the HRD talks

Ceri Gott, Culture & Leadership Coach

• Actons Solicitors • Season 2 • Episode 8

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In this episode of the HRD Talks podcast, host Nic Elliott interviews Ceri Gott, Culture & Leadership Coach, formerly Chief Growth & Culture Officer at Hawksmoor International.

What happens when you blend the analytical mindset of a government economist with a passion for creating exceptional workplace cultures? Ceri Gott's remarkable journey from economic policy expert to Chief Growth and Culture Officer provides a masterclass in transforming organisations through people-centred leadership.

In this thought-provoking conversation, Ceri reveals how her unconventional career path began with a simple phone call from her brother, inviting her to help preserve the special culture of his growing restaurant business, Hawksmoor. What followed was a 13-year adventure that saw the company expand from three London restaurants to thirteen establishments across seven cities in four countries, consistently ranking among the UK's top 100 employers.

Ceri challenges us to rethink productivity as more than just time management, arguing that true workplace effectiveness comes from harnessing the complete combination of people's time, talent, and energy. She makes a compelling business case for kindness, revealing how seemingly "soft" cultural elements translate directly to improved cognitive function, innovation, and ultimately, financial performance. Organisations with strong cultures, she notes, outperform their counterparts by an astonishing 200%.

The discussion explores practical strategies for creating inclusive environments where everyone feels welcome, valued, and empowered to contribute. Ceri shares insights from her experience translating Hawksmoor's strong UK culture to international markets, highlighting the crucial differences between high-context and low-context communication styles across different countries.

For HR professionals seeking to advance their careers, Ceri offers wisdom that balances personal growth with professional development - from understanding your strengths and mitigating weaknesses to connecting with your values and vision. Her advice to "lean into data" while trusting intuition perfectly encapsulates the unique blend of analytical and empathic intelligence that has defined her career.

Whether you're managing workplace culture, leading through change, or simply trying to create more meaningful connections with colleagues, Ceri's insights will transform how you think about the intersection of people practices and business performance. Listen now to discover how intentional leadership can create workplaces where both people and profits thrive.

We hope you enjoy this episode!

Supplier shout-outs:  

Lorraine Copes / Be Inclusive Hospitality

Boardwalk Mentoring

Hospitality Action

Ceri’s LinkedIn: Ceri Gott | LinkedIn

Ceri's Website: CERI GOTT

Nic’s LinkedIn: Nic Elliott | LinkedIn

The HRD Talks is brought to you by Actons. For more information on our podcast please visit our website.

Nic Elliott:

So welcome to this episode of the HRD Talks podcast, where we talk with HR directors and people directors about their journey into HR. We get their insight into current trends in the world of work and take their advice on the future of HR and how HR professionals can deliver value and progress their career. I'm Nic Elliott, employment lawyer, so today I'm really, really excited to welcome Ceri Gott. Ceri gonna introduce herself in a minute. We just wanted to say thank you to Waterstones for hosting us today and providing a room in London. We're on tour with the HR Detox podcast, so thank you to them. Ceri, do you want to talk to us a little bit about who you are, what you're doing at the minute, and then we'll talk about how you got into HR?

Ceri Gott:

Thank you, Nic. So I'm Ceri Gott and I want to change the world.

Nic Elliott:

So just a small mission.

Ceri Gott:

I know that sounds bold, but we all have an impact on the people in the world around us, whether we are intentional about that or not. And from my point of view, we may as well make it a positive one. And as a culture and leadership coach, I work at a number of different levels. Someone beautifully put it yesterday there are worlds within worlds. So I do one-to-one coaching. I work with individuals who are creating or getting momentum, changing their world, their life, their experience of the world, and I'm privileged to see those magical moments when someone discovers more of themselves and kind of makes more, goes in the direction they want to.

Ceri Gott:

And I work coaching, mentoring hr directors and with other leaders and businesses on their, their leadership, their leadership style, something we can learn more about. We're not taught you know how to relate to, how we relate to other people, but it's just so important um and on people and um organizational strategies. So you know our workplaces are such important communities, most people. We don't live in extended families or tribes anymore. Most people spend most of their waking hours at work with the people they work with, not their housemates, etc. So small changes there can make such massive impacts on people's lives and have really big ripples. So, yeah, that work that HR teams do and HR directors do and leaders who are very people focused, so it has such a big contribution it does change the world yeah.

Ceri Gott:

And then there are organisations whose very mission is to have a positive impact, whether they are charities or purposeful businesses. So I was fortunate enough to be part of a business for a big chunk of time, helping lead a B Corp, so a business that demonstrates that companies can be not just profitable but also positive for people and taking positive strides on the planet. So that's what I do now one-to-one coaching, leadership, development and, up to an organizational level, cultural and growth frameworks, and I just love. I love helping people create things that are really meaningful to them and do more with them sounds great.

Nic Elliott:

Um, and tell us how you got into HR in the first place. So you talked a little bit about having worked in the people side of things for quite some time, but you also had a slightly unconventional route into HR. Tell us about that background.

Ceri Gott:

I did, I did. My journey into HR started with a phone call from my little brother, hugh Gott, asking me if I wanted to come and work for him. He asked me if I wanted to come and work for him and his best friend Will Beckett.

Ceri Gott:

So they are very successful restauranteurs now you know, have done amazing work, but at the time they were just starting out. So they had recently taken over a small kebab shop in East London, in Shoreditch, opposite a church designed by the architect Nicholas Hawksmoor, and had opened a restaurant called Hawksmoor. You can see the link now With simple ambitions, so simple, just great foods and this lovely welcoming environment where everyone could have a good time and ambition, because I mean, they weren't teenage boys anymore, but they were, you know, still quite cocky as a big sister, and one day they wanted it to be the best in the world.

Ceri Gott:

So the best in London and then the best in the world okay and they had recently got some investment to help grow the business and it was really important to them to do it, keeping all of the things that made it really special, so the quality, the ethics and this workplace culture. So they already had a really strong workplace culture, which my brother, hugh, described as a group of talented people creating something special, and it was really important to them to keep it, because they and we always believed if you get the people's stuff right, the rest will follow. People enjoy being there, particularly in our industry. You know, you feel it, customers will come, they'll have a great time, they will tell their friends, they'll come back and the money will follow. So that was really important to them and they wanted my help working out how to do that. How are we going?

Ceri Gott:

to do that and someone asked me what did you think about it? So I knew that I would really enjoy spending more time with my brother and in these restaurants, because I mean, who wouldn't? It's great food and it's a great place to be. But at the time I was doing something really different. I spent 13 years as a government economist.

Nic Elliott:

A little different, a little different.

Ceri Gott:

You'll appreciate that with your different hats on. You'll appreciate that with your different hats on. So I spent 13 years working in a whole range of areas policy, strategy, economics including at one point being a national expert on productivity and innovation, which we might come on, and talk about later, because it's so topical and so I knew I'd enjoy it.

Ceri Gott:

But it was such a different world I did wonder how are these two worlds going to come together and how can I make a positive impact? And I mentioned this book to you because we are in Waterstones the interesting books.

Ceri Gott:

And I just read this book called Funky Business that talks about when you get very different experience, ideas, backgrounds, sectors. That's when you can really create something new and different and exciting and grow. And, funnily enough, will had just read that book. So it just like why not, let's join these things together and see and grow. And, funnily enough, will had just read that book, so it just like why not, let's? Join these things together and see what happens.

Nic Elliott:

Did that feel like a risk at the time?

Ceri Gott:

It did feel like a risk at the time, but they were on a change journey, they were growing and I was on a change journey because my son had been ill so there's a personal story behind it as well and he was recovering. He's 17 now, six foot three, totally fine just, but he was three, yeah, and and it just made me really reconnect to what really mattered to me and I wanted to work with people I really cared about. So my brother, yeah, um, and and work for the people they really cared about, because you can't do what you do, you know, especially as an entrepreneur, you cannot do it without your people.

Ceri Gott:

They're so important yeah and bringing those things together. So my very different experience and possibly not a leap that I wouldn't have taken if I hadn't had that personal story going on. So my very different experience and that simple ambition, I think, has been a real recipe for success. So over the 13 years that I was at Hawksmoor we grew the business from three special restaurants in London to 13 restaurants across seven cities, four countries.

Nic Elliott:

So that's the UK, Ireland and the.

Ceri Gott:

US Wow, 150 people, so 1,250. As it's an HR audience, you know, with the turnover and with big openings that could be 800 people joining in a year. Yeah, Still with very high standards, winning loads of awards, being named the best steak restaurant in the world, yeah, and being the first UK restaurant to become a B Corp the first uh uk restaurant to become a b core and in each of those 13 years hawksmore was named top hundred best company to work for in any industry in the uk, um, and obviously over that time my role evolved as well.

Ceri Gott:

So I started as the hr director some people here who, uh, particularly in small businesses, startups I was the hr director and the whole HR team and it's a great people joined me and my role evolved chief people officer internationally. And then I took on planning because of my scaled background and ended up chief growth and culture officer, sitting on the board overseeing the company in this very dynamic environment. And, of course, it wasn't always easy, because we went through expansion, went through covid, went through double digit inflation through unemployment, all of those things that have happened.

Ceri Gott:

Yeah, and I think that special culture, keeping that special culture and having actually having both those hats on really loving people like I'm all about people it's the red thread that runs through everything I do. But and also having like kind of weaving in a bit of economics and a bit of that information, really helped certainly me to.

Nic Elliott:

Yeah, um help create something that was resilient. I guess that was one of the questions I had was what do you think your kind of background as an economist brought to that role, because it is my guess is that there are probably not many people that have done that transition. If anybody does, it give you a different level of commerciality when it comes to understanding the business, or what do you think?

Ceri Gott:

I love that question because I think sometimes you know the soft skills yeah, because you can see that we're seen as something fluffy that one group of people doing one place over here, whereas the hard work on numbers is done by another group somewhere else yeah, and I'm quite passionate about finding well, I mean more, and I you know I was finding ways to do both right, because a lot of this good work is being done and it does drive the business, but people maybe don't appreciate him um and finding ways to to kind of share some of this stuff. So I'm really happy to share some of some of the things that I did there that I think one made a really lovely place to work which we know who who doesn't want to be somewhere.

Ceri Gott:

That's nice, yeah, yeah, but also helped help the business yeah, grow and be resilient.

Nic Elliott:

Well, let's talk about some of those. Let's talk about yeah, yeah, so what? Let's talk about some of those. So what kind of things?

Ceri Gott:

So can I start by explaining what productivity is Of course?

Nic Elliott:

Absolutely. We hear a lot about that at the minute, that's for sure. In terms of the wider economic picture, as in. It's not supposed to be very good, but yeah, go ahead.

Ceri Gott:

Yes, it's not supposed to be very good Labour productivity in the UK, productivity in the uk and also because labor costs going up, business very challenging. You know, there's a lot of focus on it, as you say, and I hear it and I I kind of sometimes I think it can be translated as labor efficiency, like labor costs. Yeah, and for me it's so much more than that, because my experience in both of these very different areas economics, people and culture, I mean has really taught me that what we achieve is all about people, and people's productivity is a combination of their time, talent and energy. And if we focus on just one of those things time without always regenerating energy and talent, learning then we're just taking a very narrow view. So you know, we hear a lot about we need to work smarter. What does work smarter mean? It means be more productive. And what is productivity? It is what you or I achieve in a day's work. So the value of what you or I achieve, without picking on you.

Nic Elliott:

What do you achieve in a day's work? I'm the only person here. It's fine Picking on you, yeah. What do you achieve in a day's work? I'm the only person here.

Ceri Gott:

It's fine, and so if you take what we achieve, if you take all the people in your company and multiply it by what they achieve in a day, by average productivity, you get a measure of national income, percentage of which is taxed and we spend on public services. We need more money, and so productivity is really important for all of us.

Ceri Gott:

At a company level, it is you know we grow productivity and we can grow the value of our company because it grows profits. Yeah, nationally, it gives us more money to spend on public you know infrastructure without having to put up taxes, and individually it's related to our income and there is the productivity gap. So that means that what we, what we achieve, um, well, just to make it real, okay, what it might take us 45 hours to achieve here in the uk, someone in sweden or the us might do in 43. Yeah, so get two hours back a week. And who you know wouldn't want that two hours back a week? Um, but what I know because of my background on productivity is that in every country and in every sector there are outliers, so that, because I looked at the data, so there are companies that are doing better than others in the sector and we can learn from them.

Ceri Gott:

So in 2021, we're coming out of COVID and there's a Professor, colin Lindsay, at Strathclyde University yeah, see, I'm very geeky, so I was very happy. He got in touch and said do you want to be part of a study? So they had money from the Scottish government, I think and they were just looking for companies that had a great reputation for people, practices and great financial performance so that they could get lessons to help other companies work out how to grow out of COVID. Covid, okay, um and I and um and hawks was part of that, which is great and I learned a lot from it and and so I could, yeah, so I will go on and show a few things.

Nic Elliott:

Yeah, yeah, was that all clear?

Ceri Gott:

yeah, yeah, no great, yeah, yeah so let's take the work from paul and lindsey. So one of the biggest drivers of productivity is innovation. So we think of innovation, steam tech. Now we think about ai, and what I really learned from this study was that at Hawksmoor, the people who were a kind of army of micro innovators, the ones who were making changes that drove improvements. So in the service sector, most of our innovation is how can people organise themselves and their work a little bit different every day to make themselves more efficient and make their job a bit better.

Ceri Gott:

And the people who were doing that were the people who felt that they could be the change that they wanted to see. They were people who felt their manager listened and gave them feedback and gave them training and they were allowed to make the changes that would make them more efficient. So this thing that we'd been doing, that I had always seen as an HR strategy listening, surveys, right.

Ceri Gott:

We're all doing these listening surveys. Actually, you know, not only are they engagement strategy, they're a business innovation strategy. It suddenly feels different and my experience of doing them, to give an example, was that I thought people would ask for more benefits or something, and I found people didn't tend to ask for that. People would ask for things like we haven't got enough teaspoons. People would ask for things like we haven't got enough teaspoons. Teaspoons in restaurants are like socks in washing machines, so we're in a busy service and we haven't got enough teaspoons and it makes service slow and it makes my job more stressful. So they are genuinely finding things that not only make them happier because obviously that's going to drain your energy but also make the quality of your business better and more efficient. Just think there's there's a lovely lesson in there about how listening can improve.

Ceri Gott:

Both of those things make a better place to work, and it makes them more productive yeah, we've got time for another one.

Nic Elliott:

Yeah, yeah, absolutely go for it, yeah yeah, um, let's go pick another one.

Ceri Gott:

It'd be be kindness. So let's pick something, something that can come across as really soft and fluffy, yeah, but nurturing a culture of kindness, hawksmoor has a. One of its values is work hard and be nice to people.

Nic Elliott:

Yeah.

Ceri Gott:

Like, of course, who doesn't want to work somewhere where people are nice to people? But how does that also help business performance? So when someone's rude to us, or even when we witness someone being rude, it's like a bit of our brain, our brains kind of shut down a bit. Have you heard that? Yeah, yeah yeah, so obviously our brains kind of diverting some of its activity to go over that ruminate yeah, yeah yeah, if, if you haven't, it's you know.

Ceri Gott:

If you didn't know that, I just I always challenge people to notice next time they feel a bit slighted or something at work. Just see what their brain's doing over the next few hours and if they get as much done. So now, if you imagine all of those people in your company and you put them in an environment where managers aren't confident managing conflict or microaggressions, as they're called, where this behaviour or manager might criticise someone in front of other people, you're taking all of those people in your company, you're putting them in an environment that reduces their brain power and obviously you multiply those two things together, you're going to get a lower value for your company. So there's lots of stuff on that, and then the question is always how do you do it? So that's a value.

Nic Elliott:

Yeah, well, I was thinking how do you embed that? How do you encourage people to be kind to each other?

Ceri Gott:

were there initiatives that you would kind of implement, or was it just kind of the? Culture just made it that way. It's a bit of both, okay, so, um. So we think about big and small kindnesses. So big kindnesses, quite. Um. We have what's my income insurance in place for everyone who works there. Yeah, so if something happens, I mean you like?

Nic Elliott:

everyone will know what income insurance it's quite unusual in our industry yeah but that's that's, that's a big kindness.

Ceri Gott:

Yeah, it's not why people join companies, certainly not in hospitality in their 20s having fun.

Ceri Gott:

And then my experience is that it's the small things that make the biggest difference, and that is about culture, and so that's value, that's culture. And then being really intentional is about culture, and so that's value, that's culture. And then being really intentional about how you embed it. So all new managers when I did induction with them, none of it was about this is what you must do. It's to start with, like, let's nurture a culture of kindness and actually start with you make a big difference to people's lives. You know for the story again, most people spend their time here. Like I have experienced how much difference managers make to people's lives.

Ceri Gott:

When I did, that, it'd be you know what are the kindnesses that matter to you. Be it like my head chef said hello to me when they came in in the morning. Someone wiped the section, someone had my back, someone swapped a shift, because you know it's those things make such a big difference every day. That's interesting, yeah, and that's about culture, and I think one of the most important things you know will be a theme is management.

Nic Elliott:

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Ceri Gott:

So time and again, we find the most important thing in culture is management. So for me, like culture is your management culture and I was more. Uh, we have, there's a five, just say we have because obviously I have left.

Nic Elliott:

It's only a few months ago. I was gonna say it wasn't long ago yeah, you can be forgiven and it was for a long time and it's still there.

Ceri Gott:

They're still doing a great job, though all of these things um part of the culture. There's a five stage management development program a really good thing to have in every industry and investing in people. So it is learning those things. How do you deal with conflict? We're not taught this.

Ceri Gott:

We don't get spat out of school or university, knowing how to have a difficult conversation or have relationships, and these are the skills that actually end up there's a lot of research on this now end up being the most important skills for your professional development and your company, and also for your life. So these social, emotional relations, they're more important.

Ceri Gott:

They have more impact on your quality of life and your health than not smoking you know it's it's a massive gift to people, not just to work, but all things like how can we do more for our people? Not then do more for us, but do more, and then they will stay there and you'll get all the other benefits. So so we have that in place, and and so I was really, you know, obviously I've been really interested to see research that shows that companies where the managers score more highly for emotional intelligence not only have more engaged teams, like we're going to guess that's the hr bit yeah but also more profitable and of higher cso customer satisfaction scores.

Ceri Gott:

Yeah, I mean, it's amazing isn't it? Yeah, and, and that is the theme running through all of these things and it drives productivity.

Nic Elliott:

So then, with those managers, do you think you can teach that stuff, or do you select for that when you're looking at promoting people to management?

Ceri Gott:

I'm studying neuroscience at the moment.

Nic Elliott:

I don't want to get onto it because I will go off on one.

Ceri Gott:

There's a lot, you know. There's a lot that we haven't learned and there's a lot that we can learn. Yeah, and it also it is a muscle. So this is, you know what I picked up. Just to give a very simple version, Two networks in our brain an analytic network and an empathic network. Analytic network makes us rational, it's the stuff we will learn your lawyer.

Ceri Gott:

I did economics. We will learn this stuff. It's valued in western education and we learn this stuff. And the other network is the empathic network. So not only is about emotional intelligence, it's also helps us think more conceptually, think about principles, ethics.

Ceri Gott:

That makes us reasonable yeah and I say you know you want your analytic network to be your finance director doing the number crunching, but the empathic network should be the CEO really making the decisions. And it is a muscle and if you don't use it it actually atrophies I can say that word right, yeah. So we need to train this muscle. It's good for us at work and it's good for us in life. So, yes, you can learn it. And then just to you, asked me specifically about it, you know at a company level how we did it.

Ceri Gott:

So, uh, something lovely in hospitality which is actually comes from a very famous washington called denny meyer in the us, and we talk he talks about hawksmore, talks about many other places about 49 and the 51. So 49 service, 51 hospitality. So when you come to our restaurant 49, the service is what happens to you. Okay, you know, you get the menu, your bill comes, a time you don't have to wait too much for your drinks, like what that? What happens to you. And then the 51 is the hospitality. It's how you're made to feel and your experience, yeah, so, and I think in hospitality lots of front of house managers already they're so good at meeting people, you know they're so skilled, uh, the people in this industry and lots of other industries, and so they already have that. And I always believe you take your specialism, your employment, lawyer, hr, economics and you adapt it to the personality of the organization you're in. So I'm training hr in an organization like that.

Ceri Gott:

I'll be talking about the 49, so important and for managers, I believe we should train all managers to do hr not yeah, impact, impact and to make decisions and so you know people have contact with people day to day who also understand the law.

Ceri Gott:

So, but the 49, you specialize. It's really important that you get the steps right, whether it's disciplinary 49, you specialize. It's really important, uh, that you get the steps right, whether it's disciplinary steps, whatever and it's really important to feel confident doing that so you can get the 51 right. Yeah, but the 51, how do we? How do we feel? How do you feel when we have that conversation, whether it's your performance review and yeah, and having that space where you understand yourself, your strengths, your weaknesses and grow, whether it's your having a disciplinary conversation, whether it's a communication in the company and the culture. This is what we're doing, this is why we're doing it and our values, all of that stuff. You have to help me. Did that answer your question?

Nic Elliott:

No, no, absolutely Absolutely. And it resonates with often when I'm advising, because we talked about it in my my first degree of psychology and I think often I'll be thinking about an employee situation that I'm helping a client with or an hr person with, and think, but trying to focus on how will that actually make them feel like? Yes, we might take them through a process and that'll all be legally compliant and lovely, but how are they going to feel, how are they going to react? What are they actually thinking and how might we, you know, tailor things to do things in a way that's helpful for my client usually for them bearing that in mind, so, yeah, I think it's great.

Ceri Gott:

I really like that. That's a beautiful example, I think, of you using your analytical empathetic network and the fact that we need both of them in balance Because if you just did that analytic bit, actually it's how someone feels means that yeah, it could go spectacularly wrong, absolutely yeah and how people feel is important if there's going to be any message absolutely absolutely were there any of the other initiatives that you wanted to talk about, or do you want to move on to something new?

Ceri Gott:

I think I'd I'd love to just talk a bit about welcoming everyone of course so, so, so inclusion, you know, yeah, I work and there's a wonderful woman, lorraine coats, who runs a brilliant organization and hospitality called be inclusive hospitality. It's about um, accelerating race equity, and she was a and I totally agree that it's about culture. So, when you're thinking about culture, it's about making sure that everyone feels they belong, everyone's part of it and everyone benefits. So all of these things develops, all of these things and and I can link that to productivity it's just but, barbie's just like, it's just the right thing to do, yes, but but obviously, if you, if you feel you have to hide part of yourself at work, then your brain is going to affect productivity. But it's just the right thing to do, right? It is awful that people feel they have to hide things or can't hide things that's going to affect them.

Ceri Gott:

So a little bit of insight into how we thought about it and what we did there. I guess I'd start with start with the value that everyone brings. So my brother hugh. A few years ago he was diagnosed with inattentive adhd. We agreed. It explained a lot and in particular, he is incredible at detail. He'll go down a rabbit hole and he'll.

Ceri Gott:

He's you know he's, so he's creative director yeah, yeah and and it really explains how he's so amazing at those things and explained why he finds some other things really difficult, like being on time when he's meeting me yeah yeah, um, and he would describe the success at hawksmoor. Now I think um as as a partnership between someone who's neurodivergent someone who's neurotypical and yeah, and he's a bit funky business right yeah, yeah so I mean it will come back to a theme which is like when we embrace difference, it is creative and it is exciting.

Ceri Gott:

So he um, he did. He did a internal video about it when he was diagnosed and that was really powerful. I was always really open. I was a working mom and some of the things that I was juggling with doing that, and it was a great place to be doing that. And then I was saying, well, it's all right for us, right, like what about everyone else? So Hawksmoor always had a a real culture around creating an environment in which people can feel comfortable being themselves and actually started speaking to Lorraine a few years ago. She was how do you know everyone feels that, because I knew it's a good place to work. I've got all the data from 13 years ago. Look at that data every year. But how do you know that everyone's benefiting from that? So we started our own internal survey and we ask a number of questions, but one of them is Hawksmoor welcomes everyone with respect to their background and 97% of people agree uh, hawksmore welcomes everyone, irrespective of their background and 97 percent of people agree.

Ceri Gott:

Okay, three years ago, I mean, it's the thing I'm probably most happy about and it's going to say proud of, but it's not me, it's the management culture, right, yeah, and that is the same when it's broken down by gender, by race and similarly, you know 95 plus feel they belong, um, and feel comfortable being themselves. And again, maybe it's, maybe it's about big and small things. So to give you like I mean it's a small example, but it's big for a lot of people is like you can wear your own clothes front of house in hawksmoor and it might it might sound small, but the number of people who just so happy they can wear trainers yeah like, quite literally, being comfortable being yourself if you're recruiting for receptionist, receptionists or reservationists, and you can wear trainers on your feet all day in a restaurant.

Nic Elliott:

Well, I imagine that probably is quite unusual in that sector, isn't it? Yeah, I'm not sure. Now, uniforms tend to be a thing, but yeah.

Ceri Gott:

Yeah, and part of it was like bring your whole self to work, be yourself. And casual professional, so be yourself, but really professional. In lots of ways, we have to be even more professional when we're being ourselves, but it does give it a different personality, I believe. And then again, I think you look at all the evidence. It's about my manager, you know, and my team, and I feel I have a voice and all of these sorts of things. That really makes a difference. And hospitality means welcoming everyone, you know, being welcoming and looking after people, and it's an industry that knows how to do that really well and it's an area I mentor for being inclusive hospitality, okay, and and yeah, I mean there's a lot I could talk about there as well, there's another amazing initiative boardwalk, which is about getting more women on boards in hospitality.

Ceri Gott:

so there are people who are really doing things and and let's just, let's just keep that momentum and make everyone feel welcome so that they can contribute and just feel good, and because it's the right thing to do.

Nic Elliott:

So I've got a couple of questions on that which I think are kind of linked to trends at the minute. To another people director a while ago who was kind of of the view that for an employer, people bringing their whole self to work, as the phrase goes, was actually really tricky and because often when, when their whole selves butted up against each other or maybe even offended each other, that was something that an employer then had to navigate and I think their view was that's not really what I want to have to do. Um, what do you kind of think of that?

Ceri Gott:

that's so interesting. I love that. So I talk about welcoming everyone yeah you know that that's that. That's what we talk about at Hawksmoor, um, and I think I'll zoom out a bit to culture and maybe to something that I learned from taking a strong culture in the UK to the US.

Nic Elliott:

Yeah, yeah, I might have been going US bound at some point with my next question. Oh, were you so? Well, it'd be interesting. Maybe I'll say that and then we can weave it in. But you know, in fact I was chatting to somebody this morning about DE&I fatigue and you know we're in what 25 um us president has been, you know, in place for a little while and there's been a big rollback on, you know, that kind of stuff there in the us. Often that will follow over here and whether there is a fatigue on that front and whether that's okay or not. But yeah, so it's interesting if you've got the kind of us uk comparison um as well. Yeah, I've thrown quite a lot of that at you there once.

Ceri Gott:

But yes, I think I'll absorb it and you can tell me caught the board or not, but for me it is. It is about culture and it is about welcoming and including everyone, and it is the right thing to do.

Ceri Gott:

And there's all sorts of difference in there, um, because we're all different yeah right, um, and it is being conscious about it's being conscious and intentional about making sure that everyone feels they belong and develop all of those things. Yeah, and measuring that. And for me, you know, there is a lot of difference I guess I'll pick that up again and there's difference anyway, between departments, between people, between functions, front of house, back out, you know, law me, yeah, there's difference culturally different countries, and for me, culture is, it is about the values and about how you embed them and I I couldn't pick up some examples, but but it's about good conversations. It's about creating spaces for good conversations for us to understand, connect and understand with each other better.

Ceri Gott:

Um, and the hr team has has so much power there, I think, to help shape conversations. Anything from annual review form or self-review question what questions do you want to people to have in there? What do you want them to be thinking about? How does, how is that part of your culture? How is that helping like, what is that bringing to the conversations they have? And then for me, you know we had this strong culture. I'm gonna, I'm struggling now to give you a culture model before I start, I'm just trying to tell you a little bit.

Ceri Gott:

So. So we had these values, yeah, when I joined. Yeah, they kind of, but there was a few restaurants and Hugh and Will knew it was special, they knew it was a special culture. So they had kind of bottled it in these five values Kind of be nice to people I mentioned, support development, personality, which is now welcoming everyone, and something that will come back to me. And then really the question for me was how are you going to keep the culture as we go?

Ceri Gott:

Ceri, it's now your job and and really that is, you have your hows, but you have to translate it into what what we actually going to do in the business. So I kind of peppered it into the business in different ways and that obviously served us. These values served us really well for 10 years Well, I mean 13 years still there, and their words and they tend to be people who've been there for a very long time and it's just part of the way you do things Everyone knows what they mean, all of this stuff and it's brilliant, brilliant culture. And then, with opening years, it made me really think about language.

Ceri Gott:

I don't know, if you've done any employment law between the UK and the US.

Nic Elliott:

Some yeah.

Ceri Gott:

It's just mind-blowingly different.

Nic Elliott:

Absolutely.

Ceri Gott:

People find it so hard to understand how different it is Correct.

Nic Elliott:

And usually US parent companies are not happy with the way that the UK sort of subsidiary or outpost is managing employment issues and they can't understand why we would do it the way that we do. And helping them understand that it's generally what I tend to end up doing, but yeah, yeah, it's very different.

Ceri Gott:

you're right yeah, and and I think what I really learned was we're like goldfish in a bowl. Yeah, you know, in our national culture we just can't see it. We can't see it until you jump out and you really try and understand why things are different somewhere else. But, and what I really learned from you is how language means something different and I'd love to pick up that point but also how much we're shaped by our regulatory environment and by our social and cultural history, and things just mean different things and we just value different things. So we have these one word values, and there's a book that I really love called Culture Map by Erin Meyer, and she is a professor in Seattle Business School, I think, but essentially she's spent a couple of decades doing this stuff and she has decoded, I think it's eight or nine factors that influence what good management looks like in different cultures and spoiler alert, it's not the same.

Ceri Gott:

So we think this is a good way of giving feedback. Let me train you how to give good feedback, whatever it is, it's not the same. And we have international teams, right, I'm sure all? Your businesses have difference and there was one area in there, so just think it's cool.

Ceri Gott:

On communication so, she introduced me to this idea of low context and high context communication. So high context communication is an environment where we're we're quite similar. We have lots of shared history, we're quite homogenous, so, um, my sister-in-law's japanese japanese culture is very established. It's very, very high context. Yeah, I also think it's. It's quite true when you, if you go to your in-laws, someone says, oh, blah, blah, blah, it's really annoyed and you, like you haven't noticed it at all, you know I'm nodding, yeah, quietly families or your own family.

Ceri Gott:

Like families are high context. You, you, you read subtle cues, yeah, um, and you develop a high context communication because we don't have to say it all, because we say in gestures or I use a word and you know what it means, right, and then a country, a culture like the US, it's, it's, it is formed from people from all over the world. Right, if we, if I try and talk to you in a high context way, there's a big room for misunderstanding because we don't mean the same things, we might have two different languages. So it's developed a very low context culture that really values clarity and directness and, in fact, if you are kind of nuanced, which we tend to be, we are in the middle, we're more on the high context side. We talk about things like faint praise, right, yeah, yeah, um, then then it can be seen even as frustratingly unclear or indirect. So I'm so interested in this low context culture. And actually, a word like development personality what does that mean? If I say that to you, do you know what to do with it.

Ceri Gott:

I know what to do it because I'm part of this company. I mean, I qualified in coaching a number of years ago and met a woman, georgina gray, there and I had great conversations about culture because obviously I've done all this stuff and she had worked on culture, specializing in culture with smaller purpose-driven organizations, and we kind of brought that together and really thought about how to evolve culture at hawks more doing coaching workshops there, yeah, and in particular, there's like what these words really mean. You know, georgie's great. She really challenged us. We're like what do you really mean by this? What do you want people to do?

Ceri Gott:

If I read that work hard and be nice to people, I know what to do. The rest don't really know what to do. Yeah, um, so we, so we did that work listening to people in the uk business, in the us business, the general managers because at the end of the day, it's the managers who do this, not the hr team, leadership team like, uh, they bring everyone on this journey and and so personality welcoming everyone of that, it's really clear right, yeah, we measure it and people know what it means and, again, I think these are words that support good conversations.

Ceri Gott:

It does loop back somehow to your original question, which is like dft and like how do you manage?

Ceri Gott:

difference. So it's not like be everything still mindful, we've still got those, we're trying to develop that. So like, yeah, what does this mean to me, Nic? What does it mean to you? We're very different professions, very, and let's, let's generate that understanding. And for me, that's what culture is. It's supporting those conversations but giving them this is what it means here to be belong at hawksmoor. This is what it means to belong at another company. It's these three things or these four things. Let's talk about what they mean.

Ceri Gott:

Yeah, because the thing about culture is that it can't be static. If your culture is stuck in the past and was like it's what we do, you know, it's how we've always done things, it's about this thing we do every friday, whatever it is, it's going to strangle your business because the truth is, you know, culture has to evolve. So hawksman's purpose would be creating something special, but lots of businesses will have their mission and the reality is, what special changes over time? It's changed for customers so much in the last five years and, as you will know, you spend lots of time with h it's changed for people who work here yeah what is special now?

Ceri Gott:

it's different and we have to evolve with it. Yeah, and these are the tools. The fact, these, the values, whatever they are, keep evolving, you know, would be one. They're tools to have this conversation so you can keep your culture alive and you can keep growing, did that?

Nic Elliott:

give you, yeah, absolutely Well. And also, I kind of had innovation in mind when you were talking about that evolving culture as well, because if it's strangling any change, then those kind of improvements are not going to happen either, I guess. So, yeah, it was really interesting yeah, exactly keep up.

Ceri Gott:

Yeah, yeah, really great thank you.

Nic Elliott:

Um. Wow, so many different insights. Um, that's brilliant. Thank you, um. One of the things that we talk about on the podcast is advice to the hr profession, um, and I would love you to kind of share either people kind of coming into the profession or looking for, you know, progression through or the top job, that kind of thing, your kind of thoughts on how people can best position themselves or equip themselves for for the job. I suppose it's a tough time for a lot of HR people out there at the minute. Um, any thoughts on that?

Ceri Gott:

oh, it makes me feel, feel for the hr people having a tough time, because it is. It is a big, complex job and you're dealing, you are, yeah, interacting with people and I love people like my work's all about people and impact but never think that's easy. Yeah, you know, relationships aren't easy, um, and you're dealing, yeah, with people's emotions and all of this stuff. So I, how, how to kind of grow and develop and resource yourself. I'd start by saying, but keep yourself in mind.

Ceri Gott:

I hear people in the hr profession say, oh, I must think about, say, a mentor or coach myself or training for myself. I'm doing it all for everybody else. Yeah, I'm really good at looking or training for myself. I'm doing it all for everybody else. Yeah, I'm really good at looking after everybody else, um, and not doing it for myself. So that'd be one like take a pause, just think, oh yeah, like like remember and nurture yourself, and then I think I'd share something that I would think about for anyone really, and and that is about sustained change. So I think it's true at organizational level, it's true at an individual level and actually, yeah, I was um training recently with professor richard boyatzis, who's done decades of research in us and I loved what he, what he came out with, because it's true for people at work in development.

Nic Elliott:

So our performance review that's why I keep looking at you and your performance.

Ceri Gott:

Um, it'll be a very inspirational conversation, I'm sure. Um, or people who need to make changes because, say, they're facing a chronic health condition and it's their medical professional. Yeah, uh, when we focus on what people should change doesn't lead to sustained change.

Ceri Gott:

I think it's interesting because if you're lots of people are managing change in their organization. If you're telling people this, if you're just telling people what must change, it doesn't lead to sustained change. I think it's interesting because if you're lots of people are managing change in their organization, if you're telling people this, if you're just telling people what must change, it doesn't lead to sustained change. But if you can connect people to their vision, their dreams, their values, uh, and kind of resource them with good relationships, then that leads to sustained change. That's why I think in companies, vision and value is so important. Yeah, it's why we change, but it's also true for individuals. So I think, like I think I'm like a little plant growing. You know you need roots. Roots might be your values, like knowing who you are and and, and you know the relationships in your life that matter, the activities you do that replenish you, and then know where your light is and that will keep evolving, because we all keep evolving.

Ceri Gott:

But what are you growing towards? And sometimes it's quite like I'm just trying to get the next job or I'm trying to buy a house, you know. And sometimes it's like I want to change the world, but know what you're growing towards, um, and keep reviewing that and then it's good work on this as well. Know your strengths, so you'll grow through your strengths. You know, if you just keep focusing on like how can I improve my weaknesses, this is the ceiling, um, you can really grow through your strengths. Um and I love showing this because you know I have a 17 year old son will be joining work like, if we could help younger people learn this, it it will not only make them better in their first job, it will. It will just make them happier and we'll put on all of that stuff for their whole lives. That's what I mean. Like we could change people's lives, yeah, um. So know your strengths also.

Ceri Gott:

Know your weaknesses and mitigate your weaknesses, because they are the things that trip you up yeah, you know, uh, when you're under stress, they all happen, whether that is, yeah, whatever it is, for me it's not being succinct, so, and then you can help me maybe mitigate that. Um, and then and then, and then look after your plant mode, like water it. How do you water it? Yeah, views, who are your mentors? Where do you get your ideas from? Um, how do you protect yourself in drought? Because sometimes we are flat out, like you know, I'm feeling for your hr people and yeah, um, how do you resource yourself through that drought?

Ceri Gott:

so, and relationships are an important part of that. Who are the people that you spend time with, who give you energy and help? You grow and really contribute. And then, specifically for HR people, I would say oh, you know what we talked about analytic and empathic, so maybe I will use that language.

Ceri Gott:

So, okay, do you think so, analytic, like data, like, lean into data. If you already like data, just really lean into it. If you don't like it, don't be scared, just learn. Yeah, um, like anything, actually learn the things that you're scared of. You know you have to get out of your comfort zone and get uncomfortable people. You know that. Obviously we, everyone here, will know that's how you grow, because they're all hr people. Um, I'm gonna read that stuff. But also do something that makes you uncomfortable and you do. It becomes comfortable. It's one less thing that makes you feel uncomfortable. It's brilliant, it's great. But learn data for all of the reasons we talked about there, because we need ways, these things that some HR people just know instinctively. It's the energy in the room, it's the vibe. It really matters. They know this and I believe that. But how do you communicate that? To get the investment or make balanced decisions? Manage up.

Ceri Gott:

So know what people above you as you go through your career people will want something different from you and just keep evolving yeah so ask for feedback and trying to say that personally, take it as what do people need from me now, or what do they need from me? Get to understand yourself, herman. I like I don't know if you've done, herman, but for me it's great you find out your colour red, yellow, whatever and it will tell you. This is how other people, other colours, want information from you their finance and their blue green, like they want it in a very different way from say how I want it. So get really good at managing yourself and giving other people what they need. And then we talked about the impact like trust your instinct, trust your intuition and keep developing that as well. We just need to find ways to make other people value it as well. That's a really important form of intelligence. Did that make sense?

Nic Elliott:

yeah, absolutely love it, anything. Yeah, I love it, love it, thank you. And then the other thing that we have is something called the supplier shout out. So we don't have a sponsor for the podcast, but we do like to try and showcase a supplier or an organization that you think are great. So is there anybody on that front?

Ceri Gott:

well, I think I've already mentioned two who I think are great, which is Be Inclusive Hospitality yeah, Lorraine Copes and that community love being part of that um and love the action they're taking. I mentioned Boardwalk, which are three really inspirational women in hospitality are taking action to really resource other women and get them on the board, and I would mention Hospitality Action. So Hospitality Action is EAP I don't even have to explain it to them.

Ceri Gott:

So they're challenged as EAP and they've been in hospitality for hundreds of years and they really, really make a difference to people in our industry both through that, but they also give out grants to people who've really hit hard times and you know, I had a horrible experience where one of our restaurants I mean the industry, the world, the country was in the borough attacks and they, you know, I got them involved and they came in and did crisis support. So they have. You know, people support a lot of people, they support HR people and other people and they're amazing and these are all people who really care. They do this because they care and they are making a positive impact on the world. Yeah, and I love it.

Nic Elliott:

Well, we'll tag them in the notes to the podcast for sure, so do check them out. Just finally, tell us more about what you're doing now. So we've talked about Hawks more a lot. What are you doing now? What kind of stuff are you getting involved in, and what does that involve?

Ceri Gott:

Yeah. So I think the thread throughout all of the stuff that I've done as you probably, as people, people in transformation I love that work and I love helping people create things that are really meaningful for them, and I'm also someone who has loads of ideas and I love to do loads of stuff. So I'm trying to keep myself one bit at a time. So I'm doing it in a number of different ways at the moment. So one-to-one coaching, okay, with people I am. You heard me talk about the empathy network and it is something we can learn.

Ceri Gott:

So I am doing personalized, so one-to-one leadership development, so her personalized to the individual leader. So it's it will be some models if they're relevant, but it's also really integrating it and applying it because it is personal, whatever it is, understanding ourselves, understanding other people and with georgina, we also partner with hr directors or organizations to get this cult building blocks, those values. That work is unbelievable. So McKinsey have a study and they find that organisations in the top 25% for culture outperform those in the bottom 25 by 200%. It's whopping, isn't it?

Ceri Gott:

So if I told you something else at the moment could increase your financial returns by 200, you'd be investing in that. I'd sign up, yeah, and it's not just that. You know there's, there's a range of things in there, yeah, but it is, it is, it's all of this stuff, yeah, and then I'll be launching some more stuff next year. Also, think coaching is amazing. It's like I've I had a coach, yeah, and it's amazing. Space for growth and discovering possibilities and some people, you know it's investment as well, and I think I'd like to explore other ways to help organizations give it, bring it to more people yeah, um, things like that sounds great, really exciting.

Ceri Gott:

Thank you, Nic, and I do.

Ceri Gott:

Talks on these things now yeah, because I've decided like it is really important to talk about this stuff and talk about the great work that people, leaders do, and why it's so important yeah, so thank you for asking me.

Nic Elliott:

No problem at all. It's been an absolute pleasure so many different insights, like I was saying earlier on, and really appreciate it. I'm sure people will get loads of value out of it, um, and no doubt be in touch with you asking for more. So it's been, it's been excellent, and they're really happy to.

Ceri Gott:

For people to contact me on linkedin yeah, just just to say hello to you, connect and build community. I love hearing what people are up to and just meeting other people who care, or also, obviously, on my website.

Nic Elliott:

Yeah, absolutely, which is very easy. We always include, oh, what Ceri got. Yeah, yeah, exactly. We include LinkedIn profiles for both of us in the notes as well.

Ceri Gott:

So, yeah, do and you no problem at all.

Nic Elliott:

The community you create yeah, no problem at all, thank you, thanks, very much. Thanks for listening to this episode of the HRD Talks podcast. Hopefully you found the discussion helpful. If so, please follow us on your podcast provider to be notified of future episodes and share with friends and colleagues. For more information on the podcast, please visit actonscouk. Forward slash the HRD talks.

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Nic Elliott

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