How Emotional Intelligence Helps Manage Change - Chris De Santis

In today’s episode, I chat with Chris De Santis a Chicago-based organizational behavior consultant, speaker and author, specializing in workplace interventions. Chris recently published his first book, "Why I Find You Irritating: Navigating Generational Friction at Work". 

Chris has over 35 years of experience in training and development consulting, including stints as the Director of Training and Development for the American Medical Association and as part of the Human Resource Development group for Brunswick Corporation. 

As we do in every episode, we began with Chris’ story, though quickly transitioned to the generational differences facing today’s workplaces. Last I counted, there was 5, and with increasing pressure on traditional organizational models to evolve, there’s a lot of friction. 

We spoke about the evolution of professional services workers, how Chris’ background in the arts informs his work today, and how organizations and their leaders leverage emotional intelligence to manage change

It’s a unique vantage point, and I really enjoyed our discussion. I hope you do, as well. 

Chris De Santis

Chris is an independent organizational behavior practitioner, speaker, podcaster, and author with over thirty-five years of experience working primarily with clients in professional services firms both domestically and internationally. While he often speaks on behalf of embracing generational diversity as discussed in his new book, “Why I Find You Irritating: Navigating Generational Friction at Work,” He is also conversant in multiple topics relevant to developing and sustaining long term relationships both inside an organization and with the clients they serve.

He has an undergraduate degree in business from the University of Notre Dame, a master’s degree in business from the University of Denver, and a master’s degree in organization development from Loyola University. He lives in a quiet corner in the Lincoln Park neighborhood of Chicago.

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Matt Burns

Matt Burns is an award-winning executive, social entrepreneur and speaker. He believes in the power of community, simplicity & technology.

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Transcript

[00:00:00] Guest 1: The point being here is when you decouple us from the space and we become transactional, the possibility of the future is we will only have a core group. And so you'll have a core with all of these other people who are no longer a part of it. So I think one of the mistakes companies [00:00:20] often make is they believe at this phase they are in some kind of stasis, meaning that we can do this.

No, I do not think you are in stasis. I think there is a slight degradation of the culture and, and as a consequence of degradation of the culture, there's a degradation. Of the idea of the firm that is at risk[00:00:40] 

constraint, 

[00:00:52] Matt: strive, innovation. Hey everyone. It's Matt here for another episode of Thinking Inside the Box, a show where we discuss complex [00:01:00] issues related to work and culture. If you're interested in checking out our other content, you can find us@bentohr.com and wherever you find your favorite podcasts.

By searching. Thinking inside the box. And if you enjoy the work we're doing here, consider leaving us a five star rating, a comment and subscribing. It ensures you get [00:01:20] updated whenever we release new content and really helps amplify our message. In today's episode, I chat with Kris DeSantis, a Chicago based organizational behavior consultant, speaker and author specializing in workplace interventions.

Chris recently published his first. Why I find you irritating navigating [00:01:40] generational friction at work. It has himself over 35 years experience in training and development consulting, including stints as the director of training and development at the American Medical Association, and as part of the Human Resources Development Group for Brunswick Corporation.

As we do in every episode, we began with Chris's story, they'll quickly [00:02:00] transition to the generational differences facing today's workplaces. Last I counted, there were five, and with increasing pressure on traditional organization models to evolve, there's a lot of friction. We spoke at length about the evolution of professional service workers, how Chris's background in the arts informs his work today, [00:02:20] and how organizations and their leaders leverage emotional intelligence to manage change.

I really enjoyed our conversation, and I hope you do as well. And now I bring you. Chris DeSantis. Hello Chris. How are you doing 

[00:02:31] Guest 1: today? I'm doing well, thank you. 

[00:02:33] Matt: I'm looking forward to this conversation. And before we get there, I wouldn't mind if you would indulge us with a bit about your background, your experiences, [00:02:40] and what led you 

[00:02:40] Guest 1: to today.

Sure. Uh, um, my background is in what's called organizational behavior Organization Development. Depending on. Uh, where you graduate from. And what I do is I'm an independent practitioner for the last 30, so 30 years or so I think, and I, I work with issues of performance inside companies and, uh, typically the people that find me, and you have to find [00:03:00] me, is, uh, professional services are, are probably my first, uh, My first market, but I work with anyone, knowledge workers with a budget as it were, and I try to deal with issues as I said, that relates to how people get along.

The thing that I'm talking about today, actually, I'm not talking about this alone today, cuz Matt, you, you'll have other things to talk about with me, but the thing that I'll focus on really in terms of. Getting me in [00:03:20] front of this audience is about generational differences, and the reason I, I talk, know anything about that at all is that I was running, uh, schools for new consultants probably 20 years ago and about 18 years ago, I, I started to notice as did the management of these firms that the young people coming in.

Were acting markedly different than [00:03:40] the, um, the, the cadres of students that had preceded them. And so I thought that was interesting. I didn't think it was bad or good, I just thought it was interesting. And so what I did over the next 15 years or so, actually the next 18 years, uh, I, I started to learn about the topic of generational distinctions or generational differences, which is culminated in this book, which brings me to your [00:04:00] podcast today and the book.

Why I find you irritating, and that's really navigating generational differences at work. So that's the premise of my time with you, even though there's a repertoire of things that I can speak to. So I hope that gives you a sense of who I am. I live in Chicago if anybody's interested. , 

[00:04:15] Matt: I love Chicago, one of my favorite cities in the us.

Uh, thank you. And uh, [00:04:20] yeah. Including the weather I have, I, I enjoy, there's some beautiful, windy days in Chicago as well. Um, and I appreciate you going into detail around your background and experiences. It provides a really good jumping off point for our conversation. And, you know, it, it really, you know, when you talk about your passion and enthusiasm for exploring generational differences, [00:04:40] Uh, it's hard for me not to think about my own experience and, you know, because of, you know, the timing that, that I was born and the circumstances in which I entered the workforce.

I entered into a workplace that was largely inhabited by. Those in the baby boomer generation. Most of my colleagues and my, my coaches [00:05:00] and my leaders were all boomers, or in some cases even traditionalists. Right. And I entered at a time when the internet was really just becoming a significant part of people's lives.

I mean, I, I went to, I went to high school at a time where I didn't have a cell phone. I didn't get a cell phone until after university. So at a time when the generations were [00:05:20] very much. Uh, there was a very different way of how the world interacted across a number of fronts. One of the key themes that came up for us was we knew that there was this, this pending generational shift that was gonna happen in the workforce.

Mm-hmm. , and I was hearing it through the voices of people who [00:05:40] are boomers and traditionalists and lamenting the things that were changing and lamenting the latest generation and how. That was going to necessitate changes in the workplace. And, you know, it was really interesting for me in my first few years in the corporate world to navigate a space where, because of the generation that I inhabited, which was, I, you know, I'm an [00:06:00] older millennial, there was already a connotation about me as a professional as I would enter into workplaces and interact with folks.

And I'm, I'm curious, you talked about your passion for finding generational differences. I, I'm curious. If along the way there are particular anecdotes or stories that really, you know, just solidified for you the importance of this pursuit. Well, 

[00:06:19] Guest 1: to your [00:06:20] point, uh, in fact the, the last thing you had said is that there was already a view of you, and when I say a view of you, not you as Matt per se, but the perception who Matt might be because he is a millennial.

And so one of the challenges with all of this is, and, and by the way, this is. Throughout time, each generation is [00:06:40] condemned by the generation that preceded them. So in some way we, we are, we are failing. The next generation is a failure in some, although we must be failing up because we're doing better.

But as a consequence though of that is there's a perception of the millennial versus the reality of the millennial. And, and so I discussed that in the book quite a bit because one of the challenges of [00:07:00] this as well is when you talk about a, a group like this, it's really not all inclusive. We are talking about some people within a group that shapes the perception of the group and therefore you're subject to the perception of you.

So these boomers and traditionals in the workplace probably already had a view of the young that probably wasn't as [00:07:20] accurate in terms of what actually who they actually. And so you had to live under the auspices of that. Now, what's interesting about you, Matt, is that you came into the workplace this way and you've moved up through the workplace.

So you must possess traits that ha, they have an affinity for. So you have transcended the perception of the millennial, but a lot of [00:07:40] millennials don't even get that break because what happens is, I think of you as this way. If I believe that already, I come into the conversation looking for validation of what I already believe, and this is called the salience effect, right?

The salience effect is, look, I already think something of you. For instance, I'll give you an example. One of the myths about your generation [00:08:00] is that you're sensitive to feedback. I, you know, humans are sensitive to feedback. What's different about you is, is that you react to it more overtly, meaning that you will say something.

Whereas others of us boomers in particular, or traditionalists, we would swallow what we heard and then walk out of the office and sort of deal with it in the hallway. [00:08:20] You are assertive. So what they, it that appears to be is that you're more sensitive to the feedback than I was. I don't think that's true.

I think your assertion, uh, in terms of the reaction is read differently. The point being here is if I already think that about you, then I just look for a few examples of that, which seals the deal in terms of how I think. Does that make sense? It [00:08:40] makes total 

[00:08:40] Matt: sense. And to be fair, I learned a lot from my contemporaries who were boomers and traditionalists and things about the workplace.

And there is, you know, as much as there's this, to your point, uh, a narrative around older generations and kind of lamenting the passing of time and younger generations and things of that nature, there's [00:09:00] absolutely a reciprocal bias. You know, folks that are perhaps, you know, were born for us slowing the rate of change or slowing progress, and there's this, this, this, again, this is, this will pass on generation to generation.

What I think is particularly interesting though, about this particular period of time, which is unique this period of time, is the. [00:09:20] Significant number of generations working together and living together at one time. Yes. We have some workplaces where there's four and five generations and the same workforce.

That's never happened before. So the, the generational conversation has only picked up steam over time. 

[00:09:34] Guest 1: Yes, exactly right. And one of the challenges with this is that when you get to a certain level, for [00:09:40] instance, if you are a senior boomer, you do not necessarily see the difference between. I will say a millennial crowd and a Gen Z crowd, because you only see the young.

And so when you see them as the young, we blend them together in some capacity. And I think what you do a disservice when you don't recognize the uniqueness of a, of, [00:10:00] of an individual per se, or the uniqueness of the group, the cadre or the cohort group as it were. So that's one of the challenges. But because, but we do work across all of these things.

The other challenge is you have these generations, That are mid-management and the mid-management has to translate what senior managements wants into what the, the, the junior people are [00:10:20] supposed to do. And that doesn't always sort of, the, the telephone game doesn't always play well just because what happens is what the senior people want is I want them to be.

Engaged, you know, 80 hours a week or whatever the requirements are or the desire and what the, the junior elements one is I wanna be engaged, but I wanna be engaged profoundly around the things I'm [00:10:40] interested in doing. And I wanna do it in the time that I wanna do it with. So the point being here is the disconnect between us, because we don't cross these lines, we don't talk to each other, we talk through the channel, and that gets in the way of really understanding each other because then we have interpreters of our 

[00:10:56] Matt: behavior.

Well, and to your point, we're using different channels. Yes. [00:11:00] And as time goes on, the the multiplicity around channels only increases. Yes. You know, it wasn't too long ago that if you wanted a source of, and I'm using air quotes here, truth, you had trusted media outlets that you would go to for information.

Now we could dispute the validity of the statement that they were trusted media outlets. My point is there was less options to, [00:11:20] to get information and therefore, There was a more refined filtering process. Nowadays, information is often crowdsourced. It is often decentralized. Knowledge has become a decentralized asset, which for many years was commoditized and then distributed back to people, and I think about a lot of different constructs, society speaking, where that exists.

But as things have [00:11:40] shifted, the differences in terms of individual's, levels of comfort, You know, adopting certain tools. I think, you know, for example, Chris, because I work with people around the world and I work with people from different generations, different cultures, you know, I probably use no less than nine or 10 different instant messaging applications on [00:12:00] my phone because people have different preferences.

My mother will speak to me almost exclusively in Facebook Messenger, and she's the only one. And then I have friends of mine who are based in Latin America that for reasons around where they live and they're. Pursuit of privacy, text me on WhatsApp. And then I have friends, you know, locally here in Vancouver that text me via more, [00:12:20] you know, like traditional iMessages.

So it's just, that's a very small example of, for me, what is a very small subset of the population. When you step back and look even more broadly. There are so many other ways for us to exchange information across generations. And because this of the fragmentation, it is harder for us to be able to have a broader understanding of [00:12:40] what's actually.

Yes. 

[00:12:41] Guest 1: Well, to your point, if, if we, if we move this away from just the, the application of the technology and look in terms of the firm or the company as community, and, and so what's happened is we, we, we are balkanizing ourselves to some degree. We, we hang out with those who we know, the, the people like me, so.

The boomers or the, the, the, I will call the corporate [00:13:00] elite in an organization, hang out with other corporate elite. And so each of these, these, these groups, uh, stay within the framework of who they know. And I think that gets in the way of our connecting, especially as we move further and further into a remote workspace because the, the pandemic has shifted us about five years into the future as a consequence of that.

And [00:13:20] so what we're thinking in terms, people are thinking why could be more independent and I. You know, I'm not in disagreement with a degree of flexibility. I'm in. I'm concerned about two things, uh, uh, or three things. The community, the culture, and, and then the education, how we learn. And so all of those things, uh, I think come under pressure when you try to do it all [00:13:40] remotely, at least.

As I see it at the moment. So I think this notion of the separation between us and to your point, we used to have three networks. Now we have 500 channels, so we're not all hearing the same messages. And then we end up in our own echo chambers relative to the messages we do take in. But we need something [00:14:00] that connects us across.

And that was the point of the book is. Embracing differences so that we can all do something together as opposed, uh, as opposed to not , I guess. 

[00:14:12] Matt: Well, and it's, and it's, it's a great sentiment and I think it's, it's a sentiment that's very much aligned with the momentum, broad and [00:14:20] broader society. I mean, I understand that we've just come through a very significantly trying period over the last two and a half years, and to varying degrees, people have gone through their own struggle during that period.

And I'm speaking about this in broad terms so as to not be insensitive about outlying situations. And I understand that there's a lot for us to, to look [00:14:40] at. To your point, the acceleration of, you know, broader societal views in a number of different contexts took us to a place where, We are now having for the first time a conversation around true inclusion and true inclusion in the context of a business imperative.

You know, there are lots of studies [00:15:00] now that have shown a strong driver between inclusive cultures and those that perform stronger on indices, such as innovation and profitability, you know, absenteeism, attrition. There are so many benefits in the knowledge based economy to getting this. Yes, your, your concerns around the [00:15:20] ability to.

Replicate that, replicate those human experiences, replicate those human interactions using different channels is a absolutely, is a, is a valid discussion. I think that if we take a step back and look at, you know, this, honestly, I think we would agree that a majority of organizations during the pandemic shifted [00:15:40] their businesses digitally.

Mm-hmm. . But perhaps weren't as thoughtful about how they did that in the context of this conversation. They were thinking about business continuity. They were thinking about keeping the lights on. They were thinking about how do I restore some degree of productivity to my workforce? But many at the time [00:16:00] expected to see productivity declines.

And expected to run into headwinds around moving their businesses to a digital interface, only to be pleasantly surprised and found out that it actually went more smoothly than they thought, and that the work in this ca in this context could be completed at a higher, uh, quality. Um, and we're getting significantly positive feedback from their employees [00:16:20] around their productivity, their satisfaction, things of that nature.

Now, of course, not a perfect situation. We can definitely discuss the opportunities along the. When we look at the, the, the broader data, particularly around North America, we see that trend of organizations moving with some reluctance into a digital world affording their employees more trust, and them being [00:16:40] rewarded for that trust by greater outputs and.

There's no doubt in my mind that in the future the idea of community in any context has to include people coming together, and that includes this across multiple contexts. And I'm, I'm curious for a world where we do now have more viable options, whether those be technologically speaking or [00:17:00] whether they be even just a greater acceptance of things like asynchronicity and the ability to spread messages when we're not, you know, inhabiting the same space.

How do you see those, um, real. Presenting either opportunities or challenges to this particular conversation? 

[00:17:16] Guest 1: Well, I, I think there's a, to unpack a lot of what you [00:17:20] said here, there's a, a lot of things that are very interesting, what you're addressing here, Matt. One of them is going back to this notion of inclusivity really quickly.

I'm, I work a lot in the diversity space as a consequence of this generational. Perspective that I have, cuz this is one of the differences between us, but it's also the easiest difference to talk about because we're all going to go through these [00:17:40] experiences. We're all going to go through the stages of life.

Yet our, our, our generational lens is unique to who we are, but we still go through these different stages so we can appreciate where another person is and. My, my point in that is we should get comfortable with having conversations around difference that that's in the start of inclusivity. To [00:18:00] your point though, diversity works, it works in organizations, but it's difficult for the person who is different.

It's always difficult if you are the different person on the team. If the team embraces you, then the team is richer. As a consequence. If the team does not embrace you, then you become the brunt of why the team isn't working well. So in that [00:18:20] sense, diversity does play. It does, there's called thing called the diversity bonus.

It was a book written on this whole topic. And so the, the notion of this is while there's a difficulty here, if you transcend the difficulty, you have a better team. And so this generational piece that I'm saying is, Work is becoming more and more of a team sport. It just, it's because of the [00:18:40] complexity of what you do and what, uh, your colleagues do in general.

And so you need others to do it with you. And the greater the diversity of teams, and by the way, there's identity diversity, which is what I'm addressing to some degree. But also there's, uh, cognitive diversity, which I'm also addressing on how we think about things. And so this notion to your point about, uh, [00:19:00] we're living in this remote space, now we're transitioning to a new, a new reality.

The problem I find though, with this to some degree, is we are also in a transactional space. That means businesses are no longer loyal to the employee in the, in the, in the. I will call it the traditional sense. The traditional sense. If you work [00:19:20] hard for me, Matt, you can retire from here and I will take care of you after you leave here and you will get a pension that that covenant is broken.

It doesn't exist anymore. At best. You get some stocks at the higher end of this, but the reality is we've moved to transactions and the transaction is I'll work for you if I get something in return. So this, this, this. [00:19:40] Idea of transaction coupled with a remote workspace, meaning that we can work remotely.

What this potentially does, it decouples us from each other, even inside the organization. And my, my challenge to organizations is today your point, we are being productive in a remote space. Although there is some question [00:20:00] as to the level of productivity, uh, I think a Rutgers professor has argued that we are more productive, uh, than we.

In this space before the pandemic, but we are not as productive as we are if we are working together all the time. Meaning in the same building. So there's a, there's a, there's an argument around that to some degree, but the point being here is when you [00:20:20] decouple us from the space and we become transactional, the possibility of the future is we will only have a core group.

I would equate it to a Nike. A Nike is a marketing company. It is not a tennis shoe. Manufacturing company. And so you have a core with all of these other people who are no longer a part of it. So I [00:20:40] think one of the mistakes companies often make is they believe at this phase they are in some kind of stasis, meaning that we can do this.

No, I do not think you are in stasis. I think there's a slight degradation of the culture and, and of, as a consequence of degradation of the culture. There's a, a degradation of the, of the idea of the [00:21:00] firm that is at.

[00:21:04] Matt: Hey everyone, it's Matt here. I hope you're enjoying today's discuss. And before we continue, I want to make you aware of my latest creative project this week at Work presented in partnership with my good friend Chris Rainey of HR Leaders. Each Friday we [00:21:20] will live stream on LinkedIn at 7:00 AM Pacific Standard Time.

That's 10:00 AM Eastern Standard Time and 3:00 PM GMT for our European viewers, and together bringing the latest trends, news on topics emanating from organizations, everything from culture to technology and the future of work. Joining is [00:21:40] easy. Just follow me on LinkedIn. Click the bell at the top right hand side of my profile and you'll get notified when we go live each week.

And whether you do experience the content live or later, if you've been following me for a while, you'll no doubt recognize the fun banter Chris and I have developed over the years and whether it's been podcasts or digital events. We're [00:22:00] so excited to again, bring you the topics affecting today's workplaces and their.

And now back to our discussion. 

[00:22:09] Guest 1: I hope that I'm being clear with this because it's very nuanced what I'm trying to say, . 

[00:22:14] Matt: Well, let's explore the nuance, cause I'd love to learn a little bit more about your definition of degradation. So when you say a [00:22:20] culture is degraded, what does that look like inside the four walls of a company?

[00:22:23] Guest 1: It looks like this. Look, I, I don't, I run into you, Matt. I don't, I don't work on your floor. I don't work in technology or I don't work in change, or I don't work in any of these departments, but I work there. And so I could run into you for coffee and then I will casually say, oh my God, did you hear what they're doing in marketing?

Oh my God, did you see this thing [00:22:40] on hr? Now, these are all small moments, but small. Accumulate. And so it's, it's like the Allen, have you ever heard of the Allen Curve? Matt? The Allen Curve I have. The further away you are from the source of sort of the, the connection you have, the, the, the less likely you are to connect to that.

Now, if you, if you take the Allen curve, wri, [00:23:00] larges, if everybody is remote, all of a sudden a lot of these random connections. Disappear entirely. They disappear entirely. I don't, I don't interact with hr. I, I don't interact with it. I only interact with marketing. And so in that sense, what we do is we become even more localized because as humans, [00:23:20] we don't randomly go out with technology in the same way as humans randomly go out for coffee.

And so you don't, you wouldn't say, Hey, I don't know you. I know you're in hr, but I thought I'd give you a call so we can get acquainted. No, but if you happen to be in the cafeteria, oh, by the way, what do you do? That's interesting. Well, that's it. And so you hear these things [00:23:40] and here's another interesting.

Interesting point. What we do is when we do our work, when you do your work, Matt, you do not overtly think this but you, but you do think this, how fast am I doing this relative to my peers? How is my work being, uh, seen relative to my peers? How do I appear [00:24:00] relative to the pecking order of my peers? When you are in the.

That comparative notion is, is surfaced because we see each other doing these things. And they report to you, meaning they report to each other at a peer level. Oh yeah, I finished that. Oh yeah, I did that in a week. Or, but when you are remote and alone, you lose sight of the comparative nature. And [00:24:20] now you are at the, you are subject to whatever your manager says that you have, uh, have done or aren't doing relative to the work that needs to be done.

So there could be a degradation in terms of work performance because the peers. The peers level us up, not the manager. You see, the manager doesn't level us up. The manager, the [00:24:40] manager tells us when we're below level, but that doesn't level us up on our own. So it's a different sensibility about who is watching who and as a consequence, what do we do about it?

Well, 

[00:24:50] Matt: and who's watching who. It presents an interesting conversation in this world where we are more dispersed and when we are more hybrid. And you know, I'd be curious about your [00:25:00] thoughts around trust. You know, trust is a big part of relationships. It's something that I think most of us have a bias to extend it to people that we work with, but we certainly have worked with people that may not as extended as liberally as others.

And we've all worked for bosses that may be looking over our shoulder. And yes, some bosses [00:25:20] may have struggled more than others, or some coworkers may have struggled more than others in this more dispersed linear communication way that we're talking about. Yes. I'm curious about the role of trust in the work that.

[00:25:31] Guest 1: Yes. That's interesting cuz I think trust is the cornerstone. It's easier when people trust, by the way, people confuse the notion of trust as binary. Trust isn't [00:25:40] binary, it's layered. And so for instance, uh, you are a, uh, let's take you as a, a podcaster. I trust you know what you're doing as a podcaster. I will have this experience with you as a podcaster.

Now that's the immediate thing. That's my expectation cuz that's the role. Podcaster. Now, if, if, if we do this over time, then there's the issue of [00:26:00] competence. So how does, if I hear you again and again, you've said you do a hundred, you've done 105 episodes. If I went through that now the next layer of trust would be further.

I would extend that to your competence, not just the role, but your competence. Cuz I see it again and again, demonstrate it. The harder one to get to and trust is the emotional. Do I trust you as the [00:26:20] person that you are? And this is where technology has its limitation because technology doesn't convey our humanity when we, when it's in a text or when it's in an email, or even when it's on video, because the video is performative.

And when you are, it's called performative theater in the video. So I'm not seeing the total, [00:26:40] you, in fact, video has its limitation. If I just see your head. It's exhausting because I, I, I read the body. When I talk to humans, I don't read just ahead. I read the alignment of the verbal and the nonverbal. The point being here, trust gets harder to get to if I cannot validate it.

And so this is [00:27:00] where it becomes important. And by the way, I, I think the future lies withs. Stints, uh, stints, meaning that you will be working with people you would working intimately for a period of time, but you will be working live with them. And over time as you know them, as a person beyond the role they're in and that you, you both have shown competence in terms of your, your, [00:27:20] your abilities, you then get more space in which to operate.

Cuz then trust, trust is more natural because I get what you're saying. For instance, Matt, if you were a very sarcastic human, you're not. But if you were and 

[00:27:31] Matt: I knew that about hell, I don't. What 

[00:27:33] Guest 1: about that? Well, let's say, but I, let's say I knew that about you. Then when I read your emails, I read them from the [00:27:40] point of, oh, he's being sarcastic cuz I know Matt, but if, if I don't know you and I read sarcasm, I don't read sarcasm at all.

I read, what the hell is this guy saying? So in that sense, the, the challenge. Technology and trust or trust in general is distance makes it harder to, to create it unless there's somebody who's [00:28:00] going to, quite frankly, unless there's go betweens, Matt, maybe you're one of these, um, what, what do they call these?

Um, a Maven or a, a node, somebody that other people believe, and then you would say, oh yeah, you can trust Chris. You can talk to Chris. So maybe that'll be a role in. My theory is probably 60% of the [00:28:20] jobs that the very young will have haven't been invented because we are transitioning into a new world and that new world will be really created by the young, not by me.

Well, I think 

[00:28:30] Matt: that's a really good point for a number of reasons, and I think specifically when we look at. How people interact. Uh, and there needs to be an [00:28:40] appreciation of the fact that having to, in a lot of cases, shift the way we would've traditionally communicated with one another to be effective.

And I think we need to. Except that that is a change for some people and that that change comes easier for others than it does for some. And when I think about organizations [00:29:00] specifically, I, I agree with you. I think that work becomes more intentional going forward, or it's less about let's collect a bunch of humans in one location and then tell them that they're here from these hours to these hours, but rather they.

Conversations about our team meets two times a week for brainstorming sessions. Mm-hmm. , [00:29:20] between 11 and one o'clock, we'll see you here, but the time you do between that, that's yours. But we expect you to be able to contribute. And take away actions from each of those brainstorming sessions that we use to come together.

And there will be certain roles for which that becomes more practical and more realistic and more, uh, desirable for others. And some of that will be [00:29:40] driven by the labor market and the a volume of available. Roles and talent on the market, like certain roles that have lots of people that can fill them, will receive likely less flexibility than those roles that perhaps will attract more flexibility and more, um, autonomy as a consequence of them being more highly, you know, more difficult to fill.

To me, it [00:30:00] becomes really around how do we determine the types of activities that we're gonna perform in our organizations or on our teams, and then how do we pair the mode or the node of communication to best fit the use case. So if it's brainstorming, I think we all would agree. Let's come together, let's share some space.

If it's, let me give you an update on my [00:30:20] to-do. That can probably be an asynchronous email communication. Absolutely. So it's about figuring out what the purpose is, and I think people are awake it into the reality of some of the things we spent our time doing in the office didn't have to happen here. So let's start from there as a conversation 

[00:30:34] Guest 1: point.

Yes. You're, I think you're spot on, Matt, because I, there is, there are two kinds of work. There's collaborative [00:30:40] work, which by the way, if we're going to have a flexible work environment, then when you come into the. Your point, and I love the way you frame intense, intentional. The the collaborative work is, we're here for meetings today.

I don't wanna see you alone sitting somewhere. This is the day we all plan to meet. And I, by the way, I would be so draconian to say it's all [00:31:00] present or you're not at my meeting. Meaning that I wouldn't have the, the, the, the mix in the same room with the technology we have today, because the technology has those as the poor step children.

And I wanna see the, I wanna see these people in that room who get to see each other in totality. Uh, because the other thing that, that, uh, you had mentioned [00:31:20] here is, is the, Flow work. And that is the work that we could do on our own. The uninterrupted creative work or the execution of the work we do. And then we sequester ourselves in a way that we are not interrupted.

And so I think that there's opportunities for this. I do think the young will lead the way because they've been playing universal [00:31:40] games globally on videos with people around the world and, and they're able to organize themselves and. But I'm a child of a other habits. I'm a, and so I can help in the transition to the new model, but I am not the creator of the new model because I think the creation and the execution of the new model are the responsibility of the, [00:32:00] is basically the responsibility of the next generation or the generation after that.

Quite frankly, Matt, I believe the real digital natives are, are not millennials. They are, they are gen. Or maybe even Jen Alpha, the kids after them. But I think the real transformation will happen with Gen Z. 

[00:32:16] Matt: I think you're right. I don't consider myself a digital native as a millennial who was born in [00:32:20] the early eighties.

And, uh, it doesn't to me, I, I actually, in some cases, and this makes me sound probably older than I am, but it, it makes me lament the days of. The innocence of just being able to hop on your bike and just play with your friends in the neighborhood. And the only way you get a message back to your parents was that somebody yelled at you from the house.

No, I think that's right, Matt. [00:32:40] That's, and there was an element of, of innocence that was present at that time that simply isn't now. Um, I think about. Even simple things like bullying and bullying took on a very different tone when it happened. To your point earlier, like in person where obviously the, the personal [00:33:00] imprint that leaves on somebody is different and messages received digitally are really hurtful.

And cyber bullying is a very real problem. And those unfortunately, unlike those schoolyard scuffles, some of those messages never go away. Right. And. I think about, you know, kids that are in, you know, high school or elementary school and trying to [00:33:20] just find their way and be, you know, grow up and learn and make mistakes and think about how challenging that is in a world where everything is recorded and everything is shared and everything is distributed and it's gotta be challenging.

And I, I, I do empathize with future generations and having to navigate this world and, and figure out. To live in a healthy way, uh, in [00:33:40] spite of some of those headwinds. And I'm curious for you, as you, you look at the future, you know, what are some of the things that you see for you or for us, you know, broadly 

[00:33:47] Guest 1: speaking?

Well, I, I guess the, the problem with extrapolating into the future is that it's the assumption that it's linear and it's not, I think it goes and fits and starts. So, um, but I, I'm hopeful. I've always [00:34:00] been hopeful. I mean, there is no alternative to hope and, and I see the future as such. We are, we. Um, passing of the baton.

Uh, the boomers by the way, the boomers that are still working, myself included, uh, we like to work and we're probably the last generation of the single arc career. That means that I started somewhere and I finished [00:34:20] somewhere that a lot of us wanted to be in the same. Now, there's a group of us that are still working that are, will start a second career just because they can afford to do something interesting or they have to do something.

But generally speaking, your generation may have as many. Three careers. Uh, Matt, you might have an, an economic career. Uh, I would, I would suspect [00:34:40] that you have an, an entrepreneurial career and then eventually, at some point in your life, you will have a, what I will call the socially responsible give back.

Uh, and so that means you will try these different things. Now, that's interesting. Even that is, is in sequence. I think the next generation after you and the generat after that will have multiple careers, [00:35:00] but in, not in sequence, but in s. And so what I will see there, I'll give you an example, is this, um, gen Z is known for the side hustle.

You've heard of that, right? It's, it's the side jobs that they have. And so they'll do things on the side. Now what's that? The problem with that, there's no problem. They're doing it for one couple [00:35:20] reasons. One is there's an opportunity to make money cuz they're monitorizing their. Now companies are going to push back on that.

They're gonna say, in a remote world, you're working for me, Matt, you're not working for yourself. So why do you have a side business? So this goes back to your notion of how can I trust you if you're doing something on the side? Now, this will force a lot of [00:35:40] young people to hide what they do. It will not stop them from doing it.

This is a. Take. What we should be doing is we should encourage them to tell us what they're doing as a match for our own company, because then companies become engines of growth or incubators for these young people, so they are working for you [00:36:00] and they're developing their other skills. This also, in my view, allows an opportunity for more senior people who are moving out of the organization to still stay relevant because they become the angel investors aor.

Not the investor, if not the investor, the angel advisors, because then they help these young people [00:36:20] build their other businesses and then the stake of that business is bought, or at least owned by the larger corporation. So again, uh, what we're seeing is we're seeing, I, I would argue that there's going to be a lot of growth if people are allowed.

To share what they're actually doing. Now, will that work for everyone? Absolutely not, but it, it will work better [00:36:40] than it won't. And I can give you an example of how this has happened before, if you want. Absolutely. Your, your generation when you were, uh, starting off in the workplace. Um, uh, And this was 20 years ago.

I remember the big noise about your generation was you wanted to bring your own technology, heaven forbid, into the office. You wanted to use [00:37:00] your computers and your phones and all of that. And most of the companies that I worked with at the time, consulting finance law, they said, no, you can't do that.

You gotta use our, our, our systems, our legacy systems. And you said, no, no, no, no, no. And who won the millennial? So in that sense, we are able to use what you want to use and you cannot. And [00:37:20] my point is the numbers were in your favor, and I think the same will hold for Gen Z. The numbers are in their favor and there'll be a c change in how we operate relative to the duality of these careers.

But it'll, it'll be a bumpy road to get there. We can go down 

[00:37:36] Matt: a number of different paths on this conversation and, and I'm sensitive to [00:37:40] not exploring topics that we've done at length on this podcast lately. One of them is the idea of changing demographics and the fact that in a knowledge based economy that we know there are less available workers than there were this time last year, and that there will be less available workers next year than there is at this point in time.

That with the broader demographic [00:38:00] shifts, we are going to see a more increasing. Difficult time in finding the right talent to say nothing for. The very obvious, and this will definitely resonate with you, Chris, given your educational background, the very obvious mismatch of skills that are presently readily available in the workforce and those that are currently needed from the new [00:38:20] workforce is a very different conversation altogether as we move more to a digital world that's powered by AI and changing skill sets and automation.

But on top of all of that, That in and of itself is a really interesting conversation, uh, as we look at at shifting demographics. The other thing that really is interesting for me around demographics is [00:38:40] this idea of the side hustle that you referenced. Mm-hmm. . Um, I do agree with you. I think the same conversation came up 10, 15 years ago around, is it okay if people to post on social.

Right, and now we're getting to a place where it's, is it okay to have a side hustle? I think the way I, I view this, Chris and I have a strong bias, so you'll have to forgive me [00:39:00] for, you know, stating it is, I think the actual economy we're talking about now is an intention economy such that organizations, whether they are explicit marketing entities, Or implicit marketing entities.

Um, they're all competing for our time on the platform, on the page, on the [00:39:20] article, watching the video, and they're monetizing our attention to third party advertisers or recouping that value themselves and trying to sell us their own products and services by way of their programming. And in a world where that becomes commonplace, there is.

Examples. There are examples. I remember myself in my [00:39:40] last corporate role. I used to not only, of course, collect a corporate salary from my C H R O role, but I also made money on the side speaking because I've done some work on social media and built an audience and been asked to speak at conferences on behalf of, um, myself.

And speak to some of the things that I had done in my career, and when I discussed it with my organization, fortunately I [00:40:00] was lucky enough to work with people that were, saw the value of that and saying, Hey, if you wanna go out in there and raise the flag in these places, we would otherwise not be, then like, absolutely, go for it.

They had obvious, obvious, um, limits around what information was shared around. Confidential ip, but when it came to publicly available information, they were quite happy to generate more [00:40:20] interest for their products and services in an indirect selling method by having me talk about our culture on stage and.

I think more organizations are gonna waken to the reality of your team members, whether they join you on a freelance basis, a contract basis, or they're full-time salary employee sitting in the office or working remotely. They are ambassadors for the things that [00:40:40] you're doing in the organization. And if they have a successful podcast or they have a successful web series, or they have a successful career as an author or whatever that might be, but they build some sort of community and following from that.

That is a benefit to your organization. In the same way, having a very extensive Rolodex [00:41:00] was for my grandfather's 

[00:41:01] Guest 1: generation. Yes, I am totally with you on this. In fact, um, I, I've always suggested that they do more reverse, uh, mentoring, meaning that the young should be teaching the more senior people how to leverage social media, because I think it's a mystery to us, to a great degree.

And, and I, I, quite frankly, I think the future lies in the visualization [00:41:20] of learning, uh, where YouTube is useful and TikTok is useful. These, these, these platforms are very useful in terms of how we could get, teach others to do things. So to your other point, uh, I think the educational system has to be redesigned.

I think college is anachronistic in terms of its design, uh, simply because a four [00:41:40] year degree does not prepare you to the work that you need to do necessarily. Mostly it's where it's in the work itself that prepares you for the work you're actually doing. And it costs so much. And it has limited utility, even if it does prepare you.

Because if you're going to have, uh, an ever evolving world, you have to be ever educated. So I'm a, [00:42:00] I'm a fan of changing that model and making it an annuity. I I, you don't graduate from college. You buy an annuity and you can go back to that school for the rest of your life cuz that's what's gonna be necessary.

And so I think I, you're gonna see new models introduced of education. Uh, and again, to your, your, your point about, um, leveraging. What they know in, in, in the [00:42:20] marketplace. Cuz I've also been a big fan of teaching the young, when they come into the job, what is your brand? What are the economics of how we operate?

And then teach them everything they would normally have been taught five years into the job, but teach them on day one so that they can align themselves. To your point when they become ambassadors out there with the [00:42:40] organization as opposed to maligning the organization inadvertently because they didn't know.

[00:42:45] Matt: Chris, such a great conversation. I just wanna first off, thank you so much for your time today. Oh yeah, sure. I'm gonna link all of your details and the podcast show notes for those in Justin. Anymore about you. For those interested in getting a copy of the book, I would highly recommend it. This is a conversation that we're all [00:43:00] experiencing in our own ways, and I think Chris has done a really nice job of encapsulating a whole bunch of broader topics into a really nice read.

So Chris, thanks so 

[00:43:08] Guest 1: much for your time today. Thank you, Matt. I really appreciate it. Let me be here. I appreciate it. Thank you all for listening.[00:43:20] 

[00:43:22] Matt: N O HR is a digital transformation consultancy, working at the intersection of strategy, technology, and people operations. We partner with organizations, private equity and venture capital firms to accelerate value creation and identify the organization's highest leverage initiatives. And this can take place [00:43:40] in many form.

From strategic planning and alignment to technology, procurement, implementation and integration, along with organizational design process, re-engineering and change management. With our proven track record of working with complex high growth organizations, we provide a lens that goes [00:44:00] beyond the balance sheet, increasing enterprise readiness, resilience, and value.

For more information, check us out@bentohr.com.