Episode 29: To Be a Growth Company, First Be a Great Place To Work

World Wide Technology's Ann Marr & Bob Ferrell discuss why starting with culture, people and leadership is a great business model.

Transcript

Dr. Alexandria White:    Hi, Ann and Bob. How are you doing today?

Ann Marr: Great. How are you, Alex?

Dr. Alexandria White: I am doing well. Diane and I are just excited about our conversation today, but for our listeners, we have the pleasure of actually visually seeing them. I want to talk a little bit about your working relationship. We read your bios, I see the synergy and things that you do. Tell us how you met and your working relationship.

Bob Ferrell: Ann has spent lots of time here at World Wide Technology, so I want to give her her just due.

Dr. Alexandria White: Okay.

Bob Ferrell: She's done a tremendous job in her time at World Wide in laying out the foundation for our DE&I program. She's built and oversaw an award-winning supplier diversity program. She also stood up a global community impact program. She's also did an employee engagement effort and really was the pioneer for the first ERG for our company with the women's group. We were named Great Places to Work for 12 years in a row. Much of that has to do with Ann and her team. As a result, she and I remained connected and continued these advancements efforts. We communicate regularly about our strategy. We also review the data together and our teams really have a great close working relationship together.

A great deal of what she and I do really overlaps in the DE&I and inclusion space, which means that we have to have a strong and trusting relationship that is required. And we do. We went to a Great Places to Work conference, and in the audience I set and listened to some of the speakers. One thing I took away was between the HR and DE&I, you have to learn how to dance together. One person takes the lead and the other's in support and vice versa. Ann, over to you.

Ann Marr: Yeah, Bob is very kind. I've been with the company for 25 years. What's been just amazing with Bob coming on board is he's helped really accelerate some of these initiatives with me. To his point, we have such a great relationship. We bounce a lot of things off of each other, me and my longevity with the company, but his outside perspective. That together makes just such a dynamic outcome. The different levels of experience that we each have put together really has been our way to accelerate this initiative for the company. That's really what what's important. What Bob didn't tell you, he was a three-star general with the military for 38 years. That's the level of experience that he's bringing to World Wide, so it's been just an incredible extraordinary partnership.

Dr. Alexandria White: I wanted to start with that, because as Diane and I work with companies and organizations, it's so important who you work with, right?

Ann Marr: Yeah.

Dr. Alexandria White: Because sometimes you see Bob more than you see your own family, right?

Ann Marr: That's true.

Dr. Alexandria White: It's so important to start with that because collaboration and partnership is so important in today's workplace, as we know, inclusion and belonging and making sure that you work with people that allows you to bring your whole selves to work. Well, you keep talking about this company, World Wide Technology. Tell us about it. What's your mission and who do you serve?

Ann Marr: Our mission is to be a profitable growth company that's a great place to work. As you can see, being a great place to work is really steeped in our mission. It was something that our CEO is very passionate about including, because think about that three-legged stool. Everybody wants to work for a profitable company. Growth. Growth means profitability and being a great place to work. It's hard to attract and retain great talent if you don't have a great workplace. People want to know that they're going to work in an environment that is collaborative, that's dynamic, that's energetic and has all the things, the foundational things that we talk about in the path. Who wouldn't want to work for a company like that? Our CEO says it's a three-legged stool and Bob, it is, isn't it? It really is.

Bob Ferrell: It sure is. But when you talk about the impact on our people, our community, and our customer, it's really directly related to the culture and the leadership within the company. We have what we called an integrated management leadership program. Really, that's really focused on what Ann just talked about, the three-legged stool. Our CEO did an analysis of our own culture and those success of other companies over a few decades and put together a very good program, really, designed to scale our culture globally and cultivate leaders that make employees to feel inspired and safe and valued. In fact, that's what drove me to World Wide. It was really about the culture, it was really about the people, the leadership, and the core values.

Diane Flynn: Bob, I'd love to hear more about that leadership program. It struck me when I was looking at your website that you incorporate DE&I throughout that program, and you talk about navigating difficult conversations and addressing unconscious bias and building empathy. Can you tell us a little bit more tactically how you do that?

Bob Ferrell: Well, there's a couple ways that we do that. Within our strategic plan, we have eight actionable areas. The first one is our listening sessions, and it's really key or critical that our leadership listens to our employees when it comes to what's on their mind, what are some of their concerns. In that program, we meet probably twice a week, small groups of about anywhere from 10 to 20 folks that sit down with one of our leadership and talk about... Again, 90 minutes listening at what's on their mind and then take those ideas and see how it impact as a good feedback loop from our leadership to our individual employees. Ann, did you want to talk a little bit about the actual IML training that we do on that?

Ann Marr: Yeah. The IML has been around, as Bob said, for many, many years, a couple of decades. It has stood this test of time and that was something that our CEO was very adamant about. So many of us contributed to him putting that program together, but it really is steeped in... You mentioned some of the concept of that having difficult conversations, coaching lots of concepts that, as a leader or as an employee, that are going to be valuable to you to be successful not only at World Wide. We've had feedback from employees that said this had resonated with them in their families outside. The concepts are so common, but they really hit home for anyone. When you think about having a difficult conversation with your spouse or your kids or some of those things, coaching up, coaching peers, coaching down. All these different concepts that we put into this IML are really relevant and have stood the test of time.

What we do is every new person who starts with the company, their leader is their responsibility for them to go through that IML program. It's about a two-hour program to go through each of those concepts, so they have a level set that this is an expectation of all employees, not just a leader, but the foundational things that are in that they can use throughout their journey at World Wide. So, the impact of that is so substantial and we integrated that, as Bob mentioned, into our DE&I initiatives because of the impact of that IML. It's relevant in so many ways, so we have such a great tool, let's integrate that in as many things as we can to reinforce that IML.

Bob Ferrell: When we developed the IML training training, our initial goal was to train all of our key leaders first because we wanted them to have a basic foundation understanding of what is DE&I and what is awareness, what's unconscious bias, and as Ann said, difficult conversation and empathy. After the first year, we met that goal. The next two years was to cascade it out to all of our employees. We're in the midst of doing that now. Our employee resource groups are another key indicator that provides us a very good feedback mechanism within our company as well. How do they share their culture, their relationships with the folks within the company, their events that they put on? The celebrations of monthly events are also key. Then how do they connect and strengthen our diversity within our organization? Again, the employee, we have seven of those.

Dr. Alexandria White: It sounds like DEI is embedded in the DNA at World Wide Technology. That sounds great, sounds wonderful, but we know that you get some pushback. We know that there are challenges, your personalities, your passion. What are some of those challenges that you have faced to get the DEI intertwined in the DNA in World Wide Technology, and how did you work to overcome them?

Bob Ferrell: I really have to start on a positive note. When it comes to building a culture of inclusion, there are two essential elements that must be in place at the start, and I would say it was for World Wide. The first is an authentic and enthusiastic support from your executive leadership. Now, your executive must understand the value of a diverse, equitable, and inclusive organization, and then really have specific requirements to achieve for that. If the leadership doesn't have that, you're not going to get far within your program. Second, we talked about it a little bit earlier. You must listen to your employees in order to tailor your program around specific needs within your organization. What's that feedback loop? We talked about the listening session.

And then the next thing we did... I think what's really great for us to understand how we're doing within the program, we administer an annual anonymous survey and get feedback from our employees on how to adjust the program. Again, I think it's been a positive note since I've been in the DE&I space within World Wide, because at echelon, great support from the CEO down to the lowest level of leaders within the organization.

Ann Marr: Nothing can happen without it having support at the top of the organization, and we are fortunate to have that. And you do have to pivot sometimes. You look at the feedback. You may have to change a direction or a course because it's just going to happen. And then there are outside things that change the direction. It depends on the economy, it depends on any sort of social events that happen or any catastrophic events that happen within communities within the world. I think we are very resilient, but we listen, and that's a really key part to listen. As Bob said, we have lots of mechanisms to get feedback from our employees. We're not doing ourselves a service if we're not listening and really reacting and changing a course based on the feedback that we get from our employees.

Bob Ferrell: I really want to circle back to that listening session. I said it was really led by an executive. Every Monday morning in our morning meetings, I have a chance and Ann has a chance to share feedback of how we're doing in DE&I to all of the executives. And then if an executive had a listening session that previous week, he or she talks about it. What feedback did I get back from the employees? And it's not a one and done. Sometimes, it goes 30 minutes talking about it and I think almost an hour one time, but really it's staying connected to what's on the hearts and mind of your employee is critical to ensure that you stay on track.

Diane Flynn: For companies that might be interested in hosting these listening sessions, and I marvel that you do them twice a week for 90 minutes, what would you recommend about the structure? Are they open-ended? Is there a topic? How many people attend? If you could share a few more of the details for anybody who might want to try something similar.

Bob Ferrell: Again, it's a 90-minute session and we've asked our executive team to volunteer. We don't say, "You do do this." We ask them to volunteer to host one of the sessions. We initially look at our IML integrated management program tenets and pull out some of those key topics within that. But then we look at what's happening in the world, what's happening within your community, what's happening within the company, and pick topics that may... And then we've also sent out emails to the employees to say, "What topics do you want to talk about?" So it's not us driving it. It's really open-ended, but a 90-minute session led by the executive session. I sent out an email announcing the listening session for them to sign up, and we average anywhere from 25 to 40 people that sign up for the session. Then during this session, myself or one of my DE&I teammates will accompany the executive just to monitor and take notes and provide feedback to the executive team and then quarterly back to the company on our portal site.

Ann Marr: It's a really dynamic topics. I mean, I have a session tomorrow and it's all about hybrid work. These are relevant things, as Bob said, to our employees. The participation has been amazing within the sessions. I mean, there are times where you have to look at your time and said, "Okay, we only have an hour and a half. We're trying to be mindful of people's time," but the time gets away with you when you have that kind of participation. Because we've done this and created an environment where employees really feel comfortable talking in these sessions, you do get a lot of participation, which is just incredible.

Bob Ferrell: I also talked a little bit about ERGs. Each of our ERGs has an executive sponsor and tied to the listening session. Say, it's Pride Month, the executive lead for the Pride Group would also host a listening session to talk about pride. Again, it's really dynamic, open-ended, really trying to focus what's going on in the world, community, and then here within the company.

Ann Marr: And all virtual. All virtual.

Diane Flynn: Some companies push back on employee surveys, because their concern is that if you ask, you must listen and respond. Have there been any challenges around having so many listening sessions that employees feel "they're not doing anything with my request"?

Bob Ferrell: No, I haven't. Again, we just recently did a survey for the entire company, and the top three areas that came back most liked and most attended by the employees was, one, the listening sessions, two, the employee resource groups, three, the DE&I IML training. Really, that feedback really brought a smile to both Ann and I's face, because again, there's a lot going on in the world and staying connected to your employees is critical. It ebbs and flows and then having a pulse and feedback mechanism of what's on their mind is really key, because we want it to be a great place to work for all. In order for that to happen, you got to listen.

Ann Marr: And we still do our Great Place to Work survey. That's a once a year survey, so we don't survey people out. That Great Place to Work survey is what determines us being on the Great Place to Work list. If you haven't heard, I'll tell you, 12 years in a row, number 19. I'm very proud of that. But it's because of our employees. Our employees are the reason that we're on that list and we're a great place to work. That survey is just great because it does give us a lot of feedback.

Dr. Alexandria White: You talk about your employees and the world and being a global organization. Our listeners are all over the world. As you work with global teams, what are some inclusive practices that you recommend? Where does bias show up? We have you talking about the hybrid workplace. Well, the hybrid workplace encompasses different time zones, different languages, in-person, at home, dual. So tell us a little bit about that in regards to globalization and being inclusive.

Ann Marr: I remember when we started taking the company global. One thing that we were very mindful of is the fact that everyone's not in St. Louis, everyone's not in the US. You have to be mindful of time zones. You also have to be mindful of cultures. Cultures are different around the world. For instance, the ERG Bob talked about for the Asian ERG called Ohana. We have another kind of sister group in AsiaPac with Singapore and India and China. Well, there's some modifications we realized we had to make for that, because it's a different culture than it is back in the US. We're very mindful of being a global organization and, again, we're considerate of what is going to work in the US may not work in other parts of the world. We still want that thread from what we do back here at corporate, but we have to be mindful of different cultures and how people view different things around the world. As we've grown as a global organization, we were very conscientious of that as an organization, not just from a DE&I perspective company-wide.

Bob Ferrell: One of the, again, feedback mechanism within a global company, we sit down and do a quarterly review of what's going on in APAC or what's going on in Europe. We review their program, their activities, figure out what their challenges are, what resources they need, and again, staying connected with them, making sure that, one, they've got the right level of communication on our end of what we're doing to stay connected to the corporate level initiative. But that's one of the mechanism, I think, that's been very helpful of doing a quarterly sit down with them in their entire team to review what they've done and what they want to do going forward.

Ann Marr: The other thing we really try to do with the global teams is embrace their cultures as much as anything else, celebrate their cultures because they're part of our organization. When it's Diwali, we celebrate that not only back here in the US; we celebrate it with the global team. There are things we want to embrace for them as much as back here at the US.

Diane Flynn: So much great wisdom. Okay, the final question, how do you measure the impact, the return on the investment of this time of the executive spending 180 minutes a week in listening sessions? What should others know to justify that kind of effort?

Bob Ferrell: Well, we measure it in two ways. The quantitative way, which is really looking at the survey data that we put out in our annual survey. We also account for participation with the events that we put on within the DE&I space.

Ann Marr: Well, the results are in the feedback from employees. That's a great measurement. Are employees satisfied with what we're doing. Are they engaged? Are employees excited about being here because of all the new and creative things that we're offering to them as part of being a member of this team? So, there's the data that we have and we measure that based on attendance, measure that based on progress. But some things are not measurable from data, but you know based on the feedback from employees. If you're going in the wrong direction, employees are going to tell you.

Diane Flynn: Do you look at retention and advancement?

Bob Ferrell: We do. In fact, quarterly, Ann and I sit down at our corporate level, board level, and provide feedback on all the data when it comes to retention, promotions, and everything that is aligned from a metric side of the house with DE&I. So, we track that quarterly as well.

Ann Marr: Right. Just measuring our progress and how well we're doing as an organization, really, to create the dynamic culture that we're so proud of, but really creating that culture of inclusion for the company worldwide.

Bob Ferrell: Within our strategic plan, we have three outcome areas and we have a champion that leads those outcome areas. One, we have a workforce outcome area, and then we have a business impact outcome area, and then we have a community engagement outcome area. It's led by a vice president within the company, two of which are in Ann's organization. Within our plan, we've laid out specific priorities, goals, and desired outcomes. That's what we measure on a monthly, weekly, daily basis of how we're doing outside of getting feedback, as Ann talked about, directly from the employees. But those listening sessions, again, I'm going to tell you, they're they're not bashful. They'll tell you what's on their mind.

Ann Marr: Oh, they'll you. They're not shy. Sometimes it's very spirited conversations, which is great.

Bob Ferrell: One last item that we didn't talk about but I think it's important to mention. We also have what we called a storyteller program, which is really giving an opportunity for individual employees or leaders to tell their story. Everyone has their own journey, pluses and minus, bumps and successes along the way. Diane, you may not know enough about Alex unless you listen to her story, but we found that that's another mechanism of sharing your story, to learn that much more about your coworker that will help that work environment be great. That storyteller, the listening sessions, the IML training, the spire diversity program that we have, the community engagement program we have, and then we've just elevated mental health within our strategic plan as well. All of those, to me, collectively has enabled us to, one, get good feedback, provide good guidance, and adjust the program.

Ann Marr: Yeah. It reinforces being a great place to work for all employees, because these things cut across not just some employees. This is for all employees globally, so we keep that in mind. These are very impactful things and we have had feedback from employees and some of these things that have been truly inspiring.

Dr. Alexandria White: You said it, Ann, with “impactful”. I'm actually going to add “intentional”. Diane and I, at ReBoot Accel, we work with a lot of companies. And as you have talked, we have listed these impactful, intentional things that you are doing. The listening session, I'm still in awe. The storytelling... Storytelling is the new currency. When we talk to clients in organizations, we say, "If you want that sense of belonging, listen and learn about people's others identity." So I firmly agree with that. As we close out, is there anything else that comes to mind about the passion that you and Bob are this passionate, intentional work to not only make World Wide a better place to work, but overall, communities, organizations?

Bob Ferrell: Well, I really wanted to share one last best practice for those organizations either currently setting up their program or managing the program. It's really a message to the leadership is to ensure that those individuals and teams who are responsible for driving the DE&I in the organization, really, empower them. Empower the program managers or the stakeholders to create and manage an effective DE&I program. And then your program must be data driven. Establish those goals that are specific, actionable, and tied to metrics, and then you review that with the leadership for accountability. Those are the two things that I wanted to kind of share that we try to practice daily on is empowering the folks within the company, empowering those ERDs, listening sessions, as well as, again, focused on metrics and actionable areas.

Ann Marr: And the last thing I'll say about that, it's a journey. It is a journey. Rome was not built in a day. You have to realize that. You have to look farther along and there's progress you make along the way. You're not going to do everything at the same time. You are going to have some bumps in the road, address those as you're going, but you have to look at it as a long-term journey. And it has to be sustainable. It can't be one and done. You really have to lean in and say, "We're doing this for the long haul," but really it is a journey, not a sprint. That's what I would leave you with.

Dr. Alexandria White: Thank you.

Diane Flynn: Thank you so much for your time, Ann and Bob. You have provided some of the most concrete, actionable wisdom I think we've heard on this podcast, and that is what people are looking for. I think there are a lot of leaders out there who want to do the right thing. They don't know where to start. I think you made such a compelling case to start by listening and hearing people's stories and then the right actions can come from that. Thank you so much for your time. We are honored to have you with us and go forth and continue building that great culture.

Ann Marr: All right. Thank you, guys.

Bob Ferrell: Thank you.