EPISODE 25: Designing a Cooperative Culture: Servant Leadership, Hiring for Fit, and What Co-ops Get Right with Adam Schwartz

What if you could intentionally design the culture you want—not just hope it takes shape on its own?

This week on The Culture Secrets Podcast, Chellie sits down with Adam Schwartz, founder of The Cooperative Way and one of the nation’s leading voices on cooperative leadership and workplace culture. Adam has spent decades helping electric co-ops, credit unions, ag co-ops, and other member-owned businesses strengthen their identity, improve employee experience, and align leadership practices with the values that make co-ops different.

In this deep and practical conversation, Adam shares:

• How a national safety initiative revealed the blueprint for building culture with intention
• Why culture is to an organization what water is to a fish—and what leaders miss when they’re too close to see the truth
• The balance between empathy and accountability that defines strong servant leadership
• Why keeping low-performing employees is not compassion—it’s a “culture suck”
• How surveys, data, and listening help leaders diagnose what’s really happening inside their workplace
• Brilliant hiring practices (from co-ops and beyond) that prioritize cultural fit over résumé credentials
• How co-ops can remain attractive to younger, mission-driven talent without losing their history or identity
• Why you can influence culture even if you’re not in the CEO chair

Whether you work in a cooperative, lead a team of any kind, or care about building workplaces where people can thrive, Adam’s insights will give you clear steps to strengthen your culture—and a renewed appreciation for the power of values-driven leadership.

Thanks for listening. Grab the book the original podcast is based on at https://mybook.to/culturesecrets . Check out my website www.chelliephillips.com for more great content. Follow me on LinkedIn.

Transcript

Podcast Episode with Adam Schwartz

[00:00:00] First, thanks for taking time to do this. Gimme a little bit of your background. How you got where you are right now and where did culture become something that you were just interested in diving into?

It it all started in a log cabin in Brooklyn, New York. And on a snowy day, so I went to school in upstate New York. And there was a, like a bookstore co-op in the, but I didn't really understand it.

I grew up in Brooklyn, New York, and we had lots of housing co-ops, but didn't really understand what that meant at the time. Just, we called it the co-op. And then after I graduated and traveled a bit, I came and was a lobbyist in dc and then just applied for a job at the National Royal Electric Co-Op Association and got hired as a lobbyist.

One of those happenstance things as so many people who seem to fall into co-ops, I do. And then from there I went to work for NRTC rural Telecommunications co-op and [00:01:00] then the National Cooperative Business Association. And that's when I got to see a lot of different types of co-ops of purchasing ag food.

And and then, I would travel a bit and see different co-ops and how they operate. And there was just places you just tell something was different, sometimes in a good way, sometimes in a not so good way. And I would just, talk to people what's their style of leadership, right?

And observe as well, how they went about it. And and then, it was probably, it was I think 2007, I think federated Insurance started this program called The Culture of Safety because they were tired of seeing the numbers go up and up on, on accidents and lost time accidents.

And then I was watching their progress and they would every year report on it. And it, the numbers started coming down and it just, I got talking to some of their folks and they will very be very quick to say it's not [00:02:00] federated, but it is the, all the co-ops out there that have decided to take out safety as a very big cause.

I don't know how long. How long have you been with electric co-ops? 25 years. Years. Okay. So you probably have seen the difference in emphasis. And it's not uncommon for many co-ops that all employees go to the safety meeting. All right? And that might be once a month for an hour.

That's a significant amount of payroll time. That is put in to, to say, but there's been a significant amount of payoff afford. So that was like the switch clicker for me. If we're intentional about creating a specific type of culture, we can do it, it takes time and effort and persistence.

But we can do it. And so I got to thinking, if we could do that about safety, can we do that about being a cooperative? Can we in, infuse a cooperative culture in our co-ops? And it's gonna take the same kind of effort, with folks. And [00:03:00] I'm happy to report there are, quite a few co-ops that I think are doing quite a good job of doing that.

And it just, one of the frequent things I say about it is that, culture is to an organization what water is to a fish. It's simply the environment that we're swimming in all the time and. They say whoever they are, that fish don't even know they're in water unless one of two things happens.

They get a hook in their mouth and they're outside the water. Or the water is so toxic that they can't breathe in it. And we certainly never want the water to be so toxic in our co-op that, the culture is so bad that people weave because of it. Especially for an issue that is fixable with intention.

And so a good bit of my work is working with, co-op leaders. One, to identify what the culture is because that's always an interesting experiment, asking the employees, what's the culture like here? And I will get many different answers to that question.

Now let's talk about what do we want it to [00:04:00] be? And then have them work in small groups and figure out like what would be the culture they would like. And everyone that has an opportunity to have their voice and identify and going through a funnel process. We're gonna win through it.

And then we come up with maybe a couple of different words of what we want the culture to be. Okay, now how are we gonna do it? What does that look like? How do we act to have that kind of culture? And, thankfully, folks like going through that process and I've gotten good feedback that it's helpful, but it needs to be consistent and you really need to get a large percentage of the employees top level employees.

Everybody in the organization needs to at least be open-minded enough to attempt to buy into it, it's, certainly, what happens sometimes is people talk the talk, but don't walk the walk. And that can be very disheartening to folks.

So I think I've gone on long enough. So I think you mentioned just different styles of leadership. Yeah. And so I guess maybe if you could take a minute [00:05:00] and maybe describe. What type of leader or what is the style of leadership that can help drive a successful culture shift?

I'm a huge fan.

I imagine you are too, of, the servant leadership model, right? That a leader's true calling is to help others be successful. I've been fortunate. I've had some wonderful bosses, supervisors in my career, and I've had some awful bosses and supervisors. And what I say is I've learned from every one of them, right?

And so I think that to be genuinely caring and empathetic that, recognizing that, these are, real human beings with lives and that there's lots of things. Everyone carries something, if not multiple things. So being understanding, but also being accountable. We're gonna be helpful to folks and we're gonna help them out in times of need.

But we're also [00:06:00] gonna expect effort and accountability and not just allow people to coast. I've seen, far too many co-ops have held onto employees, allow them to stay on, even though it was widely known within the organization. They're not performing up to standards. And people think that, oh, that's the kind, empathetic thing to do.

I reject that, that notion. I think we have an obligation to help them achieve, to help coach them maybe find another position in the organization. But at the end of the day, if they're not accountable and not doing their job it's much more of a culture suck than a culture add to to terminate somebody.

And co-ops that have finally reckoned. With that fact, the employees will say finally what took them so long? So it's not this anything goes and we're gonna tolerate anything kind of attitude. Most definitely not. But it is one in which we will be empathetic and caring [00:07:00] and kind and try and really learn, you know what?

I think good leaders learn the appropriate amount of personal information about their voice, recognizing that some are willing to share more than others and respecting that. And and also always enforcing the why. I'm a big fan of Simon Sinek of why we're doing this. It's not just about kilowatt hours, it's about quality of life.

And I think if we can make that connection that we're here for, a slightly larger purpose than just selling a commodity I think we will do better with productivity and connection with employees. So I think good leaders will will showcase the those skills of empathy and accountability.

Also curiosity. Not feeling like I know all the answers. I think good leaders understand that the frontline folks who are doing the job are often in the best position to suggest improvements. To, to the, to. One of my great frustrations as a customer of [00:08:00] companies is when someone will tell me I would love to help you out, Mr. Schwartz. But we've got a policy that doesn't allow me to do that. Every time I hear that, then we've got a failure in this organization. There was a failure either from top to communicate to that frontline person why we have the policy, or there was a failure from the frontline people to communicate to their superiors that, we've got a policy here that's ticking off a lot of good customers and we might want to think twice about that.

And so I think regular communication with employees, the constant pursuit of replacing what's great with something even better. Not to say that we have to make the changes every time we recognize them because I think people can burn out by too many changes. But that won't keep us from looking at at improvements and knowing that employees opinions are gonna be valued even if not always listened to.

So I'm a huge fan of employee satisfaction surveys. And a huge fan of leaders of the organization [00:09:00] responding to those surveys in a very timely manner. This is what you said, this is what we heard first affirm that what we heard is what you said, right? Make sure that there's no miscommunication in what you're asking for and what we heard, and then explaining why or why not.

We may not, we may do that. If it's something that leadership is open to trying, then maybe, there's a pilot program. A small group runs a, a pilot of that or if it's something that we're not gonna be able to do, there was a co-op I'd worked with, they wanted a latte machine in the break room.

That was gonna be about five grand and, the co-op didn't really think that was an appropriate way to spend the member's money on a latte machine. And they told the employees that, and the reason why and that's fine. I got no problem with that, but acknowledge that's what you heard.

And this is why I said no, I, that was, that example was from a number of years ago. I should follow up and see if they've ever, if they've ever done it, or maybe put in a paid latte machine, that's another option,

i've done several interviews. One [00:10:00] of my favorite was Gary Ridge, the CEO at WD 40. And I asked him, for a leader, if they had an inkling that something was going downhill with culture. Like how would they start evaluating. . And his first piece of advice was go sit in your parking lot and watch how your people inner work and how they exit work every day.

And he said, it's very unscientific, but it's very accurate. And it'll tell you exactly, what you need to know about what's happening. So what advice might you give to someone in leadership that kind of had an inkling that maybe something's off here and I need to do something about it? Where should they start and how should they go about evaluating the situation that they're in?

Yeah I have a true conflict here. There's part of my brain that works one way and another part that works another way. On the one hand I do believe in gut instincts and instinctual feels about things all. On the other hand, I've [00:11:00] certainly been suitably convinced to know that data is very important.

And the best I think that we can do around culture is surveys. I, I like, I was smiling when you were saying the parking lot story, because I certainly feel that way. When people were coming to an office very regularly, right? And there was a start time and an end time. Now we've gotten a little bit more flexible with that, with people coming in when they come in. Do people come on time? Do is it at four 30? Is there a mad rush to the door? But also, you know that, and this is where the conflict is because you know what, someone could be having a great day at work, loving their job, but guess what? They gotta pick up their kids, from school. And so they're leaving at four 30, even if they're having the greatest day in their life, and that's just reality. So that's where that anecdotal, looking at the parking lot sometimes I think, might not be the best. And depending on the number of employees you have in your organization, most electric co-ops, are, unless you're, the top tier, you've got [00:12:00] less than 200 employees.

So I think you can get to know 200 people quite well. One of the companies I talk about, one of the non few non co-op companies that I talk about is is the Gore company, the maker of Gore-Tex. Frank Gore started that company in the late fifties, and when DuPont wouldn't fund his research, he worked, he was an engineer with DuPont.

And he believed so much in his product that he quit his job, mortgaged his house, he and his wife, and they started their company. There are over 10,000 employees now, privately held company mysterious in a way. But every time they grow by more than 200 people, they separate it to separate divisions because they found that you can relate to 200 people.

You can know 200 people. And and for the vast majority of co-ops, that's a good sign. There are a couple, right here in Rappahannock, one of my clients, they're at over 400. So they're doing some other things that I think are pretty cool in having this leadership program.

And they [00:13:00] pur purposely put in the cohorts. Inside, outside people from different offices, creating more of that lattice network so that everyone's gonna know someone else in a different office in different types of jobs. I'm a big fan of that job shadowing the folks at Swee valley in in North Florida.

Just doing an amazing job with that. Every employee generally within their first year spends at least a day in, in four different departments within the, in the co-op, and they'll spend the day outside and then linemen will spend the day with headsets on, and it makes people very empathetic to their colleagues and realizing that we all have a role to play.

So I think, keeping an ear out to, you know how people are feeling, what's going on. Are they showing up at your employee appreciation day? And, what's the, are you doing some fun, exciting work at work, to keep people engaged and interested?

That's why I like when [00:14:00] co-ops take on. New projects like bring in broadband or something. I think that gives us a real opportunity to energize our workforce in a way that maybe hasn't been seen in 70, 80 years when folks with First Start brought bringing electricity to folks. And I do think the cooperative business model gives us a leg up on creating a wonderful culture.

In our co-op because we're not here just serving outside investors who don't live in our community, there's a real connection to what we do and the difference it makes in people's lives. And I hope that we never lose sight of that.

And that ties in a lot too. Like the research that you're seeing is that this next generation of workers that are entering the workforce, or the ones that have just came into that are very value and mission oriented.

Yep. And the co-op story itself is all about value and mission. Yeah. So how do leaders keep that from becoming, that's the old story, that's the still version of what's [00:15:00] happening and. Do so in a way that positions them to attract this new talent that's coming in so that we keep feeding into the co-op system this talent that we want, this very energetic, this engaged workforce that we need to be able to get these big things done.

One of my magic wand ideas, if Okay, if I could just wave the wand and it would happen is that, we would learn as a society in every country in the world in school about the cooperative business model. That this would be something that would be taught. And it would be taught multiple times at different grades.

There are curriculums that have been developed from K through 12, and then there's college level and graduate level courses about co-ops. So that work has already been done. it exists, right? So how can we get more folks to to really see and understand the potential of this [00:16:00] business model and how. When it's executed correctly. Really does oh, give us the opportunity to be a very values driven business because that's our intention. All right? There was a round table business roundtable group that met in August of 2019, and this is the JP Morgans the Apples, the who's who, fortune 100 companies and.

They came out with this huge pronouncement that investor held, stock held companies need to do more than just care about stock price. We need to care about our employees, about our customers, about the community, about the environment. And I just go, duh, really? Okay. It took you 125 years to figure that out.

'Cause that's what co-ops, have been all about, and what frustrates me, scares me, concerns me, worries me is that when co-ops start losing that co-op identity and then they look more like the industry that they're part [00:17:00] of. So for an electric co-op, they start to look just like an IOU.

For a credit union, they just look, they look just like a bank, okay? For an ag co-op, they just look like a mega food producer, alright? That, that they've lost that connection of being what a cooperative is, and they treat it as an afterthought as an annoyance, as something we have to put up with.

I realize that organizing, planning and executing an annual meeting takes time, effort, and money. And can be a little bit frustrating but it really should be cause for celebration that we work for a business that has to have engagement with our members and that we should be looking for ways not to look at these as things we have to do, but things that we wanna do and celebrate them and why this is cause for great celebration.

Know one of the things I've, I ask in, in sessions, I go, how often do you celebrate the Ann your anniversary in your personal life? And most people answer every [00:18:00] year. And I go, that's the correct answer. 'cause if you don't celebrate it every year, you won't have an anniversary the next year to celebrate.

And yet in, in our co-ops in, we tend to celebrate, the 50th anniversary, the 75th anniversary, things like if the 75th was a reason for celebration, then 76th is more of a reason and the 77th is more. So I think every annual meeting should be a celebration. It should be a partial lookback as to what we've done, but most of the meetings should be spent looking ahead, but, what's the next challenge that, that we're gonna face?

I think and there's so many innovative ways we could do, be admire and acquire. The, I say, plagiarism is stealing one person's idea. If you steal a lot of people's ideas, it's research. Everything I do is research.

'Cause really I'm just repurposing a lot of different ideas that I've heard. I guess what makes me maybe a little bit different is I'm actually interested in you in finding out about these things and wanting to share them. And it's great fun, and it attracts really [00:19:00] wonderful people.

I would like to see us do a better job of recruiting and hiring people from other co-ops, other types of co-ops to work in our co-op. So when we are, out on Indeed or whatever, monster, whatever, looking at folks who maybe have worked, if, if you're an electric coop, someone worked at a credit union or an AG coop.

And 'cause they might have some experiences to bring to the table that would, help expand how we think about it as, as well. Again, I feel like I'm rambling, so I'll stop.

No ha. I love that. I've been really lucky. In my co-op career to be involved with organizations that do put me with other types of co-ops, like CCA and stuff.

So I tell everybody capital credits as part of what we all do, or annual meeting is what we all do, but it's neat to hear how other people are doing it and incorporating it because when you listen to the same. Same group over and over. You hear the same idea over and over again. And when you hear it from someone else's perspective, you're like, that's a neat take and [00:20:00] it would work for me and let me do something a little bit different to breed some life into what's going on.

So I can totally, I get behind that statement that you just said, and I'm like I'm all about branching out to some of our other co-op friends. One of the things that I hear a lot especially since I've been working on this project, is. If you're not the CEO looking or trying to make a culture change or suggest that there's some issues that we might wanna look at to be able to push, there's not a line on the budget that says culture.

No, and there's also some thinking maybe in upper management at times that it's this foo kind of concept and that there's not a real tangible thing that I can wrap my hand around to go, a bucket truck is X number of dollars, and I know we need that to work on the lines. So what do I need culture for?

Maybe if you're trying to convince someone that we need to look at our culture and we need to do this kind of thing, what are the driving arguments that you can use to [00:21:00] help push that forward?

I like asking questions. I like to get to know people what makes them tick what are their life experiences, right?

If I'm talking to a leader who maybe is, has farming in their background, alright, I would ask them, how did you increase productivity on your farm? Okay. And they might say I got better soil. I was more mindful of nutrients I put into the soil.

Okay. And how I did that Okay. They were cultivating knowing that if they do that as a preparatory step that it's going to yield a better result. And I think culture you can draw an analogy to culture with that, right? There's certain things that you need to do to, to cultivate how people are going to feel in the workplace.

Asking them about their experience, how they would describe the culture, talk about jobs that they've had in the past, jobs that they've liked and jobs that they didn't, why didn't they like the job? And that, ask them to really do a, a [00:22:00] deeper analysis. What was that?

It didn't feel right. What was wrong? And, asked if they like to be asked their opinion about certain things, about how, about their work life. And, most folks. 'Cause I don't like to tell people what to do because, I, one, I have no authority as a consultant to tell anyone to do anything, all right?

All I have the authority and ability to do is to suggest that they consider something right? And hopefully, weed them on the trail that they all, they'll take, themselves, and then the other, this is one of my favorite quotes. You must be the change you wish to see in the world.

So for folks who are not at the leadership level, and I did a session on this at the Connect Conference a few years back I think it was Todd, how to be in charge when you're not in charge, is really find out what your supervisor's goals are. Okay. What are their KPIs, right?

What are they getting measured on, right? Then think about the idea that you have. How are you gonna [00:23:00] position that idea? So it helps my boss achieve their KPIs. So that we can build alignment. Okay. If we do this is the impact it's going to have or may have it, 'cause we might not know.

One of my new favorite quotes that I've, I'm wearing out but I will continue to do is bill James he's a baseball statistician. He developed a new way of thinking about baseball players statistics. And it was the premise behind the Moneyball the movie and the book, how the Oakland, a's they were using his theory on how to identify players.

He's gotten in the baseball world a fair amount of celebrity status 'cause of what he's done. And so he gets approached by people all the time, how's so and so player gonna do next year? And he says, whenever he's asked that question. He feels like he needs to respond by saying this.

It's the future no one knows. So we spend a [00:24:00] lot of time, preparing for the future as well, we should. Okay. But we have to recognize that. We just don't know, right? We, you, we should be mindful, we should do all the steps. We know that there's a high likelihood in North Dakota in January, we're gonna have subfreezing temperatures, okay?

So we should make sure that our lines, our poles, are tested for, 80 mile an hour winds. We, there's lots of things we can prepare for not knowing, what, what is acne is going to happen. So I think just being curious of, what's the next thing?

Open-minded to accepting new ways of doing things and just putting a big red circle with the slash through the comment. That's not the way we do it around here. That's just inappropriate thinking and an organization. One of the big shifts that I'm hearing, I've talked to a few recruiters that I've been working on is now recruiting for culture.

And I had the pleasure of talking to Rich Sheridan with Menlo Group and [00:25:00] Joy Chief Joy Officer, and he was talking about how they work. As that when they invite them in for an interview, that they really don't talk about skill anymore because you wouldn't have made it to the interview if they didn't think you had the skill.

And what they do is they partner them up and see how they're gonna work and they tell their their candidates that your job is to get the other person a second interview. Because it's all about being a good teammate and it's all about being able to help someone else along the way. And he said it was quite interesting to begin with the looks that you got on people's faces.

Like you could see the internal conflict that no, I want the second interview. I don't want them to get the second interview, and so how do you think co-ops are doing about hiring for culture? Are we still hiring basically for skill or are you starting to see any kinda shift towards. Hiring for the values that matter to us and the attitude and things that we wanna bring into the workforce.

I'm definitely seeing more emphasis [00:26:00] on culture and folks. I think Guru Energy out of North Carolina is one of my leading examples of that. Every single potential hire goes through a cultural screen and and if they are deemed not a cultural fit, even if their skills are off the charts, they will not get hired.

So that is the example I know of the most forward in my view approach. One of the questions I ask supervisors. Is have you ever gotten the question from a, an applicant? What's the culture like around here? And every year I ask that question, more and more hands are going up about that.

And so I do think that there's greater awareness about it. I. I have not done the data research to make a conclusive, decision that there is, that we're doing it well or that we're doing it consistently. So I do think that it would be a [00:27:00] kind of a scattered chart of probably there's some folks who are doing it quite well, others who may think that they're doing it but maybe, probably aren't.

And then others who like might be like, yeah, we'd like to do that, we really need alignment. And I think that, desperation, depending on how long an opening's been going on, might have, influenced that. I think good organizations stay to their values in their hiring and don't.

I, I think why, I certainly appreciate that sometimes there are emergency situations, but I think when we're in an emergency situation, I think looking at either contractors or some sort of temp work is a better way of going. Maybe more expensive on the upfront, but hiring a person who's a bad cultural.

Wow. Wow. That is, that will be a very, what, I talk about org. There's an organization called Van City. It's a credit union in, vancouver, British Columbia, and they have an orientation and immersion program. All of their employees [00:28:00] within the first month must go through it. And they allowed me to participate in it five years ago.

So I spent the whole week up there learning how they do it, and at the end of the week. It's all taught by fellow employees. Fellow employees from different departments come in. Then they spend a a day and a half in the field with members of the credit union, learning what the members do. And at the end of the five days every new employee's offered $2,000 to leave.

Just take the check. No hard feelings. Goodbye because they have found that, as I'm sure you would attest to that, getting rid of an employee who's not gonna be a good fit for $2,000 is the best bargain you'll ever have. There's no supervisor. If I, when I said if I told you it cost you $2,000 to get rid of a problem employee, would that, would you do that?

Everyone emphatic? Yes. So what it does is it does that right upfront, and it has the added impact of after you've said yes to the job and [00:29:00] refused the $2,000. I. That you essentially bought your job, that you, so you're part of this tribe, that we, this is another thing that we all share in common now that, you know so I think, there's, I think there's ways that we can do that that, that kind of makes sense and hopefully help build it.

Oh, giving every employee the opportunity to select an educational opportunity that they would like to engage in every year. To help make them better, that there should be some connection to their job. But it could be a very loose connection, it could be learning more about this cooperative business model, right?

That's, whatever it might be. Showing folks that you value them being smarter, I think is an important thing. I know we're getting close. So one last question real quick. You talked about surveys being really the measure that you had to go by if you were gonna start this process because some people have never asked their employees what they think and correct. [00:30:00] And I'm a big proponent of it. If you ask it. You've gotta deal with it one way or the other. You can't ask it and then just put it on a shelf and pretend like we never asked the first time. So if you were going into this is the first time that we've asked our employees and we're getting ready to really take a look at this.

What's the advice that you would have, or what are the key questions that you might wanna make sure that you ask on there? And then on the flip side, once you get the results back in. How do you make sure that you give them the. Attention that they need as far as, oh, this is just one person's sour grapes.

It's not really ac. You know what I'm saying? So like how do you validify what you're getting versus someone's just very disgruntled or that kind of thing. The mindset that you come into. I'm part of a co-op of 45 consultants and a couple of my colleagues. This is what they do for a living.

They do surveys. They will do hundreds in a year. And so there's a the [00:31:00] format that I'm a big fan of is the one to five or one to seven. Strongly disagree to strongly agree. It should be a double blind survey. Okay. Meaning that. We are not gonna know who filled out the survey.

We might know the department depending on the size of the co-op. So the, that the employees can be guaranteed that their animosity will, their an, their anonymity will be protect. And that is an absolute sacred bow that cannot be broken on that. And that you have the outside person review the comments.

Okay? And so if the, if very simple, this my employer encourages educ. Okay. And you have someone who says strongly disagree and says in the comments they don't value education, but yet, based on other, the rest of the, everyone, most everyone else puts that as a five. I strongly agree.

They give every employee an opportunity to have, [00:32:00] education, provided to them. Then that one comment of that person who said that. The client is never gonna see that comment, okay? Because the data doesn't support it. It's just wrong. Now, you might say to the client, there may be some people who don't understand the educational, offerings that you have, so you might wanna do a better job of doing that, but I'm not gonna poison their mind with that sour grapes comment.

If on the other. The data says, I strongly disagree, they don't provide education. Then absolutely the client's gonna see that data because it's borne out by the common. So I think it's very important that we do that type of survey. If, and I think it's important that we do it as a benchmark, that when we do it the first time, we make a commitment that we're gonna do it at least one more time.

In a year or two so that we're gonna measure, progress or regression as it may be. And that, that the results, all of the results, not all of the comments, but all of the top level data will be shared. We will have an all employee [00:33:00] meeting and if the co-op's too big for everyone to be in one meeting, we'll do it in two or three meetings.

But we're gonna share the same information and we're gonna tell you what we've heard and then we're gonna say we're gonna consider some of these ideas and we're gonna be back to you. And everything that we're gonna do in respect to our employees is gonna be based on this information.

'cause then that's gonna get future buy-in for the survey. People will know. Okay. All right. They really are paying attention and at the end of the day, people want be heard. Just hear me and I think we'll do great. I love the topic, obviously, so thank you for thinking about it and writing about it. We are all better.

We will be better for more people discussing this, so thank you so much, Adam.