Recorded Webinar

Transcript

[00:00:00] Bola Akinola: Thank you so much for joining us. Welcome to you my name is Bola. I am coming to you from Silver Spring, Maryland, and I'm so excited to be with you all today as the host of this amazing opportunity to dig in, dive into how we build trust in DEI programs. That gives me an opportunity to introduce our speakers today, which is such an honor. So first we'll start with Ben Brooks, our fearless leader. Ben is a former SVP of HR. We call it a recovery HR at a fortune 500 company. He's now he's an executive coach.

[00:00:37] Bola Akinola: He's an HR exec who's in the top 100 HR tech influence estimates. influencers echelon. I can tell you for a fact, Ben is not your ordinary leader. He having served on the board of directors for Outserve which is an organization that spearheaded the successful effort to end the Department of Defense's discriminatory don't ask, don't tell policy.[00:01:00]

[00:01:00] Bola Akinola: So having all of that under his belt, 10 years ago, Ben let go of his long held aspirations to climb the corporate ladder and instead has chosen to fly his own plane. Hence the title of PILOT for this organization. Okay, if we pop forward one more screen Jacqueline. Yeah, you can see all of this amazing information about Ben.

[00:01:24] Bola Akinola: Get to know Ben, alright? Connect with Ben. Ben knows people. Ben loves making sure that everyone gets an opportunity to network. Again, not your ordinary, everyday leader. And if we look at the next slide once again, just talking a little bit about PILOT of which Ben is now the sole founder and CEO.

[00:01:43] Bola Akinola: It was created to help everyone feel powerful at work. And this was inspired by Ben's successful business executive coaching practice. And so seeing the opportunity to share the wealth of executive coaching, he founded PILOT, giving everyone the [00:02:00] opportunity to feel powerful in the workspace.

[00:02:03] Bola Akinola: So as an executive coach, Ben wants to take his experience and make it accessible to all. all employees, particularly those who are in kind of the stages of early and mid career space, and looking to see where he can have the biggest impact on people's careers, on the companies and organizations that they work for.

[00:02:21] Bola Akinola: So what PILOT does is take the very best part of executive coaching relationships and opens up that space to make it available to all employees in a live virtual group coaching setting. Ben, you want to say hello to everyone who has joined us today?

[00:02:37] Ben Brooks: Welcome everyone. If you've joined a prior PILOT webinar, drop a plus one in the chat.

[00:02:40] Ben Brooks: We always like to know who our frequent flyers are in that regard. Happy election day if you're in the United States. I I'm traveling. I'm in the great state of California. I live in New York, so I voted early with the absentee ballot, but a reminder if you're in the United States to make time for you and your teams to exercise their rights to vote.

[00:02:57] Ben Brooks: BOLA, really thrilled to be here.

[00:02:59] Bola Akinola: [00:03:00] Thank you so much for reminding us of that of Ben next, it is my true pleasure to introduce Jim Massey. Jim is the author of Trust in Action, and Jim is what we call an adult behaviorist, right? By demanding that values be at the very center of people's chain of values, Jim Jim's teams can be very fearless about what is what's going right, which is a big requirement in today's environment.

[00:03:25] Bola Akinola: Most days, Jim can be found collecting dots to help people around him connect the dots by taking complex matters and translating them into tangible ideas for stakeholders and stakeholders, the variety of stakeholders with which he works, right? Employees, consumers, governments suppliers, investors.

[00:03:43] Bola Akinola: So one of the reasons that I, that we asked in the beginning how many states have you visited is because Jim has visited all 50 states, right? Jim, you and your family have visited all 50 states today, right?

[00:03:57] Jim Massey: Yes. We even [00:04:00] wrote the book, Geo Kids, 50 States on School Breaks. My boys were co authors.

[00:04:04] Bola Akinola: Wow. Amazing. We have some copies of Jim's book that we're featuring today to give away later on in the webinar. So stay tuned. Okay. Stay tuned for that amazing opportunity. All right. If we take a look at the next slide, just reflect for one moment and get into your chat space once again. Share with us.

[00:04:26] Bola Akinola: What are you most excited to learn about over the next hour? Share with us in chat what you are the most excited to learn about over the next hour.

[00:04:36] Ben Brooks: Yeah, what had you come here? You got a lot of things going on. It's a busy time of year. You get marketed a lot of webinars. Obviously, some of you like the PILOT ones.

[00:04:44] Ben Brooks: I think we do a nice job, but specifically, why did you come to this session?

[00:04:48] Bola Akinola: Yeah, love to hear, love to see. I like this. So see what others are doing. Jackie said, Carol says, and look at it again, looking at what other [00:05:00] DEI programs are doing. Come with an open mind. I love that, Danielle. Coming with an open mind to whatever the presenters have to share.

[00:05:07] Bola Akinola: Right? And Carol says, this is a low, a little low, a good educational low from your, from the experience time. Right? Listening and learning. Looking at how trust impacts

[00:05:18] Ben Brooks: DEI. Now, I'll ask how the backlash against DEI is being addressed by others, right? Which I think is great. For Jacob on getting buy in to a DEI program, which is a very important thing.

[00:05:30] Ben Brooks: We can't just thrust this. How does trust impact from Evan, right? Damien's asking how to better embed DEI. Beth's saying DEI and what others are looking to promote and make them stronger.

[00:05:40] Bola Akinola: I like this one, Tracy, how to help people manage triggers involving DEI work. That is a really good exploration.

[00:05:47] Bola Akinola: Yep. All right, good. All right, so get your participation purpose in place so you can really lean in and listen as we start to go through Jim's model in his book and [00:06:00] the ways in which we can engage in the DEI efforts the most effectively. Okay. All right. So let's start with an easy question, something that can get us some information about some of the information in your book.

[00:06:11] Bola Akinola: Can you talk through and lay out the CAN CARE DO model for us, Jim?

[00:06:18] Jim Massey: Absolutely. And I think this will help many of you who tuned in to understand what is trust and how does trust tie into DE& I. This is a model that I've been using for decades. We talked about me being an adult behavioralist.

[00:06:34] Jim Massey: And early in my career around third grade, I was doing my first campaign, helping a congressman get elected. And then fast forward to being an intern in the White House, working in consumer marketing. When I look back, I realize All my life I've been looking at how to influence human behavior.

[00:06:53] Jim Massey: And for me, a lot of that was, do people trust me or do I trust them to do what I'm [00:07:00] asking? So early on, when I was doing a lot of my research, nine out of 10 people will say trust is will someone do what they say they will do? Hence the do aspect element of trust. The great thing about that is that shows that we start to have a shared understanding of a definition.

[00:07:19] Jim Massey: The problem I found in all the other research and what I was doing is there were two other dimensions of trust that are critical. And I believe all three must coexist simultaneously. For trust to be there for us. So that's why I brought this model in 2020. I started writing my book at a time when mother nature put us in time out with COVID there were, the world stood up and took notice of the murder of George Floyd, there were multiple topics going on and leaders were calling me and asking what's, I don't know if I trust myself, I don't know what to do here.

[00:07:59] Jim Massey: [00:08:00] And I realized. the do aspect people understood, but the can and care was where people were also struggling. So just to very briefly share, the can is about the capability. So someone may do what they say they're going to do, but they don't know what they don't know. And so they are not capable of having the trust if they don't understand the missing pieces of their leadership.

[00:08:24] Jim Massey: of their impact, of their knowledge, of their purpose. There's a whole host of things on that CAN. But I simply just put, I CAN do what's expected of me, is the way I try to describe that element of trust. The CARE, most people think when it comes to care, do people care about themselves? Well, I think most of us do.

[00:08:44] Jim Massey: The challenge with trust is, can we convince those we're trying to get to change their behavior to believe that I have their best interests in my heart? And so people get a little, uncomfortable with this, but that's what care is about in this model. Is Bola, Ben, do you guys actually [00:09:00] believe I care enough about you that I am here because I'm interested in your outcomes as well as mine?

[00:09:06] Jim Massey: So when can care do, come together. That's what trust is all about. And those are foundational pieces. Now, you may research Google trust and there's models that are nine step, all these other things, but as a trained behaviorist, we learn in odds. Yep. The minimum odd is three. So that's why I boil it down to Can Care Do.

[00:09:27] Ben Brooks: Jim, I'm wondering when we think about DEI, and you mentioned George Floyd's murder , in June of 2020, many organizations, commercial, nonprofit, government, et cetera, stood up and says we have to do more. We have to do something, right? Some folks are already doing something. They want to do more.

[00:09:42] Ben Brooks: Other folks weren't doing much. When you think about, let's say a CEO or any head of HR in that moment, Making a commitment to make progress on DEI in that moment, what would be examples to how can care and do would show up or not show up [00:10:00] for someone in that moment of crisis? Because right now we have a lot of crises going on in the world where leaders being expected to show some, make a statement, show they care, et cetera, but you're bringing these three dimensions.

[00:10:10] Ben Brooks: So what can you walk us through an example for each of those three?

[00:10:14] Jim Massey: Absolutely. And I want to acknowledge even I get a bit choked up when I start talking about the things we're facing, right? And so some of the topics I will be bringing. I want to apologize if they are triggering an emotion, but that is what works, right?

[00:10:31] Jim Massey: So when I go back I'll go as far back, to the murder of George Floyd. And we saw CEOs coming out and saying, we stand with the black community. We, we understand we need to be doing more. They were over indexing on do. And I think they were flexing care, but behind the scenes when it came to them themselves, I believe many leaders that I was, I was speaking to, including members of boards, leaders in Fortune 500 [00:11:00] companies, the can is where they were frightened.

[00:11:02] Jim Massey: Can I even talk about this? How do I talk about this? Do I need to go and every black person I see today at work, do I need to say, how are you? Do you need to be like, they didn't know where to begin. And that's where I said, talk to an employee. But it's not their job to help you reconcile and understand.

[00:11:19] Jim Massey: So don't ask for that, but literally care enough about their interest to see where they are and how you can support them today and just giving them little words like that, then started to shift for the few leaders I've had direct interaction with starting to help them understand. So we had a lot of over indexing on due.

[00:11:37] Jim Massey: And I think part of that due from a societal. Perspective start to get people questioning, well, what about us? And one of the things that is a trigger for me is this concept of all lives matter. You know? And so people who. worked in the directly afflicted community start saying, well, wait, why are we over indexing on black lives matter?

[00:11:59] Jim Massey: There's a whole host [00:12:00] of things that leaders started to experience. Fast forward to the most recent, I think societal trauma that many of us are experiencing is the Israeli Hamas I want to call it a war. I don't know if we're there yet, the conflict that we're talking about today and there's a lot going on where leaders don't know where to fall down, or I'm sorry, place a mark.

[00:12:23] Jim Massey: And so many are remaining silent, even though there are employees who want to hear from them. And so I think the care and the do because of the backlash, some of the people were talking about, ended the backlash of DE& I. Where is this coming? I think it's coming with the care and do people are afraid to act because of the backlash.

[00:12:41] Jim Massey: What does it mean? Can we be kicked out of a state's? Retirement plan if you're in the United States and you're in what's traditionally known as a red state Can if you speak too much could they push you out from an investor standpoint? So there's so many different aspects and that's why I think these three things coexist

[00:12:59] Jim Massey: all the [00:13:00] time.

[00:13:00] Ben Brooks: And, I'm wondering, Jim, on the do part, we had done some polls on LinkedIn earlier this year, and we certainly looked at a bunch of third party research that a lot of folks say, hey, it's been three years since George Floyd's murder and the protests and everything else. Have we really moved the needle, right?

[00:13:15] Ben Brooks: In some ways, are we backtracking? We saw a lot of folks that were, a lot of employees are quite disappointed. And so, while I think you, the commitment in June of 2020 was to do a lot, It sounds like maybe the can piece being missing, right? Or what people don't know they don't know, their blind spots, their fear, not, base education, understanding, empathy, may have gotten in the way of the do, even though there was a commitment to do.

[00:13:39] Ben Brooks: Yes. The can sounds like it may have been like a restraining force, sort of like rocks in someone's bag that slows down the ability to do these. That's kind of how these things are related. Is that right?

[00:13:49] Jim Massey: Absolutely. And Ben, I even go so far as to think about, people start making, I always say the do for me is when the capability and [00:14:00] the caring join.

[00:14:01] Jim Massey: Do my aspirations match well enough with my operations? And so I think, coming into 2021, I thought I'd start seeing more representation in the executive C suite roles on boards of faces that didn't look like, and we haven't. And so partly I think that the DI backlash is twofold. I think it's from those faces that look like mine say this is ridiculous to those faces that don't look like mine saying, Hey, Where's the action?

[00:14:34] Jim Massey: You made all these promises, you made these investments, and if anything, it feels like we're sliding backwards, and particularly in the United States. when you look at it from a global perspective. And so I think that it's a great conversation and exactly why these three things coexist. And another reason I want to bring this out here is we talk about trust and we talk about losing trust in systems like religion, business, government, [00:15:00] education, health care, news, right?

[00:15:03] Jim Massey: So that's all grand. And I'll get in a little bit more about this, but it's not just that we're losing trust in systems. We're also losing the trust in ourselves.

[00:15:12] Ben Brooks: And I want to ask just everyone in the chat, when you think of Can Care Do, everyone wants the do, you want the results, right? Because I think, Jim, is that probably where, but everyone's oh, we've got to do something, we want to get results, results orientation, let's get performance, let's deliver, let's execute.

[00:15:26] Ben Brooks: But you're saying that these can and care kind of become these accelerants to that. When you all think of your organizations, I'd love for Jim and I to know, Do you think you need more CAN or more CARE to drive your DEI commitments? Because CAN, remember it sounds like, Jim, is the capability, right? The awareness, the knowledge, the experience, the readiness.

[00:15:45] Ben Brooks: The CARE, right, is comes from a perspective of sort of desire and ambition and values. Is that fair, Jim?

[00:15:53] Jim Massey: Yes, yes.

[00:15:54] Ben Brooks: So you could say, and if you have both of those, then the do can happen like those sort of they, they [00:16:00] make way can clear for that do to happen. Absolutely. So it looks like we've got some of those responses coming.

[00:16:06] Ben Brooks: Yeah. Cans, cares, cans, equal parts, can, care, because it's interesting as you just even diagnose, Jim, I've never used a framework like this in DEI. So I'm learning out loud for this and had meetings in advance and all that. Yeah. I'm just having some ahas of if someone were to say well, my DEI strategy next year, we need to do more.

[00:16:26] Ben Brooks: Yes. We may want to take a pause and say, well, you're the fork in the road. Is it around the can or the care? And if it was more CAN, what would be examples, Jim, versus CARE in this context? If someone was thinking about their 2024 DEI strategy and they wrote CAN, what are, like, thought starters of where the CAN would be on DEI versus if they said CARE, that may be even more perplexing about how to get people to CARE.

[00:16:56] Jim Massey: The space I work a lot in right now is so [00:17:00] we're having alphabet soup for lunch today, right? And so we talk about D, E, and I, of which I typically lead the broader concept of E, S, and G, environmental, social, governance. So D and I often strongly people align it to the S. However, it's really strong in both governance as well as in environment because of the disproportionate effects of those historically excluded communities around the world when it comes to environmental impacts.

[00:17:29] Jim Massey: So I bring this up because As much as people try to like to push something into a topic, DE& I and ESG is it's like water. It finds a hole and it will get there because it does belong. So, back to your question about CAN and CARE. Examples of CAN, I often start with Simon Sinek's Y model.

[00:17:48] Jim Massey: Like, why are we doing? And it's one thing, I'm a big proponent of pay equity. And it wasn't until I started to peel back that onion, and [00:18:00] I hate using analogies like that. It wasn't until I started looking at the data that I saw the nuance. And it's because I've been fortunate to have people who trusted me as an executive to give me insight into a, they would tell me as a fish, I was in water and I didn't know it.

[00:18:15] Jim Massey: Right. So when I talk about the can, I'm like pay equity, men and women should be paid equally, right? Go, go, go. It wasn't until a woman of color said, . What about intersectionality? And this is around 2015. And I started to learn that concept. And then when I looked at the layer of data, so my can of why am I doing this?

[00:18:36] Jim Massey: Is it really just gender pay equity? Or is it all employees paid equally at multiple dimensions of their, so that's how my can started to get much stronger, often to the discomfort of my peers. Because they would be talking, we have pay equity. I'm like, I at intersectionality. So I got to start throwing around that word, but it started to change how we looked at the data from a [00:19:00] capability standpoint.

[00:19:01] Jim Massey: So there's like a knowledge, there's like a knowledge and baseline background. So a part of the can is you're like, Oh, we slice it by gender. That's only one way to slice it. It could be by race or ethnicity, or it could be whether people have college degrees or not, or it could be if they're LGBTQ or have different abilities or veterans or whatever it is.

[00:19:17] Jim Massey: Your can is you got more educated, but it sounds like it also then threatened some of your fellow executives because you had more can than they did.

[00:19:24] Jim Massey: Right. Which now becomes a care because, well, I stand out differently. Well, I have a higher engagement scores. Like it's remarkable. How it, it all feeds to ego, right?

[00:19:35] Jim Massey: And it goes back to, we'll get to this in a little bit about the levels at which trust can exist on the care. I always break it down to care is about self. Okay. about others, and about our shared home. I will always add PLANET because I refuse to not address the elephant in the room of the the UN secretary general has said, we're on a joint suicide mission and no one speaks about it.

[00:19:59] Jim Massey: So [00:20:00] anytime I can, I always try to speak about the crisis of climate that we're in. So the caring is about how do we dimensionalize self care along with care of others. equally at the crisis we have of caring for the resources beyond humans. So I'm always talking about care as people and planet, unleashing and optimizing both simultaneously.

[00:20:22] Jim Massey: So it's multi dimension, very complex, but I can go in more detail there.

[00:20:26] Jim Massey: And I just want one other quick question, Jim, on the care. Think about, someone who may be from a non traditional demographic or underrepresented demographic. All of a sudden, something happens in the news. There can be a cynicism.

[00:20:39] Jim Massey: Oh Mark, our, straight white male CEO now all of a sudden is like a big DEI advocate. Is that because Mark's being forced to, because that's the news cycle or the board or competitors or does Mark genuinely care? Yes. How do you know? I [00:21:00] think it's it's healthy to have a skepticism.

[00:21:02] Jim Massey: Maybe not a cynicism, right? Think skepticism is a sign of a strong mind. But how would Mark in this fictitious example demonstrate meaningfully that he cared, not just that he was clever and grabbing on to trends and buzzwords are responding to pressure from activists, et cetera.

[00:21:23] Jim Massey: If you don't mind, I'm going to talk to this slide.

[00:21:26] Jim Massey: It's trust in action, right? The reason I picked this title is because people need to, once you boil down hand care do and start to understand the dimensions of trust, people need to see trust in action, but sometimes when trust isn't there, we need action. So back to your point, then about a CEO,

[00:21:48] Jim Massey: is it BS?

[00:21:50] Jim Massey: Or is it genuine? We will tell over time whether it's the trust being emphasized or just action being emphasized. Ideally, it's going to be [00:22:00] both. And I think that for me, for, if we stick to a CEO is saying, I am committed to diversity, then by golly, next time you bring your senior executives up on the town hall, I should see myself represented.

[00:22:16] Jim Massey: And if it's not the second time. First time, second, no later than the third time, I better start seeing something because otherwise it's just a lot of action. It's a lot of words. Your aspirations are not matching your operations and that's when you start to lose trust. Whether it's capability or care, people are just evaluating.

[00:22:34] Jim Massey: You are not doing what you're saying you're doing. So that's what nine out of 10 people say. Trust is you're done. Lost all of it. And so

[00:22:43] Bola Akinola: A great kind of formula to like to lean into making sure that action matches the intention and get people to really align with trust. Thank you so much for that.

[00:22:54] Jim Massey: Thank you, Bola. Yeah, amazing.

[00:22:56] Bola Akinola: Yeah, I'm seeing that in chat. Authenticity in action [00:23:00] helps. Yeah, showing the results.

[00:23:01] Ben Brooks: I remember in New York City where I live when Mike Bloomberg was mayor, he had his campaign track the promises that he made when he campaigned, right? And then he had a tracker, because he's a real data driven guy, created Bloomberg LP.

[00:23:18] Ben Brooks: And he would say did we deliver on those? Did we deliver on this, rezoning or affordable housing or, bike lanes or whatever it might have been, schools, etc. And, he didn't have a 100 percent batting average, and he was honest about that, right? But it was clear that if he gave his word to something, he wanted to see if that actually happened and be straight about that.

[00:23:39] Ben Brooks: Because I think that's one of the things that you know, we have a big absence of trust in society overall, right? Trust in all the different institutions you mentioned earlier. And I think this is one of those things where there's a lot of people that are pretty jaded around DEI if they've been every day feeling [00:24:00] micro, macro aggressions, whatever it may be systemic, racism, injustice, indifference.

[00:24:05] Ben Brooks: I mean, people walk around the corner and, just by how you look, they already have sized you up. And so I think that this is a very resonant topic, but I would say that, maybe I'll ask the audience with this in the in chat. I don't really hear the word trust in DEI in the same sentence that often.

[00:24:21] Ben Brooks: Do you all hear that? Is trust a concept that's been a part of the DEI strategy or conversation or content? Because I seldom actually hear. Trust and DEI coming together. So it looks like Jane and Evan, Gloria are saying no.

[00:24:36] Bola Akinola: A great call out, Ben. Great call out.

[00:24:37] Ben Brooks: Yeah, so I just had that right now. I didn't, it makes a lot of sense.

[00:24:40] Ben Brooks: It's like almost hidden in plain sight. Of course, you need trust around this, but I go to lots of DEI conferences, events, webinars, read lots of papers. The T word is just not in there. It's not even in the conversation.

[00:24:54] Jim Massey: I saw someone say it's assumed to be there from the start and I think that's a fair [00:25:00] assumption, right?

[00:25:01] Jim Massey: But then over time when things aren't changing, how do we resurface that conversation to say, you promised, why aren't you doing? And in particular, I will just share from my own personal experience It's something I had to start asking because again, people gifted me the, you're safer asking it than we are.

[00:25:24] Jim Massey: And so I would walk up to the mic during open and sometimes from the executive chair, I was in like, Hey, general questions. I would walk up and say, why do I stop, as an executive on the panel of the town hall, I'd walk up and say, no, one's asking this, but I'm going to ask, why do we still not have someone representing all the faces that I'm looking at as an executive to my fellow executives so that no one felt called out or vulnerable in their piece.

[00:25:48] Jim Massey: And that often would demonstrate, I was aware. And then if I needed to, I could talk about my data. And I would bend to your point of early example, I'd be transparent about the actions I had been taking when it got [00:26:00] time, but I wanted in a public forum to have that conversation. And my colleagues always knew I would put them on the spot.

[00:26:06] Jim Massey: So after the first time, after being angry, we had a great heart to heart as an executive team. And then the second time they were more prepared and guess what started to happen? Action. And within six months, there started to be people who didn't look like me on the panel with me. And that, that is. Again, from a place of power and privilege that I got to do it, but I didn't know to do it.

[00:26:29] Jim Massey: I wasn't capable until someone believed in me enough and had trusted me enough to tell me what a weirdo and how off I was.

[00:26:40] Bola Akinola: We have a slide up here that kind of dives connects those dots right around trust in DEI, which again is such a great call out and a good exploration, Ben.

[00:26:48] Bola Akinola: And where we stand in it, right as it relates to the can do care action. Just do you want to speak to this just a little bit because the curiosity is where do we, where, how do we find you made a really great reference to [00:27:00] Simon Sinek and finding the why, how do we find our eye in these spaces?

[00:27:06] Jim Massey: This was an important one. And this is where I, I'm very pleased other. There are more HR people on here because I spent the majority of my time in compliance with attorneys and they didn't like my warm fuzzies. And so this is an important piece about trust in action because the building blocks of trust of CanCareDo actually sit within organizations at multiple levels.

[00:27:27] Jim Massey: And so we hear the Edelman trust factor on a regular basis and it's always about the system. And as an individual, I get overwhelmed in the system. Who am I to change the world? Like that sounds not only egotistical, but so overwhelming. I just need to suck my thumb, curl up in a ball and wish it away.

[00:27:46] Jim Massey: But that's, we can't do that as leaders. And so the important part of trust is, trust actually does sit at a system level, but if you start to break it down, it also, works at a team level, but most importantly, it happens at an individual [00:28:00] level. So what I talk about in this, kind of area of trust in action is as a leader, I can sit and be overwhelmed every day with, geopolitical concepts, all these things, or I can ground myself in the confidence that I can, that I care, and that I do, and bungee into that white noise and bring out that which I can control to start to transform myself.

[00:28:25] Jim Massey: to transform my team to by golly, eventually I will transform it. That's much more measurable and easy for me. And it is how trust exists. And so Bola, when you're talking about, what is this all about? I can sit there and say, my company is horrible, or I can sit there and say, my company's not achieving what they said, but I'm a leader within here.

[00:28:46] Jim Massey: By golly, I'm going to achieve it. And it's how I started to practice. as an OD practitioner behaviorist to hold myself accountable. I will never ask anyone to do something I am not willing to do myself. And that's why I [00:29:00] believe trust is foundational and paramount at self to transform the systems we no longer trust.

[00:29:06] Bola Akinola: In line with this, I know one of your beliefs is, and you're speaking really directly to it, that there's no I in team, right? And so tell us Jacqueline, if we can, Jacqueline, if we can pop over to the next slide, tell us how that resonates.

[00:29:19] Ben Brooks: Before we do that, can we go back? Yes. Yes. So I think, Jim, in, in organizational design, or, in theory and IO psychologist stuff, there's always been this saying that, the focus

[00:29:30] Ben Brooks: of change is often the organization or the system. It's this place, the culture, our organization, right? That's this where we're, but the agent is always the individual, right? And that's self. Right? And so I think we think about changing the system. I remember I used to volunteer with people that were, unfortunately involved in the criminal justice, so called justice system.

[00:29:53] Ben Brooks: I went to Rikers Island and saw people behind bars and talked about, their career goals and things. They were in this system, [00:30:00] right? And fixing Rikers or the broader criminal justice, that's like a very difficult thing to do, right? To think as part of when you think about. Yeah. you know, DEI, right?

[00:30:07] Ben Brooks: The system can be our society, our government, financial systems, educational systems, health systems. There's a lot of systems, right? But I think that part of the methodology we use at PILOT around people improving their own employee experiences, the typical model is to start at the system. Let's do an engagement survey.

[00:30:25] Ben Brooks: Let's find out what's wrong with the whole system. Let's fix the whole system. But by the way, let's fix the system in a lowest common denominator, one size fits none approach. Versus I think the approach we take at PILOT is, Hey, let's activate individuals to change their own behaviors.

[00:30:42] Ben Brooks: Locally around the things that matter to them that have the shortest feedback loop that benefit them the most that leverage the data around their aspirations or values or needs that's very bespoke to them versus thinking about this system change, which is extremely long lead. And, and it's it's [00:31:00] no different than legislation in Congress, right?

[00:31:01] Ben Brooks: It gets carved up and earmarks and this and that you end up with a pretty ugly product and the other end of it. But there's so much that I think we miss out because we don't really as organizations often traditionally focus on activating self or individuals. Even so much of leadership is biased in what you get others to do.

[00:31:20] Ben Brooks: And the idea of like self leadership, which is where a lot of PILOT starts being self directed, feeling powerful at work. It's if you can't lead yourself, how the hell are you going to lead anybody else? But we seldom talk about self leadership, which like you said, is around, behavior change and self regulation and awareness and all those things.

[00:31:37] Ben Brooks: And I think that's one of the things that's a big aha for folks is everyone goes and tries to like, knock over Mount Everest with changing the system rather than putting on their own boots. Which is a very different orientation.

[00:31:51] Jim Massey: And Ben, I, I was reading some comments here too.

[00:31:53] Jim Massey: One of the big mantras, we're going to get here in a little bit, my favorite chapter is chapter 10. It's called step into the BS. [00:32:00] It's the broken built systems that we created and therefore we can fix, right? And so someone said, sometimes you have to step into it. One of the fascinating things about this model for me that I always like to talk to people is self team system is a sliding scale.

[00:32:16] Jim Massey: The self could be a company and the team could be an industry and the system could be the world itself, or it could be an individual employee of which they're a member of a team. in the system of which you are the leader of a function. So as a leader, we could be the system that some employee in our care believes is broken.

[00:32:42] Jim Massey: So by taking care of myself, I'm actually changing the system for others. I think that's an important piece, especially for the leaders on this call, is once again, know where you fall within the world in which you are operating, because you might be the world for another [00:33:00] individual who's going to struggle.

[00:33:01] Jim Massey: And that's why I want everyone to step into the BS.

[00:33:04] Ben Brooks: And I'll tell a 20 second story and Bola, we'll go to that next slide. It didn't mean to throw us completely off. Don't want to lose trust with you, Bola, in a trust conversation. Okay. But I, but, I remember we were at a, an offsite for my last employer and we had 25, 000 employees and we had, about 60 of the top executives globally, and this castle on Long Island, and we were there having dinner.

[00:33:26] Ben Brooks: And our CEO overheard some comments as people were having drinks. He brought up the next day. He said, I heard a lot of you last night, and I'm not going to call anyone out by name, but I heard discussions of when will senior management do this and we've got, like, when is this going to happen?

[00:33:41] Ben Brooks: And he literally used some expletives that I won't share here, but he said, essentially. If you don't realize that you are the system, and when you're in the top 50 of a 25,000 person, who is senior management? If you're the top 50, who is this mythical group of people behind some curtain? [00:34:00] And I think that there's a desire to take self out, like they didn't see self.

[00:34:04] Ben Brooks: In that they saw some other people behind the curtain that were affecting the org. And so I think that that's a part of it is all taking your own responsibility because we may be in HR and we may do talent reviews that are well meaning to give identify hypos and give people stretch assignments and get them leadership training and assessments, but there may be bias.

[00:34:24] Ben Brooks: even in how talent reviews are done, despite the fact that we don't want to be biased. Tracy's points earlier about unconscious bias. We all have bias, but it takes something to be, to admit, to say, hey, I think we may have some bias, even in how we select people for who goes into the PILOT program. And some of our customers, by the way, have said that, and they said, we're going to actually create multiple routes.

[00:34:44] Ben Brooks: We're going to have self nomination or peer nomination to ensure that we don't have top down bias in who gets access to this program. We've got to create different vantage points, diversity of perspective about who should be in this and share the power in making that decision because that's, [00:35:00] but they saw there was a role for self and they're like, maybe we can't even fix self or team.

[00:35:03] Ben Brooks: So let's work with other self or teams to affect the system from multiple angles.

[00:35:12] Jim Massey: That explains the previous slide, the models there, it's legitimately that, and it's so easy to forget. That self as a leader is actually part of one of those little circles in the system. And I think, it, Bola the fact that there is no I in team, I represent the 17 most prominent systems of power, white, cisgender, I'm in a heterosexual relationship.

[00:35:39] Jim Massey: I, I'm a parent, I'm right handed, so this whole, I've been raised in a world built for me and conditioned. There is no I in team, whether it was on the court as a basketball player or in corporate America. We're all in this together, right? And it wasn't until I started growing in my own [00:36:00] leadership, I realized the only reason a team is effective is when we find our I.

[00:36:06] Jim Massey: Why am I here? And am I worthy to be here? It's I can, I care, I do, I am here, right? And the story I want to share is, Jack, if you'll advance to the next slide for me, from a DEI perspective, I, one of the most pivotal moments for me that actually unleashed my leadership was, I got a call one day, and they had asked me we, we had this, innovative program at a company I was a part of, and it was called the Women's Summit.

[00:36:36] Jim Massey: And it was the third year it was being conducted. I had never attended. I identify as male. And so for the Women's Summit, it's meant for the women. Third year, they wanted more men. They were focusing on allyship. And so someone in my network had called and said, Hey, we want you to be the emcee. I am leader.

[00:36:56] Jim Massey: Hear me roar. I said no, that's not [00:37:00] right. I've got remarkable leaders. I've been developing on my team. I would like you to consider person A, B, and C like, well, okay. You know, thank you. I'll take it back to the committee. We'll see. Two days later, I got a call from another person on the committee and the feedback was, Jim, you're being a jackass.

[00:37:19] Jim Massey: We called you. This person knew you the best. I know you too. There's a reason why we're asking you. We need allies. I'm like, I'm not sure what that is. And so I was introduced, this is 2014. She introduced me to that concept. So we're talking about advocacy and it ended up six of the 10 people on the committee I had mentored in their careers.

[00:37:42] Jim Massey: And they actually were asking me to step up and lead the way I had already led. But if you'll advance to the next slide. It took them to help me find my IN team. And by putting me on as the speaker of the women's summit, we were able to increase [00:38:00] from five to 20 percent of attendees that we are being men, because I got to start calling it out.

[00:38:06] Jim Massey: Listen, it's called the Women's Summit because we're in this together. As leaders, we need to be here to understand what struggles people are experiencing and hearing, and then advocate when we're not here. And those are the social media plugs I could do on the internal piece. But after that, I became part of the planning committee, which then made me the executive sponsor of the Network of Women because the team asked me to come and be their advocate and be part of that.

[00:38:34] Jim Massey: And so I talk about when you find your IN team, you can actually start to transform. But there, there were two aspects. One, I wasn't walking my walk. There were three. I wasn't doing any of CanCaraDo. I didn't appreciate why they were asking. I didn't have the requester's best interest at heart. I thought I did, but I didn't understand the context.

[00:38:56] Jim Massey: And it wasn't until they held me accountable that I finally [00:39:00] started to walk my walk. I'm choking up because I'll never forget. I had introduced myself and I told that backstory as my introduction and the pivotal moment for me was when I stood dead center spotlight and introduced myself not as Jim Massey, but as the emcee for the women's summit that I realized the importance of transforming myself as a leader to transform my teams, just transform my life.

[00:39:30] Ben Brooks: And I think that's a, by the way, put a plus one if you're moved by. Jim's story there and what I'm certainly quite moved. And I think that, as you, as we think about the good intention you had, so you thought I don't want to take up the space on this stage when I got all these other women at a women's summit.

[00:39:48] Ben Brooks: Boy, I'm trying to read the room here. I don't want to be like the heteronormative white guy on the stage, taking up all this space, thinking you're being conscious. You were thinking, right. But they had a whole different, they're like, no, no, [00:40:00] no, we need allies and we need advocates. And you can say things that are going to land differently than if we said it, and you can speak to men from a men's perspective.

[00:40:08] Ben Brooks: And you can, and so that's where I think part of the trust we have to have in the DEI is also trusting with intent, right? Yes. No one tried to cancel you for that, right? No. There was a conversation, right? Someone reached out to you two days later and said, Hey, let me expand the view. Let me show you why we're trying to do this and tell you the role we'd like you to be in.

[00:40:32] Ben Brooks: Cause they, you didn't get all that context with the original ask, but that requires the trust for them to be feeling safe to come to you, even though you were in a position of hierarchical power and authority, right?

[00:40:46] Jim Massey: I always say, someone was willing to mentor the talent they saw and believed in. And because of that, I'm a stronger leader today.

[00:40:55] Jim Massey: This person was technically fortified positions beneath the org [00:41:00] chart, but had the power to influence me because they saw something in me I didn't.

[00:41:05] Ben Brooks: And I think what I'll just add is, you saw that there was an active role that I, it's not centered when it's calibrated. Right. And that's part of the caring, it's Okay, like I'm not just doing this because I want to be virtue signaling that I'm on the right side of this. I've been asked by the people that are the strategists around this, the women doing all of this. That's where you really work through. And I will tell you, I had an experience. I used to throw these mixers for LGBTQ business owners in New York City.

[00:41:35] Ben Brooks: And I did it with a friend of mine. And I had a friend who, And we were conscious about making sure that we had racial and ethnic diversity in that mix of the people we invited. And we had an invite list and we tracked it to make sure that we were having the funnel though, the invites and stuff. And yet we still had lower numbers.

[00:41:49] Ben Brooks: We had people that were non white responding at a lower rate to our events, even though, They were lovely, and it was a swanky place, and centrally located, and all this other stuff. And I had a friend criticize [00:42:00] me, who came from a different perspective. And rather than to, my first, my ego was like, Oh, come on, we're already like trying to do the right thing here, and we're tracking this.

[00:42:07] Ben Brooks: And I defensively was like people are just, I can't get people to show up. And I don't know why they're not showing. And he's like, well, do you want to know why? And I was too worried about my ego in that moment. to be curious on the capability of the can, because I, it was a can't in a certain way.

[00:42:24] Ben Brooks: I can't get people from under racial and ethnic backgrounds to show up to these events. And he's he's like, from my perspective, we feel more comfortable if we're invited by someone who's like us, because we know that we'll not be the only one, because being the only one.

[00:42:37] Ben Brooks: And then I learned all about this phrase, the only ones, and there's, and there's a whole thing of, people, Martha's Vineyards every summer of black people to get together that are very prominent, the only one on the board that's black, or the only doctor in the practice that's black, or the only, whatever it may be, and and it's not just a black thing, it could be any demographic, but I was like, oh, he's like, so if they get invited by others, they'll know they're not going to be the only one, and it makes them much, because the [00:43:00] difference between one versus two at an event is like a Grand Canyon, and so I said, oh, well, could I get your help in that?

[00:43:06] Ben Brooks: He's like, yes, I will. And in the next event, we had dramatic shift in the composition of our attendees. And by the way, which made the vibe way more fun and interesting. And it made the connections and the talent way more. But I think that's the part of it. I think that gets missed is we assume like we're building a product like PILOT.

[00:43:23] Ben Brooks: We're wrong about all sorts of stuff. We have hypotheses. We test it. We think it's a feature. It's a bug. We do this. If you're at, AstraZeneca where you worked in other companies. You test this, you disprove this, the trial doesn't turn out, there's this like optimization and experimentation that we assume is a part of the innovative process, but when it gets to these sensitive topics, I feel like we don't give each other the space.

[00:43:42] Ben Brooks: For that, and I think part of the trust is my friend and I had enough trust built to have that conversation. Your colleague, six levels down, had enough trust to be able. We're going to get this wrong, even when our intentions are right, and I think that's a part of it where some of the stuff is, it's become a little bit unsafe on the DEI [00:44:00] side.

[00:44:00] Ben Brooks: On people that are the detractors, but some also are the most, vocal advocates of DEI sometimes don't make it safe for people that are a little less unsophisticated and want to be brought along and I think that's a big thing that I really advocated for when I was doing LGBT work and DEI work is we have to like trust that people are trying to do the right thing, even if they're not doing the right thing when someone gets on a stage and they say transsexuals or transvestite or something.

[00:44:26] Ben Brooks: That's not the word that we meant them to say. Or they bicker about pronouns and they just don't get it. We can shame, right? And da, da, da, da, da. But that pushes them away rather than or when they say, I'm not going to go to the out and equal conference because I don't want to take up a space for an LGBT colleague.

[00:44:44] Ben Brooks: And we should prioritize the budget when they don't realize that the symbolism of them going is so much stronger and that we need to influence the senior people, like the LGBT people, like we don't need the content and the they need it more than we do. That starts to shift those orientations.

[00:44:59] Jim Massey: drastically. [00:45:00] And I think that, with this slide, that when we are brave enough to find trust in ourself, that's when we start to see the transformation. And that's what this whole piece of slide is, break away everything else. And then if you advance to the next slide for me, Jacqueline, every day we're around this white noise and it is overwhelming.

[00:45:25] Jim Massey: In my space, we, I go from wildfires. Climate change, access to drinkable water, and people always, think of low to middle income countries. I'm talking about Phoenix, Arizona. You know, the Colorado River is drying. It's the fastest growing population, and they're currently pumping in water from 150 miles away.

[00:45:46] Jim Massey: So this crisis, yes, is in Sudan. And in Arizona and Southern California, like these things can be overwhelming. And then you bring in the DEI layer of the disproportionality. And what I always ask, and the reason I'm on this mantra of [00:46:00] trust in action, see if I'll advance the next slide. it takes one.

[00:46:05] Jim Massey: And I always ask anyone who's willing to listen, are you willing to be that one? And Ben, I love the example. It's easy to shame. One of the biggest challenges for people who look like me in a DE& I conversation. And that, when I say look like me, I also want to imply an executive role in a publicly traded company is cancellation.

[00:46:24] Jim Massey: Is will someone capture me on my iPhone saying the wrong thing? And now am I gone? And I have to be honest with you. I no longer have that concern. And the reason for that is because I am a kindergartner in my learning and I know that and so I don't try to be an expert. I know I have lots to learn and the community every single day makes me a stronger leader.

[00:46:51] Jim Massey: And so it's funny how once you ship, I don't have to know it all and anyone who says they know it all in DEI business. [00:47:00] They're, they, there is an over index of trust. It's called narcissism, , and there are those who have that. But in this example, what I keep wanting to come back to is the importance of we can make a difference.

[00:47:11] Jim Massey: And when we accept that, if you'll against the next slide for me and step into the bs. we can start to change the system. And that's what I'm trying to do. I want the system to be fair for all of us, not just a few. And that's ultimately what drove me to write my book is the sense of urgency to do so.

[00:47:30] Jim Massey: Yeah, if you'll go ahead and advance the next slide for me. This just talks about some of the chapters that you can expect, and it breaks down the can, care, do. We've talked a lot about why do you exist? This is a hearty, meaty question. We don't exist to make money, right?

[00:47:46] Jim Massey: We are here to do something so much more, and on the care, I use show me more. I'm from the state of Missouri. It's our state tagline, and a perfect example is, The Senator in the 1800s said, you must show [00:48:00] me, you must prove to me. I use that purposefully because that's not what caring is about. When I show you who I am and what I'm trying to do, I start to show you, I have your best interest.

[00:48:12] Jim Massey: So I love to turn things on their head. So the state motto of the state in which I grew up, I want to flip. It's not about you showing me, it's about me showing you. And that's where that starts. Humanity at work is there's more Then just a few of us, there's a lot. And then, the resource I talked about, and then finally stepping into the BS, putting trust into action.

[00:48:32] Jim Massey: I talk on chapter 11, this, I know, I represent, I practice a faith, it happens to be Western Christianity, which is a privilege, but the whole concept is there's something larger than all of us, we are connected. And I believe in humanity. And so those are core principles of most organized religions around the world.

[00:48:50] Jim Massey: So if you subscribe to one that shouldn't, it should somewhat fit, but I think as humanity, we have that. And so these topics are not for the faint of heart. And so it [00:49:00] takes a little something deeper. And for me, I had to talk about the faith in humanity, the faith in tomorrow and the faith in something that connects us all.

[00:49:08] Jim Massey: And then finally, it's always act right now. This isn't something we have time to put off. People are hurting. The planet is suffering. And if we don't act now, both people on the planet will suffer. And I know we're, as we're approaching time, I think if you'll go to my last slide. I've always struggled to get through this.

[00:49:33] Bola Akinola: I'm struggling myself. That's why I got very, very quiet. But yeah, this is an amazing dedication. My goodness.

[00:49:45] Jim Massey: So I'm going to cut to the end that I wrote this for you. And I always say, yes, you. Trust yourself. It's time to act now. And I end every email and every communication with the end is good.[00:50:00]

[00:50:00] Jim Massey: If that's our intention, that will be our impact.

[00:50:05] Bola Akinola: All right. Thank you so much. This was amazing content. I think we would be on for hours if we didn't have time constraints, but Thank you so much, Jim, Ben. Thank you so much.

[00:50:14] Bola Akinola: We want to put you on to some opportunities to attend the following seminars. Okay, the first one is on December 5th. It's called Learning Lab Part 3. So that's an opportunity to hear from Learning Strategist and Instructional Designer Pinar O'Flaherty.

[00:50:30] Bola Akinola: And then also hear from PILOT's Head of Product, Rachel Crice. Okay, so that's on December 5th. Another great learning opportunity to wrap up your end of year learning goals, right? December 7th, hosted by HR Executive our own amazing Ben Brooks is going to participate in a conversation about HR Tech in 2024.

[00:50:49] Bola Akinola: You can write us email, hello@pilot. Coach. Or you can go to our site at PILOT at www.pilot.coach. Okay.

[00:50:58] Bola Akinola: Thank you all so [00:51:00] much for participating and engaging today, Jim and Ben. It has been an amazing pleasure.

[00:51:06] Bola Akinola: Thank you so much for your insights and such thought leadership in the DEIA space. And Jim, thanks for sharing all of the the information and emotion behind your book with us.