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Your words matter

Mon, 22 Apr 2024 19:43:38 GMT

23rd April 2024

"Unfortunately, you are not our choice for the role". I was gutted. Even though in my head I had made the decision that this organisation was also not my choice, it still stung. No one wants to be rejected for a job. As I sat there, attempting to come to terms with this news, the manager continued to speak, offering unsolicited advice.

"You're young" he said. Two words that were seemingly innocent on his behalf had the ability to cut through to my insecurities. Now I could write about all the ways that this organisation screwed up in the hiring process, but this is not what this post is about. This post is about the power of our words.

I know many people may laugh and say being told you are young is a compliment and socially you would be right. At 42 at times, I can still look like I'm in my 20's which is not a bad problem to have. The problem though is that my whole life I have felt young.

When I was in my 20s, a woman in Costco stopped me when I tried to get a food sample – she told me that I needed a parent with me to sample the food. I was married.

There have been times when I have felt like people haven’t taken me seriously. I have at times felt like a child that doesn't know what she's talking about and deep down I want to be heard. I want to be taken seriously. A friend of mine laughed sympathetically and suggested I should dye my hair grey. While she joked about it - it's something I've considered! More so, this one word played at a much deeper insecurity.

"You don't know enough"

"You aren't smart enough"

"Who do you think you are?"

All lies I know but equally have the power to destabilize me and stop me completely from pursuing my purpose.

Words matter. They carry an incredible weight, and we must take care with what we choose to say. I know I am guilty of saying the wrong words. Words that can hurt when we put them out there without much care or thought.

Today I feel older than my years. I feel a little tired that leadership is not always taken seriously. I'm tired of hearing stories about people who are broken because of the wrong words that have been said to them. Leadership is a privilege and it's a big responsibility. While it is about helping an organisation succeed, the people who are reporting to you need to be handled with care. They are not some cogs in a machine. They have real emotions, and everyone has areas of insecurity. Areas that to some seem funny to mention – how loud someone is, how slow moving someone might be, how clumsy someone appears. We all have triggers from labels that can elicit a reaction.

Take time to get to know your people. By building a relationship with them, you may learn some of their insecurities and they will come to have grace for you when you say the wrong thing. Because you will. Most importantly be careful with your words.

The middle matters

Tue, 20 Feb 2024 19:00:48 GMT

21st February 2024

A few years ago, I had the privilege to hire one of the best managers I have worked with to date. The department he was entering was incredibly challenging to lead. Most staff were entry level, the shift patterns were unkind, and the attrition and sick leave rates were through the roof. No one wanted to work in this area of the business and keeping a manager there was difficult. It was an HR nightmare. Within 12 months in the role, this new manager turned the department around. Suddenly staff were asking to report to him, sick leave was more than halved, and attrition rates plummeted. In addition to this, productivity increased in his area of work and engagements scores for his staff were higher than any other department.

How did he do it? Simply put - he was a good leader. He took time to communicate with his people, he explained “the why” every chance he could, and he treated his people as equals. That didn’t mean he was a pushover. In fact, he was very clear on his expectations, and he was quick to follow a process when it was required – making my job easier. He was however compassionate, listened to his staff and attempted to put out fires as soon as they arose. I talked to him once about development into a higher position, but he wasn’t interested. He liked middle management and the influence he had to impact the business.

I would argue that your middle managers are one of the most important roles that exist in any organisation. A good middle manager has the biggest influence on your internal company culture and determines how effectively work is outputted. If you have limited time and resources to grow and develop people, then I believe that this is the layer of development you should be focusing on.

Investing in good middle managers makes sense. Its important to recognise their value and treat them well. Its also important to understand that these roles are some of the hardest in the organisation. There is pressure coming from multiple sides and if you don’t ensure that they have the tools and the resources that they need to manage well, eventually that pressure may become too much.

For a middle manager to lead effectively they need time with their people. One research done in the states in 2014 has indicated that the optimum time a manager should spend with their individual report is 6 hours a week per person. This research showed a 29% increase in employee engagement to their work. From my experience, most managers would struggle to find 6 hours a week per individual report, but the reality is that many managers don’t even have the time to spend 20 minutes one on one per person. The consequences of this can be detrimental and often leads to staff issues, low morale, and poor output. While managers often don’t have time to spend with people, they also can’t afford to not spend their time with them.

When hiring a middle manager, its important that you don’t set them up for failure. Even the best leader is not a superhero. It’s important that you help to analyse how much time a leader can devote to their team while having to complete their own work. The more people that report to them, then the less time they will have to spend on projects or administrative tasks. If they are rewarded more for the project work, then they will likely prioritise this over time spent with people and your organisation will suffer. Take the time to talk to your middle managers and make sure that they have the tools they need to succeed. Invest in a training plan to ensure that they know how to lead effectively and can prioritise the right things. They are the key to creating a great Employee Experience in your organisation.

The importance of routine

Tue, 06 Feb 2024 18:36:20 GMT

7th February 2024

With most of the schools starting today, for many families this means that routines are back. For our family, school was back last week, and I will admit that there was a collective relief by all. Of course, we are sad that those lazy summer days are behind us, but in the weeks leading up to the new school year, boredom was starting to creep in, and tensions were building.

Routine doesn’t come naturally to me. I am usually a “fly by the seat of my pants” sort of person. My adaptability allows me to shift gears daily and I can easily be taken away from my focus. Even today as I write this post, my social media plan tells me that I should be writing about habits – but I changed my mind because this post seemed to fit better.

My oldest is like me. When she was born, she easily fit into my chaotic way of life and was a joyful little bundle who slept like a rock-star. In my mind I had cracked parenting. Kids didn’t need routine – they just needed parents who were easy going. Right? How wrong I was.

When my son was born two years later, he was the opposite of his sister. He slept very little and had a cry that could get inside your head and rattle your brain cells. At six months old, I finally figured out that he needed routine. When I had a set schedule for his feeding and sleep times, he started to sleep better at night and was a happier more content baby.

To this day my son still craves routine. He gets up at the same time every morning and has a set routine before school. When he comes home, he is the same. Following routines make him feel in control of his time, helps him know what to expect and gives him a sense of achievement for his day.

What I have come to learn through my son is that both myself and my daughter, although we are more adaptable, also benefit from routines (if we have the freedom to flex from time to time). Without routine we tend to flit around, and our days and weeks can pass us by without any real achievement of anything.

As a leader, its important to recognise how vital routines are for you and for your people. Especially for those whose roles shift into more strategic work with less task focused activities. As an office, take some time to work out with your team their daily routines and then work to help hold each other accountable for these. I hate to say it but often as leaders we can easily de-rail other people’s routines because of our own objectives. By understanding and agreeing to the routines that your team members work by, you will help to create a greater sense of achievement, increase productivity and your people will have overall a greater satisfaction with the work they are performing. You will also have a clear understanding of what everyone should be working on, where they should be, and you will be less likely to distract them unless necessary.

Is the employee annual review outdated?

Tue, 23 Jan 2024 19:03:43 GMT

24th January 2024

While it feels sad that the holidays are well behind us, there is one aspect that I am always a little bit happy to say goodbye to: the obligatory meetups. The holiday gatherings with people you only see once a year. Parties with distant relatives, work dinners as a tagalong partner or drinks with suppliers that want to show you how important you are to them. These gatherings are often awkward with the same two questions: “How has your year gone?” and “What are your holiday plans?” While I don’t mind the small talk, as I get older, I seem to have less tolerance for it and become bored with having to repeat myself.

I can’t help but think that the annual employee reviews bear somewhat of a resemblance to this situation. Perhaps I am a little dramatic in my thinking and I would hope that most employees have a sit-down conversation with their boss more than once a year. But I am enough of a realist to know that many organisations do not value regular sit downs and instead the annual review becomes an obligatory trail of paperwork that both the employer and the employee dread.

The good news is that in the HR world, the annual performance review is becoming a thing of the past. More and more organisations are ditching this long-hated system and instead are moving to a model that is regularly reviewing the performance and development of the individual.

It is important to note that annual wage reviews are still happening, however the important conversations involving feedback, relationship building and creating a plan of development for the employee are happening in more frequent bursts with measurable goals that are constantly being reviewed and tweaked over the year.

These conversations are not meant to be cumbersome but instead are all about helping the Employee succeed. Performance and Development conversations not only help to build a plan of success for an employee, but they also address issues that the individual may be facing, brainstorm solutions on overcoming these issues and allow for important vulnerability and relationship building between the Employer and Employee. If done well, these regular catch ups can help to build trust and understanding, provide role clarity and clear up misunderstandings. Most importantly, these conversations mean that there should be no surprises when an annual wage review is conducted.

Key Guidelines for setting up a performance and development process

· Consult with your employees to discuss the purpose of the regular catch up. Its important that the intent of this process is positive and it’s about helping your employees develop.

· Agree on measures that everyone will be provided feedback on. These might be things like behaviours that align to your values, health and safety practices and/or specific KPIs related to an individual’s role.

· Agree on the cadence of the conversations. At a minimum I believe that these should happen once every three months. So that it is a priority, add it to your calendars.

· Create an easy to complete form that provides an opportunity for the employee to fill in ahead of time and the employer to put comments in following the conversation. Remember the purpose of the conversation is not to be another administration task – it’s about the conversation! For some employees however, the feedback in writing is valuable to them and having specific agreed actions in writing helps to clear up any ambiguity or misunderstanding. Furthermore, for employees that may require a disciplinary process, these reviews can be a helpful record of clear and specific feedback.

As most New Zealand organisations head into the final quarter of the year, now is the time to start planning for the new financial year. Why not think about doing things a little bit different that focuses on better engaging your employees. Having a regular session of feedback that helps to develop trust and communication is a great place to start.

Being aware of your assumptions

Tue, 05 Dec 2023 19:09:01 GMT

6th December 2023

Early on in my career I found myself on the other side of the HR table. There had been a misunderstanding with another staff member, and we had to go through mediation. This was one of the most uncomfortable moments and something I don’t wish to repeat again but I learned something valuable about myself that day. I realised that up to that point in my life, I had an in-built assumption that people did not like me when they first met me and that I needed to prove myself likeable. This small little lie that cultivated itself in the inner working of my brain affected how I interacted with people and little social cues I picked up on throughout the day from the people around me. I would interpret a frown to mean that I had annoyed someone, or an icy demeanor meant that a person was angry with me.

At that moment I realised that I was still looking at myself through the lens of a child and needed to grow up. I was a likeable person and most of the time the frowns and the cold shoulders had nothing to do with me – especially in the workplace. This realisation was incredibly freeing, and I began to be able to accept people for who they were and not constantly be on the defense when their mood was less than positive.

We operate with assumptions every day and far more so in the workplace. It’s no wonder because we don’t really know the team of people that we work with well so to understand how we all fit together, we can only fill in the pieces of what we don’t know with our own world view and experiences. Left unchecked these assumptions can become incredibly damaging to the workplace and can form a toxic culture. Leaders are not immune to this. We assume that someone knows what we mean by our instructions and then assume the worst when they don’t do what we asked. We assume that when someone leaves early for the day, they are trying to do the bare minimum of work. We assume that staff are ungrateful because they have not said thank you for something you did for them. The list is endless.

So how do we shut down these damaging assumptions that we form every day? Here are some things that I think can help:

1) Start with your own assumptions – be aware of your reaction to situations and what lies you might be telling yourself about a situation? Could you be wrong? If so, try and reframe your thoughts with a positive spin. “Perhaps John left early because he started early or is doing extra work in the evening to make up the time”.

2) Don’t be afraid to share your misassumptions with the team at team meetings. Vulnerability can open conversation, and everyone can start to recognise and unpack their own dangerous assumptions.

3) Find a way to discover personalities together within your team. Simply understanding that we operate differently and communicate differently can shut down a lot of assumptions that we make.

4) Don’t be afraid to clarify motivations with a person. Its better to have a difficult conversation with an employee to clarify something that you are interpreting rather than let it fester and affect the way that you see them.

Lastly, I believe that in the workplace the greatest way to quiet assumptions is through building trust. We must get to know one another, and this takes time. It takes multiple points of connections. As a leader it’s important to engage with your team. Sit with them at lunch or morning tea and ask them questions. Don’t skip the regular one on ones with your staff member. Seek to understand who they are and what is going on in their lives and create moments where staff can get to know one another. By being curious about the person who works for you and not assuming the

Whats underneath the house?

Mon, 20 Nov 2023 19:36:49 GMT

21st November 2023

Have you ever smelled something that you just could not pinpoint what it was? You do everything you can to find the source – you check the kitchen cloths, the fridge, and even the back of the cupboard for rotten potatoes. Years ago, I found myself looking for a smell. The problem was that I was the only one who could smell it. My husband Shane thought it was all in my head and I did too after a few weeks. Over time it got worse. Something was rotten and it was starting to drive me crazy. After two months I began to think I was crazy and started to google medical issues that created phantom smells.

One afternoon I bent down to pick something up in a cupboard. The smell instantly hit me, and I knew in that moment I was not crazy. I called Shane to check it out and he finally admitted that I was right. It wasn’t long before he discovered that the smell was not coming from the closet but was coming from underneath the house.

Shane suited up in old clothes and a headtorch and headed under the house, half expecting to find a dead rodent. What he found was much worse. He emerged looking horrified and informed me that most likely several months earlier the connection to our insinkerator (garbage disposal) had come loose and rather than food waste going into the system, it was being deposited directly under our house. We were essentially living on a compost heap. Shane quickly called the plumber who instantly refused to come as he knew what we were up against, but he was helpful enough to give Shane instructions on how to fix the mess. Im not quite sure how my husband managed to get the job done without spewing but he got there in the end and our house was back to normal with a strong smell of disinfectant.

The story was not over, however. Within a few days we had a few visitors. Having cut off the food supply, the mice came looking for food in the house. Over the course of 2 days, we managed to catch 10 mice. I will never forget the constant sound of the traps snapping in the middle of the night.

Why am I telling you this story? I think that the employee experience can be a little bit like this situation. As leaders sometimes we are unable to smell things that may be going on in the organisation. We may put into place initiatives that we think will be important to our people, but they seem to land flat and instead our employees complain and we feel resentful, unable to understand why no one appreciates what we do for them. The truth is that we can be clouded by what is important to us and we can miss the “smells”. Over time, if we don’t locate the source of a smell, it can grow and can become toxic.

As a leader, its likely you have people in your organisation who can sniff out the issues. The ones who can sense the smallest shift in dynamics or who can walk in a room and just know something isn’t right. Its ok if you don’t notice these things – you can’t be good at everything! However, to ensure that you maintain the health of your organisational culture, it’s important to take the time to listen to these people so that you can take the time to investigate what is going on.

The Employee Experience is not about giving employees what they want – its about taking the time to really listen and understand what they need so that they can do their best work and your organisation can flourish. If you are struggling with some smells in your organisation, I’d love to set up a time to chat and help you discover what might be growing under the house.

Consistency is key

Thu, 02 Nov 2023 19:32:25 GMT

3rd November 2023

Bedtime. Every parent knows the challenges associated with getting kids to bed. It’s a battle I assumed would get easier over time but teenagers changed the rules. “Everyone has a later bedtime” my 15-year-old complained one evening. Sympathetic to the fact that she is getting older and some of the rules need to relax I agreed it was time to let her stay up later to read. One problem – I forgot to tell my husband. Five minutes later he walked into her room and told her off for having her light on. You can imagine this did not go down well.

As a leader we can think that everyone should know the standards – to us it’s obvious. What time work starts, when breaks should be, where things belong. The problem is that different leaders can place a different value on what they see as a battle worth fighting. In these instances, standards can get muddied, and this can create issues.

Employees are looking at your consistency. Do you come in hot on an issue but let it slide the next day? If you have a team of leaders, does one leader let standards slide more than another? This creates confusion and employees may not know what the expectations are. Setting standards and adhering to them will ensure that everyone is on the same page and people will be clear on the areas that are important to the company. To get consistency for your team, here are some steps that I suggest following:

1) Define the standards. As a team its important to sit down and set your non negotiables. Answer the question “what does good look like in our team?”. For my husband and I we needed to discuss what the new bedtime for our 15-year-old would be.

2) Communicate the standards. Once we decided that lights must be out at 9:30pm it was time to discuss it with our 15-year-old. When talking with her, its important not to just tell her the standard but to explain why. A rule is more likely to be followed if you can explain why its important. During this discussion you should also discuss the barriers that may prevent someone from following the newly set standard. Additionally, you should also explain that you will be monitoring the standard and be clear on what will happen when the standard is not followed.

3) Remove the barriers . Once you have had a conversation with the team, its important to show that you were listening. Removing the barriers that you can remove is an important part of this step. For our daughter, not knowing the time was a barrier to turning her light out at 9:30pm. A simple solution of purchasing a clock for her bedroom fixed this problem.

4) Monitor. Many people hate the idea of monitoring. Why can’t someone just start to follow a new standard? The reality is that habits are hard to break. People may also test how serious you are. Once the lights off standard has been set, my husband and I need to get off the couch to check. This seems tedious and hard work but by monitoring we are showing we mean business. Once it appears a new habit is formed you can back off and only monitor occasionally.

5) Hold accountable. The last step is holding someone accountable when the standard is not followed. This will be different based on the standard set. I recommend starting with a gentle warning the first time the standard is broken and then following a more robust disciplinary process.

It is easy to set a standard and communicate it with the team. The hard part is in the monitoring and holding people accountable. This is when being a leader is hard. You can feel like the bad guy, and no one wants to be that guy. By being consistent and setting clear standards your staff in the long run will know exactly what is expected of them and will see you as a fair leader. They will come to respect you far more than if you don’t follow up on the standards set.

Dear Parents of Gen Z

Wed, 25 Oct 2023 19:53:23 GMT

26th October 2023

Early on in my parenting, one of the things I took on was that my role as a parent was to raise great adults, not great children. Most of the way that I parent and the decisions I have made over the years have centred around this philosophy. For me, one of the important things for my own children entering adulthood is that they know who they are and can bring their unique value to the world around them. As the workplace is somewhere we are a large portion of the week, then I believe that preparing for work is an important part of raising my own children into adults.

This is not always easy. As most children get older, they graduate from needing us to tell them what to do. The more independent they become in an area, the more they need our coaching instead of directing. This requires asking questions and giving advice. Eventually as they become confident, then they simply need our support – standing on the sideline cheering and close enough just in case we are needed. I am learning that in some areas my oldest seems to teeter between the coaching and the supporting phase. Very rarely does she want my feedback or my input, which is hard for this mama if I’m honest. Instead, she would prefer to work things out herself and find her own way. Sometimes I think I’m looking in a mirror. Sorry mum and dad!

I would say I’m not too alone in this teenage space and can see many of you parents feeling a bit helpless like me. So, what can you do when your teenager hits this phase, and they are suddenly faced with a lot of decisions that they need to make about their future? How do we as parents support them and help them to make decisions that will help them to become a “good adult”? Ive put together some thoughts on this, both from my experience as a parent but also as an HR Manager that has experience hiring youth. I hope that some of this will give you some wisdom on what things are important to focus on as you guide your youth to the world of work and what battles are possibly not worth fighting.

Assisting Young People in Navigating Their Futures and Decision-Making:

Rather than asking, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" Acknowledge that career paths are often non-linear. Research shows that people will change careers 7 times in their lifetime! Encourage young individuals to view decisions as the next logical step based on what they know about themselves currently, with room for change as they better understand themselves.
Understand that university isn't the sole path to success. High student loans and a competitive job market are prompting young people to explore various career avenues. Encourage an open-minded approach to education, considering experience and individual goals.
Be mindful of your attitudes towards work at home. Young people may be influenced by your views on work-related stress. Avoid passing on negative perceptions and strive to foster a positive attitude toward work.
Identify and nurture your child's inherent strengths, which can be a guide for their future. For instance, a child that displays high empathy may find fulfilment working with children, the elderly, or animals. Clifton Strengths has a full list of 34 strengths that you can read about to help give you more information. The test is recommended for 16 years and over which can be a great way to discover core strengths and give anyone a greater understanding of how they contribute value to the world.
Be open to evolving career options. The job market is constantly changing, and seemingly unconventional careers which may seem crazy to our generation are quite viable choices. Encourage your child to evaluate their motivations and work ethic for any chosen path.

Preparing Young People for the Workplace:

Teach your youth what employers value most: showing up, punctuality, a willingness to work, and a positive attitude. These qualities are highly sought after and can set them up for success in the workplace.
Discuss different personality types and communication styles to help young individuals understand workplace dynamics and manage their expectations about people.
Provide insight into what to expect in the workplace. Many young people have unrealistic expectations about their roles and responsibilities and may turn their noses up to jobs like sweeping the floor. Initiate conversations to manage these expectations effectively.
Offer your support as an advocate for your child in the workplace. Young individuals may make mistakes as they learn. Make sure they know you're there to help and guide them, even in challenging situations like disciplinary hearings. Your presence can make a difference.

While it can be a hard time to navigate, giving your young person as many tools as possible will help make the transition easier. If like myself, you find yourself with an independent capable young person who only wants your support, consider outside help. I offer a 7-week course that helps to prepare young people for this next stage of life and am more than happy to chat to you more about this.

Gen Z in the workplace - part 2

Thu, 19 Oct 2023 20:12:28 GMT

20th October 2023

“Coming through” the woman would bark loudly, and I would have to squeeze up against the counter as she barged past. This was a common scenario in my first job in New Zealand working at a busy cafe. I was only 19 at the time and there was a group of young staff including myself that were constantly pushed around and belittled by a few of the long serving staff. Now you would call it bullying but at the time that wasn’t really a phrase passed around. For many young people entering the work force at that time it appeared to be acceptable and almost a right of passage to be treated rudely, teased, or given the worst jobs.

I can’t say that the experience increased my resilience, and I didn’t stay in the job long. I also don’t think I learned anything from that situation other than how not to treat people. While I would like to think that we have moved on from this time, the reality is that bullying is still present (we just have a term for it now). As young people enter the workforce, its more important than ever that as employers we are monitoring how well the team incorporates the new staff member. Here are some key things I believe that will help you ensure your young people feel safe and welcome as they enter the workplace as well as help with team dynamics:

Training in communication styles –Understanding that different people communicate differently and how to adapt your communication style can prevent misunderstandings and conflicts.
Gain an awareness of strengths – Whether it be through DISC assessments, or a strengths-based evaluation, understanding the diversity of strengths and behaviours in the team can enhance teamwork and give everyone an appreciation of what makes each individual valuable to the organisation.
Develop workplace norms – You cannot assume that a young person will know expected workplace etiquette and behaviours. To prevent tension between colleagues, team norms can set ground rules around what is and is not acceptable in your organisation. Things like not checking personal messages on your phone, interruptions of colleagues and dishes should be understood from the beginning to make an easier transition and prevent any unnecessary tension.
Give space for engagement – Never before has a generation wanted to give their perspective and be part of the decisions than this generation and giving them a forum that allows them to speak their voice will help them feel part of the bigger picture. It also ensures that you have a safe and confidential way that allows young people to voice their concerns that they may not feel comfortable addressing with a manager.
Prioritise Mental Health Awareness – Mental distress is highest amongst young people aged 15 to 24 and there is a steady increase in the number of New Zealanders experiencing mental distress. The more that we can talk about mental health awareness in our workplaces, the more we can make it a safe space for our young people to open up about their struggles.
Regularly review your policies – Regularly review policies in areas such as Bullying, Discrimination and Harassment and include a cross section of employees in all age groups to give their feedback on these policies to ensure that policies are still relevant to all generations.

If you have not considered these areas of focus for your business, it may feel overwhelming to make a start but not doing anything can put you and your staff at risk. Furthermore, these areas don’t just apply to young people and can be just as relevant for all generations. Try to bring your team together and talk about the areas that they think are most important to prioritise and then make a timeline to work through these. Consider outside help to come in and facilitate any of the training, engagement, or review of policies. I would love to chat about how I can be of assistance to your organisation in any of these areas.

Gen Z in the workplace

Tue, 10 Oct 2023 23:00:50 GMT

11th October 2023

When I was 17, I felt the pressure of needing to know what my future looked like but had no clear career path in mind. Choosing a university was another hurdle – stay local or take out a huge loan to venture out of state. I was an adventurer and ready to spread my wings, but the idea of spending a large sum of money on something that I wasn’t even sure about seemed crazy to me. Luckily my parents were open minded, and they suggested I take a gap year to New Zealand. This was unconventional for Americans at the time but as a rebel to societies norms, I loved the idea of bucking the trend and headed off to Aotearoa (land of the long white cloud). This was the best decision I could have made.

Twenty-five years later and I think I have finally found my calling. As I watch today’s young people in high school, I see the same anxieties that I had about needing to have it all figured out. Many have witnessed their parents in stressful jobs, and they don’t want to have the same experience, and can you blame them? We haven’t exactly made it look easy.

Gen Z have started entering the workforce now and they, along with Millennials are being labeled as the “entitled generation” with a perceived lack of work ethic. Employers are struggling with how to integrate this new generation into their workforce and are largely unprepared for the societal shift.

While I may not be an expert when it comes to Gen Z, I do have experience integrating youth into the workplace. In my previous role, a quarter of our staff were Rangatahi (age 17 to 24). In addition to this I am a mum of two Gen Z teens. Yes, there are challenges, as there have been with every new generation entering the workforce, especially when we have up to five generations working side by side.

I have a lot to share on this topic, so over the next few weeks, I’ll touch on some key strategies that workplaces can adopt to prepare for and nurture these future leaders. To start with:

Create Pathways – While retention strategies are important, long gone are the days of an employee staying in a role for 20 years. Instead, the average tenure of an employee sits between 3 and 5 years and for Gen Z its between 2 and 3 years. The reality is that world has changed, and employees are less loyal to organisations. To address these issues, I believe a greater emphasis needs to be placed on career pathways within organisations. I have seen many young people come into an organisation and expect to progress quickly, making their demands vocal. They want to be paid and have the same responsibility as someone who has been with the organisation for a few years longer than them. Perhaps this is the reason that the term “entitled” is being used. I don’t necessarily think that this is the employees’ fault, however and these attitudes usually stem from poorly communicated expectations. A well-constructed clear and transparent pathway that outlines time frames and provides training plans for individuals will help to manage expectations if communicated from the very beginning. By having a clear training and development plan, you also protect the organisation from having knowledge leave the organisation when a long standing staff member leaves.

Prioritise Coaching – As digital natives our young people have had access to more knowledge at their fingertips than any other generation. The challenge is that knowledge does not necessarily make someone an expert and the information learned is not always correct or relevant to the workplace. To help our young people succeed I believe an emphasis on coaching is important. A coach can help our young people make sense of the constant influx of information, manage expectations, learn to engage with other generations and help boost their productivity amongst other benefits. Growing up with technology doesn't automatically equip our Rangatahi with effective self-management skills and it’s important to provide them with assistance in developing the right tools for success.

The world is changing and so is the nature of work and it’s important that as organisations we are adapting to meet the needs of this future workforce. We need to provide them with the opportunities to grow and the support that they need to succeed.

Do you have IDS?

Tue, 03 Oct 2023 20:08:23 GMT

4th October 2023

Years ago, after observing my husband and his interactions with strangers, I came up with a disease that I think many people suffer with – I call it IDS which stands for Instant Dislike Syndrome. The main symptom of this disease really speaks for itself – you dislike some or most people immediately upon meeting them. The difficultly is that if someone is disliked by you, they must prove their likeability to you, and this can take a long time. If someone has IDS and they instantly like you, you will probably be in their inner circle for life and can do no wrong. If you are reading this and laughing, then I would suspect that you or someone you love probably has this “disease”.

The reality is that within 30 seconds most of us have formed an opinion about someone we have just met. This opinion can lead to judgements that are difficult to break and can affect whether you become friends with that person and in the world of work can affect whether you hire someone or not. We call this the first impression bias, and it can be dangerous when it comes to hiring.

While I tend to have an intuition about people, I am not immune to this bias. Early on, I learned that sometimes the smooth talkers who drew me in and had an ability to charm the room could easily fool me and become a problem later. I’ve also been proven wrong about someone I wasn’t impressed with upon meeting them only to have them become a rock star employee.

We all have biases that affect our opinion on whether someone will be a good worker based on our past experiences with people and this can be unfair to any individual. Everyone deserves a fair chance to put their best foot forward and its important as hiring managers that we can put aside our opinions and make an informed decision about someone. To ensure that you do this, here are a few suggestions when you are looking to recruit a new hire:

1) Come up with decision criteria and create a scoring matrix before hiring that will allow you to fairly assess everyone based on their knowledge, skills and abilities required for the job.

2) Design an interview process that starts with a phone interview and ends with a panel who help you to make a final decision. Its important that this process is fair and consistent for all candidates.

3) If you are likely to form a bias based on a person’s culture, generation, or gender, think about having someone un-biased pre-screen your applicants and remove the names from their resumes so that you don’t form a first impression before even meeting someone.

As New Zealand becomes more diverse, we need to recognise that our first impressions of people are not always going to be right, and we are at risks of making decisions on hires that are discriminatory in nature. By not recognising our own biases we can miss out on incredible perspectives, thoughts and ideas that are unique to our own. The first step is awareness. By setting up a good hiring process that treats all individuals equal, you can ensure that you are making fair and informed decisions.

When you feel like a fraud

Tue, 26 Sep 2023 19:45:06 GMT

27th September 2023

“Please don’t call my name” I thought to myself, doing everything I could to avoid making eye contact with my coach, desperately hoping that she forgot that I was even there. I was on the top girls’ basketball team but was the weakest link and I knew that everyone knew it. As soon as I hit the court, I screwed up in just about any way possible. Its likely I made one basket the whole season and that was probably in the opposition’s basket.

I had trialled well which is why I was on the team. I could shoot, pass, and dribble and I was tall for my age. I had all the skills a basketball player needed. For some reason though, as soon as it was game time – those skills went out the window and I lost the ability to play.

Fast forward 30 years and there are times that I still feel like that 12-year-old on the basketball court. I have all the skills I need to do this business. I am ready for this. But when it comes to game time, its easy to doubt myself and whether I even have a right to be playing the game. Does this sound familiar to you? It’s called imposter syndrome and I’ve come to learn that many people struggle with this at some point – in fact up to 82% of people at some point feel like a fraud.

The reality is that it is normal to feel like this when you are doing something new. Let’s face it, we all must start somewhere but a perceived lack of experience and the desire to achieve can leave us feeling inadequate or not good enough. While it can be a normal feeling, the challenge with imposter syndrome is that if unchecked, it can affect our ability to push past that uncomfortable feeling of self-doubt and fear of failure and move towards growth as an individual both professionally and personally.

I wish I could tell you that I pushed past those feelings and my basketball career took off at the age of 12. Sadly though, I talked to my coach and asked to be relegated to a lower team and eventually I stopped playing basketball. Now, as those familiar feelings emerge, it can be easy to give up and go back to where I was. Go back to what was comfortable. I’m not that 12-year-old anymore and I am determined to shut out that internal noise, make a point to focus on the positive, let go of the uncontrollable and get used to that terrible uncomfortable feeling every time I do something new (which seems to be a regular occurrence lately!).

If you are in a similar stage, don’t give up! Let go of your need to be perfect and go easy on yourself. Most of all, don’t be afraid to share your feelings with those around you – you may be surprised to find that you are not alone.

Mental Health Awareness Week

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 20:47:07 GMT

19th September 2023

When I was young, I spent much of my days feeling afraid. When dark skies came, it meant a storm was coming and I would hide myself in our cement basement next to the scary furnace monster until it had passed. At firework displays I would hide under my seat or in the car until they were over (I have great sympathy for my dog when Guy Fawkes Day comes around). If I was walking down the road and saw a dog, I would walk across the road to avoid it or would even turn around altogether. Many things would set me off and my brain would turn a thought over and over until I was consumed by my fear.

My dad recently apologised to me for not realising how scared I had been – he had no idea. As a child I didn’t have the words or the voice to talk about my fear. Now as an adult I have learned how my brain works and have understood how to better manage anxiety when it rears its head in my life. For me this is taking time to focus on being grateful, connecting with other people and spending time in nature.

I think as a society we have gotten better about talking about what’s going on in our brains and many kids have tools that we never had to be able to give them a voice. The sad reality however is that there is very little resources available to help our youth who need support. I also think we still don’t do a great job as adults in our ability to be able to communicate with those around us when thinks are not ok. Especially in the workplace.

The last few years have been challenging and my general feeling is that many people are only just coping. This week is Mental Health Awareness Week and I think it’s an important time to be able to take a step back and have an awareness of where our own mental health is at. Each day of the week is focusing on a different theme that helps to boost your mental health. Five Ways in Five Days. You can find an in depth description for each day at www.mhaw.nz and follow me on my Instagram or Facebook account to see my own ideas for the different themes.

Today’s theme is GIVE. It is all about kindness. To thank those who have supported my business since it has started – being my cheerleader or providing me with work, I have created themed cookies in line with each day of the week. I couldn’t do it without you! As my gift to you, my reader – I am sharing with you the recipe of these cookies. These are my very favourite and don’t last long in my house when they are made. I hope you enjoy!

Chocolate Shortbread Cookies

Ingredients (makes 5 dozen cookies)

2 cups confectioners’ sugar

¾ cup Dutch process cocoa powder

3 ¼ cup all-purpose flour

½ teaspoon salt

1 ½ cups butter, chilled and cubed

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 eggs

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C)

In a large bowl, stir together the sugar, cocoa, flour and salt until well blended. Cut in the butter until lumps are no larger than peas. Add eggs and vanilla; mix until a stiff dough forms. It may take some time to come together but don’t panic – it will.

On a lightly floured surface, roll out dough to ¼ inch thickness and cut into desired shapes using cookie cutters. If dough is too sticky chill in the fridge. Place cookies 2 inches apart on an ungreased baking sheet.

Bake 8 to 10 minutes in the preheated oven or until the surface appears dry.

Allow cookies to cool for a couple of minutes on the baking sheet before remove to a wire rack to cool completely. When cookies are cool, drizzle with melted chocolate or decorate with icing of your choice.

The Importance of Consultation

Tue, 12 Sep 2023 20:22:29 GMT

13th September 2023

I’ve recently heard from many people about how quiet things are right now on the business front. With the current economy and pre-election, it’s no surprise. In these situations, leaders can often be faced with difficult decisions about their future and the future of those that work for them to survive.

Years ago, my husband’s business was in a similar place during the GFC in 2008. Work had dried up and an election was looming. They did not have enough work to keep everyone busy and that meant that they had to consider letting some people go.

No business wants to be in this situation – how do you decide who goes? The last in? The person who doesn’t have a family to support? Sometimes its not that easy or clear to decide. Before any decision is made by a leader, it is important that consultation is undertaken. This is an incredibly important part of the process and should not simply be a box ticking exercise to make a decision that has been predetermined (the courts will often see through this).

When businesses go into consultation truly curious and really listen to what their people are saying, there could be a solution that no one has thought about that will meet the needs of everyone.

When my husband’s business approached consultation with their staff, they did just this. The staff came up with the solution for everyone on the team to reduce their work one day a week while the work was slow rather than make one person redundant. They would all rather take a financial hit than have one person’s livelihood completely affected. Within two months of working 4 days a week, the election was over, and business had picked up again. Everyone went back to 5 days.

When times are tough, if you are a business owner, it’s likely that you will be emotional in your decisions, and you may have missed something. By taking the time to let others be included in the decision making, you can know that you have considered every possible angle and have acted in Good Faith. In addition to this - when consultation is done right, employees will feel valued, heard and in the long term will be likely to remain more loyal to the organisation.

"How are you really?"

Tue, 05 Sep 2023 21:51:24 GMT

6th September 2023

“Yeah good. Busy”. The standard answer when you ask someone how they are, and I will admit that I am guilty of often using this answer. I’ve read many articles that discuss that the overuse of this response stems from a badge of honour that people have associated with being busy. I personally don’t believe this is the case. I do think we use this response because we are collectively busy but not in the way that we think.

Recently I watched a conversation unfold before me with two acquaintances where one of the women asked the other a question that brought out quite a painful experience from the other woman. Unfortunately, we were between hockey games, and it was time to get to the next game. It was impossible to share the depth, the trauma, and the journey that this story deserved.

As I reflected on this interaction, I realised that so often, when we ask people how they are, we are not really in a space or time to really listen. In the supermarket, at the watercooler in the kitchen at work, at the school pickup or watching our child’s hockey game. I tend to think that the “Yeah good. Busy” response has generated from “This is not really the time or the place to go into how not good I am right now”.

We all have stories and I think so many of us want to share these stories. We just need the space to do so.

The woman who has lost a parent who painfully watches as each year her child grows older and she longs for her mum to experience the joy of her grandchildren.

The family who has experienced the devastating loss of a child.

The parents who are daily navigating the challenges that come with a neurodiverse child.

The single mum who is fearful of what the future holds.

I often hear “Keep professional”, “Keep your personal life and work separate” - this is like asking someone to come to work without a limb. Each person is a product of their journey – both good and bad stories. We cannot ask people to leave those stories at the door.

As a leader, walking around the office and asking your people “How are you?” will likely come with a response of “Good. Busy.” You will feel you have done your duty, have walked around, and shown your presence but this is no better than a supermarket conversation. It is not the right space or the right time to build relationships. People need a leader that cares, who is curious and who gives uninterrupted time one on one time to ask, “How are you really?” Knowing someone’s journey doesn’t mean you can’t be candid with someone when you need to be. In fact, I think it’s the opposite. The more you show you care, the more honest you can be when you need to be.

Communicating without words

Mon, 28 Aug 2023 21:10:34 GMT

29 August, 2023

The lessons from failure

Wed, 23 Aug 2023 20:26:49 GMT

24 August 2023

Website launch

Thu, 17 Aug 2023 20:39:20 GMT

18 August 2023

I started my first business when I was 5 years old. I spent the day drawing pictures and unknown to my parents, I took those pictures door to door, trying to sell them to the neighbours. I thought I had hit the jackpot when one neighbour handed over her husbands bowling ball, encased in a beautiful cream, red and blue bag. To my five year old brain, this came close to winning the lottery. I'm not sure my parents were as excited about this as I was.

After my picture selling came lemonade stands, homemade baked goods at garage sales and in Intermediate I graduated to selling lollies to kids out of my locker. As I've gotten older my businesses have gotten a little bit more sophisticated (although I will say none have paid quite as well as the bowling ball I got when I was 5).

Now, as I push GO on my website, Northbound Consulting feels a little bit more real and I will say I am just a little bit excited about it. I don't know for sure what's ahead for this business but I do know that I am headed Northbound and that is exactly where I am meant to be. I hope that you join me for the journey.