You Can't Automate Kindness - Steve Wilson VP EMEA Services & Tracy Reis Opps Director Syniti

Steve Wilson  and Tracy Reis from Syniti join Sam and I to record this episode of Get Amplified. 

It is no wonder Syniti is enjoying such success and has attrition rates of <5%. This is a masterclass in building great culture. As you will hear - being kind - does not mean being ‘soft’ tough conversations and accountability are front and centre. 

But it is about EVERYONE being kind and EVERYONE being the keeper of the culture.

Thank you Steve and Tracy for giving Sam and I such a thought provoking insight into Syniti. How you are scaling your culture is inspirational! 

We would love you to follow us on LinkedIn! 

https://www.linkedin.com/company/amplified-group/

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:10

Welcome to Get Amplified from the Amplified Group, the podcast for tech industry leaders and aspiring leaders who want to help their companies execute faster. As always, we're virtual. I'm back home in Buckinghamshire, surrounded by various dogs. Vicki's over in Deepest Darkest Oxfordshire. Vicki, who have we got on the podcast today?

Vic 0:29

Thanks, Sam. And uh well, today is special for us because we have two guests today, um, and it's the first time we've done this. And this podcast has come about through Lindsay Moore, who is one of our amplifiers, who is just such a pleasure to work with. And Lindsay knows Steve Wilson, who is joining us on the podcast. And when we asked Steve to be on the podcast, he said, I think I should also be on with Tracy Reese. And they're both from a company called Sinity, which I would really like to understand what they do as well. But when we had the pre-call about this, what was just overwhelmingly obvious is both Steve and Tracy are it's all about the people. And if you care about the people and it's second nature and it's ingrained in it, they they naturally do everything that we help our clients do at the Amplified Group. So this is just going to be uh a masterclass in looking after your people. So with that, Sam, over to you.

SPEAKER_01 1:40

Great, thanks, Vicky. So, Steve, you best start off, if you don't mind, by giving us something of a little potted history of your career.

SPEAKER_00 1:47

Yeah, be happy to. Thanks, Sam. Thanks, Vicki. Um, so yes, Steve Wilson, I've been in customer-facing services roles for almost 30 years now. And for 25 of those years, I guess I've been working in and leading local, regional, and global teams at organizations like Shell, uh Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft, Salesforce, Hitachi Vantara, Test, and now at Cinity. So I've had the fortune of leading services teams ranging from sales, uh, professional services or consulting and support up to EMIA level and customer success teams up to global levels. I actually started out my career in the early 90s at Shell, where I kind of worked in the combined shipping and trading business as part of their infrastructure and architecture team. And one of the projects that I worked on there was the implementation of the first version of Microsoft Exchange, which interestingly brought me to the attention of digital. And I moved across to what was digital in the late 90s, just as they were going through their merger acquisition with Compaq, who then latterly merged was acquired by Hewlett Packard. In 2004, I moved to Microsoft, uh, where I stayed for 12 years in a number of different roles. My last role at Microsoft saw me leading the consulting division for the UK and Ireland business, which I did for about four years, uh, where I had responsibility for uh enterprise and solution architecture, delivery management, consulting across all of Microsoft's products and solutions. And uh towards the end of my time there, I also managed their support business as well. I left in 2016. I joined Salesforce. I wanted to join uh, I guess a SaaS organization, an entrepreneurial organization, high growth. And I ran their services business again for UK Island and then the emerging region underneath their customer success group banner and responsible for uh solution delivery uh across all of the Salesforce clouds. Um super interesting time. Um, Salesforce going through tremendous period of growth. Um, but I left Salesforce in 2018 uh to join Hitachi Vantara, where I was VP of their AMIA services business. So I ran their sales business, their consulting business with full PL responsibility for professional services, managed services, cloud services, and solutions sold as a service. And six months into that, I was asked to take on their global customer success function, which I ran for a further 18 months, the full kind of uh customer success lifecycle, onboarding, education, training, professional services, customer success management, support renewals, etc. And then in August 2020, I took on an interim role, um, something very different to what I'd previously been used to. Most of my career, I think, has been fairly well tenured, uh, eight years, eight years, 12 years, et cetera. Um, but the role at uh the interim role I took on was a VP of customer success for an organization called a test, a consumer research platform team or business where I consulted into their CEO to consolidate, Unify, and scale their customer success initiative. And then finally, in January of this year, at the very height of the pandemic, I joined Cynity as the head of uh AMIA services, where I had the honor of leading a team that is responsible for enabling the delivery of what I think of as extraordinary customer value through the adoption of our advanced data migration software and the Cinity knowledge platform into existing and net new customers.

SPEAKER_01 5:46

Wow, quite a run. How was it joining Cinnity in the height of lockdown? That must have been uh interesting. You know, you've had to hit the ground, you've had to build relationships on the fly, presumably without meeting people until I guess perhaps fairly recently.

SPEAKER_00 6:00

Yeah, yeah. I think I met somebody um from Cynity in the last two weeks. So I finally managed to match from the shoulders down for the typical image that you see on Zoom and uh and Teams, which is obviously from the shoulders up. Uh so great question. Uh and I think kind of that ability to create relationships in a virtual world is probably not too dissimilar to creating relationships in the, I guess, the physical world, which sounds crazy to say it, but you know, the pre-pandemic and hopefully the post-pandemic world. And I think, you know, there's probably five, I guess, kind of key points for me. One is time, finding time to genuinely spend with people, to be physically, virtually present. And again, I think that leads on to the second point, which is around being engaged and really listening and giving you 100% of you and who you are to that individual at that time. I think it's about being authentic and being yourself. Um, I've I've gone out of my way to be personal, and I what I mean by that is sharing something about who I am and what I am about, and hopefully kind of reciprocate or getting some reciprocal information back. And I think genuinely just being kind. Um, you know, just you're never too important to be nice to people. I mean, that old saying. And I think everybody in Sinity, frankly, probably embodies all of those kind of attributes. You know, if you could distill that, you're probably going to be pretty close to kind of that individual uh that you find at Sinity. And I kind of look at at all of those values, those behaviors. And frankly, no one embodies that culture or those behaviors better than Tracy. In fact, I think we call her, or I call her certainly the catalyst of culture here at Sinity.

SPEAKER_01 8:01

Well, that probably leads us on to you then, Tracy. Is Steve's described you as the catalyst of the culture or the keeper of the culture, you'll you'll know, I'm sure, from my time at SoftCat and previous conversations with Vicky that culture is something that I hold very dear to my heart. Perhaps you could give us your part of history and and tell us how you how you kind of lead that culture side of things.

SPEAKER_03 8:24

Thanks, Sam. Yeah, I'd be delighted to. Um, and Steve obviously has started us off and talking about um how important it is to us at Cynity. I started my working life in professional sport, um, the highlight being identifying and sponsoring England cricket players for a brand called Slasinger, who were at the time were dominating the market. So the likes of the great uh wicket keeper Alex Stewart and the batsman Mark Rampacash and Mark Butcher, to name but a few, were the guys that I signed. And I think it's at that point that I really recognize the importance of high-performing and connected teams. Cricket, much like business, is a team game, but it's an individual game as well. And it's pretty, pretty lonely out there on the creek sometimes. Um, your heads can go down, shoulders can slope, and you feel you don't have the support of your teammates. And then suddenly the noise in the field can lift the game and you're in it together. And that's when you can see whether the game is going to be won or lost. So I joined Sinity through a small startup, um, a UK-centric company called Intota 10 years ago now. Intota was the brainchild of some incredibly talented and entirely different individuals, connected by um entrepreneurial spirit, a vision and a purpose, but also a true appreciation of people. So that was really where the journey started on culture within the tech business that I had joined. So I've been privileged to be part of many chapters of this story, the acquisition of Intota by back office associates, as we were then. And at that point, Intota was just a 40-person UK-centric data migration specialist. And we grew the team in uh five uh five short years to a delivery capacity in Barcelona. We changed the name to Cinity. And today I am a senior director, my official title being HR Business Partner. I've got to confess I prefer being called the guardian of talent for AMIA. Um, I think HR's got a bit of a bad rap sometimes. We're just there for the difficult things in life, and I absolutely don't want to be that. Um AMIA for us is eight European entities and one in the Middle East, and we're about 200 people now in the region and growing. So overall, we're about 1,400 people, an enterprise data company that helps large organizations extract sustained value from their strategic assets. And we're formed of really amazing, smart, motivated data consultants. Data is not boring in our world. We only have boring go lives, we just don't have boring data people, I can assure you. And so the question you asked me was why is culture important? Um, culture is important not only just to create high-performing and functioning teams, I believe, but also because businesses buy from people. People work for people. I start every conversation with a new candidate saying I don't like the word interview. This is a discussion, it's a partnership. We have to be in it together. You have to see what you're gonna get from us. How's that gonna fulfill your career? And does it fit with your aspirations for your life? So most of us want to work for and with people we trust, respect, and have fun with. So that's why I do what I do. Simply, I love people and I like to have fun. And I truly like and interested in people. So that plays well because I'm a professional coach and I'm privileged to work with some of the most who I consider to be talented and clever people on the planet and people that I like to hang out with, people I care about, and there's nothing better than seeing an individual grow and succeed personally and professionally and be happy.

SPEAKER_01 12:08

Fantastic. Sounds sounds very soft, Kat. I'm envious of your uh starting your career doing the cricket thing. Vicky was looking at my face there.

Vic 12:18

Your eyes were nearly popping out of your head. Wow, that's so good. He's a massive cricket fan. I am guilty of that.

SPEAKER_01 12:28

Oh, cool, cool. One of the companies that I'm involved in is a high-end cricket bat manufacturer. Um, so it's really interesting to be in that world and the whole bat sponsorship thing and trying to pick up young talent early and and what have you is fascinating. Really, really interesting. You know, the the big brands don't make their own bats, they just put the stickers on them.

unknown 12:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 12:51

Back in the day, we did with Eric Loxton and Barnsley, uh, Slasinger, we used to go and pick the willow and and I'd go up with Shue and the boys and pick their bats. But yeah, it's very, very different world now.

SPEAKER_01 13:02

It's very corporate these days, isn't it? It's really interesting. I was reading about uh, I think I'm not sure, I think it was an Indian cricketer who was deliberately playing with a blank bat so as to try and attract the maximum sponsorship. That was like it, that was his uh his kind of uh way of advertising that he was open to market. I thought that was really interesting.

SPEAKER_03 13:24

Yeah, interesting. It it is amazing how things have changed. I remember coaching the boys of how to hold their back to get maximum exposure to the logo when they scored, you know, this was all part of the game.

SPEAKER_01 13:37

Fantastic.

SPEAKER_00 13:38

Yeah, cool, really interesting. Sounds like we've all got a little connection into sport. Um, and whilst I did play quite a bit of cricket growing up, golf was my thing.

SPEAKER_01 13:47

And I think one of the things we were talking about, we were talking about sport. Yeah, the sport, right?

SPEAKER_00 13:54

Um, I think I think this is kind of again, it's one of the things that you know is kind of what we think of when we think of someone who's at Cynity, is someone that gives something outside of workplace as well. And and both Tracy and I are mentors um to a company called Black Valley, which is all about getting black talent into the IT workplace. Um, you know, we spend some time um working with them. I've I've been a Samaritan for for again longer than I care to remember, probably over 20 years. And and we we talk a lot about mental health as well as kind of obviously physical and emotional health as well at Sinity. And the and the other thing, just to kind of bring it back to sport, is I kind of manage one of the England golf teams. And so the England under 18 boys' golf squad that kind of focused on Hampshire, Surrey, and the Isle of Wight. So so I think when we think about somebody that works at Sinity, it's not just the technical side of things, it's not just the customer facing. And you know, Tracy and I interview for people that come into my business, Tracy and I are on every interview. You know, it we're we're it's so important to us that that when people come into Sinity, they add value to Sinity and they don't detract. And we don't think of it, I don't think of it in the sense of technical skills. Yeah, I think of it as culture, I think it as behaviors, I think of the values, the DNA. You know, I think we're all stakeholders of of our culture. You know, I like to think of it as we kind of that immune system, you know, we're all protective of our culture. Yeah, yeah. You know, we react to it when we don't, yeah, we react, you know, when when we see things that are wrong, we react to it. We repel that. And you spit the intruder out.

SPEAKER_01 15:39

Yeah, that makes sense.

SPEAKER_00 15:40

Yeah, if you get through the interview process, you've done incredibly well because not only are you going to get grilled technically, but you come up against Tracy and I. Um that makes sense. Tracy and I look after the culture and the consulting side of our business.

SPEAKER_01 15:53

I I always used to refer to it as off cat as one bad apple spoils the cider.

SPEAKER_00 15:59

100%.

SPEAKER_01 16:00

So you know, very similar approach there, I think. Very much so. So obviously, you're a very people-first business, that much is clear. How do you align that with making sure you hit the business objectives here, presumably revenue and eventually profit-related, among other things?

SPEAKER_00 16:17

Yeah, uh and it's interesting because I heard I think the same question was asked of um of Colin Brown, who either the fortune to work with at Microsoft, and I think Colin said it probably the way in the way that I'm going to say, I'm gonna kind of refer back to that kind of Richard Branson approach, who I think probably popularized the view at the time. I think if you look after your people, they look after your customers. And if you look after your customers, then you can be successful in business. And that's the way we think of things here at Cynity. You know, we're a people-first business and it's helped us to become, you know, incredibly successful in a very short space of time by taking that approach, by looking after our people first and then hoping and in fact watching them deliver great outcomes, uh, great value, predictably, reliably, consistently for our customers. And then obviously, our customers getting that value uh and getting that kind of differentiated experience from our people uh make us successful. So I think that's the way we approach it, Sam.

SPEAKER_03 17:20

I think one thing to add to that, Steve, I think as a leadership type team, we try to inspire others simply by saying what we will do and doing what we say. So it's really important that we're open and we're accessible and we believe strongly in setting that tone from the top and embracing our differences, recognizing that we're all good at different things. So collectively, together we make we make the business. And we really put kindness at the top of the agenda. And I think kindness has to be intentional. You know, when someone goes out of their way to celebrate something, a listening ear and a conversation at the right time can change everything. So we believe in celebrating our successes, we believe heavily in saying thank you. Um, but not just the business-related um pieces that obviously contribute to our objectives and the growth ambition that we've got for the company, but also life events, you know, when people get married and have babies or move house, and then we're there also with the support piece when life isn't quite so kind. Um, and I think the power of sending something handwritten um to somebody's home has really, really landed well, particularly in these very remote, disconnected times.

SPEAKER_01 18:34

Yeah, that's a nice touch. Sorry, can I just go for it, go for it?

SPEAKER_00 18:38

Yeah, let me just pick up on a point that Tracy made there. Because it is really important, I think, to if you understand this, you understand, I think, the culture of Sinity and you understand the people that that flourish at Sinity. You know, as I said, I joined the organization back in January of this year. I kind of what I describe as went through a whirlwind romance with Tracy and others. I I kind of was interviewed. My first interview was on the 22nd, I think, of December. My second interview was on the 23rd, my third interview was on the 24th. And I'm pretty sure if it wasn't for Christmas and Boxing Day, I probably would have had another interview or received my offer on the on Christmas Day or the 20 or the 26th. But I actually got my offer on the 28th, signed it on the 29th, and I started on the on the 4th of January.

Vic 19:24

Well, that's quick.

SPEAKER_00 19:25

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 19:26

Yeah, especially especially for a senior role.

SPEAKER_00 19:29

And I think that really talks to again the culture. You know, we don't, we're not one of these organizations that's going to take six months, 13, 15 interviews. You don't have to have your thumbprint on every single part of the uh interview process in order to be uh thought of as kind of being someone that is is going to make a successful career here at Cinity. But but like everybody, uh well most people, I'm assuming, uh, we all got to get a swag bag of things like a water bottle and a notebook and uh actually you know, in my one, a mask. Nice is a little strange to receive, but yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:08

To wear on those Zoom calls.

SPEAKER_00 20:10

That's the times that we live in. Um, but the one thing I did get was a handwritten note welcoming me uh to the family. And I think just a small thing, like a handwritten note, means it's it means you're joining a family. It means you're joining a small organization that that thinks of you as bringing value from the moment that you first you first start here. So tremendously impactful to me as an individual. And it just kind of for me, it just it meant so much, and it felt like I was just basically, you know, uh double clicking or rubber stamping, whichever kind of phrase you want to use, all the things I thought of as I was going through the interview process. But you've got me at this point. There's no need to go over and above, yeah. But we still do. And I think that to me is the you know a mark of the organization and a mark of the people that were in are in it.

SPEAKER_01 21:07

Sounds like you felt like you were coming home.

SPEAKER_00 21:10

Yeah, I mean, just an incredible experience. And you know, I've worked for some large organizations, some big logos. I'd say that, you know, from the moment I first connected with Tracy and Ian, who was the outgoing head of Amir Services, it felt like a family. And we call it vicinity family. And it, you know, you might think of it as like, you know, it could be quite contrite. It couldn't be anything further from the truth. It really is and really does feel like a family. And so, you know, for me to get a handwritten note at the height of the pandemic when when I hadn't met anybody, uh, it just meant a huge amount. And it kind of spoke volumes about the individuals and it spoke volumes about the organization that I was joining.

SPEAKER_01 21:57

Brilliant. So, one of the things I thought it

SPEAKER_00 22:00

early days of softcap was obviously we had that this very people first people centric approach as as you guys do we would sometimes be almost too nice to people where perhaps on occasion it might have been better for them to have um plowed a different furrow you know gone off gone off somewhere else where they could succeed where perhaps they weren't succeeding with us um how do you you know when when you're hell bent on being as nice as you possibly can to people how do you have those difficult conversations how do you challenge people how do you hold them to account i think i think for me and obviously i'll kind of hand over to to tracy i think you know the simple answer is we document everything everything that we need to achieve uh together as a team we we regularly check in and discuss how people are doing uh and how we're performing how we've performed what are the things that we should stop doing um what are the things that frankly are adding no value um and you know the stop start continue I guess approach but what are the things that that frankly people are seeing value from and what should what should we amplify and popularize and what should we share amongst others um for me it starts with being clear about the vision starts being clear about how do we achieve that vision through strategy and and you know one of the things here at Cinity is we plan on doubling the size of the business in the next two years. So the next two years being actually for us the next 18 months so the end of 22 we talk about it consistently and constantly and and we ask ourselves the question you know will doing this help us to achieve our goals you know it's the kind of the the kind of the approach you hear you know will it make the boat go faster will it give us that extra one percent of that phrase yeah absolutely and and for us if something's approved we're committed we're all in um and it's generally because it will help us whether that be directly or or indirectly and and we do that at the leadership level but we do it with our managers we do it with the team and we cascade all of the the vision obviously the strategy and the efforts we cascade that throughout our entire organization so so everybody I think is clear as to you know what are the priorities but but why you know why am I why am I being asked to do this you know if I can understand the why then you get my commitment if you just give me a task and give me the what to do or maybe even the how to do it I don't quite have that same connection. So so that for us is is really important. And you know we've just kind of finished our Q2. It's been another record Q2 for us. You know we'll now sit down and review not just the outcome of the performance but but what can we do better? How do we do not just what did we do and you kind of we focus a lot on the inputs whereas I think you know obviously everyone looks at the outcomes in a in a services world you look at revenue you look at utilization you look at margins. I think that's incredibly important but how you do that how you do that predictably how you do that consistently so you build that that foundation that for me is the piece that my leadership team and I are focused on.

SPEAKER_03 25:23

Can I just jump in and add to that because one thing you said there Sam was really resonated with me where you said about being nice and how do you have those difficult conversations for me the word is kind having kindness at the top of the agenda and having professionalism and respect we still have the difficult conversations but you know even when you have to have a difficult conversation in my world to let somebody go it can be a positive experience. And I think by doing the annual goal setting and we do something called bi-monthly check-ins um so everything gets documented but in order for that to be a programmatical approach part of it is a 15 minute golden 15 minutes conversation with the individual and the idea being that we're getting regular feedback and never to accept the unacceptable we act immediately if we get that feedback so we can educate our teams to see that if things are bumpy, have a conversation with us. It's not an escalation have a conversation our doors are open we're a pretty flat management team you know in terms of structure um we we we encourage that two-way feedback but we do have those difficult conversations it's not nice all the time it's just done with kindness and respect and a professional attitude it's a cruel to be kind thing sometimes isn't it for from both the employees point of view and also from the business's point of view.

Vic 26:53

Yeah it is absolutely and we it it's the area when we're working with our clients that they find the hardest to do but actually the way to think about it is we don't learn and we don't get any better if if we're not able to to give each other feedback and you know I'm I'm facilitating a a leadership workshop tomorrow and one of my constant things that I say is you can't fix secrets and you know we quite often refer to Kim Scott so Tracy have you heard of her with her radical candor yes yeah and so the the concept of that of you know give feedback but with kindness and you know I think she talks about having I can't remember what within her teeth but parsley is a big thing that we eat in our house and I would not want to be walking around with parsley in my teeth. I'd want someone to tell me and it's the same thing if if we're if in fact delivering the workshop that I'm doing tomorrow I want to know how I've done and where I could do better because I'm always wanting to get better at what I'm doing.

SPEAKER_03 28:01

And I think if you've got that that mindset and we're seeing this as actually it's constructive feedback given with care and kindness as you say Tracy then it's all for the good isn't it 100% I think it takes it takes some bravery and some courage for people to and we do a lot of coaching with our leadership teams to be able to have those conversations not just to escalate they're not performing on the project I want them off can I can I have a swap because it doesn't give anyone a chance does it if you do it doesn't and people are multifaceted. So is it is it a personality issue is it a communications issue is it a technical ability is it a lack of functional knowledge you know let's let's do let's make sure that we're having those rounded conversations and really digging into the core to be able to identify how we can develop and improve yeah brilliant and I think if that feedback comes from a genuine position of I trust that you're doing the best that you can and you trust me that what I'm about to share with you comes from a position of I want to help then actually you can act you can share some fairly candid feedback.

SPEAKER_00 29:13

But I think it comes from that position of trust and humility and compassion you know they're not often words that you hear I think in business you know but that really is I think for me you know the behaviors this value set that we have so you know we quite often see encourage and you know personally I get feedback from people all the time you know we don't it's not a top down thing in synity it's very very 360 degrees and I you know I I listen try and listen to everybody's feedback because you know that's their perspective and I and I I I approach that from the position of you're trying to help you see something in me that perhaps I'm not seeing my in myself or I'm not doing so you know I think you're trying to help me and that's the way that we approach things here.

SPEAKER_03 30:02

All sounds a bit a hotel California does anybody ever leave what's your retention like yeah it's a great question and um yeah I mean our retention is really good but of course people do want to leave um so to answer the question with it we're we're under 5% uh attrition so we we are very fortunate that we have high rates of retention but some people decide that their chapter of the story is done and they need to move on to pursue some something else um for me the the the critical piece that we uh we look at is the exit interview and the exit questionnaire and if people are choosing to leave versus wanting to go then we will celebrate and wish them every happiness and success you know if if recent lever I had wanted to join the Catalan police force I can't compete with that what what can I do that's going to make the world anything like that you know or they or there's a or there's a reason in their own personal family. I mean I'm personally as a working mum you heard about the chaotic start to at the beginning of the podcast when we were just chatting you know as a working mum I'm delighted that 99% of our females who take maternity leave come back.

SPEAKER_01 31:14

You know that that's great in the that's uh that's that's really impressive very very cool Vicky you wanted to drop in about employees leaving.

Vic 31:24

Yeah I mean it's it's a massive topic for us at the moment the I think it's been described as the turnover tsunami of employees and we're really seeing it as a as a as a big issue but you know I think we've just I think we've just covered it.

SPEAKER_01 31:40

So you talked about your ambitious goal of doubling in size in a year you know I remember back to the the early days of SoftCat where where we were literally doubling year on year every year for well for quite for quite a long time actually until I guess the law of big numbers starts to kick in um we always maintained a relentless focus on the cultural side of things and keeping SoftCat as a great place to work clearly it changed over time as it grew but it the important thing was making sure it didn't get worse it got if anything it got better and presented people with more opportunities.

SPEAKER_00 32:14

How do you guys work to maintain that culture yeah so maybe I'll I'll go first on on this one and I think it's probably similar to what I shared earlier. Everyone's responsible for maintaining the culture of sinity and I think that's really key it's not it's not a department uh it's not one person's sole job to look after culture. It's everybody's and you know we think of it as kind of the stakeholders shareholders of culture here. And as I mentioned you know Tracy and I personally interview everybody that comes into the delivery organization. And no I'm not looking for technical skills I've got people that can can support me in that conversation but but certainly we're looking for consulting skills soft skills but we're very much looking for that fit that that synity-esque set of attributes those behaviors those values uh and we we count on that i mean that to us means more than perhaps the technical skills because to a degree we can train them in the product we can help them with their understanding of sinity platform and solutions but but yes we can enhance soft skills we can enhance values but but frankly if we've got to take that person from scratch and take them forward so that's going to be that's going to be challenging. So so everybody adds value to our culture they're the people that we bring in to the organisation no one detracts away from from that synity cultural aspect um we've hired 20% you know about 40 odd people into to our organisation in the first half of this year. So Tracy and I feel as though at times we're on this perpetual interview loop and everyone just brings that unique contribute contribution but the one contribution they all bring is additive to to our values and culture.

SPEAKER_03 34:09

I think the question Sam that you asked about you know doubling in the size of a year we we're we're not naive to think that that how do we scale that you know how do we how do we achieve that scale and really where we're focusing on is automating the processes having a programmatical approach to ensure that we still have the time to have that human connection because it is fundamentally the USP and and part of our four values as we talk about as a business that are stronger together, being curious, taking action and thinking big and we want to recruit individuals that embrace those. So we have to show that ourselves we have to turn up as our authentic selves and talk about our story and our experience and what we're aiming for and how much it means to us to be the happiest hardworking people doing something that we love doing. So we're focusing heavily as we have this huge growth agenda on that that automation piece and the programmatical style of the of the processes that don't require that human interaction.

Vic 35:15

What I love about what you've just said there because I was really curious about this was how you know Steve talking at the beginning about that handwritten note and how that real personal touch makes such a difference. And then you're talking about scaling how on earth do you keep that really personal touch and scale but you've just answered that so beautifully so you're what can you get more efficient and automate to allow you the time to still have that personal touch and I think from for our listeners that's the biggest thing that I want them to to to take away from that that's that's think about high value and low value activities and automate the low the low value stuff and the most high value activity you could possibly do is looking after your people right and and showing that you care.

SPEAKER_03 36:07

Yeah yeah it's that kindness case you can't automate kindness can't you can't fake it either no a hundred percent and that's why that has to stay top of the agenda the other stuff we can we can we can scale we can grow we can automate we can have a process but yeah 100% it has to stay top of the agenda.

SPEAKER_01 36:28

So I might go with the title of this being you can't automate kindness does that work for you you can't fake the funk perfect my basketball days so I guess we've probably done the time that we should probably take up of of yours Steve and Tracy um perhaps um as the two of you we normally give our guests three three key takeaways maybe you could have sort of one and a half each I think if if I if I was going to summarize kind of this podcast and the things as I'm hearing Tracy talk and even kind of listening to some of the answers I'm giving I think it's just that culture of kindness you know as I said earlier that that saying that you're never too important to be nice to people and you know whether that's our teams whether that's you know people within the Simity family our our partners our customers I think we as a business at its at our very core we're a kind company that doesn't mean that we don't take tough decisions but we do it from a position of kindness and I think that's the kind of people that you you work with at Sinity and I think it brings the best out of people it brings the best out of teams I think it actually drives greater value for us as a business because we take a very people centric position.

SPEAKER_03 38:03

Fantastic thanks Steve Tracy anything from you I think um actually the Sinity family is not dissimilar to having your own family and the guidance that I would give my children is much the same as I tried to live my own life and that is live your life like a mirror give out what you want to receive back. So if you want your teams to be connected kind engaged enthusiastic motivated respectful giving you constant feedback you we're privileged enough to have a seat at the table take that seat very very seriously and and and to see is to be so I you know I talk about with with anybody who who I engage with in the organization I've had a tricky day today I'm a working mum it's been a it's been a juggle so I I really believe in being honest and open and somebody they can trust and to live your life as a mirror give out what you want to get get back.

SPEAKER_01 38:58

Maybe that's why you have so many working mums come back into the organization. Maybe because you you you know you embody that and people aspire to what they can see you know if they have a role model to live up to then happy days great Vicky for once you're quiet it's quite nice actually you're so cheeky.

Vic 39:22

One of our most popular podcasts is one that we recorded um earlier in the year with a lady called Rebecca Fox who is MD of the Association of Project Management kind girls can get the corner office and that was that was really important but but what I love about this this isn't just about girls this is about everybody this is about everybody yeah 100% and you know having things like an employee assistance program for every region. And uh yeah I I I I strive to have a diverse um candidate pool and to continue to attract women into the tech industry we all know that that's a challenge but this isn't about gender this is just about treating people with the way in which they would you would want yourself to be treated really with with humanity perhaps yeah yeah absolutely thank you so much what a delight that was sorry for the bumpy stuff sorry I was a little bit distracted at the beginning because my daughter had sent me a message saying um where we live um we have a very kind bus driver that drops her just outside our house because we are literally in the middle of fields and she'd got a different bus driver and she's going to be dropped off in the next town. So I was like I'm recording a podcast I can't pick you up and you are not walking home so really sorry about that.

SPEAKER_03 40:53

So this is me being very human here Tracy working parent this is my this is my can you not send Charlie to pick her up no can't send Charlie Charlie could probably get all the way on his own he probably would yeah yeah guys thanks so much for taking the time that was just yeah that was cool it's really nice to meet you both indeed yeah it was a real pleasure thank you thank you so much for asking us feel quite privileged that you've asked us that the podcast that I have listened to repeatedly on my dog walks have have really been engaging and and really enlightening.

SPEAKER_01 41:27

So thank you Tracy and thank you Steve that was that was magnificent really fascinating so it just remains for me to say thanks for listening to get Amplified from the Amplified group as always your comments and your subscriptions are gratefully received