HR Labs

Upskilling and reskilling are essential to helping today’s workforce adapt to changing industries, markets, and global environments. But how can skills also drive the growth opportunities that employees crave? 

Meredith Wellard, VP of Group Learning Talent and Platforms at Deutsche Post DHL, joins host Summer Salomonsen to redefine how we think about skills in the workplace. Together they explore the results of Deutsche Post DHL’s investment in skills and provide a framework for how organizations can put skills to work for their people and their business.

Cornerstone specializes in employee growth and development, and its Skills Graph uses AI to map out learning content and potential pathways to new opportunities for employees. As new talent needs arise, it can match employees with the required skills for any role or project. To learn more about how the Skills Graph can fit into your people strategy, click here. 

When we think about employee growth, we think about the skills people need to build to prepare themselves – and their organization – for the future. So how can talent leaders facilitate learning experiences that lead to opportunities for employees to develop?  

Lisa Christensen, Director of the Learning Design Center for Excellence at McKinsey & Company, joins host Summer Salomonsen to talk about learning and development as a shared responsibility between organizations and their people, how modern apprenticeship can meaningfully fuse learning and development meaningfully, and the role frontline leaders and managers have to play in making those learning experiences successful.

Cornerstone specializes in employee growth and development and has recently launched Cornerstone Xplor, a solution designed to power the future-ready workforce. It gives employees access to learning directly in the flow of work and provides curated, personalized learning content informed by each employee’s unique skills, interests, and career goals. To learn more about how Cornerstone Xplor goes beyond traditional learning experience platforms, click here.

Employees are demanding more from your organization than fair wages, improved benefits plans, and a flexible work schedule. They’re seeking an opportunity to actually change their lives—to develop new skills, new careers, and to find acceptance, purpose, and belonging.    

Carly Cooper, Head of Culture and Transformation at Vianai Systems, joins host Summer Salomonsen to talk all about the connection between HR and culture, the components that make up a solid organizational culture, and how talent leaders can lead the way when it comes to rebuilding the way we work.

Cornerstone specializes in employee growth and development and has recently launched Cornerstone Xplor, a solution designed to power the future-ready workforce. To learn more about how Cornerstone Xplor can help HR teams put people first, click here.

It’s no secret that the way we work has changed over the last few years—and people are thinking differently about what they want from their jobs. In season 4 of HR Labs, new host Summer Salomonsen will examine how talent leaders can help make work truly “work” for all employees. Along with HR leaders and experts from organizations like McKinsey, Amazon, and Deutsche Post DHL, Summer will explore topics like learning, skills, career growth, AI, equity, and more to understand how together, we can build a more connected workplace. Subscribe now wherever you get your podcasts, and join us for new weekly episodes starting February 22nd.  Tune in: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/hr-labs/id1482283780 Follow Cornerstone:

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In the season 3 finale of HR Labs, Duane is joined by A Cloud Guru's chief people guru Lorraine Vargas Townsend to discuss what belonging means, what it looks like at work, and the positive impacts it has on people.

According to Townsend, "The opposite of belonging is a culture where tokenism thrives and where tolerating people wins instead of celebrating people and helping them get to prosperity and growth."

Why creating a sense of belonging matters

A true culture of belonging is one where you are accepted and celebrated and supports you in a way that can help unleash your true potential. It's why, Townsend explains, “Belonging is not a diversity metric.” It’s about creating a culture where you can be yourself, you can share ideas, fully contribute to team and organizational goals and see a career path in front of you. And belonging has a direct impact on retention, engagement and performance outcomes.

Reflecting on her own experiences and those of her mother’s, Lorraine shares key strategies for unleashing people potential through intentional practices and commitments. She also shares what A Cloud Guru is doing to reach its goal “to build the most inclusive company in tech.”

When it comes to what we all can do to build a sense of belonging, Lorraine put it best when she said, "That actual human experience is where we're going to find the moments that either create belonging or create exclusion, that either support people or don't, or treat people like humans or treat people like cogs in a wheel."

Take a listen to learn why adding belonging to your DEI strategy is critical to driving engagement, retention and outcomes that matter.

If you missed any of the previous episodes from season 3, we invite you to catch up on the rest of the season here. On behalf of our season 3 hosts Duane and Jeff, and all of us at Cornerstone, thanks for listening, and be well.

Read Lorraine's story about her mom:

My Mom's American Dream

Follow Lorraine:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/lvargast/

https://lorrainevargastownsend.medium.com/

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"The primary thing we're trying to understand is, from a soft skill holistic perspective, what are you best suited for in the world of work." That was Frida Polli, Ph.D. and CEO and co-founder of pymetrics, a company mixing behavioral science and AI to build fairer workplaces. This week, Jeff and Dr. Polli discuss how you can use data and technology to advance diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging (DEIB) efforts and remove unconscious bias from your organization’s hiring process.

How AI can actually make your recruiting process more human

"What everyone was trying to understand in this matchmaking process, both the individual who was going through it as well as the company that was recruiting, was not what was on someone's resume—that was clear. Really what they wanted to know about someone was their soft skills. Their cognitive, social, and emotional makeup. Like what makes them different and human and unique," explains Dr. Polli.

According to Dr. Polli, when it comes to recruiting, "Everybody hates the fact that a job search takes three months, six months. We sort of have this expectation that the process has to be painful."

Using AI to build diverse workforces of the future

The conversation then moves to ways you can use AI to streamline and diversify your hiring process while avoiding AI that instead scales human bias and makes the world less fair.

Dr. Polli and Jeff go deep in on how pymetrics is using behavioral science and audited AI technology to build the diverse workforces of the future. "A lot of times talent is overlooked because it doesn't fit the mold. That's silly," says Dr. Polli when she explains pymetrics’ philosophy on helping you hire better at your company.

And according to Dr. Polli, "To solve the diversity problem, we need to be a little less cautious and a little more bold."

Follow Dr. Polli:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/frida-polli-phd-03a1855/

https://twitter.com/fridapolli

Check out pymetrics:

https://www.pymetrics.ai/

Follow Jeff:

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This week, Duane sits down with sociology professor Don Tomaskovic-Devey Ph.D. from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst to discuss how to engage white men and middle managers in DEIB strategies.

Dr. Tomaskovic-Devey researches the causes of workplace inequity, and he and Duane waste no time getting into it. According to Dr. Tomaskovic-Devey, "There's a disconnect between where the work normally gets done and the [company's] diversity and inclusion agenda." In the episode, why that is, who is dropping the ball, and what we all can do to help solve it.

Duane's experience from his first job until now as the Chief Diversity Officer at Cornerstone has shown him that the biggest difference between successful and mediocre DEIB initiatives is "their ability to engage white men and middle managers in the conversation and the solution."

Dr. Tomaskovic-Devey agrees on the role of white males and diversity, and he explains the two things keeping these groups of people from fully embracing and facilitating the company's DEIB efforts.

What's missing in DEIB strategies is conversation

When it comes to addressing diversity at the individual employee level, "Training is only one component," says Duane. "What's often missing is the important dialog and conversation that needs to happen prior to the training and after."

And according to Dr. Tomaskovic-Devey, science backs this up: "Most diversity training has a short-term effect for people who are already primed for the message. ... For the people who are resistant to the message, it often produces backlash."

Because training doesn't seem to have the long-term impacts we all would hope for, Duane and Dr. Tomaskovic-Devey then dig into how we change people's minds and hearts for the better.

Dr. Tomaskovic-Devey even walks us through what a few of the organizations he's studied did to have successful DEIB initiatives and how you can use his learnings in your initiatives. "The stakeholders inside the firm became empowered." When it comes to solving why diversity and inclusion strategies are struggling at any company, he says, "The real solutions here are always going to be organizational."

Tune in to the episode to learn more from Duane and Dr. Tomaskovic-Devey's conversation.

Follow Dr. Tomaskovic-Devey:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/donald-tomaskovic-devey-666873b/

https://www.umass.edu/issr/donald-tomaskovic-devey

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"We’ve not overcome the perception that women should be paid less because they need less – that's not true," says Lilly Ledbetter, activist, the namesake of the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, and this week's guest. She and Jeff sit down to discuss her fight from undervalued Goodyear manager to pay equity icon. Along the way, they discuss how to negotiate salary, equal pay for equal work, how companies can make swift, effective change, and so much more.

After spending 19 years working for Goodyear, of tire and blimp fame, Lilly discovered she was making 40% less than the white men doing the same exact job she was. The thought of how much money this had cost her and her family left her devastated. For Lilly, "I knew it wasn't right. It was not the law. I couldn't let it go." So she filed a charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and her case made it all the way to the US Supreme Court. And that's only the beginning of her storied career.

She and Jeff also discuss how the modern workplace is handling equal pay. Spoiler Alert: Lilly says, "Not as good as it should."

The Equal Pay Act was passed in 1963 and was supposed to eliminate wage discrimination from then on. "Well, it didn't," says Lilly. "Because it wasn't enforced." She and Jeff dig into why that is and what Human Resource teams can do to ensure everyone is equally paid across the board.

“My goal in life is to make a difference.” And Lilly truly has. This is a conversation not to miss!

Learn more about Lilly:

http://www.lillyledbetter.com/

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Though companies have been taking steps to address overt racism at work, microaggressions present a wholly different challenge. In this episode, Duane speaks to Dr. Ella Washington — an organizational psychology professor at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business and founder of DEI strategy and consulting agency Ellavate Solutions — about microaggressions in the workplace, their damaging impact on building a culture of belonging, and how and when to respond to them.

What is a microaggression?

According to Dr. Washington, microaggressions are “the everyday subtle, unintentional — but sometimes intentional — interactions or behaviors that communicate some type of bias towards a historically marginalized group.”

They are the seemingly innocuous things people say that are actually racist, sexist, or offensive.

Dealing with microaggressions at work

“Microaggressions, for so long, have been thought of as acceptable forms of comedy. Someone says an offhanded joke, and people laugh and kind of keep going. People don’t realize they’re being offensive,” explains Dr. Washington.

Trying to fully “solve” or “eliminate” microaggressions at work is a righteous but unattainable goal. Having an anti-discrimination policy at work isn’t enough. As Duane and Dr. Washington discuss, HR teams and leaders alike need to be consistent in handling complaints and providing training on how to identify and address microaggressions.

Tune into this episode to learn how HR professionals can be the catalyst for creating a work environment where people feel comfortable speaking up and calling out micro (and not so micro) aggressions.

Follow Dr. Washington: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ella-f-washington-ph-d-a6490761/

Check out Ellavate Solutions: https://www.ellavatesolutions.com/

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What are you doing to overcome unconscious bias? In this first episode of Season 3, Torin Ellis, diversity strategist, author, and co-host of the Crazy and The King podcast, joins Jeff to discuss what you can do in the short and long term to address and defeat unconscious bias.

Yes, more and more companies are implementing training to help boost diversity and inclusion in the workplace, but according to Torin, training isn’t nearly enough.

Training, while important, shouldn’t take the place of real action—like having difficult conversations or actually holding yourself, employees, and leaders accountable for their contributions to diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging (DEIB).

Overcoming unconscious bias is a constant journey

Knowing the unconscious bias definition can only do so much. “People and organizations lean on the academic definition as a way to be like, ‘We’re part of the good crew. We care.’ No. You don’t care enough,” says Torin. “Addressing unconscious bias is just the start.”

For him, overcoming unconscious bias is a constant journey, “I hold everyone responsible for being a better human.” Whether your company is a global enterprise, a five-person startup, or a one-person shop, in this episode, Torin challenges you to take the necessary steps to “wrestle with what it means to be human.”

Listen to the full conversation for more of Torin’s views on how to lift the “curtain of complacency and mediocrity” and be a part of meaningful change when it comes to supporting DEIB in the workplace.

And if you like the conversation, subscribe to HR Labs to never miss a future episode.

Episode correction:

At the ~11:53 min mark of the episode, Torin states that the Democratic Party hasn’t had a Black woman lead a committee in 40-something years. After the interview, Torin shared with us that he misquoted from an interview Congresswoman Brenda Lawrence conducted on #RolandMartinUnfiltered. In the interview, Congresswoman Lawrence states there hasn’t been a Black female in a Democratic Caucus leadership position in over 40 years. You can view that interview here: https://www.house.gov/leadership

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Listen to Crazy and The King:

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