Dreams with Deadlines

It all starts with meaningful conversations. That’s what Jenny Herald’s guest on this episode of Dreams With Deadlines believes, and he’s got data points to back it up.

Devon Brown of Inciting Leaders shares insights on the evolution we’ve seen over the past decade from traditional top-down performance management techniques to a more continuous, ongoing framework that encourages ongoing communication.

Key Things Discussed

• Why meaningful results start with meaningful peer-to-peer conversation
• The difference between (and mechanics behind) one-on-ones versus check-ins
• How to apply OKRs and measure for individual success within a team context
• Driving what matters: Choosing to emphasize behavior, delivery or both
• The future of performance management – what it looks like and what it needs

Show Notes

• [00:00:35] About innovating the transition from traditional performance management to continuous performance management, starting in 2009 and accelerating as the function has shifted away from HR.
• [00:01:50] Why shifting the performance management model away from top-down annual event to ongoing, frequent conversations empowers managers and employees.
• [00:03:04] About the potent combination of Conversation, Feedback and Recognition (CFRs) with Objectives & Key Results (OKRs) at the heart of visionary leadership.
• [00:04:06] What poor management looks like versus a continuous, integrative approach that seeks to develop skills and adapt to situations on an ongoing basis.
• [00:06:33] Distinguishing between leaders and managers, where their skills overlap and why their tendencies are often (wrongly) conflated:
  • Leaders create change while managers react to/execute on it.
  • Leaders are people-focused while managers tend to be process-oriented.
  • Leaders seek feedback while managers avoid or minimize vulnerabilities.
• [00:09:00] How the tension between organizational, team and individual application of OKRs can be managed to create a culture that supports progress across the enterprise.
• [00:14:30] Applying OKRs to and measuring for individual success – and growth – within a team context within a robust continuous performance management framework.
• [00:17:28] Why performance management is trending towards a team emphasis:
  • Increasingly complex global and internal business structures
  • The intensifying need for cross-departmental communication and collaboration
• [00:18:43] Defining “check-in” versus “one-on-one” conversations:
  • Check-ins are ongoing conversations about performance, development, expectations wellbeing, and general feedback.
  • One-on-Ones are solution-oriented, task-oriented, operationally-oriented and tactical.
• [00:20:25] A deeper dive into the big-picture, strategic nature of “check-ins”, including these four types:
  • Assessing and adjusting to effectively manage expectations and goals.
  • Short- and longer-term career development.
  • Ongoing feedback conversations, both positive and negative.
  • Overall, holistic well-being within a personal and professional context.
• [00:22:50] Why well-being conversations are key to the current workplace landscape:
  • Pandemic-related recognition that people are not computers and have emotions.
  • Potentially isolating hybrid conditions.
  • The need to be in touch with whether workers are engaged – or not.
  • To maximize retention and corporate loyalty.
• [00:27:01] How “performance” and “relational” currencies impact outcomes – and why.
• [00:29:13] Driving what matters: A look at which levers to pull in measuring for success and how they vary based on whether the emphasis is on behavior, delivery or both.
• [00:34:16] Distinguishing between the “what” (results) and the “how” (behavioral) in managing OKRs for both teams/individuals.
• [00:37:00] About identifying and incentivizing individual behaviors that build towards positive team results (without leaving behind a trainwreck).
• [00:41:20] Looking at the future of performance management:
  • A move away from the individual towards team management through ongoing feedback.
  • A tremendous need for enhanced leadership and training for stronger ongoing conversations at all levels of the enterprise.
  • Integrative software systems to support ongoing agility and adaptability.
• [00:46:39] Quick-Fire Questions for Devon:
  • What is your dream with a deadline? To impact 1,000 leaders in 2023 with positive downstream results across company cultures and individual lives.
  • What is the No. 1 thing leaders can be doing to uplevel performance? There’s no one thing, but frequent and ongoing conversations are essential.
  • What advice would you give to people undertaking an OKR journey? It’s easy to get excited by the idea of results, but stay attuned to how concepts like stretch and transformation actually fit into your workplace culture and history.
  • What book has shaped the way you think about leadership and performance management?
    • "The Leadership Pipeline: How to Build the Leadership Powered Company," by Ram Charan, Stephen Drotter and Jim Noel.
    • "The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever," by Michael Bungay Stanier.

Relevant links:

• "Measure What Matters: OKRs, the Simple Idea that Drives 10x Growth," by John Doerr
• More about Daniel Montgomery and Agile Strategies, an OKR consultancy
• More about Dr. David Rock and his Neuroleadership Institute
• "The Leadership Pipeline: How to Build the Leadership Powered Company," by Ram Charan, Stephen Drotter and Jim Noel
• "The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever," by Michael Bungay Stanier

About Our Guest:
Devon Brown transforms teams and organizations using neuroscience research for insight, habits, and performance. He considers both individual and organizational behavior change with a systemic approach. Certifications include NLI Brain-based Coaching, Hogan, DiSC, MHS EQ-i/360, KAI, and Linkage – Purposeful Leader.

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OKRs. In this episode of Dream With Deadlines, Host Jenny Herald sits down with Lucas Gauzzi — OKR Coach and Head of Consulting Services at Sierra Studios — as he shares the importance of strategic communication in building trust and generating momentum for organizations. Lucas shares that a structured and deliberate approach to change management is necessary for successful implementation of OKRs.

Key Things Discussed

• The significance of trust in organizations and identifying four key behaviors to measure trust
• Using surveys and go-to-market metrics as proxy metrics to measure the success of OKRs and build trust between business development and product teams
• Using John Kotter's eight-step model to institutionalize change when implementing OKRs in his company, emphasizing the importance of having strong leadership and dedicated change agents to drive program effectiveness

Show Notes

• [00:01:50] Lucas mentions the importance of trust in organizations and highlights four key behaviors that can measure it. He also shares his experience leading an OKR rollout in a multinational company motivated by misalignment and wasted team effort, which was successful due to creating a sense of urgency using the book "Measure What Matters."
• [00:05:00] Jenny and Lucas discussed proxy metrics and how they were used in tracking the success of OKRs. Lucas shared his experience in using surveys to understand if people were trusting the process, but eventually found that a good way to measure a trust relationship between BizDev and product was the go-to-market metric. This became the proxy metric that was used to see if all of these aspects of trust, communication, and client needs were being met.
• [00:06:54] Lucas Gauzzi discusses how he approached change management when implementing OKRs in his company.
  • He talks about how his first attempt failed due to a lack of structure and trust-building, which led him to research change management models and use John Kotter's eight-step model.
  • He then discusses how he formed a coalition of the willing, found innovators, celebrated wins, and created a rollout plan to institutionalize change.
  • He also discusses the importance of having strong leadership and dedicated change agents, and how he and a peer from HR orchestrated the adoption of OKRs company-wide, with the support of sponsors and knowledge replicators.
• [00:18:26] Lucas Gauzzi discusses the specifics of his company's OKR program and cadence. He explains how they used OKRs to diversify and make changes that were necessary for the long run. Lucas also discusses how they brought different siloed teams together and created a new dynamic that contributed to achieving key results. Additionally, he mentions the challenges they faced and the emergent dynamics that helped change systemic behavior using OKRs as a tool.
• [00:22:32] Lucas discusses the success of the OKR program and how the leadership team's support was key in driving its effectiveness. He describes a pivotal moment when senior management presented the company's achievements in an open check-in meeting, showcasing the exponential results achieved through the program. This led to increased buy-in and a culture where people embraced change.
• [00:27:02] Quick-Fire Questions for Lucas:
  • What’s your Dream with a Deadline? Lucas’ dream with a deadline is The speaker's goal is to change societies through entrepreneurs, as they believe that entrepreneurs are the key agents of innovation within cultures.
  • What's your one piece of advice you'd give people out there who are trying to give OKRs a go? Pace yourself and make change enjoyable.
  • How do you craft a good proxy metric? Starting with a measurable layer can lead to the development of effective proxy metrics over time.
  • What is the book that really shaped the way you think? Thinking in Systems from Donella Meadows.

Relevant links:

• Neuroscience of Trust, Harvard Business Review article by Paul Zak
• Measure What Matters by John Doerr
• Change Management Model by Kurt Lewin
• The 8-Step Process for Leading Change by John Kotter
• Finite and Infinite Games by James Carse
• The Infinite Game by Simon Sinek
• Thinking in Systems from Donella Meadows

About Our Guest:
Lucas Gauzzi is an experienced Enterprise Agile Coach with a background in complex systems management, data storytelling, agile methodologies, and OKRs. He also facilitated strategy planning and provided data analytics support. He has worked as an IT Product Manager, Agile Consultant, Developer Leader, and Software Developer.

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When it comes to anything in the realm of OKRs, there are few practitioners anywhere with the depth of expertise and insight Host Jenny Herald’s guest brings to this episode of Dreams With Deadlines.

Natalie Webb, owner at Cloud Peak Enterprise Group LLC, has worked with the full spectrum of process and change management methodologies. But nothing, she says, delivers results on par with the OKR programs she has helped roll out over the years at companies across sectors from Health Care to Aviation, Manufacturing to FinTech.

Key Things Discussed

• How to get executives onboard with the level of transparency associated with tracking and measuring performance and other indicators
• What naysayers bring to the equation and how to open their minds, ease their fears and allay their concerns
• Why it’s important to keep teams honest about reporting their outcomes from quarter to quarter – not just wasting everyone’s time with “serial cloning”
• The cultural and financial effects to the bottom line when work and efficiencies are improved
• Tips for establishing new Standard Operating Procedures and ingraining teams with the benefits of OKRs

Show Notes

• [00:02:25] Jumping Right In: Natalie starts off with a look at transparency on the OKR journey and how that sits with executives across the gamut of business sectors
• [00:04:34] Where workplace culture fits into the conversation about OKR adoption, especially in times of upheaval and when there’s a lack of alignment across leadership
• [00:06:31] Turning Naysayers Around: Natalie shares the case study of an executive whose resistance she was able to surmount by listening effectively, building trust and breaking the process into digestible, credible pieces
• [00:09:20] What’s top of mind strategically for companies riding the tide of economic uncertainty:
  • A “radical shift” from being understaffed and struggling to find quality hires to now enjoying an abundance of talented resources
  • A strong focus on high-quality, selective hiring with an emphasis on DEI
• [00:13:10] About shifting efficiencies and maintaining revenue with fewer resources – both in terms of personnel and workplace tools
• [00:14:36] Inputs to Get to Outcomes: What it looks like to run KPIs and OKRs in tandem, leveraging their complementary nature and measurable results based on already ongoing performance metrics 
• [00:17:05] Putting Serial Cloners on Notice: How Natalie audits and holds accountable leadership that phones in OKR results from quarter to quarter, undermining the hard work, collaboration and team efforts
• [00:20:22] Measuring the body of work for results and making course corrections in real time is critical to OKR success and requires foundational support, including: 
  • Linking directly to project plans
  • Tracking milestones
  • Creating transparency and visibility into processes
  • Building humility into planning
• [00:23:35] How OKRs can be deployed to create the cross-leadership alignment and team habituation that ensures sustained change across the enterprise:
  • Increased communication around goals and outcomes
  • Increased understanding of interdependencies and dependencies
  • Setting the stage for improved collaboration
  • Accountability as a tool to increase efficiencies
• [00:27:11] Natalie’s best practices for enlisting executive leadership’s commitment to helping teams find the time to set, report and confer about OKRs and OKR progress: 
  • Create a streamlined, agile, one-stop-shop environment for all OKR processes
  • Integrate regular and easily accessible project reporting functions
  • Pause to assess – and celebrate – quarterly benchmarks, improved efficiencies/time savings and progress towards goals
• [00:29:36] Making It Stick: Natalie shares two examples of environments (health care, lithium-battery manufacturing) where sustained adoption occurred not because of enforcement or coercion but because leadership championed – and teams witnessed – direct benefits, including:
  • Agility based on transparency
  • Timely risk identification and mitigation
  • Access to nimble course correction
  • Rapid, effective inter-departmental communication and collaboration
  • Time- and effort-saving efficiencies
  • Clarity and recognition around the value of and purpose behind the work
• [00:35:19] Quick-Fire Questions for Natalie:
  • What’s your Dream with a Deadline? A legacy of having helped clients whose work is about making important contributions, effecting positive change and touching lives. For instance, a hospice organization she works with in New York
  • What are some strategies you’ve seen organizations deploy that boost the success of OKRs? Be truthful and forthright in calling out inflated objective or key results – sooner not later. Staying honest and authentic upfront saves time!
  • What advice would you give to an OKR champion trying to turn around naysayers? 
    • Listen to and validate the skeptic’s concerns or fears on an ongoing basis
    • Explain the purpose of the methodology and how it showcases bodies of work 
    • Emphasize that nothing is carved in stone and agility is built-in
    • Figure out the key results and metrics that resonate and matter culturally
    • Accept that there will always be naysayers – some of them harder to win over than others

About Our Guest:

Natalie Webb is an executive with 6+ years of OKR Expert experience and 15+ years’ experience in Global Consulting Engagements & Technical Leadership. She has led OKR implementations at 18+ global companies to include the framework, tools, facilitation of strategy sessions and 1000s of executive level coaching sessions. Her work spans industries from Healthcare, Aviation, Technical/Digital Transformation, FinTech, Manufacturing and Supply Chain. Natalie also has Big 5 Consulting Experience as Sr Engagement Leader and Principal on the Account Team.

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This episode of Dreams with Deadlines with Host Jenny Herald showcases the work of two dynamic women – each with a complementary area of expertise – who have joined forces to address how over-50 workers factor into the future of our global economy.

Dominique Ben Dhaou and Ellen Kocher, co-authors of "Wake-Up, Shake-Up, Thrive!: How to Lift Up Your Life in Your 50’s and Beyond — Swiss Secrets to Not Growing Old," share with us their strategies for retaining older employees and building a sustainable framework for helping corporations of all sizes keep their organization’s healthy and nimble.

Key things discussed

• The fact that only 8% of companies internationally have included age in their Diversity, Equity and Inclusion initiatives.
• Why it’s critical that we embrace a five-generation workplace model.
• The five dimensions of mental and physical health that corporate leaders and individual employees should be addressing.
• Why measuring efficiencies in the workplace is a holistic exercise, requiring a systematic assessment and trackable, qualitative measures.
• The co-authors’ book, "Wake-Up, Shake-Up, Thrive!: How to Lift Up Your Life in Your 50’s and Beyond — Swiss Secrets to Not Growing Old."

Show Notes

• [00:02:16] Introducing two women who are using their complementary talents to reshape workplace cultures with their vision for creating sustainable, purposeful employment for people of all ages.
• [00:03:06] About the huge demographic shifts that will impact the workplace of the (not-so-distant) future and how Dominique and Ellen are leveraging their decades of experience to help corporations navigate with customized, structured action plans.
• [00:06:47] A closer look at the challenges posed by a rapidly aging Western workforce, including impacts to productivity and availability of skilled workers.
• [00:08:10] Why embracing a five-generation workforce is relevant and its implications:
  • Businesses are suffering the economic consequences of an insufficient supply of employees with the skills and competencies to serve clients.
  • Older team members often feel disengaged, disenfranchised or dis-incented.
  • Misconceptions and biases tend to flourish if left unchecked.
  • Retaining (and respecting) older workers communicates a psychologically safe workplace which can cultivate loyalty in younger workers as well.
• [00:16:50] How Diversity, Equity & Inclusion initiatives include age in only eight percent of companies globally. The bright spot: 75% of CEOs recognize the importance of managing age diversity.
• [00:17:29] Looking at the many workplace stressors and how mental health and wellbeing have come to the fore as corporate and social priorities.
• [00:20:54] Breaking down the five dimensions of well-being and how they sustain(or undermine) workplace cultures. Those elements include:
  • Physical.
  • Emotional.
  • Intellectual.
  • Spiritual.
  • Financial.
• [00:29:52] How Dominique and Ellen help companies embed employee actualization within overall corporate goals and outcomes. It starts with the checklist they have developed based on their combined decades of experience, including questions like:
  • What are you doing?
  • Are you happy with it?
  • What are you not doing?
  • Is it important to you or not?
  • How do we create a roadmap that embeds those in corporate cultural priorities?
  • What bottom-line impacts will these necessary changes have?
• [00:32:43] How Dominique and Ellen’s dynamic, nimble, hands-on approach builds bridges to change at every level of the enterprise while anticipating business impacts.
• [00:35:42] Measuring for Efficiencies: A study has shown that companies – large and small, regardless of nation or origin – are wasting 51.5% of payroll every month due to  factors like operational dysfunction or disaffection among workers.
• [00:39:23] Case Study: Ellen shares the powerful example of how a bank in Geneva used the five dimensions to shift the mindsets of employees who, feeling undervalued by their employer, had been taking their assets elsewhere upon retirement.
• [00:42:00] About the tagline: “Don’t Grow Old Waiting” and how Wake-Up, Shake-Up, Thrive! was founded on a holistic platform that celebrates the privileges of being over-50.
• [00:43:48] Why over-50 workers and entrepreneurs are well-positioned for success due to demographic shifts that make them a renewable resource worth retaining!
• [00:46:52] The authors share insights into their book, "Wake-Up, Shake-Up, Thrive!: How to Lift Up Your Life in Your 50’s and Beyond — Swiss Secrets to Not Growing Old," their 2/3s “learning” and 1/3 “doing” formula and other tips for keeping workers engaged at every stage of growth and life.
• [00:50:23] Quick-Fire Questions for Dominique and Ellen:
  • What’s your dream with a deadline? Boosting the numbers of companies that include over-50 workers in their DEI plans. Also: Getting things done, making an impact and living balanced, healthy, happy lives.
  • Where should business leaders start in addressing the challenge of retaining and optimally integrating older members of the workforce? Consider bringing in experts to assess the organization and identify tools for measurable outcomes.
  • What does a person who is thriving within an organization that is thriving look like? It’s someone who:
    • Has clarity about why they’re working.
    • Knows what their contributions are.
    • Has healthy boundaries.
    • Feels a sense of purpose and excitement about the job.
    • Intentionally chooses to stay.

Relevant links

• Link for Deloitte study: "Workers wanted: How the 50plus age group can help tackle the looming labour shortage: Ageing workforce challenge in Switzerland."
• More about the work of the National Wellness Organization's Multicultural Competency Committee.
• The Surgeon General’s 2022 report: "Workplace Mental Health & Wellbeing."
• A link for McKinsey’s report, “Help Your Employees Find Purpose or Watch Them Leave” can be found here.
• "Wake-Up, Shake-Up, Thrive!: How to Lift Up Your Life in Your 50’s and Beyond — Swiss Secrets to Not Growing Old," by Ellen Kocher and Dominique Ben Dhaou.

About Our Guests:
Dominique Ben Dhaou, a co-founder of Wake-Up, Shake-Up & Thrive, initially built a corporate career that allowed her to travel the world beyond her native Switzerland, while simultaneously gaining vast experience as a C-suite executive. After 30 years in upper management of Human Resources, sh...

From earliest stage start-up to coveted unicorns status, few people have had more of a front-row seat on helping grow businesses than Jenny Herald’s guest on this episode of Dreams With Deadlines.

Luca Cipriani, who is Head of Architecture and OKR Coach at Jimdo, knows intimately the strategic elements that make scaling ventures fly or fail – and he’s sharing his rules of the road. It all starts, he says, with building nimbleness and psychological safety into the blueprint from your start-up’s earliest days while keeping goals flexible without losing sight of the core North Star mission.

Key things discussed

• How integrating OKRs into processes from the outset ensures they are foundational at every stage of execution.
• What the goals should be in building a framework for your start-up journey.
• Why it’s important not to tie key initiatives too closely to key results.
• Which ingredients successful start-up cultures tend to share in common.
• What are some predictable barriers to building a healthy workplace – and how to head then off at the pass.
• The show wraps up with Luca’s thoughts on the importance of keeping OKRs simple and giving teams the room to evolve, experiment, iterate and surprise. How integrating OKRs into processes from the outset ensures they are foundational at every stage of execution.
• What the goals should be at the outset of a start-up journey.
• Why it’s important not to tie initiatives too closely to key results.
• Which ingredients successful start-up cultures tend to share in common.
• What constitute the most predictable barriers to building a healthy workplace – and how to head them off at the pass.

Show Notes

• [00:03:13] Getting Started on the Journey: About at what point in scaling Luca Introduces OKRs and other optimization solutions.
• [00:04:33] What are the goals when implementing OKRs at an early stage:
  • Creating strong alignment from the outset.
  • Instituting systems to measure as much as possible any relevant KPIs.
  • Introducing rational metrics that can anchor young founders as they navigate the high-stakes, high-stress start-up phase.
  • Establishing a framework for what success looks like and means.
• [00:06:23] Balancing Quality and Quantity: Luca recalls how he has helped start-ups create sustainable objectives through systematic, evolving feedback.
• [00:09:08] It’s a process: Why Luca believes OKR processes must necessarily be iterative and have built into them an assumption that there will be missteps as well as the need for reflections and adjustments along the way.
• [00:11:13] What it looks like to help founders or teams, at whatever stage, assess on an ongoing basis and roll those learnings into go-forward plans.
• [00:13:08] Luca explains how he deploys OKRs – and parses outcomes versus outputs and inputs – with early-stage start-ups that don’t yet have a well-established baseline.
  • Companies must have a clear North Star.
  • Putting initial metrics in place can be a way to get started getting started putting measurable processes in place.
• [00:15:12] How Luca helps start-ups move into a scaling phase, deploying OKR processes that keep companies on track with their vision and strategy:
  • Top-up as well as bottom-down collaboration.
  • Intentionally aligned KPIs understood across teams.
  • Cross-department communication to promote consistent global goals.
• [00:18:33] Why it’s important not to tie specific initiatives to key results:
  • It can yoke people to fruitless busy work.
  • It reduces nimbleness.
  • It thwarts creative problem-solving.
  • It discourages experimentation.
• [00:20:38] Luca shares examples of unconventional wins and success stories worth millions of dollars saved through out-of-the-box flexibility with OKRs.
• [00:23:36] Going off the Rails: Illustrations (both real-world and in film) of how communication gaps, micromanagement and relentless pressure can take companies off course and away from core values by pursuing the extraction of value at any cost.
• [00:30:15] About mastery, purpose, autonomy and how flexible OKRs can be leveraged to motivate teams.
• [00:30:54] Taking a closer look at workplace cultures and the attributes Luca has seen in the unicorns with which he has worked:
  • Maintaining a unity of purpose.
  • Creating an environment in which all team members feel they’re contributing.
  • Preserving inter-departmental intimacy and removing barriers to communication.
  • Cultivating agency among teams to be autonomous and work autonomously (i.e. minimize micromanagement).
  • Delegating judiciously – enough but not too much.
  • Emphasizing unity of purpose.
  • Fostering psychologically safety so that teams feel free to seek help and admit failure.
• [00:36:05] About the concept of aligning around the perfect number of OKR objectives. And that number is? One! Not because there aren’t other goals, but because the overarching focus needs to stay on the business’s true North Star.
• [00:37:09] What Luca sees as the most common barriers to building healthy, effective workplace teams:
  • Lack of communication.
  • Toxic behaviors that squelch authenticity and honesty.
  • Siloed teams.
  • Lack of direct interaction and feedback.
  • Lack of autonomy or agency to self-organize, act independently and surprise.
• [00:40:28] A Round of Quick-Fire Questions for Luca:
  • What’s your Dream with a Deadline? To have fewer things to do and to do them faster!
  • What management techniques and practices do you believe have most helped the teams with which you’ve worked? Attention to detail, staying open-minded, helping people figure out how to raise the bar on quality.
  • What advice would you give to keep teams focused while scaling up and incorporating OKRs? Set and communicate expectations clearly!

Relevant links:

• https://lab.okrbusiness.com
• More about Monsters, Inc.
• More about The Lego Movie.
• "Drive: The Surprising Truth about What Motivates Us," by Daniel Pink.
• More about the views of OKR coach Christina Wodtke.

About Our Guest:

Luca Cipriani is an OKR Coach and Engineering Manager with great expertise in SaaS products and companies. A strong contributor to Open Source software, he also has a proven record in managing developers and other managers, scaling teams and SaaS businesses and making them successful.

Follow Our Guest:
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Key things discussed

• The use of OKRs in organizations and how to make them more effective.
• The importance of decoupling OKRs from financial incentives and using them to assign resources and help people achieve their objectives.
• Rianne shares her approach to getting buy-in from different teams and senior management, and her belief that the logic of OKRs is undeniable.
• A more radical approach to budgeting, using OKRs to drive budgeting, which provides a clear intent and strategy.
• The importance of showing that resources are available to help staff achieve their OKRs and how this approach can lead to a better and more strategic budget.

Show Notes

• [04:05] Rianne Roggema walks us through her career since becoming a managing director for the first time at 25, started her own business at 28, and sold her digital marketing agency, Irie Digital
  • Became the CEO of a merged business, Duwun, and grew the team from 15-20 to 80 by the age of 30
  • She was searching for a tool to manage such a large team, and got introduced to OKRs
  • Her latest venture, Practic, helps leaders and entrepreneurs become better leaders by using OKRs
  • Rianne Roggema started her career with a six-month internship at Rocket Internet in Myanmar, and then became the managing director of the company
  • She started her own digital marketing agency, Irie Digital, but as the team grew, she realized she needed a better way to set clear goals and direction for the team, and that's how she got introduced to OKRs
  • She found OKRs to be a good tool for managing her team and facilitating them to do their best, and that's why she started Practic to help other leaders and entrepreneurs to use OKRs in their businesses
• [07:17] Jenny and Rianne discuss the use of OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) in organizations
  • Rianne started using OKRs with a team of 12 and believed it could work for small teams
  • OKRs are a simple concept, but can become bloated if people add too much to it
  • The introduction of OKRs can bring attention to bloatedness already present in the organization
  • OKRs can help make bloated processes more organized and reduce them.
• [09:14] Jenny and Rianne discuss the implementation of OKRs in a newly merged business where the team initially struggled with them and did not like them. The CEO, Rianne Roggema, managed to solve some of the team's concerns by giving them more clarity around the company's goals and the employees' success criteria, as well as decoupling OKRs from financial incentives. After a half year of implementing OKRs in a new way, the team came to love them and even missed them at their new jobs.
• [12:28] The discussion on how to make OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) more effective in a business.
  • The first step is to decouple OKRs from incentives, as linking them may cause people to be defensive and less open to discussing success and failure.
  • The second step is to use OKRs to assign resources and help people achieve their objectives, rather than just monitoring and evaluating them. This helps increase acceptance and effectiveness of OKRs.
  • The final topic discussed was incentives, as there are already systems in place for many businesses to assess performance and offer bonuses or promotions.
  • Rianne talks about detaching these incentives from OKRs.
• [15:06] Making incentives work with OKRs. Rianne detached financial performance bonuses from OKRs but kept them as part of the annual performance conversation, with 50% of the assessment being based on OKRs and the other 50% on company values. 
  • Different people are incentivized differently, with salespeople usually motivated by bonuses and others more by job satisfaction.
  • The clear goals set by OKRs help employees see how they are doing and being valued for their good work, which can lead to promotions but not necessarily direct financial bonuses.
• [17:13] Listeners can learn that OKRs are a simple management tool that can be adapted to fit an organization's specific needs. In this case, a media organization (Duwun) used a bottom-up approach, where local teams decided their own strategies and created their own OKRs, rather than a top-down approach where a central leadership team would dictate global OKRs. This approach worked for Duwun as it aligned with the company's DNA, which values local initiative in journalism. The local teams presented their OKRs and had discussions with top management for possible adjustments. Centralizing the OKRs would not have worked for Duwun, as journalism is contextual and varies by local market.
• [21:08] Rianne shares her approach to getting buy-in from different teams and top management. She believes that the logic of OKRs, including clear goals and measurable results, is undeniable and can be helpful in settling debates within a company.
  • On a senior management level, Rianne exposes any unclarities or differences to well-intended managers, and most of the time, they agree to try OKRs.
  • On a team level, Rianne stresses the importance of showing that resources are available to help staff achieve their OKRs.
  • She gives an example of how she, as a manager, provided resources to her editor in chief to fulfill an OKR, which led to her team realizing the benefits of OKRs.
• [25:50] Rianne discusses a more radical approach to budgeting beyond the traditional annual planning and budgeting cycles.
  • She shares that often, budgeting involves merely adjusting numbers in Excel to make them work, without a clear strategy behind it.
  • To overcome this, Rianne suggests using OKRs to drive budgeting.
  • OKRs can provide a clear intent and strategy, helping to link budgeting to specific goals such as launching a TV channel or getting into YouTube. By linking the budget to specific goals, Rianne believes it will lead to a better and more strategic budget.
• [29:53] Rianne believes that the success of OKRs depends on the leader. The leader must lead by example, show that OKRs are a priority, and make sure all conversations tie back to the OKRs. When OKRs are working effectively, meetings have clear goals, and ideas from team members are presented as OKRs. When team members propose projects as OKRs, it makes discussions between employees and managers easier.
• [33:28] Listeners can learn that the dynamic of conversations change when they focus on the progress made towards their OKRs rather than the day-to-day tasks.
  • This helps people feel like they're manifesting results, making the experience more fulfilling.
  • The concept of clear goals and trust is also emphasized, as trust within an organization is crucial for success.
  • Managers should avoid over-managing and trust their employees to figure out how to achieve the agreed upon outcomes.
  • Trust and clear goals are key to a successful outcome.
• [36:27] Quick Fire Questions for Rianne:
  • What’s your Dream with a Deadline?
    • Rianne Roggema wants to help other entrepreneurs find peace through OKRs by starting a group program for five entrepreneurs in mid-February with the goal of finding five entrepreneurs to join the program.
  • What is a change in the business brought by OKRs that you are proud of?
    • Rianne answered that the shift from micromanaging to people being able to use their own specialties and having clear goals led to better outcomes with less effort by the management.
  • What is your advice for someone who has tried OKRs before but didn't work, and they want to try again?
    • Rianne's advice for someone who tried OKRs previously and it didn't work is to be willing to admit that they need...

Key things discussed

• The challenges of implementing a customer-centric approach in a large organization and the strategies for overcoming silos and incentivizing teams to work together
• The importance of building resilience and pushing decision-making to the lowest possible level
• The value of creating a clear, actionable plan with options and risk management and the importance of scenario planning and how to navigate the bureaucratic process
• The importance and techniques for getting buy-in and alignment from multiple stakeholders and driving customer-centricity
• Insights on the future of banking and the role of innovation in achieving financial goals
• The need to reserve capacity for innovation and experimentation.

Show Notes

• [03:20] Jonathan walks us through his background and career trajectory in the financial technology and design thinking industry. He began as a consultant in public relations, then moved to the client side working on environmental sustainability at DuPont and financial innovation and literacy at Wells Fargo. He went on to lead design thinking at Credit Suisse, and now wants to scale it up on an industry-wide basis. 
• [05:32] Jonathan discusses the issues with the customer experience in the banking industry, specifically with regards to the automated phone systems and the metrics used to measure customer satisfaction.
  • The common experience of long hold times and poor customer service when calling companies, specifically mentioning the banking industry.
  • The reasons behind this experience, such as internal incentives and metrics that focus on the wrong things.
  • How the pandemic has exacerbated the problem and the opportunity for new market entrants to provide better service.
  • The importance of viewing customer service and success as an investment, not a cost, and measuring success metrics such as first call resolution and true customer satisfaction.
• [10:10] Jonathan suggests that to change the mentality of companies to be more customer-centric, the focus should be on middle management, who can be partnered with to change the company's incentives, investments, and employee treatment in order to improve customer satisfaction and loyalty.
  • Middle management plays a key role in translating strategy into operation plan
  • The importance of changing the mentality internally, especially in customer success and financial departments
  • Focusing on customer delight rather than just getting the last penny out of them
  • The importance of investing in employees, providing living wages and benefits, the right training and technology support to enable them to do first-call resolution
  • The push towards AI and automation in banking and how it should be approached, focusing on the customer's needs and simplifying the process.
• [14:35] Jonathan highlights the importance of empowering employees in the middle management level to make decisions and aligning their incentives with that of the company's goals, in order to achieve better customer satisfaction and long-term growth, rather than using fear, uncertainty and doubt to push for change.
• [21:44] Jonathan discusses the importance of starting with middle management in order to change the way companies operate and become more customer-centric.
  • He emphasizes the importance of empowering employees to make decisions appropriate to their level of authority in order to drive change.
  • Jenny highlights the importance of customer satisfaction and how lost business can occur when a customer has a substandard experience with a company and chooses not to recommend them to others.
  • Jonathan gives an example of how a bank he worked for took a customer-centric approach to their payment products, but faced barriers that were not technological in nature but rather human and business-driven.
• [25:16] Jonathan talks about the difficulty of incentivizing teams to work together in large organizations where silos and competing incentives can prevent collaboration.
  • He uses the example of creating a microsite for customers to make payments, which crosses different organizational lines and value streams.
  • The main problem he faced was getting buy-in from peers who owned different product P&Ls, as they were incentivized to focus on other things.
  • He attempted to address this by having in-person conversations and acknowledging the reality of the situation, building relationships, empathy and trust.
  • He suggests using quantitative measurements and metrics that account for customer satisfaction and success, and empower people to make decisions appropriate to their level of authority.
  • He also emphasizes the importance of building organizational incentives that align with customer satisfaction and success.
• [30:40] The conversation is about how to incentivize teams to work together, specifically in the context of a microsite that is customer-centric and crosses different organizational boundaries.
  • The challenge is that different business units are incentivized to optimize spend for the outcomes that they think are most important given their remit.
  • Jonathan shares how he had to sell the idea to his peers who owned different product P&Ls and get buy-in from them.
  • He acknowledged the reality of the situation and built empathy and trust by being honest about what they were facing.
  • He had multiple stakeholders and product owners involved in the project, including product managers and their supervisors.
  • The next step after getting buy-in is to actually build it and sequence and prioritize it across multiple business areas, which poses its own set of challenges such as getting on the release calendars and limited capacity.
  • The importance of scenario modeling to quantify the potential benefits of the project and make it less abstract for stakeholders
  • The challenge of building a new section of the system that is customer-centric rather than product-centric and how it takes time to get approval from senior executives
  • The loss of capacity and engagement with customers due to the disruption of the existing system, which is not built to serve customers but rather internal goals and incentives.
• [40:11] Jonathan Alloy discussed how he and his team got executive buy-in for a project to make the customer experience more human-centric and less product-focused.
  • He emphasized the importance of understanding the executives' role in managing risk and presenting them with clear, actionable options.
  • He also highlighted the importance of showing how risks will be mitigated and having control plans in place.
  • He also acknowledged the complexity and bureaucracy that can be involved in getting new ideas approved in large companies and the potential for competitors to gain market share because of this.
  • He emphasized the need for companies to reserve capacity for innovation and new ideas to stay competitive in the market.
• [46:42] This part of the conversation highlights the positive outcome of the project, and that it resulted in the company becoming more customer-centric rather than product-centric.
  • Jonathan also discussed the importance of considering the customer experience when implementing new technologies like AI and chatbots, and how focusing on cost savings alone can lead to a poor customer experience.
  • He also talked about how innovation in customer experience can come from outside of large financial institutions, and how empowering employees to make good decisions on behalf of the business can lead to great solutions that serve the customer experience.
• [50:54] Qu...

Key things discussed

• The connection between business agility and OKRs in private equity
• The role of OKRs in alignment and focus within an organization
• The principles shared by various frameworks such as OKRs, Scrum, and SAFe
• The importance of understanding and implementing frameworks effectively
• The benefits of dynamic team organization and shuffling based on OKRs
• The value of discussing outcomes rather than specifying outputs and having conversations about OKRs
• The dangers of chasing the next shiny thing without fully understanding and implementing it
• The connection between agile principles and OKR success
• The role of transparency, collaboration, and psychological safety in creating a successful environment for progress and continuous improvement
• The challenges and opportunities in improving work environments and creating meaningful progress in organizations.

Show Notes

• [03:04] Yuval walks us through his background in IT and product development and begins using agile practices in his work. After moving to the US in 2015, he started consulting and coaching different types of organizations and began incorporating OKRs into his work with agile processes and helping organizations improve their use of OKRs.
• [04:33] Yuval walks us through his experience in private equity
  • The role of OKRs and business agility in private equity
  • The investment hypothesis
  • How to apply agility to the process of finding the right way to reshape your go-to-market strategy
• [09:03] Yuval dives deep on when OKRs are not applicable
• [11:03] Yuval shares his insights and examples of best applications of OKRs
  • OKRs are an alignment framework
• [12:43] A look at how Prezi, a presentation software, and their OKR-friendly way of managing the work in their organization
• [14:47] A look at the different frameworks (OKR, Scrum, SAFe)
• [16:03] The pitfalls of not getting the value or understanding the different frameworks
  • How organizations struggle to get value out of OKRs
• [19:41] High-level overview of Ron Jeffries and Scrum
  • One of the three founders of the Extreme Programming software development and The Agile Manifesto
  • Ron Jeffries’ article: “We Tried Baseball and It Didn't Work”
• [20:35] What makes Scrum great?
  • A relatively simple and lightweight framework that's really laser focused on achieving empiricism
  • The structure of Scrum and how it can be used to develop the business
  • How to create a rhythm of making progress in an environmental uncertainty with Scrum
• [28:06] Scrum became popular and spread quickly
  • Many people using Scrum did not fully understand the principles and applied it with traditional project management approaches
  • These people saw Scrum as a template rather than a continuous improvement process
  • This led to the development of "Scrum Theater" or "Zombie Scrum" where people were just going through the motions of Scrum without fully understanding and implementing its principles
  • When an approach becomes too popular, the knowledge about it becomes thinned out and there are more people who are just following it because it is popular, leading to more haters of the approach
• [33:31] Yuval discusses how OKRs should be used for goal alignment and focus on outcomes, in conjunction with evidence-based management. He stresses the importance of empiricism and empowering teams to achieve outcomes.
• [37:06] Yuval is discussing the concept of empowerment in agile processes and how it leads to better solutions and motivated employees. He emphasizes the importance of providing teams with the necessary knowledge and expertise and allowing them the autonomy to come up with and execute experiments within certain constraints. He also discusses the role of frequent feedback and access to leadership in empowering teams.
• [42:06] Jenny and Yuval are discussing how empowering teams to achieve a specific goal can lead to innovative solutions and improved business performance.
  • The importance of empowering teams to achieve goals and the motivation and effectiveness of empowered teams
  • The role of constraints in providing direction for teams while still allowing for flexibility and creativity
  • The value of fast feedback loops and cross-functional collaboration in achieving outcomes
  • The dangers of micromanaging and a lack of safety in communication
  • The concept of "scheduled chicken" in which multiple groups work towards a deadline without being transparent about issues or challenges.
  • The use of OKRs to align organizations around goals and focus on outcomes
  • The benefits of using empiricism and focusing on outcomes rather than activities
  • The concept of evidence-based management, which involves continuously evaluating progress and adjusting course as needed
• [46:25] Quick Fire Questions for Yuval:
  • What’s your Dream with a Deadline?
  • Yuval's goal is to help organizations create environments that allow people to have an impact on work processes and to provide more case studies on this topic in the next few years.
  • Can you share an example of a meaty strategy execution challenge, and how did they overcome it?

Relevant links:

• Prezi's product development approach
• Ron Jeffries, one of the three founders of the Extreme Programming software development
• Fixing OKR Theater Using Agile/Scrum Principles
• Ron Jeffries’ article on Scrum: “We Tried Baseball and It Didn't Work”
• Scrum.org Evidence-Based Management Guide
• Yuval Yeret’s article on OKR Theater and OKRs in Name Only 
• Zombie Scrum, an article by Barry Overeem on Scrum.org
• "Fixing your OKRs”, an article by Yuval Yeret

About Our Guest:

Yuval Yeret is an expert on agile methodologies and OKRs, with experience in coaching and consulting a variety of organizations on their agility journey. With a background in IT and product development, he has helped businesses improve value and profitability through private equity deals and digital transformations.

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Key Things Discussed

• The tools that Talentful provides clients ramping up and expanding (much as Talentful itself has been doing throughout its steep-growth startup trajectory).
• Why strategy, replicable work, decisions and change are among four key areas  on which to focus when it comes to creating and implementing OKRs.
• The data-driven tools Talentful’s state-of-the-art methodology leverages to help clients identify, onboard and retain talent.
• How to manage competing demands and balance long-term, proactive startup development standards and priorities against near-term reactionary fire drills.

Show Notes

• [00:02:13] Jenny introduces Jem, who shares her journey from teacher to recruiting at a time when Talentful was just launching in London.
• [00:04:53] What Talentful brings to the table as a personalized intermediary aligning and optimizing companies’ hiring goals, practices and execution.
• [00:06:00] Some of the tools Jem deploys to help clients:
  • Creating new Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) to leverage metrics.
  • Training/interview prep.
  • Hiring qualified identified applicants.
• [00:07:13] About Jem’s transition into an operational role and engaging Talentful’s employee base through the use of Objectives and Key Results (OKRs)
• [00:08:11] Activity within companies typically fits into one of four buckets:
  • Strategy.
  • Replicable work.
  • Decisions.
  • Change.
• [00:08:48] Jem highlights her areas of focus (strategy and replicable work) and the role that OKRs play in keeping operations on track.
• [00:09:53] Standardization of replicable work practices and how OKRs serve as a framework to support the process.
• [00:11:38] How “pushing down decision-making where the data  lives” enables teams to make the right decisions when leadership is not in the room.
• [00:13:39] What a data-driven approach means in the context of onsite client consulting and aggregating metrics to understand timeline, pipeline and other activity.
• [00:14:43] Jem explains outdated versus state-of-the-art hiring practices Talentful has developed to get the right people in the right roles at the right time.
• [00:17:38] About the context-driven nature of recruiting – including the nuance of
• understanding candidates, contours of individual roles and fit with team cultures.
• [00:18:58] Weighing in on talent retention – what it takes and the culture as well as strategies that
• Talentful deploys within fluid, often challenging, distributed workplace:
  • Knowledge sharing: Communication through channels like Slack is candid and supportive.
  • Heavy emphasis on collaboration over competition
• [00:23:29] Jem traces the impacts of a steep growth trajectory and the challenges it has manifested throughout Talentful’s growth and development, including:
  • Siloing of work across geographies and departments.
  • Lack of global cultural understanding and shared definitions.
  • Lack of clearly articulated SOPs.
  • Time lag in communicating replicable models.
  • Fragmented data and segmented/overlapping systems.
• [00:26:43] Strategies that Jem and the operations team use to advance understanding and move teams cross-departmentally towards OKRs include:
  • Writing down procedures and making sure everyone is on the same page.
  • Defining and validating data points.
  • Using metrics to establish baseline workplace integration and functionality.
• [00:30:22] Insights on ramping up new team members quickly and effectively through strategies such as:
  • Establishing clear, standardized, replicable procedures.
  • Using tech tools, such as video resources, to optimize and customize training.
  • Providing data-driven decision points.
  • Fostering safety and permission to fail.
  • Deploying seasoned talent to share institutional knowledge with new team members.
• [00:33:58] Getting down to startup priorities among competing urgent demands, balancing long-term proactive development against near-term reactionary fires.
• [00:36:13] About making judgment calls for “edge case” clients with regard to bending SOPs based on mitigating factors (like revenue, length or ease of engagement).
• [00:36:48] Jem explains “edge case” accommodations and scaling back  Talentful’s team of “Talent Directors” as the result of economic downturn.
• [00:39:53] A shout out to VUGA – volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity – and weighing investments and resource allocation against future goals and realities.
• [00:40:08] Wrapping up with Quickfire Questions for Jem:
  • What’s your Dream with a Deadline? Mastering CrossFit and feeling confident enough to enter a competition when she’s “very much someone who doesn't want to compete unless I think I have a chance of winning.”
  • Does Talentful have a bragging channel? Jem is looking to convert a “goals channel” to a space reserved for kudos and celebrating team wins of all kinds.
  • As a seasoned veteran, what advice would you give someone just launching strategic OKRs? Don’t underestimate the amount of time it takes to roll out an effective program. Don’t rush! Brainstorm, establish sound metrics and get teams fully onboard.

About Our Guest:

When Jem Pauley joined Talentful five years ago, she was among a small group of people with a shared vision to change the perception of recruitment. Now with a team of 100+ talent partners working in London, Berlin and the US, Talentful is helping clients recruit, hire and retain talent while navigating a steep growth trajectory of its own

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Key Things Discussed:

• Where ESG and CSR overlap in their mandates to develop better corporate citizens.
• The UN’s 17 Goals for Sustainable Development and how that’s going.
• The challenges associated with creating reliable, long-term metrics by which to track individual company efforts to reach carbon neutrality.
• The difference between – and examples of – carbon offsetting and insetting.
• Innovative technologies Guenter is involved with and what’s on his horizon.
• The episode wraps with some lively Quick Fire Questions that will leave you inspired to join Guenter in driving hard towards creating the environmental solutions we need!

Show Notes

• [02:20] Guenter brings us up to speed on his career trajectory, from academia (where he acquired advanced mathematical and analytical skills) to the Boston Consulting Group, where he was introduced to a steep learning curve across industry sectors.
• [03:25] Defining the E, S and G of ESG, a framework for supporting Environmental, Social and Governance measures for corporate responsibility:
  • Provides a common language to discuss non-financial indicators and parameters.
  • Connects corporate impacts in a global context.
• [06:50] While there is overlap, ESG and CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) are not completely interchangeable.
  • CSR has traditionally been a somewhat vague, even random, corporate commitment to philanthropy, community engagement, stockholder expectations and compliance/risk mitigation.
  • ESG is the framework or vehicle through which to measure and quantify social impacts beyond financial metrics, the boardroom or day-to-day business.
• [10:28] Guenter places ESG within the context of 17 Sustainable Development Goals defined by the UN, including challenges such as hunger, poverty, health, economic development.
• [13:00] Does ESG impact the bottom line? Guenter argues yes and that evidence suggests that environmental and social elements in particular pay off in terms of both overall corporate and global health.
• [16:26] Challenges and Concerns:
  • What metrics can be put in place based on hard indicators such as CO2 emissions developed based on sector-relevant resources and practices.
  • Large accounting firms and regulatory control will also have a role to play.
• [18:42] Affordability, especially for small- and medium-sized businesses, will be determined in large part by scaling of technology and automation in the coming years. 
• [19:44] Impact measures and the fuzziness around defining them because of a lack of longitudinal tracking measures and the murkiness of long-term timelines. 
• [22:17] Guenter’s thoughts about developing corporate solutions and plans for capturing impact measures in terms of political and scientific indicators:
  • Using a flexible framework for collecting data.
  • Implementing pro bono efforts to help environmental nonprofits.
• [26:25] Guenter explains the difference between carbon offset and inset: Buy your way out versus build your way out? It’s nuanced!
• [30:07] Guenter gets granular with specific examples of offsetting methods, relative levels of impact available through programs in place today as well as innovative new technologies under development to scale efforts to stabilize and sequester carbon.
• [33:04] Guenter shares projects he’s excited about with Sinkco Labs, which is developing a carbon-neutral alternative protein source, as well as a new app in beta testing that will offer consumers a simple way to get an ongoing read of their carbon footprint based on travel, dining out and other lifestyle patterns.
• [38:54] Quick Fire Questions for Guenter:
  • What Is Your Dream With A Deadline?  Helping all sectors – but most especially the corporate world – realize their pledges to be profitable as well as socially and environmentally responsible.
  • What do you appreciate about the teams you work with? The passion for common goals, excellence and pursuing a mission to make a difference.
  • What challenge have you overcome and how did you do it? By pivoting in the right way at the right point in time. It’s about stepping back to reassess, even if it means shifting your direction or strategy.
  • Advice for effective team-wide and company-wide goalsetting? Focus on creating a shared vision that excites and enfranchises all stakeholders, which will lead to high levels of buy-in, satisfaction and success across the enterprise.
  • What’s top of mind for you these days? Moving forward with projects in progress in order to grow, grow, grow, scale, scale, scale and meet our global challenge

Relevant links:

• The UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals.
• Sinkco Labs
• Compenshare

About Our Guest:

Guenter Rottenfusser is a strategist, global social impact and sustainability expert currently working with several CO2 reduction and removal start ups, most prominently Sinkco Labs and Compenshare. He has been named an EWOR fellow and previously consulted for the Boston Consulting Group.

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