On Connection

Change is a near-constant part of life, leadership, and organizational management today. There are endless books, articles, frameworks, and best practices on the subject, and yet change is still one of the things organizations struggle to manage the most. We’ve found that it isn’t actually enough to simply change. Instead, we think a mindset focused on evolution is more valuable.

So, why evolution rather than change? What’s the difference, and why does it matter? In this episode, Emma Rose is joined by Anne Murray Allen and Krista Spence, both Senior Consultants with experience leading, managing, and studying change. They talk about this distinction and what it means to adopt an evolution mindset.

The Great Resignation is just one of the COVID-era phenomena many people, especially organizational leaders, are concerned with right now. Everyone wants to know—why is this happening? And why don’t we know by now, when it’s been nearly a year since we started noticing the trend? Most of the articles you can read and podcasts you can listen to have tried to analyze what exactly is contributing and what’s to blame. There is a long list of possible explanations that have been given, but no single clear cause.

On this podcast we’re not going to be analyzing the why – you can find plenty of that elsewhere. What we’re most interested in is, how do leaders make decisions in the midst of so much pressure and uncertainty? We have a principle we think is helpful across challenges of all kinds and scales: separating facts from explanations. This is particularly valuable when it’s hard to find anything factual to anchor to and we’re swimming in a sea of explanations. That’s the case for most leaders as they face today’s “war for talent.”

Shownotes: https://bit.ly/3HEpRH3

“Flow state” has been a popular area of interest since it was studied by positive psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi over 40 years ago. To experience flow is to be fully immersed in an activity, engaged to the point of hyper focus—being “in the zone.” Whether you’re in the business world, an artist, or an athlete, that level of productivity is something we’d all love to get the secret recipe for. While primarily studied in individuals, we started wondering—can you achieve interpersonal flow? Can a team be in flow? What can leaders do to make it more accessible for those they lead? 

Emma Rose is joined by her Conversant colleagues Kell Delaney and Roger Henderson to share from their experience what we can do to encourage interpersonal and team flow. 

Find show notes for this episode here: https://bit.ly/3EOxfyG

Community is an important part of building vitality in organizations, or for any group of people that wants to achieve something together. We define vitality as “the capacity to live, grow, or develop; the presence of intellectual and physical vigor; energy.” For organizations, we say that whoever masters vitality as a source of performance has an extraordinary competitive edge and provides a deeply satisfying life for themselves and the people they lead. In this episode, we focus on why community matters and how to build the kind of community that lends to personal and collective vitality.

Link to show notes: https://bit.ly/3kH2YK3

At Conversant, we believe that conversation and connection are underutilized yet critical leverage points for achieving results. Whether it’s meetings, one-on-one check-ins, emails, or chat, studies show that leaders spend the majority of their workdays communicating. What if each of those conversations was truly valuable?

There is a design to conversations that drive value, and we can be students of that design, developing our conversational skills the same way an athlete works to get better at their sport. With practice, this skillset drives more results with less time, money, and stress. That’s why we say “the conversations are the work.” In this episode, we dive into that phrase, sharing why conversation is a worthwhile focus not just for leaders, but for anyone who wants their working and personal relationships to be a source of value and fulfillment rather than waste and stress.

You can find show notes for this episode here: https://bit.ly/3GN3uj3

At Conversant we often say “joy belongs at work.” Not only do we believe work can be joyful, we believe joy belongs at work. These two words, however, feel counter to one another more often than not. How many of us describe our workdays as "joyful"?

Juan Mobili, leadership development consultant, executive coach, and long-time friend of Conversant, has recently reflected on joy in his poetry. Juan joined Robin and Emma Rose to explore this concept of joy a bit more: How is joy different from being happy? What is work without joy? How does joy relate to authentic leadership? How does joy contribute to organizational success?

In this episode we tackle those questions and more, and get to hear some of Juan’s poetry which we hope will inspire similar reflections in all of you.

You can find show notes and learn more about Juan here: https://bit.ly/3na45lT

Should we be remote? In an office? Is hybrid the answer? These questions have been dominating business news and keeping senior leaders up at night for months. There’s no clear answer or one-size-fits-all solution, but we can learn from the leaders that are managing workplace policy decisions today.

This is the unedited version of our interview with Chris Hanslik. The edited episode features clips of our interviews with two other leaders that have also been navigating the office debate challenge. You can find that version by the title, "Leading Through the Great Office Debate: In-Office, Hybrid, or Remote?"

Should we be remote? In an office? Is hybrid the answer? These questions have been dominating business news and keeping senior leaders up at night for months. There’s no clear answer or one-size-fits-all solution, but we can learn from the leaders that are managing workplace policy decisions today.

This is the unedited version of our interview with Kevin Hanes. The edited episode features clips of our interviews with two other leaders that have also been navigating the office debate challenge. You can find that version by the title, "Leading Through the Great Office Debate: In-Office, Hybrid, or Remote?"

Should we be remote? In an office? Is hybrid the answer? These questions have been dominating business news and keeping senior leaders up at night for months. There’s no clear answer or one-size-fits-all solution, but we can learn from the leaders that are managing workplace policy decisions today.

Should we be remote? In an office? Is hybrid the answer? These questions have been dominating business news and keeping senior leaders up at night for months. There’s no clear answer or one-size-fits-all solution, but we can learn from the leaders that are managing workplace policy decisions today.

The latest episode of On Connection features three executives that have led very different approaches to this challenge: Chris Hanslik led an early return to the office for BoyarMiller, a Houston-based law firm. Kevin Hanes has been managing what a hybrid solution looks like for the cybersecurity platform Cybrary. And Sté Crispino leads Tribo, a Sao Paolo-based consulting firm that has always been remote, and she has a few things to say about building a strong culture in a virtual world.

View the show notes for this episode, along with bios for our guests, here: https://bit.ly/3BjKHbR