ICommunicate Radio Show #92: Trust Can Be Fleeting

In a remote work environment, how can we build foundational trust and maintain productivity? In this episode, MindsetGo Founder and President Mark Altman and Melissa Glenny, CEO of Franklin Professional Staffing dives into the benefits, dangers, and best operational practices of remote and hybrid workplaces. Segment 1: Why is there a decrease in productivity when employees work remotely? Why are some leaders resistant to encouraging remote work? What is the relationship between trust and remote work? How can we effectively evaluate remote employees? Segment 2:How much of a problem are distractions for remote employees? How can we reach our company goals with remote employees? What does the process of setting realistic expectations look like? Why is reciprocity so important in a workplace? What does reciprocity look like in a successful work environment? Segment 3: What are the best practices for hiring and recruiting remote and hybrid employees? As workplaces evolve and transform, how can you stay ahead of the curve when it comes to hiring? Why do hiring professionals think remote workplaces are just as effective as in-person settings? How can setting expectations alleviate most concerns leaders have with a remote workplace? Segment 4:Why do salespeople get latitude at work that others don’t get? How can you gauge trust when hiring an employee? How does trust manifest in remote workplaces? Can we apply office norms to remote workplaces?

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:04

Welcome to i Communicate on full service radio 830W CRM. To join the conversation, call 508-871-7000. Now, here's your host, Mark Altman.

SPEAKER_00 0:19

Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to another edition of iCommunicate. Glad to have you here with us on this Thursday afternoon. Ted, how are you? Boy, Ted, I gotta tell you, it it's rough. And you know, it's so funny. I I think so many times in my life I have said to myself, man, if I only had more time.

SPEAKER_03 0:42

Yeah, time.

SPEAKER_00 0:43

If I only had more time, and oh, there's so much more that I could do. And now I seem to have found a lot more time, and I'm not all that happy about it. I gotta tell you the truth. You know, I I find that I have more And what's funny, Ted, is I find that I have so much time on my hands, I'm tackling a lot of projects for mindset go that I had put off, but boy, I am really missing that human interaction desperately.

SPEAKER_03 1:09

You know, it it is odd in a world where people are so they've made themselves distant by the use of technology, by the use of other things that have just separated us, and now here we are, we are forced to be separated, and yeah, I think I'm missing it too.

SPEAKER_00 1:35

Yeah, and I think I think what's interesting is we all live in a in a in a society in a world where we all tell each other how busy we are all the time, and we're always going from thing to thing and place to place.

SPEAKER_03 1:47

And I wish we could find some time to do that, but not today.

SPEAKER_00 1:51

Right, right. And so now what this has done is it's forcing a lot of people to slow down, to do some self-reflection, to uh figure out and identify what their true priorities are. And so, look, there's so much bad news going on related to this coronavirus, but I think a lot of times we talk on this show about growth mindset and positive ways to think and reflect. And I think there are a lot of positives that can come out of this crisis.

SPEAKER_03 2:21

Absolutely. Um you know, I've been trying to find positive developments to put in the news. I've uh been very careful when speaking about it around my grandchildren. Uh they're just not capable, really, at the at their ages. Uh a child is not capable of processing something like social distancing. And they pick up on the slightest bit of panic. So you've got to be calm when you're talking about it around anybody under the age of 15.

SPEAKER_00 2:59

Yeah, and so, you know, Ted, I was thinking, you know, what what can I do my show on today related to this coronavirus? But so many of the storylines related to the coronavirus are being so overdone and talked about, I wanted to kind of take a different angle. And I'm gonna talk about something today that I've I've felt strongly about for a while, and that is the concept of working from home. Now, as a listener, I understand everybody's talking about working from home, but I want to attack it from a different angle. And the angle is that most companies, okay, for the longest time did do did not and do not want to let their employees work from home. As a matter of fact, I was doing some research, and as far back as just 2015, Ted, only 24% of employed people did at least some work from home. Yes. That is a really low number. Yes. And even though that number has climbed in the last four or five years, I would argue it's climbed reactively and not proactively because of the work life demands, because of the millennial generation, it's almost like you have no choice as a company now. You you have to bend or accede to the wishes to allow more people to work from home.

SPEAKER_03 4:23

Well, I I don't want to be a uh management uh slave here, but I I gotta point out that the numbers about telecommuting and productivity over the past ten years have just been awful. And many employers look at those numbers and say, well, you know, if there's a 40% reduction in productivity when they work from home, then we have to be careful about that. Our stockholders will not forgive us. But you're right. Now it doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_00 4:59

No, no, but no, but but no, no, no. Let's go with that because I wanna I want to understand the mindset that has been over the last five years, and and I want to talk about what you just said, is been, geez, I guess we have no choice. I guess we're gonna need to start doing this, right? Which is crazy because there are so many benefits to doing it, but everybody's been in a reactive mindset. And now with the coronavirus, now it's not only do you have to have a reactive mindset, but this could be the impetus that finally transitions many companies to actually examining and taking the necessary steps to fix that telecommuting data that is so poor. And what really boggles my mind, Ted, is when I think of working from home and why companies have been so resistant to it, there's three primary reasons in my mind. One is the productivity of their work, are they as productive as they would be in the office? Two, the efficiency of the work. Are they getting enough done and getting it done correctly? It's almost like being detail-oriented and multitasking at the same time.

SPEAKER_03 6:21

Right.

SPEAKER_00 6:21

Right? And so you and then the sense of urgency in the work, right? Can they have the same sense of urgency when they don't have that peer collaboration around?

SPEAKER_03 6:32

Well, there's also another element to this, and that's security. When you have remote workers, you have the potential of security risks to your network. Um just so you understand, I used to sell this kind of product, it's a virtual private network, each employee gets their own ID, and you're able to have a secure network, and they can work from wherever their company-issued laptop is. But those laptops are also collecting other data about their productivity, what their eyes are looking at, and whatnot. So you have to be sensitive to the fact that somebody at the corporate level is looking at this data. And they're not just reluctant to let people work from home, um, and they do see the benefit, but it's the cost to productivity that they will have to then report back up to the stockholders.

SPEAKER_00 7:37

Well, well, wait a minute, wait a minute. You but you started talking about technology, and I'm sorry, we're in 2020. I mean, if you are a company and you have technology concerns about the safety of data and security, yes, you've got to be kidding me. I mean, it's 2020. I mean, come on.

SPEAKER_03 7:53

Uh look, you know, you're absolutely right. The uh security level on a private network where you pay for it to be clean through the cloud, you'd think. But unfortunately, there's a downside, and that is where it's delivered. Are they on a secure wireless network at their home? Or are they sitting in a mug and muffin using public Wi-Fi?

SPEAKER_00 8:24

Well, well, let you know what, Ted, let's take, let's go backwards for a second, okay? Because I think it all starts right here. I am a leader for an organization. I am hiring someone to work for me in some capacity. When you hire someone, do you trust them? Are you hiring people that you can trust? Because let's let's be honest. Trusting people to be as productive and efficient at home versus in the workplace, I mean, even if they're not working from home, there are trust issues all the time. Can you delegate certain work to them? Can you trust they're going to turn in projects on time? I mean, so there's trust issues that are required between an employer and employee, many trust issues, well before you even get to working from home.

SPEAKER_03 9:14

Well, I got one thing to say about that. They shouldn't have been hired if you don't trust them.

SPEAKER_00 9:19

That's right.

SPEAKER_03 9:20

So if they belong to your organization, trust is presumed.

SPEAKER_00 9:25

Okay. So now let's look at the data you spoke at earlier of the telecommunicated data where the productivity drops off so much. Now let's talk about that. Why does that happen, Ted?

SPEAKER_03 9:36

Well, I think there's two reasons for it. Uh, human behavior at the office is well established, and people know how to behave when they're in the office. Let me just give you an example that is going on right now as we speak, while people are listening to this radio show. Somebody's been told to work from home and their kids are out of school. The primary person sits down, logs in, and starts the first email when the first child walks in with milk all over its face. Something's got to give. And the child is gonna come first. That's number one. Okay. The interruptions. Number two is access to uh information immediately at the office. We stand up, we walk across the room, we pick up the document, or we the person, and we say, Here's my question. You get your answer, you go back to your desk and you complete the process. When you're working from home, you might have to stop a moment, pick up the phone, go to another screen, and uh what is the word we say, Google it or search engine, the uh particular concept, or you have to get special access to use the virtual private network to get it to the company's database. So naturally, with the process of things, there's going to be a reduction in productivity.

SPEAKER_00 11:13

Okay, so let's go with that for a moment. So here's my take on that situation. Because I've thought a lot about this, Ted. When you are in the office, okay, let's talk about accountability for a second. Do how often do we truly understand people's workload? Now, if you work for me, matter of fact, I had I had a client say to me this morning that they need to get their company needs to put together job descriptions. This is a multimillion dollar company who's been around forever, and I said, Why do you need job descriptions? And he says, for accountability and structure. I said, So let's talk about that. Accountability and structure. So I said to him, I said, I get what you're saying, but let's face it, once you're hired at a company, no one ever looks at that job description again. You start doing your daily workload. We we keep piling more and more work on time. We don't know what an appropriate work. I mean, how many leaders can honestly say, everybody who works for me, I can tell you they have an appropriate workload, and here's why or here's why not. How many leaders can actually honestly answer that question? Because I don't think many.

SPEAKER_03 12:27

Often the review of a person's performance is really not for the purpose of review or productivity. It's either to move them along or to eliminate them.

SPEAKER_00 12:41

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 12:42

Now, you know, let's just be honest about that. I mean, because the the function of a corporate world is you're either on or you're off. You're you're either productive or you're not.

SPEAKER_00 12:54

Okay. So so here's my point, right? So if you work for me, all right, when if you work for me, how do I evaluate? Forget working at home, how am I evaluating you, right? Uh if I have to give you deadlines, it's again, it's quality, performance. Okay, but at the end of the day, I'm it's unlikely, and we're gonna continue after our first break, but it's unlikely I'm giving you a very specific to-do list every week, and you're saying I did all those things, and that was a productive quality week. So when we come back from our first break, I'm gonna talk about how the difference in working from home and the difference of working at the office, it's a similar problem, just veiled under a different challenge. This is Mark Altman for I Communicate. We'll be back after the break.

SPEAKER_02 13:48

Now iCommunicate continuous on full service radio, 830 WCRM. Once again, here's your host, Mark Altman.

SPEAKER_00 13:59

Okay, welcome back to iCommunicate. Okay, so Ted, I have a scenario for you. This is, I want I want our audience to really listen to what I'm proposing because you know, we're talking about accountability, we're talking about structure, we're talking about distraction, you know, as the enemies, right, to working from home. But I've got a scenario for you. The scenario is I want to give everybody what they want. You know, I don't even know if I can trust you yet, but you know what? You want to work from home, knock yourself out. I'm gonna let you work from home, okay? And I don't care how many distractions you have. Hell, if you want to work, instead of assuming logistically this is possible for the company you work for, you want to work 6 p.m. to 3 a.m. for all I care, if that's a better time for you to work, knock yourself out. Here's the thing. At my company, here's the rules. I am going to give you an appropriate workload that I think, and you know what I'm gonna do, Ted? My appropriate the definition of my appropriate workload is it may take you instead of a 40-hour work leak work week, and this is gonna get rid of clock punchers and everything, Ted. You're gonna love this. So instead of it being a 40, I'm gonna make sure it's a 50 to 60 hour workload. Because the way I think is it's a trade-off, right? Because you don't have to commute, save money on gas, wear and tear on your life, your mind, your car. You get to be near your loved ones more frequently, you can have the flexibility you work. Dry cleaning. Dry cleaning, knock yourself out. You can have it all. But you know what? I'm gonna really do a great job setting very clear expectations about the amount of work, the quality of work, and the timeliness of the work that you do every week. And that's the trade-off we're gonna make.

SPEAKER_03 15:46

All right, can can I and I'm gonna put on the employee hand. Please, please, yep. Um honestly, if they have not had this plan in place already, they're in trouble. You mean the company? The company, yeah. Because if you say, Okay, well, now that your job description has been changed, you're gonna be at home doing the work and policing yourself. How are they going to evaluate these new work plans?

SPEAKER_00 16:21

Oh no, that's just it. There they will not be policing themselves. My point is, I believe where things falter, and right before the break, I made the point that the problem isn't working from home or working on site. The problem is the lack of clear expectations in communications around what needs to be done and when.

SPEAKER_03 16:42

Okay, but the you've got to understand that there are rules with regards to monitoring your employees.

SPEAKER_00 16:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 16:51

Um back in the day when we first rolled out these systems that allowed the computer to report back to the manager how much activity and what their eyes were looking at, and the keystrokes and all that. The device is capable of speaking to the operator and saying, rest time is over. And that was and we were told that that can't be in the system. That that is a breach of personal space, was the way it was picked. I'm I I'm all in favor of what you're talking about. I just don't see how it can be policed. It's going to have to be self-policing. Otherwise, it won't work.

SPEAKER_00 17:37

How is it policed in the office? That's my point. If you got policed in the office.

SPEAKER_03 17:43

Hang on, hang on. If you go into the lunchroom at your office these days, there's a posting there that lets everybody know that everything you say and do in the office is being monitored, the information is collected and evaluated. That's the the rule now. That's the conditions in the workplace. And that extending that into the home is, in all senses, illegal in our country.

SPEAKER_00 18:11

Okay. Well, you're you're going a totally different direction. As far as what's legal and illegal, companies have intranets that whether you're working from home or working on site, it's still company data. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 18:23

And it does collect data about your activity.

SPEAKER_00 18:25

Right. So you can you can monitor, you're not limited in monitoring information when someone's working at home. If I'm sitting in the office and I don't want some information to be at public, I'll text it to someone or I'll send it through my phone, just like I would if I was at home. So the point I'm trying to make, Ted is you're talking about data. I'm talking about things like productivity and accountability and things like that.

SPEAKER_03 18:50

Performance data is what I'm talking about.

SPEAKER_00 18:52

Yeah, but there is no need for performance data if the expectations of tasks and responsibilities are clearly laid out with a corresponding timeline. And see, I think in the workplace right now, what happens is, and Ted, I run into people all the time who will say to me, especially younger generations, but not exclusive to younger generations, who will say to me, you know, Mark, could you give me a deadline? Because I work better with a deadline. A lot of people don't know how to prioritize and organize themselves without a deadline. So in the office, what I think happens is if things aren't deadline driven and measured as far as how long things take, people kind of run amok.

SPEAKER_03 19:39

Yes, they do.

SPEAKER_00 19:40

And then if you take that mentality home, then it really runs amok, leading to your bad telecommuting data.

SPEAKER_03 19:48

Yeah, I I guess that goes back to our first conversation about this, and and that is unless they've got a plan already in place with a methodology for imposing a work schedule, then it's kind of tough to do it now that the people are already at home behind a screen.

SPEAKER_00 20:11

Well, wow, that's a loaded response. Because now you're talking about change management, which companies struggle with all over the place, regardless of whether it's working on site or at home. Well, so think of it this way, okay? Just to put a bow on this, okay. My basic premise whether you think it's right or wrong, my basic premise is relationships struggle in the workplace because of unclear expectations, poor communication, and mistrust. Okay? Right? And so those things are there whether they're on site or at work. Now, one of the things when we measure data to justify working at home, now here's a couple of things, right? One of them, though, is employee retention. So have we taken the time yet to measure the increase in employee retention? And I bring that up because right after our second break, we're gonna have an expert joining us on recruiting and employee retention, Melissa Glenny, CEO of Franklin Professional Staffing. And we're gonna talk about that because what it comes down to is life is a trade-off. You know, I did a show a couple of months ago about reciprocity when it comes to networking and sales. And what I'm proposing is reciprocity. I'm proposing that I will give you everything you want, and I'm proposing in exchange for giving you everything I want, the workload's gonna be tighter. The workload is gonna be bigger because you now have flexibilities you didn't have before. You're able to save money, you're able to improve your work life balance. So I'm gonna demand a little more from you. And you know what? It's gonna be a change. Ted's spot on, it's gonna be a change. And you know, when I when I talk to companies about change management, this could be one of the biggest examples of change management companies have ever faced. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_03 22:08

That's a major cultural shift.

SPEAKER_00 22:10

Trevor Burrus, Jr.: Major cultural shift. And so and I gotta tell you, Ted, I really believe this is my last comment about this going into break. You know, it is trust. Trust is a big part of this. That's true. But what I think is really going on here is managers don't trust their ability to lead when people aren't right there. And that's why I call the show Out of Sight, Out of Mind. Right? Because if if if managers are fearful of the change, if managers are fearful of their ability to control, key word being control, because it's they're not they're out of sight, they've got to step out of their comfort zone. Most people don't like stepping out of their comfort zone, and it starts right there. And so the focus of trust is change. It's change. So when we come back for our uh next segment, we're gonna have be joined by Melissa Glenny, CEO of Franklin Professional Staffing. I'm Mark Altman, and if you'd like to call in for the show, 508-871-7000, this is i Communicate.

SPEAKER_02 23:20

Now, iCommunicate continued on full service radio, 830 WTRF. Once again, here's your host, Mark Colt.

SPEAKER_00 23:31

Welcome back to iCommunicate for segment number three. Feel very fortunate right now uh getting to uh talk to one of the prominent experts in the recruiting and retention industry, Melissa Glenny. Melissa, thank you so much for joining the show.

SPEAKER_01 23:44

Hi, Mark. Yeah, it's my pleasure to be here. I've enjoyed the show so far. Thanks.

SPEAKER_00 23:48

Excellent. So, Melissa, I guess, you know, if you could just kind of just briefly share a little bit of your background and in your experience in the industry, just so our listeners kind of have a feel for your expertise.

SPEAKER_01 23:58

Sure. So I've been working with companies for almost 20 years now, helping them to hire and build high-achieving teams. And for the last eight years, I have owned my own business, so have had that extra special nuanced experience of leadership. Love it. Um which I know you have too.

SPEAKER_00 24:17

Yeah, so so Melissa, I guess I want to start out. I know, I know companies are looking to you um to find top-level talent, regardless of what position they're trying to fill. I'm wondering what what changes are you anticipating when you're thinking about recruiting? You know, if if if if if I'm right and there are gonna be some cultural shifts around work styles and trust and accountability, how does that shift your approach uh to recruiting and how and what kind of advice are you giving companies to anticipate that?

SPEAKER_01 24:53

Well, you know, I I mean I think it's gonna be really interesting to see how things play out in terms of specifically hiring and training. I think one of the first hurdles that I'm seeing companies starting to get through um quickly uh in the instances where they were reluctant previously, but now the pain of having people come in is obviously greater than the pain of of allowing them to work remotely. Um so I think that you know for a lot of the companies I'm uh I I'm knowledgeable about, they've already moved to the remote working platforms for a lot of their employees to all of their employees. But now the question the next question is if this continues, you know, how are they gonna adapt and how are we in shopping in the recruiting industry going to adapt our processes so there's more of that shifting thing? Um I think that there's still a lot yet to be fleshed out in that. Um you know, 360, I'm sorry, um video interviews are very, very common, so that part is pretty straightforward. I just saw that the um uh CDE had put out a memo earlier this week about the I9 requirements for filling out the um uh I9s in person with physical examination of the documentation. So they're you can uh it appears they're considering loosening up that requirement, but we haven't received anything officially yet. So, you know, this is definitely changing the whole landscape for us, and and there's still uh uh uh a great deal of uncertainty. Um the only thing that's certain is that I think this is going to definitely uh be uh an experience that's delineating, you know, the way things used to be versus the way things are going forward.

SPEAKER_00 26:36

Well listen, let me ask you, you know, you mentioned virtual and remote workforces, and you know, it it got me thinking as I was listening to you that, you know, Ted Ted earlier in the show talked about distractions and working from home, and I could totally picture it as he was saying it, you know, the the father, the stay-at-home mother or father who's interrupted by their kids or you know, whatever's going on at home that they have to deal with. And what occurred to me is one of my big pet peeves about virtual and remote workforce is when you're interacting with them, whether it's a webinar or a meeting or whatever, I have so little confidence that they're actually paying attention and that they're not at their desk doing something. And the only way you can really prove with a virtual or remote workforce is that they're paying attention, is if they have to take a role and be actively engaged and participate in the actual interaction. So this is an example. My question for you, this is an example for me of communicating with a virtual and remote workforce and communicating with someone working out of their home. Is there a real difference from a communication perspective?

SPEAKER_01 27:46

Luck, I think that that's such a great question because I don't think there's any difference at all, to be honest. I I think, you know, I did a uh blog post earlier this week about um a story my grandmother used to tell me about uh electric ovens when they hit the market. And the reluctance, you know, they my my great grandmother had one and wouldn't use it for the longest time because she couldn't see the fire, she couldn't see the the color of the flame, the height of the flame, she didn't know if the oven was hot enough. And you know, it seems ridiculous looking back and say, Well, was your bread coming out baked? You know, if it was then it it was hot, it was fine. But you know, I think that that connects to what we're experiencing now because there's such a um I I used to think it was a distrust, but I think that this is just inertia. We're we're just not adapted to the to the remote working environment to the level that we're comfortable with yet. So, you know, I I think that's a lot of it.

SPEAKER_00 28:43

And Melissa, you talked you talked in the beginning about training, and you know, one of the points I made before the break about how how managers are fearful of change, especially change that requires them to step out of their comfort zone. And I say that because when you talk about training, I think there needs to be a tremendous emphasis on training related to the leaders themselves as opposed to the people that are working from home. Because I think whether it's fear, whether it's lack of control, whether it's um just uh a level of competence they just haven't had to utilize. You know, I w I'm wondering what are your thoughts on that regarding to training priorities.

SPEAKER_01 29:23

Yeah, I think that's a good point. And you know, it it makes me think back to the conversation you and said we're having earlier about, you know, monitoring employees and uh, you know, the uh managing expectations and knowing if they're on top of things, if they're engaged or paying attention. And you know, we started using an employee monitoring system back in 2016, and it was before we even allowed for remote working. The reason we were using this is it basically was a a a tool that takes a screenshot every single second of the the screen of the the company's machine. Obviously, we would never do this on some if somebody's working from a personal machine, but um from a company's machine. So it was great for training purposes because we could at the end of the week say, okay, you know, we get the analytics and say, what did you spend your time on? Wow, you were on this particular app or tool for a lot longer than I would expect. Let's go in and zoom in on on the steps you were taking and see what what was going on there. Um so that's kind of the the what the impetus was for us to employ that and we could see where the inefficiencies were and then work to uh teach to coach and train people to to increase their efficiency with certain things. But you know, in the in the context of working from home, you know, that's there in case somebody, a manager felt like they needed to monitor that to that level. But then again, and and coach and such, I think it was valuable for that. But you know, what I one of the things that I learned through the course of using something like that was that if you ever question that you have to be watching over someone to a level where you want to know what they're doing moment to moment, then your answer is already given to you. Uh I I I wouldn't can I wouldn't uh suggest um, you know, that that you want to be monitoring people to that level of granularity.

SPEAKER_00 31:17

And and Melissa, wouldn't you concur that it f aside from being a control freak and maybe a potential micromanager, perhaps you need to monitor because your expectations and instructions for what they're supposed to do aren't clear enough in the first place.

SPEAKER_01 31:32

Exactly. Oh, exactly, Mark. Exactly. So then it goes back to whether you're uh instructing people to be working at a desk right next to you or from their home, your instructions are as good as your instructions in either case.

SPEAKER_00 31:45

All right, so Melissa, please stay with us for our next segment. When we come back, we're gonna talk about the difference between why salespeople have been able to do this for years.

SPEAKER_03 31:53

Well, yeah, I that's what that's what I wanted to chime in on. Exactly. You're absolutely right about retraining the managers because uh I spent many years as a road warrior, and when people go out on the road and are remote from the office, they need their manager to serve them and service their interaction with the office. Yep.

SPEAKER_00 32:17

That's right.

SPEAKER_03 32:17

And you know, when you when you said that about retraining the managers, it really rang true with me. I'm sorry to interrupt.

SPEAKER_00 32:24

Oh, that's great. And and and you know, uh, Ted, how much time do we have before break?

SPEAKER_03 32:28

We got another minute. Okay, okay.

SPEAKER_00 32:29

So I want to so I want to make a point to build on what you just said, which is this what's funny about let's let's take, let's get off the table of working from home or working on site. If you are a sales executive or sales manager that has a sales force that works for you, how do you spend your time supporting your sales force? Now, if they're in the office, right, what are you doing, right? The way you're supposed to be spending your time is being out with them in the field, listening to calls, going on appointments, so on and so forth. So again, if they're in the office, people learned a long time ago that having salespeople that work from home or virtually as opposed to inside the office, i i it was an advantage. And and when we come back, and Melissa, I know I know so much of what you do is to place quality salespeople. When we come back, I want to talk about your take on why salespeople are trusted or given the benefit of the doubt, and why everybody else in the workforce doesn't seem to be given that latitude. So stay with us, Melissa. Yeah, absolutely. Excellent. All right, this is Mark Altman for iCommunicate. We'll be back after the break.

SPEAKER_02 33:39

Now, iCommunicate continues on full service radio, 830 WTRN. Once again, here's your host, Mark Altman.

SPEAKER_00 33:50

So thank you. Welcome back to iCommunicate for our final segment. Melissa, you know, I forgot to ask you before you joined, you have not been putting Mercury in the trash, have you?

SPEAKER_01 33:59

Mercury?

SPEAKER_00 34:00

Yeah. Because we don't we don't like our guests to be putting Mercury in the trash.

SPEAKER_01 34:05

Oh, I I didn't know if you were talking about the planet or actually.

SPEAKER_00 34:09

Oh, see, you got me on that. All right. See, that wasn't even see, that was a bad joke. I I I got punished for that. So Melissa, uh back to where we were. I want to I want to uh continue with our discussion. So salespeople, Melissa. So what you know, you recruit salespeople. What is it that you think why do salespeople get the latitude that others don't?

SPEAKER_01 34:26

Well, I think this goes right back to the to the um uh uh uh topic of expectations. You know, for the for the longest time, uh, you know, and and again, back to the the the um point I was making about inertia, we're accustomed to having a salesperson have a quota. That's the expectation. If they meet it, if they exceed it, the who cares if they're on the golf course six hours a day? Good for them.

SPEAKER_00 34:51

Well, so that's an interesting point because you're going back to what I said earlier about if the expectations of what your workload is, when it's expected to get done, and how much you're expected to do is completed, then you don't care, right? Right. So here's the thing. Melissa, when I think about I I feel like your company is such a tough job. You know, finding the the talent, finding someone with the skills and qualifications. And what I think every company would pay an infinite amount of money for is if you could somehow vet out whether someone was trustworthy. Imagine being able to hire someone, because let's face it, if you're hiring someone, all you have to go on is references. You know, you can call and ask other people, but to really understand if someone is trust trustworthy. So when you're when you're qualifying, Melissa, and when you're finding people for companies, how do you approach that? Because it's it's it's really a tricky, tricky conundrum.

SPEAKER_01 35:53

Well, I mean, certainly I think that behavioral interviewing uh uncovers a lot um and and references are big for us in that arena too, you know, talking with fire bosses about um you know their their experiences with a with an employee. But you know, I I have to think too, when it comes down to trustworthiness, call me Pollyanna, but in my experience uh through the years, I really think that the majority of people truly desire to do a good job and meet expectation, and that's their intention. Uh what uh you know, not to not to be the dead horse, but I think it's when there's ambiguity around expectation, that's where things start to break down.

SPEAKER_00 36:38

Well, and I think to your point, you know, when I talk about trust, and when I keep coming back to trust, what's interesting, trust is a two-way street, right? People have to be set up for success. And I think too often, you know, as we alluded to earlier in the show, I think too often people are not set up for success. So I think the ambiguity is and you know what, you know what, Melissa, ambiguity is is really anytime there's a communication breakdown, so often it relates to the unclear ambiguity of that communication and of the expectations set. So one final question for you, Melissa is what advice would you give to companies as they're navigating through this, as they're navigating through shifts in culture, shifts in hiring practices? You know, so many companies depend on your feedback. So what would be your biggest piece of advice?

SPEAKER_01 37:29

I think that, you know, really clear expectations. And, you know, kind of going back to the um example of salespeople, you know, there's a very um hard line in the stand, you're meeting expect expectations or you're not. One thing that I have found with um, you know, I'll I'll use the example of administrative support. Um if you've ever worked on a statement of work kind of arrangement, there's something that's referred to as go creep. And I find that with support workers more than with, you know, for example, salespeople, that's um something that's more likely to come into play. So especially if things get stressful and the leader might need more support, where there was initially an expectation of you know, A, B, C, not like that's it. It it will be, you know, A, B, C, and then you know, add on right, left, uh uh um, you know, up, down, extra things. And and then it gets away from leaders, I think, where they don't realize how much more they're asking for.

SPEAKER_00 38:36

So go ahead, continue, please.

SPEAKER_01 38:38

No, please, Mark, go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 38:40

No, I was gonna say I agree with your thought. And you know, one of the points I wanted to cover before we wrap up the show today is one of the most um narrow-minded evaluation of someone's performance. And how many times, Ted, Melissa, have we heard over the years leaders and executives see someone in the office at six or seven o'clock at night, and because they're staying there later, we immediately attribute them to having more of a work ethic and more committed and dedicated to the job when the fact of the matter is, longer does not necessarily mean more efficient and more productive. Right? And so and so there's this visibility question that out of sight, out of mind, when you're not in the office, I don't really know how hard you're working. I can't see you. Are you a clock puncher? Are you watching TV in the middle of the day? Like, I don't know any of that. And Ted talked about that familiarity earlier in the show that I can kind of control. Like I can see in the lunchroom, you've got the poster and I can see everything going on. And I just think that visibility, lack of visibility factor really scares a lot of people in leadership positions.

SPEAKER_03 39:54

Can I pipe in? Please. Um I think you guys are smack on in terms of setting expectations and there being no ambiguity. Uh and using the example of salespeople who work remotely. You either make the quota or you don't. Well, if you hang on, hang on. If if we're going to go the route of telecommuting support workers, then we need to have a quota stated for work, a daily work quota.

SPEAKER_00 40:26

Yeah, well said, Ted. Right. So, Ted, you're talking well, that's a great point. So you're talking about quotas for non-salespeople.

SPEAKER_03 40:33

And you want trust? The only trust you get is when you meet your quota. Yeah. That's a good thing. I'm sorry, that's the way salespeople operate. And that's the way remote workers are gonna have to operate to work in a corporate environment.

SPEAKER_00 40:46

Well, I think that is phenomenal because one of the points I was gonna make is a lot of the ways we determine how we trust people is based on their consistency and their reliability. So when you talk about what you're talking about are the quotas for those are KPIs, but the thing about KPIs are most companies only have KPIs for the leadership level, and even in that case, a lot of leaders don't even have KPIs. So giving everyday workers quotas of completion, that, Ted, that sums it up beautifully. And that's why you know it it's occurring to me that this concept of micromanaging, I think what's gonna happen is as cultures shift, I think you're gonna see uh a leaning towards more micromanaging, because the more that grip loosens and the more you have, do you don't have that control, I think there's gonna be a tendency to require more micromanaging. Not saying it's the right way to go.

SPEAKER_03 41:45

But those people those people who can't make the shift from being a micromanager to being a servicing manager are not gonna be able to keep their job because you have to serve people who are remote. You can't be putting your thumb on them because they're not in front of you.

SPEAKER_00 42:03

Yeah, that's that's so well said. And and uh Melissa, do you have any thoughts on that? I don't want to leave you out of this.

SPEAKER_01 42:10

No, I mean, you just reminded me of something that um I'd offer up um again, not KPI. I think that every job should have a KPI data. And you know, in my business, we have job descriptions, and they're they're not it's not one complaining where you can sort of a bit dynamic for the number of categories of um areas within the company where everybody is working on. So we're what we've what we've designed is um expectations of activities in each category for every week, and there's a hundred-point system. So um, you know, I'm not expecting everything's gonna be perfect in every category every single week, but we need everything to add up to a certain uh each level, you know. Like I need a full pie of some sort.

SPEAKER_00 43:03

That's yeah, that's just keep going.

SPEAKER_01 43:06

It's a well I do have a template and I think that it could be easily adaptable. So I just wanted to throw it out there. If anybody's interested, um I'd be glad to share this template on how we broke down the activities to weigh them on a point system. And you know, so I use it myself. So just to be sure, am I am I staying on track with the things that I've said are essential for us to focus on every single week?

SPEAKER_00 43:27

Well, Melissa, that's what I wanted to, and I know your company often does complimentary behavioral assessments and you'll do some consulting for companies. So if a company wants to reach out to you, whether it's for recruiting help, whether it's for an assessment or a consult, what's the best way to reach you?

SPEAKER_01 43:42

Um I uh my email is mglenny at franklinprofessionals.com. There's an S on the end of professionals. Um I'm I'm active on LinkedIn as well. And um Franklin Professionals, our phone number is nine seven eight five three four two four two.

SPEAKER_00 44:00

So that's nine seven eight five three four four four four four two four two two. Yep. Excellent. Melissa, thank you so much for joining us. We'll look forward to you having coming back as a future guest and uh all the best with your continued great success. Thank you so much. So, Ted, I I want to finish the show with the concept of all or nothing. We have this tendency, right? We have to make everything so black and white. Like so you're either working from home or you're working at the office. And look, so many managers will say that, and even employees will say you lose the aspect of collaboration and you lose the tightness and cohesiveness of your team. I'm gonna tell you right now, I think that in the next 10 to 15 years, we're gonna see a huge shift of to co-working spaces, way more than we have now. And we've already seen it start a little bit. But I think what's gonna happen is a lot of companies are gonna say, we don't want to we don't want to pay for the real estate to pay for all this all year round. We just need people to come in certain times during the week. We want our teams to be together. And I think you can have your cake and eat it too. Yeah. You know, you can have the cohesiveness, you can maintain the collaboration and teamwork, but let's face it, everybody, I don't even want to throw the final thought today. It's not just times are changing, it's it's working smarter, not harder. Right, it's using your money wisely. Ted, any final thoughts?

SPEAKER_03 45:22

Um there's public software out there that was developed by the MITRE Corporation years ago. It was developed for the United States government, and it's free to everyone. It's called Collaborative Workspace. We use it all the time. We just don't realize it's in lots of different things. So go for it, people.

SPEAKER_00 45:39

Final thoughts from me. If you need training for your leaders working on culture change management, the things we've talked about in this show today, please reach out to me, 978-206-1535. You can email at info at mindsetgo.com. Uh, happy to do a consult myself, do some coaching, training, uh, whatever works best for you and your organization. I know we are at a time of difficulty, so anything I can do to help your company right now, please let me know. Thank you for joining us for another edition of i Communicate. We'll see you next week where former general manager of the Red Sox and Angels, Mike Port, will be joining us.