Max: Hello, and welcome back to the recruitment hackers podcast. I'm your host, Max Armbruster. And today I'm delighted to welcome to the show, Dorothy Dalton. Hello, Dorothy. Welcome to the show.

Dorothy: Hi!

Max: So Dorothy is a talent management strategist who focuses on diversity inclusion and gender balance, and it's very visible on LinkedIn and has a practice over more than a decade, I believe in talent management strategies. How did you end up in this space?

Dorothy: Well, it was fortuitous in the sense that I'd like to say it was a strategy, but it wasn't that I have a background in corporate HR. I then did a stint in sales and marketing completely divided from HR.

And then I came to Brussels in the mid-nineties and set up an executive search consultancy. I was approached to do that and over the years, it's just sort of like topsy, it's just grown. So I'm a certified coach and trainer from my earlier corporate career and I've just expanded my range.

So I do more career coaching and the next active coaching. I do two corporate training, but I very much support organizations who want to make a cultural transformation, especially around, as you said gender balance, diversity, and inclusion.

Max: Right. And is Brussels a good place for you to be based in it's world, famous as the think tank or Europe for policies. Are you finding that there is an AP center too? you know, the HR world in Europe, or really, it's more of every country fighting for their own piece of land.

Dorothy: I love being in Belgium, so I'm now half of, because of Brexit. I now have dual nationality. And it's what I love about it.

It's very international. There are lots of different cultures, people from all over the world. In terms of HR, there were a lot of Amir headquarters located here, but it's also a hub in sense of its geographical location. So between Paris, Amsterdam at one time, London that's fast important now, but all the other major cities in Europe and internationally, so absolutely love it.

Max: Now I love visiting as well. I have family there and I know it's very welcoming very, as you said, the international city, but you know, in your answer was also the other answer, which is no, there's no real capital of Europe when it comes to HR best practices. And we were saying before we started recording, you were sharing how this puts Europe at a disadvantage sometimes against the loud voices and HR practitioners from North America, which is the biggest market and headcount and budgets and access to media.  And it can drown out some of the voices in Europe.  Did I summarize your position well?

Dorothy: Well, It's sort of, I mean think, cause you say is that particularly terms of HR practices and access to social media that the US is a world leader. But that is kind of changing a lot now over time. And one of the things that I'm perpetually chipping away at is that I would like to see some diversity included in the type of advice we see coming from the US and I gave you before the show, that one example of some career advice that one of my clients heard on pub house and they went away and did it, and it was about integrating straight to the hiring manager. And so bypassing HR goes straight to the hiring manager and trying to double your salary from the figure you first started and the person got past, I mean, so in an organization, which does not respect and value individualism, the way the US does instead not fly at all.

So what I would like to see is just some nuance and recognition that not everyone does the same thing everywhere. And in Europe, 99% of businesses, the resumes. So they're not all these big global us Anglo-American types of realization. So just let's factor in and say, this applies where we are and you have to be cautious about testing it in other locations, it's not rocket science, right?

Max: No but particularly for younger audiences who, some of them, they haven't even seen an office. And so they get most of their content from thought leaders like Gary V and other loud you know, go-getters. Of course, they're going to think coming into the workplace that this is how it's going to be.

It's not going to play out that way in a lot of cultures dialing in from Asia where I think hierarchy are even more rigid than in Europe than many companies, you know? So applying to the field of well gender equality would you say that there's different sensibilities between the European continents and North America is there one geography that's more advanced than the other?

Dorothy: Well, I mean you're probably aware of what's been going on in the states recently. And Europe is streets ahead of the states in terms of protection of women's rights, women in the workplace. I think the US in terms of access to parental leave, I think it's right. I mean, of the developed countries, it's the lowest, I think in the world, there are only a few like Pacific islands that worse than US.

And with the recent changes that are coming about, about abortion rights. And I think that we're seeing quite a dramatic shift and obviously, even in Europe there are differences with the Nordics are very advanced in terms of gender balance and inclusion and parental leave that sort of.

Max: Yeah. I guess if an American company in North America came out and said, we're giving away three weeks maternity leave, and maybe it'd be kind of a nice perk by local standards, but actually don't know what the baseline is, but it wouldn't look too good on the international scene

Dorothy: No, and you know I think this is a cultural thing but that commitment to what I call the sacrifice culture you probably saw for example, that Goldman Sachs were exhorting their employees, that analyst work hundred-hour weeks. And there are just certain things around time off and vacation time. You know, I have American colleagues to just say, well, you know this because, you know, France.

You know, the whole of France closed down in August, you know, how is that possible? But it does. And mainly, you know, but I suppose it's just things that we've got used to. We have a different approach to well-being and work-life balance, I think.

Max: Yeah. I know culturally there's, there's a big gap and for some of the Europeans who don't feel at home with their native culture and who do want to put in super long hours and hustle harder. I see a lot of them on the international scene, right? There's a lot of Europeans who go abroad go to London and go to the US go to, you know, to Asia seeking for that extra work rush. Because it's just to chill at home.

Dorothy: Yeah. And I think don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that people in Europe are less committed to their jobs or anything like that, they're not, but I think there's a sense of roundedness. And I work a lot with executives, particularly in a pre-retirement situation.

And honestly, they never say, I wish I spent more time in the office. Never not once. So I think everybody has to find the balance that works for them. And there are some people, and there are international companies that appreciate that work ethic and that commitment. But I don't think that those who want a more balanced life should be penalized.

And we're seeing this particularly in the hybrid situation and what happened in confinement where people find themselves working much longe...