Ep. 3 The End of L&D?

Greg Arthur (00:00.311)

well but I've never ever got the name of the podcast right first time so prepare for about six attempts at trying to do an introduction this you never know this might be the day get it first time okay already I was about to fluff it okay and welcome to the product design for learning podcast which is the first time I've done this right first time and we have Toby with us

Toby Kheng (00:09.32)

I'm looking forward to it.

Greg Arthur (00:29.587)

Hello Toby. And we have landed on the fairly clickbait title of The End of L &D. So Toby, in 60 seconds to start us off and make this way more engaging than some sort of clickbait nonsense, what has made you come to that conclusion that the end of L &D question mark for those listening is potentially a thing?

Toby Kheng (00:59.466)

14 years in L &D, think, is pretty much testament to that. Delivering products and services from an L &D perspective only seeks to really validate L &D's existence rather than designing things that the companies actually need to improve employee engagement and productivity and in turn make the company more revenue, more money, more profit, all those kinds of things. So what ultimately needs to happen is that if you want to take a

Greg Arthur (01:01.42)

You

Toby Kheng (01:28.094)

holistic approach to product and service design for employees, you kind of need to break down the silos of recruitment, internal communications, L &D. I mean, L &D and internal communications are always kind of this Venn diagram, which causes a little bit of friction, certainly in large corporate. So ultimately, to make any of this product design, human centered design stuff work properly, I think you probably just need to get rid of those silos and have a holistic employee experience design strategy.

Greg Arthur (01:53.454)

Yeah, and that makes perfect sense. And that doesn't sound in any way like, I if it's in a bad way, it doesn't sound groundbreaking. Do you know what mean? It just sounds logical and sensible. And I'm sure there are probably people doing it somewhere in some shape or form. There's probably also a lot of people, which I'm sure we've both worked with, that say they're doing it.

and then you get under the hood of it and they are not doing it at all. So when we were talking about this last time when we were kind of setting up the podcast I was wondering is this more an evolution of L &D or are you thinking about something that is fundamentally completely different to how we view it now?

Toby Kheng (02:34.44)

Well, the clickbait nature says it's going to be burnt to the ground and rebuilt anew. It probably isn't. It probably is an evolution, right? That if we looked at product and service design for customer experience, like that doesn't stick itself into a pigeonhole of, it's this thing. Whereas product and service design from an L &D perspective does. And it's like the thing that inhibits that is the very structure of a HR team. So I think the skills that we are

Greg Arthur (02:45.793)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (02:51.061)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (02:59.821)

Hmm.

Toby Kheng (03:04.36)

developing, acquiring, and stuff in L &D will just be re-appropriated to employee product and service design. think it fits really nicely when we look at human-centered design, the double diamond, all that design thinking, all these buzzwords fit quite nicely into product and service design because they've already been applied in that world for a customer. So if we take that for an employee, then you start actually designing a human resources function that looks very much like a...

like the rest of the business, it has sales, has marketing, it has customer success, it has product and service design. Even those four pillars, right, transform how you think about employee engagement and HR as a broader thing that learning development sits within. And learning development maps into that. Internal communications maps into that. So does recruitment. But you shift the skills and the knowledge and the approaches to be something more akin to what happens in the rest of the business.

Greg Arthur (03:34.432)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (03:45.804)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (04:00.008)

guess what? The rest of the business has learned how to measure those things as well. So it's like, well, let's just transpose some of that stuff over to HR and L &D and then transpose some of the L &D stuff into that model as well and combine this kind of Frankenstein approach which is halfway business, halfway HR and jobs are good.

Greg Arthur (04:13.963)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (04:18.252)

I mean, just to use your little move there, because I thought it was quite fun. Customers equal cash. And that is also cash in and out. And also cash, not cash, customers that are internal and external. So if you look at learning like your customers are the other employees, it could also potentially be your customers if you're trying to help them understand what your product is, but then that kind of blows into sales. But either way, you still got to try and hook them. So your...

internal employees can still be sitting there thinking there is this you know whatever the version of their learning offer is internally but they can still very much just turn around and go I'm going to look at everything that is over here that is that is not internal and I will still get the same things and it's probably going to be better as in it's designed for an external customer so they're probably choosing to pay for it or they're getting their company to pay for it but it's not the thing that has been made internally.

So like when we're talking about customers equal cash is that kind of move. I think and again I'm sure you've heard this about the last. I'm going to say 10 years it might be a little bit longer than that might be a little bit less than that. Over the last 10 years I've heard people saying learning needs to take a nod from and then insert industry here. So it's usually been things like marketing or it's been things like.

real commercial operations or at the moment we're talking about product design or something we're talking about product design but then they never really do it or they never really adopt it fully and what you're saying is don't just pick one or the other or pick one that you kind of really have a focus on right now take all of them and bang them all into this big melting pot because you've still got a cell to your

customers, you've still got to hook them, you've still got to retain them, you've still got to service them with a good product or service and if you don't it's so easy for them just to go somewhere else and then one of things that I used say to people I worked with was what is the point in us turning up every day? And not in a flippant like I'm off down the park like it was more of a if we're turning up and we're getting paid to be here whilst there is an element of I'm turning up to be here to get paid to pay my bills

Greg Arthur (06:35.071)

But there is also, I'm choosing to do this job because I'm good at it and I really like it and we can do, we've got the opportunity to do something really interesting. Rather than I am just turning up, I hate my job, it's paying the bills and as soon as I clock off I don't even think about it. Yeah, I find that mad that that does seem to be how people view L &D as in when they're there like, this is great and then they leave and there's no...

consideration as to how this how this works or could work.

Toby Kheng (07:07.924)

Well, everything L &D does sits within human resources quite broadly. There are some organisations where it doesn't, but quite broadly it sits within human resources, people function if they've changed their name in recent years. But what that kind of department looks after is everything an employee feels, feels and touches that isn't the work and the leaders essentially. So it's that department's opportunity

Greg Arthur (07:15.435)

Mhm.

Toby Kheng (07:36.52)

and responsibility to be able to offer a seamless end-to-end employee experience. And the whole structure of HR just does not enable that to happen. So it's not a criticism of L &D, but when L &D says, let's use marketing, let's use sales techniques, let's use commercial acumen to protect our own viability within organization, that's kind of hypocritical because you're kind of, you are doubling down on creating a silo or...

Greg Arthur (07:47.251)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (08:02.975)

Mm-hmm.

Toby Kheng (08:04.49)

But what might happen is that L &D supersedes HR and then HR sits under L &D. Now that would be a very, very crazy world. But if you look at learning technologies as an example at the Excel last year, it had like a little bit of HR technologies bolted onto the slide. Like 90 % learning technologies and 10 % HR technologies. Like this feels like it's kind of the wrong way round because...

Greg Arthur (08:11.593)

Mm-mm. Yes, it would be.

Greg Arthur (08:21.438)

Yes.

Greg Arthur (08:31.422)

But is that more because that is an event that is historically focused at learning? in they, like it's not that, and again I could be wrong, maybe we should get Big Don on and ask him, but like is that a case of like we just focus on learning people, so that's our deal, but by the way you guys should also maybe think about this, rather than this is the hierarchy. I don't know.

Toby Kheng (08:59.934)

Yeah. But it feel, you know, when I go to HR events, there certainly isn't like an L and D bolt on, if that makes sense. It's considered as like a holistic part of that function. So this is where, like, you know, and then we get things like RecFest, for example, which are obviously the same, but like RecFest doesn't have like a little HR tent bolted on. Or actually, it might do, let us know.

Greg Arthur (09:14.793)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (09:25.618)

in the comments, we're not live streaming. it might, you know, as this bolt on where it's like recruitment, internal comms and branding, employee brand, L and D all report into this function. So, you you then kind of got to look to people, guess, CIPD, they kind of go, well, you're ultimately responsible as an industry body for defining how all these departments work together. And clearly they're not working together. They're working to validate their own existence.

Greg Arthur (09:26.622)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (09:43.367)

Mm-hmm.

Toby Kheng (09:54.666)

How do we make them all work together but to create this seamless end-to-end employee experience? And I think just no one's really sat down and thought about it before because the framework of HR, L &D, and all the facets around it have been tried, tested, implemented the same way for the past 30 or 40 years. Yeah, there's a little bit of human design in L &D. Yeah, there's a bit of marketing. But it's not necessarily transforming what it's doing. It is...

Greg Arthur (09:59.933)

Mm-mm.

Greg Arthur (10:08.872)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (10:20.06)

it is kind of just incremental change rather than the systemic change that's probably needed.

Greg Arthur (10:22.824)

Yeah, yeah. So we talk a lot about, you and I talk a lot about product design, service design, and I'm sure we talk to our clients about this a lot as well. And this is very geared up towards, at least for my end, is more geared towards learning products, but not coming at it with like an ad or whatever.

whatever process someone feels like they should or shouldn't be following. I'm not going to start bagging on all the different processes. That's a whole other episode. But then some clients we work with love it. kind of, get very excited by the fact that we're talking about real life products. Like we usually use an iPhone as an example and say, you know, know exactly what it is. You know exactly what the benefits are. And all I've said is the name of it. Like, so it's been designed very well, but it's also to your earlier point, it's been marketed very well.

to the point where my mum for example doesn't need an iPhone. She doesn't need a phone or a little computer in her pocket that is that powerful. Yet she's got one. Like, it's not for her. Like, she makes calls, she maybe can send a message every now and then and that's about it. Like, it's completely wasted. But again, because of the marketing, because of the commercial aspect, they've done really well. So when we bring all this back down to...

consumer product design and how outside of L &D that works really really well in most cases. What is the disconnect that L &D has now with everything that sits outside of it? What is the overall kind of high level top level problems it has and does it matter if there's a disconnect?

Toby Kheng (12:05.546)

Well, I think your iPhone example is quite an interesting one to leverage there because if you have an iPhone and you're not, let's say, using the App Store, then Apple might be going, there's a huge amount of users not using the App Store. Maybe we should send them an email to make sure they use the App Store. So that kind of transcends itself inside an organisation where it's like, we created this learning product and we've got 30 % adoption.

Greg Arthur (12:12.251)

Eh-heh.

Greg Arthur (12:16.348)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (12:23.271)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (12:31.804)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (12:35.082)

but 70 % aren't using it. How do we get the 70 % of people that aren't using it to using it? you suggest that the 70 % aren't using it because they don't need it or want it. It's not about marketing it in that regard. It's like, actually, it's just a functional feature they don't want. And I think this catch-all approach with L &D tends to kind of go, OK, we've designed an amazing thing.

Greg Arthur (12:43.511)

coming.

Toby Kheng (12:58.726)

technology providers are really good at this is like, the learning experience platform is so good. It's so ubiquitous that every single employee in your company will want to use it. I highly doubt that because that's like saying I've invented a phone and it's so ubiquitous that every single person on planet is going to have exactly the same phone. That hasn't happened. mean, it's close, but it hasn't happened. Exactly right. But there's that opportunity for choice. What L &D invariably does is

Greg Arthur (13:08.241)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (13:18.093)

Yeah, yeah, and it's between two of them basically.

Greg Arthur (13:25.446)

Yes.

Toby Kheng (13:28.038)

It doesn't offer choice. It offers one solution and tries to market that really heavily. You say, this is the answer, this is the answer, this is the answer. And it's like, yeah, but is it? Like, is it the thing that everybody needs? It could be, like I say, a section of your people need it, but others might not. So design something else.

Greg Arthur (13:42.076)

Yes, and this is the thing, so like I don't disagree with any of that to be fair, is we go back to the phone example where there are two major phone providers that are, the blitz coming up, I'm not sure why, there are two major providers for mobile phones that people use, these little supercomputers we've all got in our pockets and run our lives by. Again, to take that analogy even further, when we talk to people about an iPhone is we always say,

straight out of the box, everyone's got the same phone. As soon as you turn it on and choose your language, you're then narrowing that funnel down. As soon as you then put your phone wallpaper to, you know, photo of you and whoever or whatever it's going to be, then it's unique to you. Then as soon as you start customizing it even further, it is so far removed from everyone else's phone because it's just yours. You've personalized it to that point. But ultimately, anyone else that has that,

can probably navigate your phone super easily and figure stuff out and it just works. So like there was a really lovely user experience that goes with it. It's been designed really well. So with technology platforms that are in learning, it does feel like they're saying it's one solution for everybody and there's very minimal customization or none. And I don't think...

It's the technology providers fault to a degree purely because I don't think people are telling them what they need to know. In my opinion.

Toby Kheng (15:16.074)

Yeah, where's the where's the user insight that tells you to validate or disprove that, you know, that hypothesis? It probably doesn't exist with that organization, right? The I mean, if we look at the old I don't know how long it's been since Netflix in I'm going to do inverted commas. Netflix in learning was the things like. Well, there's a couple of things that way you can't really transpose the consumer grade experience of Netflix to learning or just employee experience more broadly, because number one.

Greg Arthur (15:23.301)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (15:38.246)

Hmm.

Toby Kheng (15:44.596)

There are hundreds of thousands of millions of pounds spent on the quality of that content. I highly doubt that any organization is spending that amount of money putting that level of production quality on their internal content. Maybe they should, but they're not. And then to your point, there's that hyper-personalization that my Netflix account looks very different to your Netflix account. I can say that with some substance, right? But that's built off, you know, data, insight, and the opportunity for personalization.

Greg Arthur (15:56.773)

Hmm.

Greg Arthur (16:04.037)

Yes.

Toby Kheng (16:13.584)

with high quality content. think when you consider Netflix for learning, it's like, okay, how do we personalize the experience? It's like, well, you can't really try and replicate Netflix because Netflix is a library of thousands of films and TV shows that have had millions of pounds spent on them. like, are you telling me your learning content is as compelling as like The Office or Game of Thrones? Because I don't think it is.

Greg Arthur (16:30.15)

Also...

Greg Arthur (16:35.95)

Yeah, but also it's got a shed tonne data that is constantly updating itself on based on what everyone else that is similar or like you or has watched similar things to you based on whatever information you've given it. So the things you mentioned here about personalisation, personalisation data, there's something else you mentioned about, and choice, like...

These are all the things that we talk about in L &D and there is a data episode which I think has just come out before your one where we talk about how much is enough when you've got enough data to be able to move on and like think about things. At the moment we say all these things about data and personalization and then we just go but you're gonna sit within this tiny little box and it looks the same box and everyone's got the same box, good day. Like that feels a bit shit.

Toby Kheng (17:28.49)

Well, and this is the thing, right? Is that most of what most of the data that HR and D team gathers is based on surveys or it might be interviews and focus groups as part of the human set design process. But a lot of that isn't well surveys. Let's not do a whole podcast about service because that would probably be something else. Right. But low uptake, low quality. They just don't really work for the majority interviews, focus groups, observations and stuff are great.

Greg Arthur (17:39.459)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (17:51.716)

you

Toby Kheng (17:56.574)

but they're actually quite high input to then to do. So to implement those on a project by project basis can be quite difficult for an internal team to do. So what you need to be able to do is be getting good quality data and insight just as part of your operating model. Now, if you just look at it through an L and D lens, that's an extremely limited amount of data that you're trying to design product from. But if you expand it out to HR, recruitment, brand,

Greg Arthur (18:12.644)

Yes.

Toby Kheng (18:24.68)

brand awareness, employer brand, internal communications, off-boarding, alumni networks. If you look at that holistic customer data, then all of a sudden you have way more insight to go at. But recruitment has its data over here, internal comms has its data over here, MD has its data over here. it's like, those aren't built into a holistic kind of CRM, essentially, is what you need to be able to understand what your customers are doing, saying, behaving.

Greg Arthur (18:26.477)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (18:38.083)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (18:42.926)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (18:48.227)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (18:52.722)

all that kind of stuff as just a part of BAU, which is why I don't disagree that human-centered design and learning could be valuable, but I think it could be even more valuable if it was a holistic approach where you were just capturing human insight as part of your operating model. And then you can go and do some focus groups and interviews to add more to that. But the problem is, is most start from the base and go, well, let's do surveys, interviews, and focus groups and observations because there's no data there.

Greg Arthur (18:55.118)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (19:08.803)

Yes.

Greg Arthur (19:13.497)

Yes.

Toby Kheng (19:22.196)

There's a lot of data. It's just not all stitched together telling stories.

Greg Arthur (19:25.573)

Well this is it and I think that's where there's a bit of a catch-22 so like if someone's listening to this going I agree with everything you're saying Toby we want this kind of universal data-driven picture on you as an individual because we want to market our thing to you but I can't go and get that because that team won't give it to me or this team use a different tool to that team to that team to that team so I'm now going to get

four or five different sets of data all in different formats plus my own. I'm going to spend more time doing that by the time I've reconciled all of that it's all changed anyway because you've had a different experience you've gone on holiday and seen something or you've changed your mind or life has just moved on. I do feel for people when they go this is this is all we've got so we've got to start somewhere so I appreciate you know there is an element of having a crack at it.

But like, when you look at like, so when we've done learning programs for people that talk about consumer driven products and how they're gonna do marketing, that kind of thing, and they talk about the customer life cycle, and it's going from like no awareness at all to being aware to how they might interact with it. So then being like a brand ambassador or a poster child of, you I use this product all the time and it's great for these reasons.

Toby Kheng (20:28.607)

Hmm.

Greg Arthur (20:45.407)

All of that's great, but sometimes it's learning people saying to us this is what we need to, you know, need have an infographic on this customer, wherever it is, customer journey. And then you talk to them about their learning that they would like and it's like can you stick this in a PowerPoint or something? And we're like, is that, are these two things relatable? And obviously they're not, but so they know it, but I don't know how...

I don't know where the disconnect is for people not to understand that we're doing this all the time anyway. Like we're giving our data away, we're giving our opinions away. If we just go on social media and say, like this, I hate that, I put this hashtag, whatever it's going to be, that's a data point. Like...

Toby Kheng (21:31.498)

Well, and I spoke to someone the other day and they recommended like, so they've been doing sentiment analysis about their employer on Reddit. I was like, wow. And he's like, yeah, we explored the name of the company, I won't say, but they looked at the company data, the threads that people were talking about training at this company. And there was Reddit threads about it. Reams and reams and reams of comments. He's a quite large organization. know, do a bit of sentiment analysis using AI. And all of a sudden,

Greg Arthur (21:31.917)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (21:38.922)

Greg Arthur (21:55.148)

not.

Toby Kheng (22:01.564)

you've got a whole bank of data there. So the problem is, I think, is that we kind of neglect to appreciate the other points, right? So what we've done in the past is we've looked at Glassdoor, LinkedIn, and then financial metrics are available and made stories out of those. And we've told stories about what the employee experience and organization is like with every even talking to the company. And then we kind of go to them say, hey, this is the information we've got here.

Greg Arthur (22:09.986)

Yes.

Greg Arthur (22:25.857)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (22:29.674)

Imagine what we could do if we could actually talk to you and get your own data, that would be incredible. But to your point, and this is the thing, right? So the last project that we did, we managed to get everyone in the room, recruitment, HR, BPs, L and D, benefit and benefit comp. The only one we didn't have in there was internal communications. And then we had the HR director as well. And all of a sudden,

Greg Arthur (22:31.331)

Yes. Yes, yeah, yeah. But the thing is they're not even talking to each other within that company though.

Toby Kheng (22:58.518)

the light bulbs are going off in the room, because it's like, I didn't know that was that. I didn't know that was there. I didn't know this. And it's like, it is just bringing all these people together to be aware of what that, well, two things, what the data ecosystem looks like and what the user journey looks like end to end. Because you're building a bottom dollar. If you had a fuller understanding of that, you probably could drop some of the stuff you're designing, because you're like, that's kind of covered elsewhere. Or it's already on another team's radar, and they're already measuring it.

Greg Arthur (23:01.761)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (23:22.593)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (23:27.942)

this is, and you're completely right, this is easier in smaller organisations because there are less people, less stakeholders, all that kind of stuff. If we look at some of the largest employers in the UK, it probably is impossible because there are so many people to consider in that that it's really, really difficult. I can't live with myself to say it is actually impossible, but what you need is HR strategy.

Greg Arthur (23:32.855)

Yes, 100%.

Greg Arthur (23:43.917)

Is it?

Toby Kheng (23:56.66)

people strategy to drive that because L and D is going to really struggle to drive that by itself when all the other functions are operating from a point of self validation against a typical HR strategy. you know, L and D is probably going to die off and be reborn into something else. But that's only if you've got all the other components doing the same, because if all the other components aren't doing the same, then it will just stay as is.

Greg Arthur (23:57.473)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (24:07.842)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (24:14.615)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (24:19.544)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (24:23.031)

So you mentioned this is probably impossible in bigger companies. Now, just going to on a slight tangent. Regardless whatever your thoughts are on Elon Musk, especially at the moment, we're not going to get into that. If you just think of him as clever rich man, that's all he is really, if you boil him right down. Clever rich man who...

who decided I'm going to make a spaceship company or bought into a spaceship company and then started flying these spaceships around and then started putting real people on these spaceships and then on the the other side of that table is NASA who've been doing this for much much longer way more information way more experience and now I'm sure so the other week there's the the the two people that are stuck up in the space station so they're using a SpaceX rocket

to go and get them. So Clever Rich Man has just turned up and gone, I've a at that. If this is the world we're living in right now, it blows my tiny little mind that you can't get an HR director, an L &D director who will work in the same company.

who all have each other's email address, who are all largely on the same team to go, we're here to make sure this company does whatever that company's there to do. Can't just all sit in the room and go, should we all just be pals and like maybe just share information? Because clever rich man is going, you don't even know about me, but now we're doing something together, like mental.

Toby Kheng (25:51.914)

It goes back to the point that each department with a company, and this sits outside of L and D and HR as well, this is just companies in general, that the whole framework of organization only seeks to validate each individual's existence and your performance reviews, job descriptions, all of this thing. What you're expected to do is validate your existence with that company and no more. And maybe you exceed expectations every couple of years or whatever, right? But the...

Greg Arthur (26:19.981)

love it when I exceed expectations.

Toby Kheng (26:20.624)

Everyone, everyone, everyone benefits. Everyone benefits from just being exactly what they're supposed to be. And so if you try and stray from that lane, there's no remuneration or incentive to do that. Regardless if your CEO or leader says they want entrepreneurs. Like that's not a thing. That doesn't make any sense because no organization is set up to to accept those. I know because in the past few organizations I've been, I've tried to be an entrepreneur and nobody wants it because like, no, I need you to do what your

Greg Arthur (26:27.703)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (26:38.763)

No.

Toby Kheng (26:50.312)

box says you do. So which one do you want then? You can't have both. But you can have loads of entrepreneurs and loads of people stuck in their box. those two things are almost diametrically opposed. It doesn't quite make sense. So the very fabric of an organization just makes you do the same thing over and over again, particularly in large organizations, startups, of course, by their very nature are completely different.

Greg Arthur (26:51.351)

Yes. Yeah.

Greg Arthur (26:56.013)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (27:02.145)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (27:08.703)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (27:17.408)

But, but, but, yeah, of course. But then like, I can't remember the exact quotes, but isn't like madness is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. So like, if people are still, so, and again, I'm sure there's a lot of people that are probably at a point now in L &D, wherever their first job, a millionaire's in, whatever job they're in, could all largely agree, they don't like the phrase, well, this is how we've always done it.

Toby Kheng (27:28.573)

Exactly.

Greg Arthur (27:47.336)

And that grinds their gear, it grinds my gears, when you kind of speak to them and go, well, why isn't this working? go, it's how we've always done it. And you're like, is it, should it be? then, but then yet, to your point, companies are saying, well, let's be entrepreneurs, let's do this, let's do that. But then they revert back to, well, this is how we've always done it. This role has always done this, because this role does this and this role does that.

I don't think it's a bigger shift or as bigger shift as people are thinking it will be to take a model like yours and say get them in a room and figure this out so then you either stop duplicating things or you start sharing the things that matter like data and then yeah you can just kind of get on with it so like you mentioned about L &D being in a bubble which I think is the same for a lot of industries but I don't think

L &D is the only problem. Where is it a problem? Well, it has a problem. But two questions on that actually. Otherwise I'll keep banging on about Elon Musk sending rockets up. So two questions. So the first one is why is L &D at risk if it continues in this way?

in this kind of bubble doing what it's doing, little things can't be good. And then also if you give me an example like so say we had a client saying I'd like a leadership program. L &D client comes to you, I'd like a leadership program for this many leaders, just a generic every day, we want some people to be leaders, best put on the program. What would your sales pitch be to them about working with other departments? How do you convince them that...

This isn't an only L &D thing. It's wider.

Toby Kheng (29:40.298)

So the first question, think the issue I partake with L &D is that it is probably the one department that is doing more innovation, understands more technology more, understands human behaviour more. It has this just a way better understanding of what it does than I think the other components within HR. Now that's in itself a problem.

Greg Arthur (30:04.02)

Mm-hmm.

Toby Kheng (30:08.232)

because L &D struts around the business going, aren't we fantastic? We're amazing. We do lots of cool stuff and you're all rubbish. I know it's not exactly like that, but that's how it can be perceived, right? especially with internal comms, the amount of projects have been on and internal comms have been like a thorn in the side. And it's like, actually, they should be your biggest partner in this. But why they're the biggest on the side is because A, you're trying to take a slice of their pie and B, you're trying to tell them what to do. And it's like,

Greg Arthur (30:14.676)

Yep.

Greg Arthur (30:23.688)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (30:33.023)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (30:36.138)

You haven't really brought them on the journey to bring them onto that. And it's like, well, they should be doing this. It's like, maybe they should. But like, either you can rise above and lead, you know, the strategic direction of your whole HR people department, or you can just sit there and complain about it and go, they're not as innovative, they're not doing that right kind of stuff. They're the two worlds you can live in really, or your HRD comes in and restructures everything and all that kind of stuff, which is

Greg Arthur (30:39.509)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (30:52.063)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (30:59.413)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (31:04.778)

kind of the world I want to work in. So that's the first question. The second question, we want a leadership program designed for X, Y, and Z, blah, blah, blah.

I'd probably just say no. This is why, you know, with Emily I've set up for eFormers is that I was always in organizations that would just say yes. And I was never empowered to say no because like, I'm not, you know, who's going to turn down X amount of thousands of pounds to do exactly what you've done in the past? No company's ever going to turn that down. In fact, it was one of the reasons I have left companies is like, you've just accepted money to deliver a program that no one here believes in.

Greg Arthur (31:30.066)

Mm-hmm.

Toby Kheng (31:47.06)

That has happened to every organisation I have been at. You've accepted money to deliver something you don't believe in. Great. So why are we here then? This makes no sense. You're just perpetuating the status quo. I don't want to perpetuate the status quo, so I'm actively going to say no to that kind of stuff. Now, does it make me loads of money? Absolutely not. It does the opposite, but it helps me find the...

Greg Arthur (31:50.782)

That's a big statement.

Greg Arthur (32:02.96)

huh.

Toby Kheng (32:12.446)

HRDs, the CPOs that are innovating that want to take a different approach and work with them. And invariably, that is at smaller organizations because what happens now, I don't talk to HR, L and D, I talk to business owners. I talk to business owners about this and go, okay, you have now 50, 100, 150, 200 people and you don't really have a HR department. Maybe you have maybe one or two people or fractional HR support looking after you. But actually, this is the world.

Greg Arthur (32:16.284)

Mm-hmm. Yep.

Toby Kheng (32:42.128)

you should design for your employees. This is how you should set up a strategic approach. And of course to them it makes sense because I talk about sales, marketing, customer success, product and service design, a language they already know. And we're going to measure the employee experience the same way you measure your customer experience. Like you say, it just is common sense, but you're unable to build that world in those small to medium businesses. In large organizations, not necessarily actively trying to work with companies that doing what you said because...

Greg Arthur (32:43.73)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (32:50.053)

Yeah. Yeah.

Greg Arthur (32:58.589)

Mm-hmm.

Toby Kheng (33:09.63)

they're not going to do what I want to do. And there's 101 companies that will design leadership programs for those companies. And that's fine. But there'll be people like you that do it way better than most as well, right? So this is the kicker is that not that you operate in this halfway house, but you're designing the very best thing that the system will allow you to design.

Greg Arthur (33:15.516)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (33:30.709)

This is the thing and I don't disagree. think there's think there's nuances so I love I love the the vision I Just felt the vision is is Sorry, the vision is big and I love the vision. There you go. There's some hearts popping up now I'm not entirely sure why screens during this But then the vision is big but then like the pool of people that are ready to get on board with it is Is so small

Toby Kheng (33:47.432)

Yeah. You love that. You literally love the vision. I love that.

Greg Arthur (33:59.963)

I feel like there is a, I think almost like a halfway house of saying, if you want a leadership program, first you're to do it anyway. Like whether it's me doing it or someone that you're going to do it anyway. But then I think there's, there's a whole load more steps in terms of service design and process design and products. ultimately to be able to say, why do you think you need a leadership program? What are you trying to get out of this? And then starting to think about

where would you even start with this? Like who are these people? What does leadership in this organization look like? Because every company needs a version of leaders but then every company might need its own unique version of leaders. I think going on this generic version of leadership development that people send their employees on at the moment is just pointless. I've never really seen a good leadership development program that's been any more than

it's got some great branding. It's like, okay, but what are they doing about it? How many people that have been on that program, can you now tell me, are good leaders because of that? Or are they just good eggs that go on a bad program?

Toby Kheng (35:10.932)

Well, I think that there's two factors at play. there's one, I just go back to the, I'm not gonna say approach to data, but certainly approach of impact measurement. We talked about this, right? A couple of years ago, delivered an onboarding program that was a three hour webinar on people's first day. What were the key measures of success? Attrition and brand advocacy. Like, are you really gonna try and link three hours on someone's first day to attrition? Like.

Greg Arthur (35:21.691)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (35:28.742)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (35:37.99)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (35:39.634)

The data is probably, the data is telling you, or imagine the data would tell you, that actually the dip in brand advocacy happens at about six, maybe 12 months. So what's happening then when the brand advocacy dips that causes people to leave? Because it probably, isn't, all you're doing on someone's first day is like validating their purchase. Hey, well done, you've made a great purchase. Welcome to the company. Isn't the company great? I'm not saying that that's necessarily.

Greg Arthur (35:50.182)

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Greg Arthur (35:55.345)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (36:01.626)

Mmm. Yes.

Toby Kheng (36:08.531)

an important part of the journey, but it certainly isn't going to fix attrition. highly doubt

Greg Arthur (36:12.525)

Only unless they had lots of first-day queers. Like, and that was a reason for doing it. I... Sorry to cut you off.

Toby Kheng (36:15.838)

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But they're not, right? The data wasn't saying, everyone has such a rubbish first day at this organization that they leave. Because if you had a rubbish first day, you'd leave within a really bad first day. You would leave in the first day, the first week. You wouldn't even make it past probation. But people were making it past probation, right? So is the issue the first day? Should you be spending vast amounts of time and resource on that? Probably not. But I think you're empowered there with the data to have that.

Greg Arthur (36:27.898)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (36:33.977)

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Greg Arthur (36:47.951)

Mm-hmm.

Toby Kheng (36:49.744)

any project that we start, because induction is a huge part of what we do, is like, let's just do, let's just dig into the data. Let's dig into the data and see what the data is telling us. We want to talk to your people. We want to uncover user insight. Absolutely. But let's dig into the data and see what the data is telling us first so we know where to target our user insight, rather than going, let's map the whole user journey through focus groups, interviews, observations, and surveys from the moment someone applies to a job to them.

Greg Arthur (36:56.634)

Yes.

Greg Arthur (37:08.09)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (37:15.662)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (37:18.686)

to end of the first 12 months. Well, that is a huge project to do. Also, your department should be just capturing data about what that user journey is like anyway, but it might not be. But what can we do? What data can we get, bring together, tell us a story of what this could be like? And...

Greg Arthur (37:20.623)

Yes. Yeah.

Greg Arthur (37:28.581)

Absolutely.

Greg Arthur (37:36.972)

And I think to this point is where you kind of almost bring back this like consumer journey model. So like if you're an impulse buyer, you're still going through the same journey. You're just doing it in a much, much shorter timeframe. So like you see it, you kind of go, yeah, that's for me for whatever reason. You buy it, then you get it. Then you even make a decision there and then, or fairly quickly from impulse buyer about.

Toby Kheng (37:43.327)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (38:03.931)

did this satisfy my need or solve my problem, whatever it's going to be. And then you have potential brand advocacy or you just move on to something else because you're an impulse buyer. And if not, you're maybe the person that takes a little bit longer to think about what is it I need? What problem do I have? Or do I just have a little bit of cash to burn or a bit of time to burn or whatever it's going to be, or a space to fill in my life, whatever it's going to be. And you go through this process. When you're joining a job and it's an onboarding program,

that onboarding that first day is pre-looted by a bunch of interviews, probably a load of research you've done on the company, maybe a couple of other job offers, or maybe some sort of promise around what the future might hold. Day one is purely just like the middle of this whole period, that kind of consumer journey period where you're going, I've made some decisions and fans out some information. Day one is just where

Reality hits a little bit as in I'm not I'm not looking from the outside anymore. I'm now on the inside looking in But I don't know if many people really make their decision based on day one There's maybe nice to make sure you've had a nice first day because it's super nerve-racking anyway But other than just going it's okay We're not we don't expect you to like, you know fix the world on day one just some sort of reassurance that's probably all you're really looking for on day one is come back tomorrow like

Toby Kheng (39:19.444)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (39:31.774)

This is where LinkedIn is really interesting, right? Because this is a data source that broadly ignored, right? Is that people, it's not within our ecosystem. It's like it totally is within your ecosystem. Glassdoor is in the new ecosystem. So is Indeed. Like it is in within your ecosystem. Whether you're in L &D, recruitment or whatever, it doesn't matter. It is in your ecosystem. Sorry, I got quite very matter of fact there. I'll try and be more jovial.

Greg Arthur (39:38.498)

Why though? Why is it ignored?

Greg Arthur (39:45.806)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (39:51.096)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (39:55.949)

No.

Greg Arthur (39:59.318)

No, no, hit me.

Toby Kheng (40:00.478)

But people on their first day snap a picture of like the mug or the chocolate or whatever that they got given on the first day. here's me outside this building. Great first day, blah, blah. like LinkedIn data is a really good indicator of like, what are people saying and doing on their first day? Because you don't need to go and ask them. They're probably posting about it on social media.

Greg Arthur (40:04.953)

Greg Arthur (40:17.668)

But is it like the whole Instagram vs reality thing? feel like LinkedIn is very much becoming like work version of Instagram like, isn't it great I got a notebook today and they're like and then like they don't use that notebook ever.

Toby Kheng (40:32.378)

But they were so inclined to do it. that as an indicator is good, but what you'll see over time, because I've seen it this week, someone in my network has started a job. Photos, photos, photos, photos, photos. What will invariably happen? Bam, it'll drop off. That's when reality hits, when they stop posting about how great it is to work there. That's the reality. Because at the moment, they've got the nicest possible way. They've not got enough work to do, maybe. They've got the freedom where they're

Greg Arthur (40:43.865)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (40:48.526)

Yeah. Yeah.

Greg Arthur (40:59.063)

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Toby Kheng (41:01.694)

They're open, they're curious, they're exploring. I can take selfies in front of buildings and say I've met this person because that's the whole onboarding journey is just about networking within your organization and meeting new people. Once those posts stop, that's when reality set in. What's happening now? Why are you not posting about your employer on LinkedIn anymore? Then go to them and say, because obviously we've crafted a really great experience for you for your first three months because you've posted about on social media a hell of a lot.

Greg Arthur (41:11.523)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (41:28.258)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (41:29.182)

But then what happened after three months? I had a lot of meetings in my diary and all the blah, Like, okay, cool, tell me more about this stuff now, because all of a sudden, you're not necessarily as fulfilled in your work because you've now been part of the grind. What's that variance like? And how does that differ to your expectations?

Greg Arthur (41:35.246)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (41:42.638)

Yes.

So that, and this is it. So this going back to the consumer journey thing is where if you're at the kind of the later stages of that consumer journey, you've got the product or you've used the service or whatever it is. In this instance, it's you've started the job, you're doing the job.

you've had it for a little while, you kind of know what real life is like with it. It's like when someone says you can test drive a car for the weekend rather than just that 10 minutes around the block with the salesman. You kind of see what it's like in your real life rather than when they go, this road's really nice and you can go a little bit faster and there's no cameras. What's it like when there are cameras and you are sat in traffic and your dog wants to get in and your kids are screaming, like, is that car still nice? That's like the latest stages of this analogy. So like,

Will you be a brand advocate and continue to post and go, this is still great. Yes, it can be a bit busy, but that's part of the job and I really enjoy it and that's what I joined for. Or is it, geez man, like this is not, this is not what I signed up for. Like I'm just busy and I'm just getting on with it. Like no one needs, no one wants to read that post on LinkedIn. Hi guys, this week I just did some work and it was fine.

Cheers. what kind of a, no one's going to engage with that apart from going, yeah, me too. Yeah, probably.

Toby Kheng (43:08.106)

That's interesting then because like, so not every employee is going to post about their job all of the time. Obviously that's the case, right? But who are posting, when are they posting and what about becomes really interesting. And also what are they like as a percentage of the entire population of people on LinkedIn from your company? Because even that is like, even as a metric, right? 20 % of our employees talk about us on LinkedIn. Last year it was only 5%. I'm like, okay, that's interesting.

Greg Arthur (43:13.431)

No.

Greg Arthur (43:19.927)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (43:32.543)

Mmm.

Toby Kheng (43:37.032)

What are they talking about? What is the sentiment? Like, what's that kind of going? If 100 % of your employees are talking about your LinkedIn, I'd be a bit worried. Well, you're probably a startup, right? That's probably where you're at. Exactly.

Greg Arthur (43:44.554)

Yeah, because there's two of you to work there. but then like but then what so I didn't post Actually until I started doing this company, I didn't really post a huge amount on LinkedIn Because I just found it again personally. I just found it a little bit cringe going. Hi guys I'm really enjoying this but also with that same token. I don't have Facebook. I don't have Instagram I'm not a big poster on other platforms. so

I'm probably not, I'm probably going to be a type of person that doesn't fall into that category of there's probably a lot of data I can give you because I was enjoying it or not or didn't post for a while because of whatever reason and it did if I was a poster but I was just kind of like across the board I just don't really post like

Toby Kheng (44:32.81)

Well, and that's absolutely fine. If you look at the five kind of key archetypes that act on social media and you were a lurker, lurker is a well defined. And that's fine. it's like, yeah, yeah. All the, you know, lurkers and trolls are like very negative terms, whereas like window shopper, the selfie, all that kind of stuff are a bit more positive.

Greg Arthur (44:40.619)

Yeah, yeah nice and creepy. Yeah, yeah, that's how live my life.

Greg Arthur (44:47.528)

Ugh.

Greg Arthur (44:51.327)

I prefer foyer, it just sounds a more like, a bit French and bit mysterious but I'll take the creepy lurker vibe, that's cool.

Toby Kheng (44:58.762)

But you account for that in analyzing the data. You know there is a percentage of employees that are lurkers on LinkedIn and not actively taking pictures and that kind of stuff. So it's like you'd never expect 100 % uptake. I think you'd barely accept 20 % to be completely honest. But what is the benchmark? And also, guess what? All your competitors' employees are probably on LinkedIn as well. So you could probably do a little bit of benchmarking and go, what is it?

Greg Arthur (45:14.721)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (45:22.121)

Mmm.

Toby Kheng (45:25.492)

Which employer in your industry is generating the most conversation on LinkedIn about that company?

Greg Arthur (45:30.476)

then also if you flip that completely what are people not saying because I can't imagine 20 % of people that are posting are gonna go on there and say this week saying really shit he happened at work and I didn't like it and they handled it really badly or I'm really against what we're doing now as a company blah blah blah and if you do it even if you feel that way

you probably wouldn't say those kind of things on LinkedIn because you're an employee.

Toby Kheng (45:59.654)

No, generally that stuff only gets said and felt and distributed once someone's left. Someone's very rarely likely to say that whilst at a company, unless there is this open culture, which I don't think anyone's ever created. Are you going to say something? Because I've done it in the past. I've said stuff that completely goes against the grain of what the company's saying. And I've had a manager direct to say to me, what gives you the right to say that? My opinion?

Greg Arthur (46:07.959)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (46:12.854)

out.

Greg Arthur (46:26.881)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (46:29.29)

Free speech is probably what gives me the right, but anyway, obviously we don't have that here. So, but what does happen is that then translates itself into something like Glassdoor and the Glassdoor everyone will say, it was just a disgruntled employee. was like, that's just, that's just a cop out because every company in the world is now reviewed in the same kind of way as an employer, but also as a customer. got, know, TripAdvisor, Trustpilot, Google reviews, like no one, no customer facing brand goes,

Greg Arthur (46:29.302)

Yeah?

Greg Arthur (46:39.285)

Yes.

Greg Arthur (46:48.812)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (46:55.145)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (46:59.624)

well, we've got bad reviews just because of disgruntled customers. I was like, well, if they were disgruntled customers, you'd get your customer success or service team to execute. Yeah, the employer goes, it's just disgruntled employees. Cool. What you going to do to fix that? nothing. It's their fault.

Greg Arthur (47:06.379)

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Greg Arthur (47:14.582)

But this is the thing, so like if you look at almost every product and service that we use outside of work, so if I just pick a handful off my head, so anything that has Google reviews, if you go on some sort of trip or vacation, you're probably going to be looking at TripAdvisor for restaurants or locations or attractions, those kind of things, and then even just taking an Uber.

Like at the end of your ride you automatically get the how do you rate this driver. You get zero to five stars and then some categories just to go I'll give him five stars.

he ran all the red lights and got me there early, like great, this guy's a legend. That can be the thing that you can do, or you can be like one star because he ran all the red lights and I was absolutely terrified. So you've got the option of doing that. So it's natural for people to say, you had a product or service that you engaged with or experienced, what do you think? Because we need to know the good and the bad. So it does feel crackers that there are still...

Not just L &D, because that would be unfair to say it's just them. Companies in general that are just saying, yeah, we're really all about data, but we don't want to hear the bad stuff. Or we're going to push down the bad stuff. But I think, again, there should be proper mechanisms for that. So if somebody is...

stood outside the office going this company's rubbish because John my old boss was a real pain in the arse and I hate him and he he bullied me and it's like is that the best place to do that? I mean that's feedback that they probably need to hear about fictitious John just you know legally this John doesn't exist but then but then you're standing outside on the street isn't the best place to do it so where should he have gone where can they go to do that like

Greg Arthur (49:10.836)

There needs to be proper data capture, otherwise going back to your point originally about silos, this will just be in a silo and then that's almost like a sub silo of stuff we don't really want to hear about because we want to keep this box, the box it's already in.

Toby Kheng (49:26.494)

Yeah, and so obviously like LinkedIn and Glassdoor, we create that scenario where that's publicly available data. You can go and see that. Anybody can go and see that. That's useful. Not saying create your whole data strategy around those two things because the Uber example you just give is really good is that they need a data point at a moment in time to tell them something. So they put the star rating at the end of a journey. What HR does is...

Greg Arthur (49:34.663)

Mmm. Now, of course, yeah, yeah,

Greg Arthur (49:44.532)

Mm-hmm.

Yes.

Toby Kheng (49:49.994)

pulse survey same time every year. It was like, well, that doesn't align itself to a moment in time for the user or the company, where it does for the company, because it might be like a month from year end or whatever. Do you know what I mean? that gets into the, not only does the data capture need to be at a moment in time where it's valuable, it also needs to be consistent and frequent enough where you can track it over time is the other thing. But also it has to be for the benefit of the end user and the creator of that.

Greg Arthur (49:54.079)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (49:59.465)

Yeah, yeah.

Greg Arthur (50:10.804)

Mm-hmm.

Toby Kheng (50:19.112)

that mechanic. And this is where Uber get it right, Driver rates person, person rates Uber. Uber driver. Like that happens. But what we tend to do is create this one way metric is the employer wants to get stuff out of employees rather than the employer wants to give stuff to employees. And so there's loads of stuff out there that says that actually by analyzing oneself and getting some data, then that can instigate a difference in mindset. This is why circumetric tests.

Greg Arthur (50:19.273)

Yeah, absolutely.

Greg Arthur (50:25.843)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (50:33.93)

Yes.

Greg Arthur (50:37.364)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (50:48.136)

are really valuable because they either validate, they kind of validate what you're thinking and instigate a thought process, but you give data to someone and they give you something back. That's why people engage with them. If you did a psychometric test, just give away all your gave away all that information and then never got that report back. Would you do it? Absolutely not. You kind of go, you're just scraping my data. Well, guess what? Psychometric tests are scraping your data anyway. They're just placating you by giving you something back. Facebook is the whole is built on that model. Yeah.

Greg Arthur (50:55.625)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (50:59.324)

Yes. Yes.

Greg Arthur (51:05.864)

Yes.

Greg Arthur (51:12.028)

Yeah, it's a transaction. It's a transaction, that's all it is. Every person probably over the age of two, I would argue, is used to some sort of transaction. Whether it's I would like this, well if you do this then you've earned your reward. Or if you pay this much, or if you do this action you will get whatever is back.

Greg Arthur (51:40.916)

Where was I going with this? So basically trying to explain about good product and service design, it's definitely, it's not just tangible things, it's service as well, is very much about it needs to work for both parties. Or it needs to be as close to 50-50 working for both parties. So like, and we always explain this to people that just because if it's going to help the business, as in the business needs to protect themselves against some sort of regulation or whatever it's going to be, fine, then that's something that you have to adhere to.

we can make that happen. But then the people that you're trying to give this to, your customers, your employees, it has to work for them as well. Why should they care about it? Why should they be engaged with it? And then what should they be able to do comfortably or at least with the least aggravation possible to be able to get on with their day? Like otherwise, they can just try and say, I'm going to work somewhere else or I'm not going to do your thing. Or if I get it wrong, you're the one that gets fined and I just get slapped on the wrist. So.

Is it really that important to me? So it has to be, you have to think of every end product and service in the minds of both parties or if there's a third one to chuck in, chuck them in as well. But everyone needs to have equal measure.

Toby Kheng (52:54.794)

And it goes back to the thing that you said, right? Employment is a product. That's, employment is a product. Yeah, like if you think of employment, if anything else, you're kind of slightly deluded because no one's gonna stay at your company for 20 years. They're probably gonna stay there for three or four years and then move on. So there is a transient relationship that you're gonna enter in at one end and you are definitely going to come out the other end at some point. Now, as an employer,

Greg Arthur (52:57.997)

Yeah, it's a transaction.

Greg Arthur (53:18.61)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (53:21.522)

what is that person going to say about your company once they've left? Because now it's like, you're not trying to make them stay for as long as possible. That is impossible. Don't try and fight the societal trend, but try and make sure that when they leave, they become the biggest advocate of your company. So they return in sales, recruitment referrals, all this kind of stuff. But all that stuff is predicated on a great experience. To your point in this transactional relationship, everyone defaults to money. Like, okay, we need you all to do a survey. Here's some money.

Greg Arthur (53:28.786)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (53:34.546)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (53:42.066)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (53:46.93)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (53:50.974)

Here's a voucher, everyone completes it. And even in some companies, it's like, most expect them to do it for free. The second will be like, okay, we will put you in a drawer to get a 20 quid voucher, or everyone will get cash if they do it. That very rarely happens, but it doesn't really inspire the uptake. I've done this very early in my career. I gave away the opportunity to win a 1500 pounds worth of camera equipment. It had zero impact.

Greg Arthur (54:04.69)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (54:20.394)

on the uptake for that survey. Zero impact. It was exactly the same uptake as the week before. Because it's like, just don't want to engage with this laborious process that adds no value to their lives. It's the same with Google. Google's recruitment referral, think, I don't know the exact number, I think it was $2,000. For a successful hire, you will get $2,000 as a bonus. don't understand.

Greg Arthur (54:25.031)

why.

Greg Arthur (54:36.807)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (54:45.992)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (54:50.266)

Do you want to know, does Google take referrals seriously? No. Now it thinks I'm talking about it. And I now have to say it because otherwise it'll start talking again. But that company, they offered £2,000 as a referral bonus. They went, we want more of these. So they increased it to $4,000. Had zero impact. Because it's much more nuanced on the advocacy and the experience you have as an employee.

Greg Arthur (55:14.6)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (55:16.518)

And all of a sudden you kind of go, well, I've now got to think way, way harder about how I create this relationship. So it isn't as transactional, money in, money out, but it's actually experiencing performance out. And that... Sorry, gone.

Greg Arthur (55:24.477)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (55:32.26)

So just to boil this down to almost like a really simple version, if you go on Amazon, just checking your thing isn't going to start talking again, and if you go onto that marketplace website and you look for any product, like literally any product they sell, you don't only have the option of filtering by cost low and high, or high to low.

You have lots of other things you can filter by as well. Like if it's a laptop for example, it's like what brand is it, what screen size is it, what processor it has. Always different things based on your needs or your wants and needs. As in I want something powerful but I don't really want to spend a huge amount of money and I need a kind of medium sized screen or a particular size screen so it fits in the bag I've got. All the rest of it. So it becomes much more than just is it expensive or not? Will you be parting with cash or not?

It might also even just be down to, I don't really care, but I need it tomorrow. So which ones will you be able to send me by tomorrow if I order it right now? And I think it's the same thing with what you're saying about employment, as in, again, going back to your point about these things shouldn't be in a silo, there are so many other things that affect that person, and also that when learning products are created that can utilise those other things.

that if they're not being utilized, then your product and service is almost hamstrung from the beginning because you've not given it a chance to survive or to have a kind of release into the world.

Toby Kheng (57:04.81)

Yeah, product design inside an organization is quite an interesting one because if, you know, the organizations that are out there that talk about like creating consumer grade stuff, like if it's consumer grade, it would live and survive outside the world of work. A lot of the stuff I've seen would not survive outside the world of work, but it survives inside the world of work because it's like, well, we must have designed the right thing. People just don't engage with it. So let's ram it down their throats and you're like,

Greg Arthur (57:15.419)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (57:21.2)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (57:33.925)

Hmm.

Toby Kheng (57:35.274)

If you took that approach outside the world of work, you wouldn't make money. But all of a sudden, because you've got a... Yeah, well, yes, if you're to physically ram iPhones down people's throats, then you're going to be in trouble.

Greg Arthur (57:41.221)

you'd probably also be in jail, like so, yeah, just to be.

Well, you two put their album on iPhones and that pissed me off. I didn't have that iPhone actually to be fair, but I don't want that on my phone.

Toby Kheng (57:53.034)

But isn't that a really good example though that you two had a product and they literally rammed it down people's throats and there was a rebellion. But inside the world of work you of go, okay, we're going to push out this thing, whether it's internal comms, whether it's an L &D initiative, whatever it is, we're going to push this out and you're going to enjoy it. And then some people go, well, some people don't use it or don't want it.

Greg Arthur (58:01.883)

then he had to apologize.

Greg Arthur (58:20.881)

Mhm.

Toby Kheng (58:21.322)

There isn't the U2 rebellion because they're not empowered to have the U2 style rebellion because they're not a consumer in this relationship. But all of a sudden it's like, it's the employee's problem that they've not engaged with this or whatever. But it's like, yeah, go on, sorry.

Greg Arthur (58:23.44)

No.

Greg Arthur (58:26.832)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (58:35.341)

But also there's also not the repercussions of a product failing or not being utilised. in, that team that have made it don't all lose their job overnight and go, we've run out of money. They may have run out of budget for that year, but they can just go and make another product and have another crack at it. If you were a start-up and said, we're putting all of our bets onto this product that we're making.

you release it to your market and your market then says, we're actually fine, we don't need this or we don't want this. You would likely go bust as a company, which is then ironically going back to companies wanting entrepreneurs, as in if you genuinely felt like an entrepreneur, then you would be thinking we need to make sure that every product we release has a need, has a purpose, is immediately or at least very quickly recognized by our consumers as

that's going to solve this problem or that's going to be really fun or whatever it is you want them to do with it and if you don't have that why are you making it? Like it is really that simple.

Toby Kheng (59:42.186)

But it comes to the point where you validate your own existence, right? It's like, if you are in charge of induction onboarding for a big corporate, you will live and die by whether did you deliver an induction onboarding program that people enjoyed this year? Did you? Yes, tick. Didn't you? Well, then you're probably going to not have a job. I mean, if your job is induction onboarding and you don't deliver that, then you probably don't deserve it. But the whole framework is geared towards validate your own existence.

Greg Arthur (59:49.018)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (01:00:03.961)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (01:00:09.63)

don't create the best thing for your people. Because like I say, that's the system with which we currently operate. It doesn't allow you to be fluid enough to say, I've gathered loads of views. As an L &D team, I've gathered loads of user insight, and this is what we should deliver. Because the expectation is you're going to deliver something for L &D. And that's probably what will happen. Where it might be you kind of say, actually, what's not working here is

Greg Arthur (01:00:19.182)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (01:00:31.022)

Yes. Yeah.

Toby Kheng (01:00:36.498)

We've got too many Microsoft Teams channels. No one's collaborating because there's choice paralysis. No one's engaging with any of these communities, community chats, because there's just too many of them. No, let's pump out loads of training on how Microsoft Teams works. you're you're a, right?

Greg Arthur (01:00:45.453)

All there for, yeah.

you don't want to join in. And then there is still too much choice to be creepy and listen into.

Toby Kheng (01:00:58.57)

But the worst thing I could do is try and deliver some training to make the lurkers and the voyeurs into active social media, like having an active kind of presence on these communities. Because that doesn't make sense because, you know, Facebook doesn't go in, actually Facebook and LinkedIn do try and do this. They create the mechanics to kind of go, post something, post something, post something.

Greg Arthur (01:01:09.303)

Yeah, it's not their deal.

Greg Arthur (01:01:17.645)

Yes. I got asked six times in the last couple of weeks, are you hiring? I was like, no, still not hiring. Stop asking me. Do you want to post about hiring? No, still not doing that. So maybe I'll let you know when I'm doing it. I found it a little bit annoying, but yeah.

Toby Kheng (01:01:36.85)

Yeah, but I think LinkedIn probably goes a bit too much like, people who are successful on LinkedIn post at least three times a week. And like, OK, cool, I'm not going to do that. there's that whole element of product design, is you're creating nudges then. Booking.com is really good as an example to try and get people to book a room there and then because there's only two left at this price. TrainLine does exactly the same thing.

Greg Arthur (01:01:43.343)

Hmm, maybe.

Greg Arthur (01:01:51.459)

Yes, yeah.

Greg Arthur (01:02:00.56)

But those things, again just on a tangent, those things got called out for it recently to say you didn't just have two left, you shouldn't be doing this. So I think again whilst that is an external product with real-life financial and legal ramifications, I think internally you can almost take a note out of their book to be able to say if you have a captive audience as in people that work in this organisation already,

what can you give them to say, let's spark a little bit of urgency or try and hook them and don't lie to them, that's not what I'm trying to say, but like, but try and hook them in whilst you've got their attention because whilst they do work there, you do have their email address and you can put stuff around where they're likely to see it. They've also got their phone.

Toby Kheng (01:02:35.924)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (01:02:50.316)

which will give them a gazillion messages about a gazillion things that are not the things you're trying to tell them. And they will be super easily distracted as soon as something happens on their phone or if they're not immediately hooked on that. it's again, that brings in sales and marketing and commercial elements and internal columns rather than just, it's great, we made it, so please use it.

Toby Kheng (01:03:15.068)

in the middle of the countryside so I'll tell you the middle of the countryside story. I was talking to someone who is on the parish council and they had a litter pick recently to clear up litter from the village and they were like, hardly any people came. I was like, well who did you tell? I like, I put a message in the Facebook group about three weeks ago. Cool. How many? no just that one. All right so that one thing because again they come from the, there the priority, it comes from a very selfish point it's like

Greg Arthur (01:03:19.906)

Nice.

Toby Kheng (01:03:43.69)

If I post this once, people will look at it. And again, it's the same from an employer perspective. If I post this once, I don't have to say it again, because I've said it and I'm important enough that they should have read it. Unfortunately, that's just not the way the world works. Because like you say, so many notifications, so many messages about various things, there is that balance between not doing it too much and like the LinkedIn example, right? Don't do it too much, but don't just assume that because you've posted it once, people look at it. I worked under a lead who's like they were using Workplace by Meta at that point, which is now seen now.

Greg Arthur (01:03:46.455)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (01:03:56.728)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (01:04:02.505)

Of course. Yeah, yeah.

Greg Arthur (01:04:12.792)

yeah.

Toby Kheng (01:04:13.524)

being sunsetted, but they were like, what I want everyone to do is I want everyone to like my post to let me know they've read it. And you're like, could you imagine if someone did that on any external form of social media, you'd be like, that is ridiculous. The onus is on you as a content creator to make that content engaging enough that people want to react to it. That is extremely lazy leadership. So everyone liked my post, so I know you've read it. Because what I think you're looking for is an email.

Greg Arthur (01:04:32.279)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (01:04:38.242)

Yeah.

Yes, yes, yeah. And also like, it's very easy to go like and not read it. And just to avoid the wrath, yeah.

Toby Kheng (01:04:52.074)

And verbally that's what I actually did. just went, went, end of the week, like, like, like, like, like, cool. I've read all that leaders posts. Trying not to say their name.

Greg Arthur (01:04:59.021)

Yes, yeah. And when they start getting send notifications from Toby at the end of the week it's a bit like he's a he's either a very fast reader or he is fudging the system.

Toby Kheng (01:05:09.456)

He really loves my content at the end of the week. I'm going to post all my content at the end of the week now because that's when all my users are liking it and it's like... Exactly.

Greg Arthur (01:05:14.877)

that's my data points yeah. Bringing this back to the potential end of L &D or the death of L &D whatever kind of catastrophic clickbait title we want to go with. If we fast forward to 2030 and then again from there to 2040 what in your mind, not in an ideal world but what you think actually might happen, what is L &D going to look like?

Toby Kheng (01:05:44.362)

In 10 years time, I don't think a lot will have changed, to be honest. think L &D will have adopted technologies and processes to make themselves better at what they're currently doing. So obviously everyone's talking about AI at the moment, but AI is essentially for the majority just doubling down on what already existed. So I think in the next 10 years, we'll have hopefully got over that kind of hump and we'll actually be using technologies to innovate what we're doing rather than just improve efficiency and output of what we're doing. I think in 20 years,

Greg Arthur (01:05:46.646)

Okay.

Greg Arthur (01:05:56.108)

Mm.

Greg Arthur (01:06:11.243)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (01:06:13.642)

The companies that have started doing things differently, like I said, the small to medium businesses were the ones that set up their people infrastructure differently. They'll have become slightly larger companies and will have be kind of, there'll be case studies out there that people have gone, actually, maybe this is the way we should be doing things. Now, my hope is that we'd be there in 10 years. I think it'd be very naive of me to say that we'd reach that change. But in that certainly in the case studies that we're creating,

Greg Arthur (01:06:31.788)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (01:06:42.024)

I think the small to medium business market changes substantially in the next 10 years. I think the large corporate space doesn't change a lot until the things have changed. And then the small to medium market in the next 10 years to 2040, let's say, they start impacting what large organizations are doing. Much like FinTechs, The Starlings, the Monzos, the Revolutes of the world did things differently. And then every bank started doing it to the point where someone like Starling, for example, is

Greg Arthur (01:06:45.346)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (01:07:09.576)

very much just like a corporate bank now internally than it would be 10 years ago when it was a smaller player. So I think that's probably, that's where we'll get to the challenger companies that are doing stuff differently. And they already exist. There are some of those that already do it differently, but they haven't been able to demonstrate the processing system in which they do it. They just do it because it's in their head and heart. This is how I'm going to run my small to medium business.

Greg Arthur (01:07:15.863)

Mm-mm.

Greg Arthur (01:07:26.667)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (01:07:34.666)

Mmm.

Toby Kheng (01:07:37.118)

So they haven't really demonstrated that there's impact there, which is a problem, but they also haven't kind of codified it so you could adopt it. So that's gonna be the thing that happens over the next 10 years. It'll be proven that it's valuable, it'll be codified, and then large companies will start adopting it. And those who don't will hopefully die.

Greg Arthur (01:07:44.565)

Yes, yeah.

Greg Arthur (01:07:54.819)

Wow! We're gonna put that out as a trailer but with no context just so it sounds like you're just you know you're being very blanket driven to everybody and thank you and thank you for that sound bite and so we're nearly end but a little small anecdote as a teenager I read NMA and if you don't know what NMA is

Toby Kheng (01:08:00.618)

you

Greg Arthur (01:08:18.923)

It's the new musical express. It was a little paper that used to go and buy and then it started failing and then you could get it free and I don't think there's even a paper anymore. When I was a teenager, which was many years ago, it was it was the holy grail of music every week. That's where you would go to go and find out what was going on. And then I'm gonna guess every seven to eight weeks there will be a cover story with another band and it would say literally word for word

the new saviours of rock and roll and it would be... fucking Coldplay was on there once and I was like no not having that it would be worse if it you too but Coldplay runner I really don't like you too and you know they never were it was a throwaway statement and it was said so many times you were just like is it are they I don't really care the photo is cool but you know that time was rubbish so taking that kind of throwaway nature what do you think of the actual saviours

Toby Kheng (01:08:58.035)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (01:09:18.141)

of L &D or what do think they're likely to be and how would you see them kind of playing out?

What's the Coldplay version that people think it is and what's the actual version that it is? What's the Pink Floyd version?

Toby Kheng (01:09:31.93)

The Coldplay version is AI, for sure. A few years ago was VR. I think blockchain was in there at some point. These are going to be the things that change. They come and go. The Coldplay's of the LOD world come and go. And thank goodness they do.

Greg Arthur (01:09:49.934)

If they do, I'm leaving. If they stay, I'm out.

Toby Kheng (01:09:54.634)

AI is going to substantially change things more than blockchain and VR for sure. So it's a bit flippant, but it's like, it's the front page article at the moment. I think that the thing that's going to substantially change are people that are willing to challenge, you know, the old Apple thing, challenge the status quo. I don't think there's enough people out there that do challenge the status quo because the status quo is safe and they innovate within the status quo, which isn't actually necessarily innovating really. So going out,

Greg Arthur (01:09:57.707)

100%.

Greg Arthur (01:10:18.698)

Mm-hmm.

Toby Kheng (01:10:24.296)

and saying stuff that challenges the status quo. I'm not saying do exactly as I say and do. I'm not like, there's a number of approaches. Perry Timms is a great example, Developed a new way of thinking about a human resources function. Like no one's necessarily paid him to just do that. He's actually just gone and done it on his own volition. And so therefore there is, this is what the world could look like. Me and Emily have done the same. This is what the world could look like. I'm not saying you have to do this.

Greg Arthur (01:10:39.892)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (01:10:48.276)

Yes.

Toby Kheng (01:10:53.502)

I'm not preaching about it. I'm not saying that this is the way it's going to be. I'm saying it's an option. So I think the saviors will be those people that create alternative options to the status quo.

Greg Arthur (01:10:58.046)

Yes.

Greg Arthur (01:11:03.818)

Yes, and I completely agree with that. I think one of the things, again it's probably no surprise to me, is taking product design into learning, which I don't think is... I don't think we're a million miles away from, but I feel like maybe it goes back to like the language we use or the way it's always been done, those kind of things where it's easy for some people to say it, but when you actually get around to doing it, it's...

It should be a lot easier than I think some people will make it. think, yeah.

Toby Kheng (01:11:38.634)

I think that's a really good point. putting a product design approach into L &D will essentially kill L &D itself because what you then become is you become a more holistic employee experience design team. And that can only be a good thing. by innovating in the right way in changing the system and processes in which L &D operates, by truly adopting product and service design, we'll get you to a point where

Greg Arthur (01:11:50.399)

Yes.

Greg Arthur (01:12:02.153)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (01:12:04.264)

You're elevated to such a point in your organization where it's like, we don't just do L &D now. You look after the end-to-end user journey. And I think that's where it gets you, right? That's where it's the evolution of what L &D. It transforms. It metamorpholizes. It comes from this ugly, chubby caterpillar into a lovely product and service design butterfly. You can tell which book I'm reading to my daughter at the moment.

Greg Arthur (01:12:10.365)

Mmm, yes.

Greg Arthur (01:12:22.505)

What an analogy. Amazing. Hats off. But then, but you can, I'm not bagging on awards here at all. I think they're a great idea for people to be genuinely recognised by the industry as in, you did a thing, it was better than the other things in this category. Well done. Claudia's wooden comments on stage to tell you how great you are. That's lovely. And I'm not going to take that away from anyone. Brilliant.

Toby Kheng (01:12:47.774)

Half cut probably, half cut as well probably from what I've seen.

Greg Arthur (01:12:51.869)

Give her more, let her have a nice night out. But like, and I'm not taking that away from anyone, because some people genuinely, most people that win those things genuinely deserve them, they've generally had a crack at it and done a really nice thing. But then again, if you take this as a product design, like ecosystem, I hate using that word, but like as a whole thing, basically, your product isn't just judged.

Toby Kheng (01:12:54.317)

You

Greg Arthur (01:13:15.451)

and the longevity of that product and even that business unit if you take the entrepreneurship side into it just by how many awards you win or how many other of your peers turn around and say that was really good and you know what it was better than ours and know kudos. It's your users and your customers. Please.

Toby Kheng (01:13:29.556)

Can I, so, okay, I'll tell you a story that I, at a company I used to work for developed a really cool learning experience. Won awards, stakeholders are happy, learning and development team in that organization was happy, everyone was super jazzed about it. And then two months later, my brother-in-law who worked at that company took me aside at my niece's birthday party and went, I just.

Greg Arthur (01:13:41.821)

Mm-hmm.

Toby Kheng (01:13:59.252)

did this. I had this learning experience. He didn't call it a learning experience. used words I cannot use on this podcast. he, yeah, I went through this learning experience. I've got to tell you what a waste of time. was one of the most awful things I've ever been through. It was pointless. It burned through my time. It made me unhappy. And I just cannot tell you how bad it was. And I was like, what was it called? And then he said the name of it. was like, no.

Greg Arthur (01:14:04.48)

the technical term.

Greg Arthur (01:14:28.177)

That's me!

Toby Kheng (01:14:28.606)

This was about five years ago. Yeah, that's us. This is a company I used to work for, by the way. This is a company I do work for now. Just to be super clear, was five years ago. I'm not that person anymore. Because that was one of those pivotal moments in my career when I was like, I can't be part of that. I can't win awards, be patted on the back and have a salary for making my brother-in-law and

Greg Arthur (01:14:40.358)

Yes, yes, yeah. Good disclaimer.

Greg Arthur (01:14:50.204)

Yeah. Yeah.

Toby Kheng (01:14:58.418)

everyone that's around him miserable. Like that doesn't sit well with me. He actively told me it didn't help him do his job. Didn't make his day any better. I was like, okay, so what did it do? goes, it did nothing. It just literally pissed him off and got in the way. Great. I won an award for that.

Greg Arthur (01:15:00.294)

Yes, yes, yeah.

Greg Arthur (01:15:13.245)

I mean, things that a product shouldn't do, just in case anyone's unclear about that.

Toby Kheng (01:15:20.866)

I don't really just... I mean if you're designing a product that gets in people's way and pisses them off then I don't know what kind of product you're designing.

Greg Arthur (01:15:20.868)

in my opinion.

Greg Arthur (01:15:31.672)

speed cameras. think those are the only things that kind of to do that.

Toby Kheng (01:15:34.943)

that was such like, what was that thing in Friends? Like, there's no such thing as a selfless act or something like that. That I think that there's no such product that is designed to annoy people and get in their way. But you've found the one, you found the one.

Greg Arthur (01:15:43.847)

Yes.

Greg Arthur (01:15:48.177)

Yes.

That's it. That's it. Genius. Before we go, last question for you. So we've been talking for an hour and 15 now. Maybe this will get edited down a little touch. But I think that's a good, think we've had a good wide, wide ranging conversation. If we were to summarize the conversation we've had, the experiences you've had, your vision.

Toby Kheng (01:16:06.825)

I've enjoyed it.

Greg Arthur (01:16:15.91)

where you see people right now, where you see the industry right now. If somebody comes to you and says, I'm into that, this guy's talking my language, or I can get on board with this, but I'm stuck in the right now, like this is what's happening right now, I can't change that all on my own. What advice would you give to them to either get themselves ready for the future or start to do, things they can do to help them start to kind of move things that are happening around them?

What things can people take away from this conversation? What would you recommend to them?

Toby Kheng (01:16:51.978)

The first step that I've seen the most effective is to, rather than run a human-centered design initiative, like the process as a project, run it as a holistic kind of departmental project. So number one, how do we capture user insight and activity and behavior on a frequent and regular basis?

Greg Arthur (01:17:00.648)

Mm-hmm.

Greg Arthur (01:17:07.463)

Mm.

Toby Kheng (01:17:18.568)

As a HR team, not just as an L &D team. Now, of course, it'll probably come from an L &D perspective, but how can you look at how you do that? How do you bake it into what you do? And then how can you socialize that? Now, I know a lot of people, because I've heard all the messages and stuff and comments on LinkedIn, go, we don't have time to do that. It's kind of your priority to do, I'm afraid. The reason why it's difficult and hard is because you try and bake it in at the beginning of every project. it's a human-centered design learning project.

Greg Arthur (01:17:27.016)

Hmm.

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (01:17:40.283)

Yeah.

Greg Arthur (01:17:46.237)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (01:17:48.19)

We need to do research. need to do research. need to do. Time and experience has told me that that is hugely, it's costly in both terms of time and money. you're an external provider, you're better off trying to do that approach once on a slightly larger scale and bake it in and socialize it with your wider team, with internal comms, with recruitment. Say, look, we've just done this piece of research. We were just initially looking at, let's say, induction onboarding.

Greg Arthur (01:18:08.978)

Yeah.

Toby Kheng (01:18:15.562)

But actually, we found out all this user insight. Get them all to room, present that user journey, tell them where the pains and gains are. Should we measure this on a regular basis? What should we design as a result? And then, because we've actually applied some metrics to it, can we demonstrate that it's improved? I think if you're going to wait, if AYL &D are going to wait for the opportunity for this approach to work with inside their organization, it isn't going to happen. You're going to have to.

Greg Arthur (01:18:19.033)

Mm-hmm.

Toby Kheng (01:18:43.838)

what is it, manage upwards, right? You're gonna have to manage upwards because as we've talked about on this podcast, the HRD or CPOs of the world that are gonna come to the table with this are very few and far between. And this is where I think L &D has that huge opportunity to manage upwards and transform itself into product and service design.

Greg Arthur (01:18:45.092)

Yes.

Greg Arthur (01:18:54.682)

Yes.

Greg Arthur (01:19:04.323)

Yes, and I hope so. I hope so. And I think there's so the way we talk about data gathering is that you don't just focus on the headline problem. You then start to look at lots and lots of other things that happening and you go outside of the problem. You go all over the place. I'm not sure if that's my dog or yours trying to get in. Then we're going to hear something.

Toby Kheng (01:19:27.018)

If it's my dog trying to get into your house, I'd be worried. We don't live near each other.

Greg Arthur (01:19:32.594)

it's someone's dog

Toby Kheng (01:19:34.773)

I also don't have a dog so I don't know if I did like...

Greg Arthur (01:19:37.623)

I think it's definitely my dog then. She's probably outside trying to get in. I'll let her in afterwards. She's lovely. But then, where was I saying? So yes, I think what we're trying to say is you have to get outside of the problem because at the moment functions like companies and functions aren't set up in a way to get this holistic data. So you have to go and get some version of that right now. So we're trying to bridge the gap between what you should have and what you can get.

And those two things aren't a million miles away from each other, but you need to start thinking way bigger than just this. It needs to be this. But then to your thing, it's this. That's even bigger. If anyone's only listening to this, my hands just went from very small to slightly medium to much bigger. Yeah, there is no cardboard box here. If anyone's old enough to remember that, then we're old.

Toby Kheng (01:20:23.882)

Big fish, little fish, tiny fish.

Toby Kheng (01:20:30.366)

Because you've just told everybody to think outside of the box. There we go. It will not get any better than that, guarantee you.

Greg Arthur (01:20:33.789)

legend. I think we should end it there. We're not going to get any more gold than that. And I probably should let my dog in before she breaks through the door. But this has been brilliant. Is there anything you want to plug? We usually do this right at the very end. Anything you want to say, any shout outs, anything that you feel you'd like to tell people?

Toby Kheng (01:20:58.836)

Just come and talk to me and Emily. We just want to talk about this as much as we can because if we can just change a few companies to change their approach, then that's what we want to do. We want to get people to do that. So yeah, connect with me on LinkedIn, connect with Emily on LinkedIn as well. And let's just have a conversation about it because there needs to be a community effort to drive change. We're not going to do it by ourselves. So if you're like-minded, if you like what we say, just connect with us and let's take the conversation on from there.

Greg Arthur (01:21:25.923)

Amazing, amazing. I would highly recommend that. It's definitely from the conversations we've had recently. It's been enlightening. It's been nice. It's been refreshing to hear something different. Thank you, sir.

Toby Kheng (01:21:39.812)

Thank you very much. That's very kind of you. And then like and likewise, you know, to find like minded individuals, like I say, we, you know, we found each other through Patrick Malarkey, which I'm really thankful for. But if this podcast can make even more of those connections happen and find, you know, like minded people like ourselves, then that's only a good thing.

Greg Arthur (01:21:48.825)

Yes.

Greg Arthur (01:21:58.403)

and is a lovely segue because Patrick is the next episode. yeah, so Patrick's talking about MVP and testing. So in two weeks from whenever this was released, Patrick will be released. He's not captured somewhere. His episode will be released and you can all listen to it. It'll be really, really fun. But cool. Thank you so much, Toby. And we will probably have you back on another episode where we have like a couple of people.

Toby Kheng (01:22:02.916)

no way!

Toby Kheng (01:22:07.562)

Ugh.

Toby Kheng (01:22:15.092)

Ha ha ha!

Greg Arthur (01:22:28.163)

gaping about our topic. So we'll do that as well. Nice one. Thanks sir. Have lovely day. Cheers.

Toby Kheng (01:22:30.378)

Awesome, I'd love to do that. Thank you. Cheers, you too.