00:00:00.000
ready for takeoff
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hello everyone
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how you doing
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Ruby cops going so good so far
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yeah that I I felt a little enthusiastic
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in the front here but not in the back so
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much it's going good it's great
00:00:32.059
awesome well we're going to talk about
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something which hopefully won't bring
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down the mood too much which is how hard
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it is to bring change into your
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organizations it's really challenging if
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anyone's ever experienced wanting to do
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something different the company they
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work for see a couple head nods hand
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raises did you experience any challenges
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at all
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none it was perfectly seamless perfect
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it was amazing for those of us who are
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not as fortunate as you who have
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experienced some challenges I hope in
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our time together we'll present a
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framework on how to really grapple with
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that and we call this talk changing the
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climate before changing the weather and
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hopefully we'll see why in just a couple
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minutes so I want to start with a bit of
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an axiomatic truth I believe that
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workplaces are difficult they're
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challenging they're challenging on many
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different layers they're difficult often
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to get onboarded into you know as the
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experience of a new employee in an
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organization even with the best
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onboarding docs right the best
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onboarding guides he really hard to
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figure out what exactly you're supposed
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to be doing in that first 30 days 60
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days 90 days you may be the kind of
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person that wants to feel productive and
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then you start in a new company you have
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a College finding that experience of
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productivity because you're just
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engaging in a lot of learning and
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learning doesn't necessarily feel
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productive even though it's really
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productive and you don't know what you
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should be learning
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Etc it can be really really hard to find
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your place in a company who are your
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people that you should be getting to
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know who are the communities within the
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company that is important to get your
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job most effectively done unless you
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have a mentor a buddy system of some
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sort be really really hard and as a
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result it can just be hard to feel like
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you're getting your job done but in the
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context of our conversation workplaces I
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want to focus in on what is most
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notoriously Difficult about workplaces
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and perhaps we can say the same for
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organizations writ large that workplaces
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are notoriously difficult at adapting to
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change
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really hard the larger the organization
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even though it doesn't necessarily
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correspond with size but oftentimes that
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could be the experience the slower it
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moves the slower it adapts the more
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resistors there are to those changes so
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in our time together uh in the next few
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minutes we're going to try and do three
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things we're going to try and address
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why exactly is that the case why are
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workplaces so hard to change and then
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we're going to show a three-step
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framework to help perhaps address these
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kind of problem this kind of issue and
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how you might be able to affect change
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in your organization and lastly we'll
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conclude with one uh relatively uh
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compact practical example that
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illustrates that framework in action
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sound good
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good awesome so but first of all I just
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got into Stage I just started talking to
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you you're like who is this guy talking
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to me about things was he invited to
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speak here maybe he just took up the spa
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I don't know so hello everyone my name
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is Ben I work as a developer relations
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engineer at a company based in Germany
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called parity Technologies and I myself
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am a second career developer I
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previously spent a decade working as a
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congregational Rabbi and a community
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organizer throughout the US before I
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came and moved to Israel and now I'm
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based outside of Tel Aviv in Israel uh
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and the side I do a couple small
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projects for fun one of them is called
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hire the pivot because I really am
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passionate about people like me career
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transitioners people have taken that
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brave courageous step to move forward
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into a new career so it's a reverse job
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board written in rails for second career
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developers and I do write an occasional
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newsletter not as often as I would like
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that tries to find the intersection
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between homos
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and Ruby on Rails my two favorite
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passions in life good hummus and good
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rails so uh it's really great to be here
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so let's try and
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understand the problem what is going on
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when we talk about the challenges of
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workplace
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adaptation that's a very live microphone
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okay so what essentially is an
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organization because we have to start at
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the very beginning when we talk about
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organizations we talk about companies
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what are we actually talking about what
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we're actually talking about from a
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systems theory perspective is any
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organization whether it's your workplace
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whether it's your Meetup Group whether
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it's your family particularly your
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family but for our context your
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workplace a workplace is made up of many
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different smaller systems subsystems
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that come together to form that greater
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whole so for example let's say you're on
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because it's a ruby conference let's say
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you're on one of the back end teams
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right you may interact with the
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front-end developers pretty regularly
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you may interact with the devops cicd
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kind of people pretty often as well you
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may interact with product managers
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hopefully a good healthy relationship
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you probably don't interact with the
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marketing and the inbound sales people
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that often if at all maybe a company
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Retreats once they year or something and
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you probably will interact with human
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resources at some point throughout each
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year for a party or a gift they're
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sending you and hopefully nothing
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negative but just those lovely gifts
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they send in the mail things like that
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but this despite how little or how much
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you interact with these different
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entities all of them come together to
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form that larger whole which is sort of
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like a good well-designed rails app in
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the sense that every rail zap is made up
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of the MVC framework models views and
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controllers right and every single model
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every single view every single
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controller should ideally function
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independent and be able to that's code
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should not have to know about what's
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going on inside the other thing but yet
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they all come together to form the
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greater application right the model is
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built not assuming it knows about the
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controller and vice versa but a model
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without a controller a view without a
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model Etc they're not going to work if
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you don't all bring them together into
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one larger application so similarly at
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the end of the day they're all part of a
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larger hole which is the same with your
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company or your organization that all
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these parts Human Resources the back end
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team the front end team they're all
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together in some ways each of your
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departments is kind of like its own
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smaller climate in a company that we're
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circling back right to the title each of
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your uh departments is kind of like its
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own climate its own culture and together
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what do they form
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what's the title
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the weather exactly all together the
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different subclimates you're you're
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brilliant you're right you're right on
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it with me I see you we're we're
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connected I get it so all together they
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come to form the larger whole the larger
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weather so given that framework of
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trying to understand
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organizations I want to present you a
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screenshot of something that may or may
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not look familiar to you this is from a
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slackbot called the gender inclusive
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slack but anyone familiar with this
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yeah I see actually a good amount of
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hands so maybe your company uses
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asynchronous chat platforms like slack
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Etc and at some point it was discussed
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or it happened it was implemented this
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gender inclusive slack bot and what's
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the notion the gender inclusive slack
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but that in companies with multiple
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genders all agendas are presented when
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you're addressing a group of people you
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should address the maximum number of
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people you can in a room and not just
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the people who identify as male in the
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room right so instead of hey guys hey
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all hey folks hey y'all so many options
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and I happen to love this example for
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many reasons the one the reason I really
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like this example is because the ask of
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the people in the room in the company is
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pretty small
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the ask is to change a word when you're
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addressing the group right but the net
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positive result of doing that can be
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quite large
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so I love this example for us to hone in
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on to talk about organizational change
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because what's the experience sometimes
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like when this conversation happens
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sometimes it's really really positive
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and I've been in those rooms in those
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companies where it's been really
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positive other times it's something like
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this
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everyone is shouting into their laptops
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and these are all by the way all
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generated with generative AI things like
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with prompts so sometimes you know the
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experience is everyone's shouting into
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their laptops and streaming no yes no
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and it's a fight and the Public Square
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becomes more like a boxing ring of your
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company and everyone's shouting at the
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end of the day you're making a small ask
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that could bring about a positive net
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change and yet the reaction can be like
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that
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and that what's challenging about this
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is we often think that our companies are
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filled with relatively intelligent
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people
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what what I love that an instantaneous
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reaction it's just like right there it
00:09:54.060
was like a psychological test of some
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sort when I say that what do you say
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what we often think and and you know
00:10:01.260
there's whole conversations to be had
00:10:02.760
the way that we hire in fact I have
00:10:04.680
given talks on that conversation the way
00:10:07.500
that we conduct hiring and there's so
00:10:09.240
many challenges about that but what
00:10:11.519
those tests and whiteboarding challenges
00:10:13.860
can you implement a bubble sword
00:10:15.839
algorithm on a whiteboard and reverse a
00:10:18.060
string without using reverse and all
00:10:20.220
kinds of Interest things what they're
00:10:21.360
trying to do and I think they do it
00:10:22.980
spectacularly horrible but what they're
00:10:24.779
trying to do is they're trying to filter
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for intelligence right and Einstein I
00:10:30.779
think so uh aptly said that what is the
00:10:33.300
ultimate measure of intelligence it's
00:10:35.100
the ability to change the ability to
00:10:38.459
take in new information
00:10:40.680
process it and adapt
00:10:43.380
and yet if that's the measure of
00:10:45.420
intelligence we and I include myself in
00:10:48.240
this we and maybe some of you as well we
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so often fail at that
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so often so when we point the finger at
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the people in our company we should also
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point the finger at ourselves
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we so often fail and I think the reason
00:11:02.040
why it could be from the nuanced sort of
00:11:04.680
positioning of this uh expression from
00:11:06.720
Einstein from the late Harvard
00:11:08.399
paleontologist Stephen gold who said
00:11:10.740
that single facts almost and I love this
00:11:14.100
evocative language almost never slay
00:11:16.140
World Views
00:11:17.820
at least not right away
00:11:20.220
meaning when you get in a new piece of
00:11:22.920
information that challenges the way you
00:11:24.899
do something
00:11:26.040
challenges how you think how you operate
00:11:30.060
well an intelligent person according to
00:11:32.100
Einstein would take it in process it
00:11:33.660
think about it and adapt but we're not
00:11:35.700
just intelligent people we're also
00:11:37.860
emotional people we're also irrational
00:11:40.440
people all of us we have a lot of things
00:11:43.620
going on in our head and one of those
00:11:46.019
things going on in our head is people
00:11:48.240
generally don't like being wrong
00:11:50.399
they generally dislike the experience of
00:11:52.800
being told the way they're doing
00:11:54.060
something the way they've done it for
00:11:55.800
their entire life
00:11:57.360
maybe there ought to be a better way
00:12:00.019
oftentimes that is not the a positive
00:12:03.779
experience for a person
00:12:05.519
so given that if people don't like
00:12:07.620
generally being wrong or feeling like
00:12:09.600
they're being told they're being wrong
00:12:11.000
or don't like the change because it
00:12:13.380
challenges the way they do things so
00:12:15.600
then how do you ever bring about change
00:12:19.440
it's a fundamental question
00:12:21.899
without forcing it and causing a lot of
00:12:25.500
discontented people
00:12:27.360
how do you ever bring about change
00:12:29.700
so that's what we're going to do
00:12:30.720
together we're going to present three
00:12:32.459
possible paths as part of a larger
00:12:34.740
framework of how to bring that change
00:12:36.600
and help move that ain't that the prompt
00:12:38.579
for that by the way was moving an angry
00:12:40.560
Mountain I think that pretty much
00:12:41.880
encapsates it uh to move that angry
00:12:45.320
discontented Mountain forward with some
00:12:48.839
framework a loose framework for a change
00:12:51.660
so we start from where does the change
00:12:53.760
come from you're in your company your
00:12:56.639
company is multi-faceted multi-layered
00:12:59.519
regardless if it's 800 people or 10
00:13:01.680
people there's a lot of complexity in a
00:13:03.720
company and you are somewhere over there
00:13:06.899
in the company
00:13:08.940
and you've maybe been there for a few
00:13:10.800
months but you've been there for a few
00:13:11.940
years it doesn't matter really matter
00:13:13.560
you have an idea a new way of doing
00:13:16.920
something maybe it's a new way to assign
00:13:19.200
reviewers to pull requests maybe it's a
00:13:21.480
new way you say you should squash the
00:13:22.920
commits they say they should rebase the
00:13:24.240
commits and you were starting a whole
00:13:26.100
conversation and you raise your hand
00:13:29.160
and you say excuse me I have a question
00:13:32.339
I think there might be something better
00:13:34.019
to do here
00:13:35.399
I want to First offer the the the fact
00:13:39.060
the reality I want to get let us in the
00:13:42.480
right positioning that the very Act of
00:13:45.540
doing that
00:13:46.920
of raising your hands with a suggestion
00:13:49.980
can be for many of us
00:13:52.260
absolutely
00:13:54.380
completely terrifying
00:13:57.660
when you give in and the idea that a
00:14:00.000
company is really complex full of many
00:14:02.820
different layers and a lot of people and
00:14:05.760
you kind of feel like you're just one of
00:14:07.320
the masses to stand out whether it's
00:14:10.680
remotely or in person whether it's on an
00:14:12.899
asynchronous chat platform or it's
00:14:14.339
during a daily stand-up or what have you
00:14:16.320
can feel really terrifying so the first
00:14:20.220
thing that needs to be articulated is to
00:14:22.500
have courage
00:14:24.240
to take the action
00:14:26.639
but courage you're not born with it
00:14:29.040
you're not born with courage courage is
00:14:32.100
something you develop it's something you
00:14:33.480
articulate over time something you build
00:14:35.940
and I often I love this quote from Maya
00:14:38.519
Angelou because I think it's so eloquent
00:14:40.800
and so uh profound in its Simplicity
00:14:43.980
right so she says that people are not
00:14:45.420
born with courage you develop it by
00:14:47.399
doing small courageous things then she
00:14:49.560
gives this example maybe you want to be
00:14:51.420
a person who lifts 50 pound bags of rice
00:14:53.339
you know that's an aspiration we all
00:14:55.260
want to lift 50-pound bags of rice in
00:14:56.880
our life we don't just start with a 50
00:14:58.920
pound bag of rice I mean maybe you do
00:15:00.779
but most of us don't start with 50 pound
00:15:02.699
bags of rice we typically would start
00:15:04.199
with a five pound bag of rice get the
00:15:07.560
string then go to 10 pounds to a 25
00:15:09.540
pound to then one day we can look at the
00:15:12.420
50 pound bag of rice and like yeah I got
00:15:14.579
that I can do that easily but that
00:15:16.740
moment didn't come from nowhere that
00:15:18.839
moment came from going through a process
00:15:21.060
a journey of doing small things to build
00:15:23.760
that strength so too with taking the
00:15:27.720
ability with with fostering the courage
00:15:30.300
and culcating that sense in yourself
00:15:32.100
that you can raise your hand in a
00:15:34.740
company in organization and say
00:15:36.720
something
00:15:37.620
and like Maya Angelou I often think
00:15:39.720
because for my own tradition I think of
00:15:41.399
a Jewish ethicist from the early 1900s
00:15:43.860
in the in Poland to change the face of
00:15:46.260
Jewish ethics for over a hundred years
00:15:48.540
and he talks about in later in his life
00:15:50.639
during his career how he first when he
00:15:53.880
just became a new Young Rabbi and he
00:15:56.160
wanted to go out in the world and change
00:15:57.240
everything and change the world they're
00:15:59.639
everywhere thought like I'm going to
00:16:00.600
change the world you graduate college
00:16:02.040
you throw your cap in the air like yes
00:16:04.440
the world is mine and then you realize
00:16:07.440
you fail
00:16:08.639
you can't change the world it's really
00:16:11.940
really hard there's a lot of resistors
00:16:14.579
so he said you know what can't change
00:16:16.620
the world I'm gonna go back and just
00:16:18.839
change my city
00:16:20.160
those are the folks I know people I grew
00:16:22.560
up with this is my community so I'm
00:16:24.899
gonna go back to my city in Poland and
00:16:26.519
I'm going to change just my city
00:16:29.399
he also failed
00:16:31.139
in fact I might have been harder than
00:16:33.420
trying to change the world can imagine
00:16:34.500
trying to change your neighbors
00:16:37.139
that's an audacious proposition so he
00:16:39.480
said okay I'm gonna pivot again I'm
00:16:41.579
gonna try and just change myself
00:16:43.980
and at that point he succeeded
00:16:46.620
but just changing himself he didn't end
00:16:48.540
there right because I told you he
00:16:50.459
changed this is Rabbi Israel Kagan he
00:16:53.040
ended up changing the face of Jewish
00:16:54.720
ethics for over a hundred years
00:16:57.240
tremendous ways
00:16:58.920
he really succeeded in changing an
00:17:00.660
entire community
00:17:01.980
but it started with himself
00:17:04.439
so the first principle is to be what you
00:17:07.319
want to see
00:17:08.520
if you want to see it happen it starts
00:17:10.679
with you it cannot start actually any
00:17:13.799
other way
00:17:15.480
any other way this is the way it has to
00:17:19.380
start with you
00:17:21.299
the second principle I think is most
00:17:23.579
articulated at least in my reference
00:17:25.140
points from a person named Saul Alinsky
00:17:27.480
who was the father of community
00:17:28.740
organizing in sort of the mid 20th
00:17:30.480
century in the United States in Chicago
00:17:31.760
and he forced us as a society to Center
00:17:36.900
on a notion of self-interest
00:17:39.419
and so often in the ethics that were
00:17:41.640
raised in the cultures that we come from
00:17:43.380
we see self-interest as a dirty word
00:17:47.220
we see it as something to not be talk
00:17:49.260
about to shy away from you're not
00:17:51.480
supposed to have self-interest supposed
00:17:53.280
to be interested in others altruistic
00:17:55.559
but olinsky says if you ignore
00:17:57.179
self-interest you actually won't be able
00:17:59.100
to accomplish anything
00:18:00.780
because self-interest is integral
00:18:02.460
because in every single person every
00:18:06.000
single human is made up of so many
00:18:08.340
competing wants and desires fears
00:18:12.960
hopes dreams things that make us every
00:18:16.679
one of us in this room right now make us
00:18:18.840
get up in the morning and do the things
00:18:20.580
we do
00:18:21.840
the things that make us push and do that
00:18:24.360
annoying jira ticket we don't want to do
00:18:27.360
because we're composed of these things
00:18:29.340
in our head
00:18:30.780
and if you want to bring change in the
00:18:32.700
world yes you start with yourself but if
00:18:34.799
you only start with your if you only end
00:18:36.240
with yourself you've accomplished
00:18:38.100
minimally
00:18:39.660
to start building change we need to do
00:18:41.460
you need to build power
00:18:44.280
with other people
00:18:46.320
and the way you build power with other
00:18:48.240
people is to identify the self-interest
00:18:50.700
of others
00:18:52.020
and to build a shared narrative for
00:18:55.020
change with the self-interest of other
00:18:56.340
humans
00:18:59.220
do you just go up to somebody be like
00:19:00.900
hey you know you were the person who was
00:19:02.580
able to make change without any
00:19:03.720
resistance can you tell me what what
00:19:05.820
your hopes and dreams are in life
00:19:07.620
can you reveal to your deepest fears and
00:19:09.600
wants I you know we just met but I would
00:19:11.940
love to know them
00:19:13.380
that that could be a bit of an awkward
00:19:15.539
conversation but you do it by really
00:19:19.200
having intentional active listening
00:19:21.840
conversations with people now when I
00:19:24.240
first was Learning Community organizing
00:19:25.559
you know many years ago and I was taught
00:19:27.840
by one of my Educators yeah active
00:19:29.820
listening like yeah of course we all
00:19:32.280
octave listen we listen all the time
00:19:33.840
what are you talking about I'm listening
00:19:35.700
to you actively I listen to this person
00:19:37.200
actively I'm listening to everyone
00:19:39.179
actively right because I'm not passive
00:19:41.580
I'm active
00:19:43.320
so wrong active listening is actually
00:19:46.799
really challenging and we can collapse
00:19:49.500
active listening into kind of five
00:19:51.299
elements the five elements that I think
00:19:53.940
are important for this conversation is
00:19:55.559
first when you're listening to somebody
00:19:57.360
else pay attention to them how often and
00:20:01.140
the hallway track of Rubicon from the
00:20:02.820
past day two days or so were you in a
00:20:05.400
conversation with somebody and as they
00:20:07.440
were talking a part of your brain was
00:20:09.539
thinking about what you're going to say
00:20:10.679
immediately when their mouth stops
00:20:13.320
how normal is that that's so normal
00:20:16.919
because you don't want to have a lull in
00:20:18.900
the conversation
00:20:20.100
so you immediately while you're
00:20:22.080
listening a part of you is also thinking
00:20:23.640
what you're going to say
00:20:24.900
in active listening conversations that
00:20:26.820
can't happen
00:20:28.140
the second thing how often when you're
00:20:30.360
listening to somebody do you start
00:20:33.000
judging
00:20:34.740
kind of saying well that's that's a
00:20:37.020
weird idea
00:20:38.400
where did they get that from what
00:20:41.340
I don't think that way
00:20:43.320
so part of active listening is one to
00:20:46.320
stop thinking what you're going to say
00:20:47.760
next second stop judging as they're
00:20:51.539
talking
00:20:52.740
so what are you meant to do if you're
00:20:54.299
not judging which is so fun so often
00:20:57.059
and you're not thinking what you're
00:20:58.620
going to say next what are you supposed
00:21:00.120
to be doing reflecting
00:21:02.520
you're listening and you're in the
00:21:04.620
moment you know you could be in a busy
00:21:06.660
room you could be in your lunchroom at a
00:21:08.460
company like a traditional office you
00:21:10.320
could be anywhere and the world's around
00:21:12.059
you but in that moment the best
00:21:13.620
one-to-ones it's just you and that
00:21:15.299
person
00:21:16.260
and you're with that person exclusively
00:21:19.440
and you are just reflecting on the
00:21:21.720
experience of what they're saying how
00:21:23.640
does it make you feel what is it what
00:21:26.039
kind of emotions is it bringing up
00:21:27.960
reflecting in that moment and then when
00:21:30.299
it's your turn to speak what are you
00:21:32.520
meant to say you're not supposed to
00:21:33.480
judge them which was the whole point of
00:21:35.100
civil discourse if you can't judge
00:21:36.360
somebody you're not supposed to judge
00:21:37.980
them and you're supposed to be paying
00:21:39.600
attention so you don't have immediately
00:21:40.860
equipped to say right away so what do
00:21:43.440
you say instead you clarify
00:21:46.320
and you summarize
00:21:48.480
clarification is super important because
00:21:51.120
clarification makes sure that they get
00:21:53.100
another opportunity to let you know what
00:21:55.380
they meant even if you didn't understand
00:21:56.580
it especially when you didn't understand
00:21:57.720
it right away so I thought you said this
00:21:59.820
is that what you said
00:22:01.260
summary is this is what I heard you say
00:22:03.659
and you do that enough with enough
00:22:05.220
people you start understanding sort of
00:22:07.440
the fabric of the team you're on what
00:22:09.600
moves you what motivates people and
00:22:11.039
you're coming with your self-interest
00:22:12.780
because self-interest is not a bad word
00:22:14.580
you're coming with your self-interest
00:22:16.200
which is you want to bring about a
00:22:17.400
change and you start listening and then
00:22:19.799
after the conversation when you walk
00:22:21.179
away that's when you start thinking
00:22:23.100
about tactics and strategies not in the
00:22:25.980
conversation
00:22:27.059
so the second principle is a seek to
00:22:28.620
understand the self-interest of others
00:22:30.539
and the third idea the third sort of
00:22:33.299
principle in our framework is from a
00:22:35.640
research done in Harvard Business Review
00:22:36.900
in 2021 that most of our life is routine
00:22:40.559
we spend most of our life doing the
00:22:43.140
things that we always do from morning
00:22:44.580
until we go to sleep we may think we're
00:22:46.919
making a lot of free choices using free
00:22:49.140
will but we're usually not kind of just
00:22:51.059
doing the things we just do
00:22:52.679
so if you want to bring about change
00:22:54.360
that's lasting you slowly integrate one
00:22:57.600
thing at a time
00:22:58.860
and make that part of the new routine
00:23:00.720
you constitute a new routine with a new
00:23:02.760
thing the new thing could be additive or
00:23:05.159
reductive you either changing something
00:23:07.140
reducing it removing it or you're adding
00:23:09.240
a new thing one step at a time
00:23:12.480
until it becomes routine so how does
00:23:14.760
that work now you've done your
00:23:16.620
self-interest conversations you
00:23:18.360
understand the narrative in people and
00:23:20.100
you're in your team and you understand
00:23:21.539
there's some folks you agree with you
00:23:22.919
that research showed that the ideal
00:23:25.980
group of people to start bringing about
00:23:28.020
change in a business is about two and a
00:23:31.020
half percent of the company
00:23:33.120
two and a half percent to start with
00:23:35.940
then that two and a half percent start
00:23:37.860
doing this routine plus one small
00:23:40.140
changes incorporating them which grows
00:23:42.840
to twenty percent twenty percent you're
00:23:44.940
now in something what's called
00:23:45.960
significance
00:23:47.220
people in the company know it's
00:23:48.780
happening they understand there's
00:23:50.760
something going on
00:23:52.440
and they can either Buy in or they can
00:23:54.179
ask they can start clarifying it's
00:23:56.280
happening when you reach a sixty percent
00:23:58.500
threshold that's standardization
00:24:01.799
now standardization is not the same
00:24:03.659
thing as it is the only way it is now a
00:24:06.360
possible path it is normal in the
00:24:08.520
company it's part of the culture of the
00:24:10.320
company as one of the options
00:24:12.480
but once you hit 80 that's when it's
00:24:15.720
fully integrated that's what this
00:24:17.460
research research tells us
00:24:19.380
60 is it's now one of the options eighty
00:24:22.380
percent is this is the path
00:24:24.299
this is the way things are done for new
00:24:25.919
joiners in the company this is how it
00:24:27.900
happens but it all starts with 2.5
00:24:31.980
percent of the company now that's a
00:24:34.559
number it's a a percentage what is 2.5
00:24:37.260
so if you're in a company of 500 people
00:24:39.600
that's 12 humans
00:24:42.240
12 people a lot of us don't work in
00:24:44.820
companies with 500 people we may work in
00:24:46.740
companies of 50 people 100 people what's
00:24:48.539
2.5 of 50 people 100 people you're
00:24:51.840
talking about just a few people
00:24:54.720
to build initially the power with to
00:24:57.900
start moving things forward just need a
00:25:00.120
few it's not daunting to start
00:25:03.480
so the third idea is big change starts
00:25:07.140
small first it starts with you you
00:25:10.559
emulate that change then it starts with
00:25:13.140
active listening campaign conversations
00:25:15.179
with the people in your team maybe in
00:25:17.640
your company finding five people six
00:25:21.120
people ten people if you're working at a
00:25:24.000
500 person company and building that
00:25:26.340
power together and then incorporating
00:25:27.960
the changes one step at a time
00:25:31.799
so let's now talk about how we might be
00:25:34.380
able to apply that in practice we
00:25:37.320
started by talking about this gender
00:25:38.820
inclusive slack bot which I think is
00:25:40.799
really a perfect encapsulation of this
00:25:42.299
conversation because it's a small ask
00:25:43.980
with a great net positive potential gain
00:25:46.320
and yet can be very evocative and
00:25:48.299
emotional reaction
00:25:49.620
right
00:25:50.460
so remember this slackbot and remember
00:25:52.919
the reaction to the slack bot which
00:25:55.140
doesn't always happen thankfully but
00:25:56.940
often does happen reactions like this
00:25:58.860
how could we do this differently well I
00:26:02.580
think we can apply our framework which
00:26:04.140
is we start with ourself if we want a
00:26:06.480
space in our companies and our slacks or
00:26:08.520
in our whatever we're using elements
00:26:11.340
Matrix slack Discord you name it like
00:26:14.520
start with yourself you want to have a
00:26:16.320
gender inclusive space speak with gender
00:26:18.600
inclusivity and everything you do and
00:26:21.000
every message and every asynchronous
00:26:22.620
chat and every pull request review and
00:26:24.360
everything be inclusive and then start
00:26:27.960
talking to people in your team it's
00:26:29.520
natural maybe to start with your own
00:26:31.020
team just as a place to organically
00:26:33.659
begin so if you're in like one of the
00:26:35.580
back end micro service teams or
00:26:37.200
something like go have a conversation
00:26:39.120
make a little chat and engage them with
00:26:42.299
the principles of active listening and
00:26:44.340
start building that narrative and then
00:26:46.080
we've identified the self-interest you
00:26:47.640
now have allies who can start building
00:26:50.520
this change with you and then once you
00:26:53.159
have those allies you can start doing
00:26:54.960
small things within the company with the
00:26:57.360
gender inclusive slackbot it might be
00:26:58.860
something like uh incorporating it into
00:27:01.380
your team's chat
00:27:03.539
and then from there incorporating to a
00:27:05.580
chat that is kind of across team chat
00:27:07.559
between your team and maybe one other
00:27:09.900
team like maybe you have a chat of like
00:27:11.520
all engineering teams
00:27:13.559
right so you're in one you your back end
00:27:15.600
team and then you have a chat with like
00:27:17.220
the front-end developers and the devops
00:27:19.320
people and and all this other fun stuff
00:27:21.720
and you bring it together and that's
00:27:23.700
like a cross-collaborative chat so now
00:27:25.140
you bring it there
00:27:26.220
and then now you built more allies
00:27:28.200
and now you go from there to something
00:27:29.580
bigger
00:27:30.659
et cetera et cetera et cetera from two
00:27:31.919
percent until you eventually hit 80
00:27:33.779
percent
00:27:34.679
and the reason why we do this is I think
00:27:36.960
most articulated in the way a poet can
00:27:39.059
only articulate something Julia Carney
00:27:41.279
that little drops of water doing little
00:27:44.700
actions
00:27:46.020
over time can really make the mighty
00:27:49.559
ocean
00:27:50.820
thank you very much