Scaling With People
Tired of spinning your startup wheels but never gaining traction? Buckle up, founders and CEOs, because this podcast is your rocket fuel to profitability! Every week, we ignite explosive conversations with bold-faced founders, brainy experts, and even a few out-of-this-world vendors. Get ready to crack the code on growth, master employee engagement, and blast through your scaling goals. We’re talking real-world strategies, actionable tips, and perspectives that’ll make your business do a cosmic dance. So, strap in and prepare for lift-off!
Scaling With People
Unlocking Storytelling Power: Jason Anthoine on Transformative Communication, Authentic Leadership, and Inspiring Employee Engagement
Discover the transformative power of storytelling with communication expert Jason Anthoine in our latest episode of Scaling with People. With over 35 years of experience, Jason joins me, Gwyneth McCreary, to uncover strategies that bring founders and leaders closer to their teams. Ever wondered why storytelling is pivotal in aligning your employees with the company's mission and vision? Dive into the world of organizational storytelling and learn why even repetitive stories can be fresh and inspiring for new hires. Gain insights into the art of communicating across diverse backgrounds and experience levels, ensuring your message resonates effectively.
We also unravel the intricacies of authenticity in leadership communication, highlighting the importance of genuine interaction over polished perfection. Jason and I tackle common challenges, such as misinterpretations and unexpected reactions, and share tips on leveraging key influencers within your organization to enhance message clarity. Whether you're visiting different locations or addressing sensitive topics, understanding local concerns is crucial. Finally, explore a framework focused on informing, involving, and inspiring, designed to elevate employee experience and culture. Join us for a treasure trove of actionable insights that promise to enhance your communication strategy and foster meaningful connections with your team.
Welcome everyone to today's Scaling with People podcast. I'm Gwyneth McCreary, your host and founder and CEO to Guide to HR, and I am going to broach a subject that I don't like, which is communication. For those that know me, you know I'm a math major. I love numbers, I love being analytical, so communication is not my jam and I'm super excited to. So. Communication is not my jam and I'm super excited to have Jason Anthony on the call and he's going to be talking about some strategies around communication and effective storytelling. Jason, welcome aboard and tell us a little bit about yourself.
Speaker 2:Well, gosh, it's so great to be here. Thank you for having me on Guinevere. This is great. I'm really looking forward to our conversation. I guess I kind of got started in communications growing up in a small town in in middle Georgia. My dad worked at a school bus factory. He was a foreman on the line and my mother was a secretary at the bank and they would come home from work, you know, and just talk about what happened, what was good, what was not, what they liked, what they didn't like, and most kids would be like, oh, so boring.
Speaker 2:I'm not listening to any of this stuff, but somehow it kind of sunk in with me and I just found it all fascinating. So when I went to college I studied, you know, public relations, because that was kind of the closest thing that I could find out of the course catalog to major in. That felt like that. And then my very first job right out of college was doing an employee newsletter for a bank in Atlanta. And now here it is, 35 years later, and I'm still doing employee communications, employee experience and culture change and I love it because I'm sure everyone on listen to this podcast can agree with this. I mean, if you're going to be spending 50, 60, 80 hours a week at work, you know it really ought to matter. You ought to be getting some good stuff out of that. So my whole job is to help you know work matter more, both for the leaders and their employees.
Speaker 1:I love that and it's so true and I think you know a lot of times, just coming from the HR hat like there's so much that needs to be done and not everyone is an expert, Well no one's an expert at everything, right, and so understanding where your skill sets are and then leaning on those that have different skill sets to help lift you up, I think that's really important.
Speaker 1:So I'm super excited about diving in and talking about communications and learning from you, and hopefully the audience will do the same. So tell me, like, what is the most important thing that you see a founder should be focusing on around communications with their employees?
Speaker 2:I think that the number one thing certainly with the startups that I've worked with over my career it feels like watching them all it feels like the number one thing is they are the best at telling the story of that company and how and why they founded it and probably after six, nine, 12 months maybe they are sick of telling that story.
Speaker 2:They're like, oh, not that again. But just like with advertising, you know you got to see an ad nine times before you even remember it. Like as soon as you're tired of saying it is when your employees are, you know, finally listening and understanding it. So A you're the best person to tell that story and B tell it often Because as soon as you think that people have heard it and they know it better than I do they're really just now listening. So, and usually you know your beliefs and mission and vision and value and purpose and all that's kind of built around that whole startup idea. So the more you reinforce that through that storytelling particularly as the founder, I think, the more personal it begins to feel for your employees.
Speaker 1:Well, and you also have employees that come and go right. So, even though you might have been telling it every month for the last 12 months, you have people that had just started with you two months ago. So you know they may have only heard it once or twice and you know when you're in a business. Now you're five years, 10 years.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You have people that have just joined you. And to continue telling that story feels like. But this is five, 10 years old, but to this person that just joined you, this group of people, it's new.
Speaker 2:It's brand new and the thing about that that I think a lot of leaders you know, larger or small organizations, don't really think about as much as they should. As soon as you tell those stories, then that's the stories that those employees are going to be telling when they're not at work. So people say where do you work? What do you do? They then begin telling their version of that founder's story and you, you know you want them to tell it right. They want to tell it right. So the more often you can tell it, the easier it is for it to spread in the way that you would want it to.
Speaker 1:Absolutely so, thinking as a founder. I know a lot of founders who are very analytical engineering brains and words might not necessarily be the easiest thing and I know that.
Speaker 1:I've also talked with founders who you know. They thought they said things that were very clear, but then five different stories come out of communication. So how can you be effective in communication, especially when your audience of employees is a wide range of different individuals who maybe they're just starting their career from coming out of college, maybe they're got two to five years under the belt all the way up to, you know, the more senior level staff, maybe your middle managers that have 10, 15 years of experience. It's really hard to like tailor your conversation and what you're sharing at all hands or all teams or whatever you want to call your full company meeting where you can really resonate the message to everyone. So what are some of the key maybe a key thing of like to think about as you're tailoring that message and thinking about what you're saying?
Speaker 2:That's great and that is a big issue. I don't care where you work or how long you've been working there it is. You know, I've got so much diversity inside all organizations, particularly age groups and different jobs, and you know even locations.
Speaker 2:Some of these companies are international whether they're in person or not, while you, while they're listening or whatever it might be. So there's just so many things that you have to take into account. But to me there's kind of two, kind of rules. One and you've probably heard, everybody's probably heard this before Tell them what you're going to tell them, tell them and then tell them what you told them. That way at least you are clear about your part of the communication. Their part of the communication is receiving that information. So you own the part about sending the information. So if you want it to be really clear, you need to be really clear. So tell them what you're going to tell them, tell them and then tell them what you told them, just to make sure that everybody understands that. And then the second part is is even if you are analytical or you've got, you know, a phd in engineering or you know whatever fascinating complexities that you have in your career to get you to this point, don't use five dollar words when a nickel word will do.
Speaker 2:You know most of your employees, even if they have the same kind of degree you do. When they are not at work. All the communication that they receive in their personal lives isn't written at a phd level. Even though they might have phds or mbas or whatever the advanced degrees might be, most stuff is written at fourth, fifth, sixth grade level at the most. So if you're delivering something that's complex or complicated, it has a lot of jargon or stuff that you know this level of people will understand but will confuse the majority of the rest of them.
Speaker 2:Just tell it simply, like there's a good rule, like how would you explain to an you know, an eighth grader what it is that you do all day long? Which sounds to some people oh well, I'm just talking down to my employees. I'm not giving them the credit. Maybe that that's due to them? No, you're just making it as simple as possible for people to understand and usually when you default to that, then you don't have to spend as much time. All right, for this audience, I'm going to say it this way and for this audience I'm going to say it this way. If you just say it a normal, regular, simple way for all those audiences, then everyone can understand it, regardless of what level they're at.
Speaker 1:Especially when you want them to take something out of what you're saying, that they need to incorporate, internalize, incorporate and take action on whether that's because they need to do something different, whether that's because you need them to, like, light the fire and move 10 times faster. And then understanding how their actions are going to impact the ultimate goal of the business is also a key factor to making it what's in it for me right. It's like that. What's in it for me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, which everybody listens to, that same radio station, wiifm. What's in it? For me, that's all anybody ever cares about, you know, and that's a great point. And so the more time you can spend understanding, truly, that any kind of communications that you're doing in a business setting, whether it's internally or externally, all you're trying to do is to help people think, feel, say and do whatever is best for your organization to help drive your results. That's it. That is all you are ever doing. And when you stray away from stuff like that, that's when it starts to get messy and complicated and cloudy. But if you just stick to what, do we need people to think, feel, say and do to help drive this business forward and then build whatever comms you're going to build underneath that to deliver whatever you've got to say. You can't go wrong. You can't go wrong because it's all in service of driving the business.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So I feel like that is a great segue into providing our audience with maybe a couple of steps or one first step, especially if you're not really into communication or you feel kind of like, oh my gosh, this is like such a big hurdle, when do I even get started? What's a step or two that our audience can take to get to that point of making it simple and making sure that all audience levels and skill sets are understanding what you're trying to say?
Speaker 2:Right, well, I think the first one, and you kind of brought this one up, but to me the first one and this is one of my favorite quotes from the, from the founder of the public supermarket chain. He had a saying just begin, the rest is easy. So whenever clients call me in, normally they are so afraid of trying something and having it go wrong that they're just not doing anything.
Speaker 2:So just begin and the rest, you know the rest will be easy, and the way that you begin is with something easy. So let's pretend you're a leader of a startup and you're not that comfortable with video, or you think your voice sounds funny. Whether those things are true or not, you think that, which means there's like two reasons right there where you're never going to do certain things because it's going to be hard to convince you.
Speaker 2:So if that's true, fine. Whatever it is, how about writing? How about when? Just go around to your employees and talk, you know? How about? Just do the thing that feels most comfortable and most natural to you, just to start. And then then the next thing that usually comes up is well, I'm not a good writer, or I don't know how to put words together and have them be inspiring in front of a town hall or whatever it is.
Speaker 2:It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. Your employees aren't expecting you to be like an Oscar-worthy actor. They know you don't have a side career as some television and movie star. They just want you to be yourself. And so it doesn't matter if you're the best writer, it doesn't matter if you, you know, are the best on camera. Just be who you are. Um, tell the stories that you want to tell, and that's the best way to start. And then, once you do that, it will be obvious all right, we're doing it this way. What if we try this other extra thing that we know will reach the salespeople, for example, because they're out on the road all the time? Like, once you start, then it will become obvious what to do. But usually people never start because they think, well, we, we're gonna have to do 50 things. No, that means all 50 of them will be kind of half done. Just do one and do it really well and start like that so such a simple thing, but I will say maybe with my HR hat on where I get stuck.
Speaker 1:A lot is yeah, you're right, it is just start Right, but then it's also. Then you get the feedback of like an employee heard it this way, or you know now employees are disgruntled, or you've pissed a group off, or you know people like go a completely different direction because they want like you have. You know, you said one thing, you storytell one thing, and then you check back in with everyone a week later and now there's like 20 different stories about what you said. None of them are right.
Speaker 2:That's right.
Speaker 1:How do you like, try to be proactive and not have that happen? And then, and then my second part is okay it happened. Now what?
Speaker 2:how do you fix that Right? So the first part of the question is all right, you go out and communicate it, and then people have all kinds of filters and they hear things. You know the way they they want to hear them. Sometimes that matches what you say, sometimes it does not. That's fine. Humans are humans. You know, as long as we still have humans in here, then that's going to keep happening. So know that. And then have a way to get that feedback quickly so that you can then make whatever adjustments or keep repeating it more often or, you know, rely on leaders and managers to help kind of answer those questions and deliver some of that information for you. But the the most important thing is make sure that there are feedback, because that's you know, that's part of the whole communications from me to you. That is not complete communications loop. From you back to me is a complete communications loop. So you've got to have that feedback because, knowing that all that's going to happen, you want to get it as fast as possible so that you can then make whatever adjustments that you need to make.
Speaker 2:And then the second part of your question was well, once that happens and then people are like, oh, they're going off in 20 different directions. That's when you have to say it say the same thing, but then say it differently wherever people are. So there are people in your organization, regardless of title, who are influencers. That's who everybody goes to for the meeting, after the meeting. They're not necessarily hypos, they're not necessarily managers or leaders or whoever it is you think they are. It's whoever everybody else trusts.
Speaker 2:And so after the meeting, they say well, I don't know what I'm going to do until I talk with john. And once john tells me, then that's how I think phil say indeed, figure out who those people are. Everybody out there knows who they are. Usually leaders in HR don't know who they are. So let's just find out who they are and make sure those people understand it, because they're going to be more believable and more trustworthy just because that's who all your employees are relying on anyway. So understand who they are, get cozy with them so that they can not only give you feedback but can also help translate your messaging. Even if you're crystal clear and simple, they do a better job of translating things according to all those employees they influence. So make sure that they understand what's going on so that they can extend your reach and influence those other ones that you have a hard time getting to.
Speaker 1:I love that concept and also too, if time permits. Sometimes it doesn't, but if time permits actually doing your speech or your storytelling to them as part of your practice, to get feedback about what they're hearing and then help bring them along, then you can help them get more context to then be able to storytell it to those subgroups in your organization.
Speaker 2:That's right. And also, you know, depending on the size of your organization, you know, maybe you have a couple of different locations. Before you go to a location where you don't spend most of your time, you can reach out to those people and say, hey, we're going to do, you know, the quarterly update from your location next quarter. What do I need to know before I come out there? And, most importantly, what should I not talk about at all because it's a hot button over there, unless I have the solution to it? Or what are the hot buttons that I should talk about, that we should face head on, so that then they're like oh well, we thought this stuff was a secret and nobody was ever going to do anything about it. This woman comes in here and just addresses it right head on, like there are so many different things you can do with that advanced knowledge like that and it's those people who have it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's such great advice. Well, jason, I feel like we could talk about communication for quite some time, especially since I'd love to learn more about it. But as we wrap up today's show, is there any last tidbit, thought, trick, tool in your tool belt that you'd like to share with the audience today?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I like to think about communication. We're trying to get people to think, feel, say and do whatever it is to help drive the business forward. And so to me there's kind of three areas to do that in inform, which is tell everybody what's going on, tell them you told them, and then tell them what you told them again, um, so that everybody understands and is on the same page you know, as you grow and scale it gets a little bit more difficult to do that.
Speaker 2:But that doesn't mean you should stop. It just means you have to try harder and then the second one is involve.
Speaker 2:So the first one's informed, the second one's involved. All of your employees there are on board because they believe in this organization, they believe in each other, they believe in your vision as the founder. Involve them. The more that becomes their dream too, the more likely you are to have the kind of culture that will allow you to get to the success that you're looking for. And then the third one is around inspire.
Speaker 2:And this is all about recognizing employees all the time, even for the smallest of things, even if it's to recognize failure, because a lot of times, particularly startups don't want to oh, we tried this and it went sideways and we don't ever want to talk about it again. That's a great story to tell, because everybody's going to fail. So what can we do to highlight different kinds of story and inspire others, whether it's a success story or a failure story? What we're trying to do here is talk about the effort involved to try and make things better here, not always the result, because the result could be something negative, but that's also a good thing. So inform, involve and inspire are kind of the three easy ways to think about your comms and how you're kind of trying to drive your employee experience in your culture.
Speaker 1:I love that framework and definitely will be using that in my future efforts as well. So thank you, Jason, so much for your time and thank you, audience, for listening. We'll see you on the next one. Have a great day.
