of the reasons that we went with them and really love them as a partner is because of the algorithm in their survey, and that most of us, when we get a survey result back or any type of test scores, we immediately go to what we got wrong or lowest scores. And that's where we start to build our action plans. Because if we improve this, then everything
else will be better. Culture, amp has really spent a lot of time diving into that and thinking about that and said, You know, it's not so much your bottom scores, it's the combination of how these questions are being answered in relation to each other. And so they actually give us focus areas. And some of those may be our top score. Some of them may be our bottom scores, but they really are able to hone in on what's important to the
associate. And so you know, I'm a strengths based person in general, I believe on focusing on your strengths. So I always think it's important to understand what your strengths are, and how you continue to better those because they serve you well, and they've gotten you to that place. But I also don't think you ignore, you know, the
lowest areas either. But I think it's to your point, it's finding that blend and balance of okay, what's really going to move the needle, what's really the most important to our associates to
be able to check in. And so we definitely advocate and really encourage managers to once they get their results and have that opportunity to digest that information, to then sit down with our team and share the results openly and candidly have that conversation and ask them, you know, is this important to you, you know, and build that
action plan together. So you're really, you know, co creating the future and then check in right on those results, because at the end of the day, numbers only tell you so much of a story. And if you have somebody who's at 100%, and somebody's at a 0%, that's 50. And you're not serving either them at that point. So I just think that that follow up conversation is so important. And the survey can tell you all sorts of you know, focus areas and different data
points. But until you check in and have that conversation, you're not going to really be able to form a real action plan that's going to really move the needle.
Absolutely. And on that note about having conversations with your people. I was thinking this morning before this podcast and just what we were going to talk about, and I came across a LinkedIn post that someone I follow posted that they had connected with Santa Claus on LinkedIn. At the time this episode is published, Christmas will be 10 days away, but that Santa had put this person on the nice list. And they were sharing that out to their entire
LinkedIn community, right. But it made me think about performance reviews, right in the annual performance review cycle, because I'm also currently working on kind of a continuous performance review framework for the company that I'm currently at. And I was thinking about how, as far as Santa goes, your parents don't threaten you with the naughty or nice list in March, right? You don't really care about it in
May. But there's like this big uptick where all of a sudden, the threats start coming in about November 15 that Santa is watching, right. And then I was thinking that, you know, people who do these annual end of the year performance reviews, it's kind of the same way, right? That once you hit November, October, November, it's like performance reviews are coming up. Everybody's watching, right. So would you would you say that that's kind of a common thing that you've seen at other
organizations? And how do you make February and March matter?
Absolutely. And it's a conversation I've been having with a lot of people in my network, We're certainly starting to see shifts in the field where you know, continuous performance management and some of the radical companies even we're moving away from the
performance review entirely. One thing we've tried to focus on is one on ones and different touch points throughout the year and mid mid year check ins and different conversation so that the performance review is really just a formality in the sense of we're officially documenting it right. These are it's just a culmination of all the conversations we've had
throughout the year. So we really tried to create templates and tools and resources and encourage managers to have those weekly one on ones have the mid year check in, solicit feedback from those around that individual to make sure that we're getting well rounded feedback, unbiased feedback to really paint the whole picture. And so that we're focusing on performance and looking at our KPIs metrics throughout the entire year, and not just you know, that November 15 timeframe.
So what would you say is kind of an ideal if you just had a brainstorm spitball, something, what's kind of an ideal schedule for you know, maybe one on ones. And then for kind of a more formal, let's talk about your goals.
I've always preferred weekly check ins, even if you don't need the full hour, the full slot, it's just always so nice to have that dedicated time on the calendar that you could just catch up. Even if it's just to catch up personally and understand what's going on in that person's life a little bit, you know, it may not always have a work center. But I really am a big fan of weekly touch bases. Beyond that, I definitely
think quarterly goal reviews. I mean, obviously, you're talking about your projects and different things every week as well. But I think actually looking at your goals, reviewing them checking the metrics, adjusting anything that needs to happen should be on a quarterly basis.
Have you found it more difficult to do that with moving to remote work?
Interestingly enough, I have found it actually easier. Before you know, when you're running from meeting to meeting, and you're not really at your desk, being virtual, I've actually been able to implement some different touch points that we wouldn't have been able to do previously. So every Monday morning, we just have a coffee meeting, it's a half an hour, the whole team.
And it's if there's any work updates, we share those, but it's just about checking in how's your week, looking ahead, how was your weekend, we would have been able to do that before people are coming and going at different times. So it's actually been kind of nice to be able to facilitate these different touch points, just because time allows it now.
That's great. And I think too, for those who have a little bit more of a distributed workforce, that those touch points don't even necessarily need to be synchronous, right, those can happen in a thread, if you have somewhere to communicate as an organization.
You know, if you've got someone working in China, someone working in Europe, someone working in the United States, you all just have your little your posts that you leave when you can and when you're working, and it still kind of serves the same purpose, share your pet pictures, share your memes, you know, that kind of thing?
Absolutely. And I think this whole pandemic has just really humanized everyone. You know, before, when you were at work, you had this persona you had to put on. And now that you're at home, you have your dog running into the camera, your cat walking across the laptop, the kids in the background, so it really has humanized. And I think taken away this this element, and you really do get to start to know
people better. And I've noticed my team, we are sending more memes and you know, text message chains and stuff like that out there. But I also think too, so when you're in the office, and you're in a meeting, it's kind of rude to be on your laptop and multitasking. But now that you're at home in this virtual environment, it's much more acceptable. So I am I able to be more available on Skype and kind of answer somebody quickly and facilitate that, and still be in
my meeting and present. So I think it just kind of a different dynamic of how we're able to multitask.
Yeah, absolutely. So wouldn't ask you some questions about kind of your career path, because a lot of my connections on LinkedIn, are educators who want to become instructional designers or who want to get into learning and development in general. And you've gone from higher ed to a hiring managers position. Right? So this might be a tough question, but what are some of the kind of things that stand out to you as a hiring manager?
If you're looking at applications from people who are coming from the education world?
That's a great question. And I think there's so much synergy between education and organizational development, right. It's you're you're developing children, you're developing adults, it there's so much synergy in the what you're
doing. So I think that people that have been able to successfully, you know, bridge over into the corporate world have that naturally curious element, like they want to know more, and they're really good about picking up the information and synthesizing it and being able to readily use it very
quickly. I think that their design thinkers, you know, they're they really sit through, brainstorm, analyze the needs analysis, and figure out how to adapt quickly and apply to different situations, obviously, innovative, creative, and just love to build relationships. I think they have to have a willingness to say, I don't know, can you help me? You know, and really just dive in.
Great. So on the flip side of that, if you could pick one area that educators need to kind of build confidence in, when they're trying to make that transition, what would it be?
I think kind of remembering your audience like you're not working with children anymore, and you can't tell them what to do with adults. You really have to lay out the What's in it for me and even though it's their own development and is going to benefit on long term, you still have to sometimes encourage and coax them into buying in and earning that the investment is worth it. And, and this is the long term value. I think just kind of knowing your audience and building those
relationships. It's just it's just a very different world. And obviously, the business acumen, the way a school runs is so different than the way the way the business world runs and the processes and how work gets done is just so different.
Yeah, no, I think business acumen is a really important one that I don't think we stress enough in instructional design, because that was definitely a big obstacle, or at least learning curve for me when I transitioned was, wait, how do we do things around here? I very distinctly remember one of the places where I worked, had new hire trainings with facilitators, and this particular facilitator was telling me that she was having trouble with one of the
employees. And I was like, Well, you know, just kick them out of the classroom. You know, I had like, my higher education professor hat on, I'm like, we'll just kick him out of the classroom and just tell him to sit down and be quiet, you know? And she's like, Oh, no, no, we can't do that. We work for a business. She's technically my equal. I can't really treat her that way. Right. Yeah, that one, I was like, Come on, just just threaten to fail them. Right,
right. It's not really enough, though. So I've spent a lot of time looking at this. And certainly, we know that, you know, a child's brain is different than an adult brain and and how they process and learn. But at the end of the day, they really aren't that different. They still need a wide variety of activities, they still need that one on one personalization and coaching. So it's super interesting how different they are and how you have to approach that relationship and approach.
Again, the what's in it for me, but I really don't learn that differently. It's very interesting. The similarities there,
right? Yeah. On one of my previous episodes, I talked to Lesley early about this, this kind of Pooh poohing the l&d people due to the word pedagogy because they're like, oh, that's kids, we use andragogy. And her argument was that they're essentially the same, especially in modern classrooms, where the teacher is not lecturing, they're more of a facilitator, the project base, the problem based learning is effective for both audiences.
Absolutely to get on the high horse or my soapbox here. But I think that's a reason of what education is struggling right now, because of that it is very instructor led. And it's always interesting to me, I there was a meme or an article a few years ago, and it compared a classroom from 1920, to a classroom to today. And they're the same, right, all the desks are still facing forward to the chalkboard where it's, it's centered on the teacher.
And we know that the more you involve and engage the senses, the more the person learns, and that doesn't matter what age you are. And so I think, you know, the more that we can model some of the adult learning principles in the, you know, K through 12, even college classrooms, the better off the students are going to be in the more actual learning long term retention is going to take place.
Absolutely. And I think that a lot of the K through 12 teachers, especially the newer younger ones are starting to do that. Yes. And that is going to be key for those teachers who want to transition into instructional designers to leverage that. I didn't teach my class, like the sage on the stage, right, I did xy and z to be able to engage them and help them.
Absolutely. And I think that's one of the things that, you know, kind of alluding to my earlier point is design thinking is just so important. And I think that's something we need to foster in our students
and adults. But when I was consulting in the K through 12, space, that's something we really worked with teachers on was to design activities and experiences that really helped the students, you know, think differently and creatively and it yes, the end product is important, but how they got there are so important and to set up these, you know, activities that really help them think through and, and troubleshoot and problem solve.
And it's not this cookie cutter, follow these steps, you get your a right, but it's about putting the process together and critical thinking and it's about the how as much as the what?
Yeah, for sure. And for those who are transitioning into the field of l&d in your portfolios, it's not as important to have a finished product I've found as it is to also give some sort of explanation of your process, right. 1,000% Yeah. And it's okay, if it was something designed for the K through 12. Audience, if you explain that process, and that process can then be translated to the corporate world or, you know, government or higher ed, or whatever you're looking to do next.
Absolutely. And I think taking that example, and then taking it a level deeper and saying, Well, this is what I did, because this is what the situation called for. If I was in this environment or at this position, this is how I might
tweak it or change it. But again, those core fundamentals of the design thinking process or the critical thinking whatever, are still you know, evident, because this is what where we need the person to get and grow and again, whether it's a child or an adult growth processes the same you need them to be able to pick apart and dive in a little bit deeper and not just follow a checklist sit through our webinar, and they're going to come out, you know, all knowing, right?
How would you say organizational development differs from instructional design?
I think the principles are the same, and the skills needed to be effective. And both are the same. I think it's just the functions, you know, that are different. Right. So obviously, OD, you know, is more about performance management and Talent Management and kind of the overall process and and moving the organization as a whole, where Id tends to be focused on the learner centric and achieving, like a more specific, you know, mission based on whatever the content
is. But I mean, I certainly think that you have to have both to be successful. They're definitely partners in the work. I just think the fields are, you know, different.
Instructional Design is a little bit more down in the weeds. Yeah,
absolutely. Absolutely. And I think there's a very specific outcome in each of the projects, you know, and you're developing a tool for one specific approach where od can just take on so many different heads, bodies, arms, you know, whatever it depends on and you can, you know, it kind of twists and turns
other duties as assigned.
Yes. Although I think that applies to many different job descriptions.
Yeah, no, that's very true. I'm sure everyone can relate to that. Yes. As far as going remote, because I know that at your company, you guys went remote. What March?
I want to start again, Thea?
Okay, what is the biggest lesson that you've learned from a change management perspective?
So I think it's twofold. For me, one, it's been interesting to watch the organization, appreciate the working from home perspective, and just this virtual environment, I think before there may be with some hesitancy, and not just from our organization, just from a lot of people in my network, and that I've chatted with, you know,
it's so new and different. And before that was something like Silicon Valley companies did, you know, work here, but it's so new age, but I think it's been very interesting to watch how people are being very successful and just in really thriving in this world, in that work life balance now, and just people tend to seem to be happier pandemic aside, because obviously, that's a whole other, you know, kind of issue there.
But the second thing to that is, I think, how resilient people are, you know, it's interesting enough, how many companies spent so much time thinking about work from home policies and crafting, and we have to do this, and we have to have this whole change management plan. And we literally went virtual overnight, and we did it. And so I think, you know, having trust in your employees and having trust in their resiliency and their agility and being able to
flip the switch. So I mean, I'm certainly a proponent of change management, I know that you have to have the plans and the communication and everything. But also, inherent is that as sometimes you just have to trust your employees and know that they're, they're going to be able to roll with it, you know, because I think it was just crazy. Amazing how quickly we adapted and figured it out.
Sure. And you get those typical arguments of how do I make sure the person who's working, how do I make sure that they're being productive? You get kind of those traditional arguments of the lack of, I don't know if for lack of a better term, big brother ring that happens in the office, but I just read the books rework and remote by Jason freed and David Heinemeier Hansson, and they're the guys who started Basecamp.
And it's really about comparing at the office, here are your distractions at home, here are your distractions, they basically even out you know, and when you cut out the commute, when you cut out, you know, the trips to the watercooler at the office, you still have the same amount of productive time in your workday. Right? Have you noticed any difference in productivity on your team since going remote?
So interestingly enough, I definitely think it's ebbed and flowed. I think certain things have made it easier to work remote and other things like the collaboration, you know, before you could just run up to somebody's desk. Now you have to spend time with them. So So it's certainly ebbed and flowed, I think we're as productive as we've ever been, which is just, you know, a phenomenal
transition. I I've said this to you before, and I'll say this, you know, again, I've always believed in managing the project and not the person. And when we were in the office, I was at my desk, maybe 30 minutes a day. So truly, I had zero clue what my team was working on. Just like I don't have any clue when they're at home, right? I don't know if they're at their desk, changing
the laundry, whatever. They could be playing on Facebook at their desk, just like they could be at home, you know, not working. So if you're having those weekly check ins right to circle back and you're having those quarterly reviews and you're always talking about the project and the progress of work. I truly don't care what you're doing during the day, right? As long as the work is
moving forward. It's getting done and when we're happy with the progress our customers are happy with the progress and we're you know, meeting the budget and the timeline. At the end of the day. It shouldn't matter and I agree there's just as many distractions at the office as there are at home Oh, I read an article recently that talked about in the office that employees really only actually are able to work about four hours a day.
Yeah, I've seen something similar to that where you count lunch, you count, you know, just times where you're like, Okay, well, I've only got 20 minutes before this next meeting, I can't start, you know, the night project or something. Well, let me just mess around. And then inevitably, you go talk to somebody else. And now they're not working for that 20 minutes, you know, so it's the same situations, just a different environment, I
think. Absolutely. And so I like I said, I think our productivity has been overall the same throughout the year. But I think what I've noticed is the engagement of the team has gone up, because they manage that work life balance, so much more. I mean, of course, we all miss our families, we miss our co workers, we missed the human connection and the social interaction, but being able to just run it, throw that laundry
in or whatever. And so when your day ends, your day ends, and it's not okay, now I have to go home and do all these other things on top of it, you know, but notice that just the mindsets, the, you know, just just engagement overall, because now we're able to be more human and not you know, this work life, personal life separation.
Yeah, absolutely. You're at home, you eat your lunch, and you can go unload the dishwasher and put your lunch dishes in it, instead of having to take your dishes to work, bring them home and let them pile up. Right? Absolutely.
And again, you know, kind of what you're talking about, we've humanize this so much more. So now I don't feel bad about taking a meeting with my boss, while I'm cooking dinner, you know, or I answer the phone a little bit later, or whatever, because we recognize we all are at home, and I can have a conversation and multitask. While I'm doing that, obviously, not in every situation. But sure, you know, it just kind of makes everything
a little bit more flexible. And you know, we're able to approach things differently. Because now we can just restructure our day and what makes sense to us. And not, I have to have my button seat from nine to five, and then drive an hour home or whatever,
right. And some people just work better at different times of the day, you know, think about I know, I was this way in my 20s I would sleep into like 10 or 11 in the morning. And my best work would come at like 1am, you know, and working remote gives people that kind of that freedom and that flexibility to work when their brain is awake and works best.
Absolutely. And it's nice to because you know, you don't have that judgment of when some you know, watching when somebody walks into the office, you know, it's funny, some different companies, you'd walk in at a certain time and people are, you know, kind of giving you the side eye. And they have no idea that you were up till one o'clock in the morning or whatever the night. So I agree I'm very much a night person. I'm super creative at
night. And I appreciate now having that flexibility that if I don't want to sign on until nine in the morning, that's okay. And nobody's you know, big brother in New York checking in again, because my work is getting done. And that's, that's the nature of the conversation not about what time I'm working, how many hours I'm putting in, but what the work is doing and the customer satisfaction at the end of the day?
Absolutely. So from your professional opinion in OD. How do we keep this remote work momentum going? How do we prevent everything from just going alright, be here at 9am On Monday, the day after the vaccine comes out? Right?
You know, that's that's definitely I think the question of the hour, a lot of us are having that, you know, what is this look like when this is over? And I don't think that too many companies will go back to that, because I think most people have found that this is successful. But I think that it's something you have to start talking about now with leadership and understanding
what employees want. For instance, we're in our poll survey this past summer, we actually did ask, you know, if we were to go fully remote when the pandemic is over, what would you want to see? Do you want to be 100% remote, just two to three days a week, just, you know, understanding what your audience wants a little more. And we found that most people just want two to three days, you know, flexibility, they don't
want to work from home. Well, that lets us have a better conversation with senior leaders and talk about rolling out a policy that allows people to have that, you know, a little more flexibility. So I think, you know, it's checking in with your team's understanding what the actual needs and wants are. And then crafting a policy that you know, is fair for everyone. Yeah, absolutely. But the conversations have to start now.
Because if you wait till, you know, the vaccines out there or whatever, then it's too late. And now you almost have to say we'll come back into the office, and then it becomes harder to have that argument. Right? People forget Absolutely. You know, where we just came from. So yep,
yeah, no, that's really great. So my last question for you is the same one that I asked all my guests, but this lens is going to be for people who aren't very familiar with organizational development. If you had to pick one, book, magazine, TED Talk, documentary comic strip on, I don't know, some sort of media. That's a great primer for organizational development for dummies. What would that be and why?
Oh, so I think first and foremost, ATD. The Association for Talent Development is just an absolute great resource for somebody who wants to get started in this field. Whether you're a member or not, you can definitely access some of the art articles and content, they have some great competency models just to kind of start you thinking and kind of introduce you into what it takes to be successful in the
field. And then from there, you can certainly purchase, you know, content, more formal learning certification programs to dive a little bit deeper into the content, professional organizations are starting to emerge in the in the OD field. So od network is also a great resource to get started very similar to an ATD. But it's very odd centered, whereas ATD can start to get more into learning and development as well.
Sure. Great. Well, we'll share the links to those in the show notes so that you guys can all check it out. And thank you, Jen, so much for being on this episode.
Absolutely. It's such a pleasure to chat with you as always.
Thanks again for joining me on the BLOC. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with friends and review us on your favorite podcast platform. I hope you'll tune in again soon.