Recorded Webinar

Transcript

[00:00:00] Liz Palm: Hello everyone. Glad to see you joining us today.. My name is Liz Palm. I am the Marketing Director for PILOT, and I will be your host today.

[00:00:12] Liz Palm: We'll be talking real talk with PILOT about economy, attrition, and manager employee relationships. And I'm super excited to talk to Jeff Wahlberg, one of our crew that works with a lot of our strategic accounts, to see what he's hearing out in the market. And I'm also joined today by the lovely Laura Mastrorocco, who is our producer.

[00:00:32] Liz Palm: Laura, do you want to take a second to introduce yourself and give our audience some tips for interacting and being present for today?

[00:00:39] Laura Mastrorocco: Thanks so much, Liz. Hello and welcome everyone. I'm Laura Mastrorocco. So happy to be with you here today. So my role is to ensure that things run smoothly from a technical standpoint. You'll also notice that today's session is being recorded, so we will send out a recording after the session.

[00:00:57] Liz Palm: Thank you so much, Laura. Again, as I [00:01:00] mentioned already, I am marketing director here at PILOT and your host for this conversation. Bringing in Jeff Wahlberg, like I said, he works with a lot of our strategic accounts here, but he helps organizations connect unique objections and challenges to solutions that will deliver unparalleled value with the programs they deploy.

[00:01:21] Liz Palm: Jeff has a lot of expertise. across various areas and gets to talk to HR professionals like yourselves on a daily basis. So I'm super excited to dig in and hear what he's hearing and also see if it aligns with what you all are hearing in the market.

[00:01:38] Jeff Walburg: Thanks, Liz. I appreciate the intro.

[00:01:41] Liz Palm: Before we dig into our themes and topics, I'd love to take just a minute and tell you a little bit more about PILOT in case you're not familiar with what we do. So PILOT was founded to help everyone feel powerful at work. We show participants how to use self reflection, solicit and accept feedback, advocate for themselves, and take [00:02:00] effective action in their organizations.

[00:02:02] Liz Palm: This is done through four methods of learning that you can see right on here. Technology enabled group coaching, where participants are broken into groups or cohorts to begin their PILOT development journey. Individual reflected in activities that can be done asynchronously on their own time and on any device.

[00:02:20] Liz Palm: Executive fireside chats, which give participants access to higher level executives to learn the rules of work, and finally, one on one, future focused manager feedback. This is where both the manager and employee focus on development objectives and aspirations that are completely separate from any performance conversations.

[00:02:41] Liz Palm: And feel free to let us know if you have any questions throughout, not just about PILOT, but also about the conversations we have. We'll be watching the chat to go through that. But without further ado, let's jump into our themes for today. All right. You all already saw in the headline, Jeff and I got together.

[00:02:57] Liz Palm: We whittled it down. There's a ton going on out [00:03:00] there right now, but we chose these three as some of the top themes that are coming up in Jeff's conversations. So we want to dig into the uncertain economy, preventing attrition, and fostering manager employee relationships. If there's any of those that really stick out for you all, drop it in the chat.

[00:03:19] Liz Palm: We're going to talk about all of them, but I'm curious where your interest really lies. All right. Yeah, Jeff, all of the above. Absolutely. Why don't we dig into the first one? I actually was reading through a report from Ernst Young. It's their global outlook report that they put together.

[00:03:38] Liz Palm: And I was very interested to see that they are leveraging the uncertainty to create opportunity, or at least that's what they're recommending that we have the opportunity to do. We all know there's that threat of a recession coming in 2023, and they feel like that's pretty likely to happen with persistent inflation and elevated interest rates.

[00:03:59] Liz Palm: They [00:04:00] actually mapped out five different areas in this report. Feel free to click on the link in the chat if you want to read through all of it. But the one I wanted to highlight was about labor, something very near and dear to all of our hearts. We're going to be navigating tight and fast moving labor markets with a shrinking talent pool, shifting employee expectations, and increased mobility of the workforce.

[00:04:22] Liz Palm: Because the markets are so tight, businesses are really competing for that reduced talent pool to find the right people. In order to get those, the correct people, they're having to spend more. So compensation costs have also soared as businesses are struggling to find that right talent. The good news is labor market is rebalancing, but the relative tightness is expected to remain for a while.

[00:04:47] Liz Palm: So the key I think to remember here is the talent attraction and retention are more challenging and strategically important than ever. What do you think, Jeff? Is this close to what you're hearing? Did EY [00:05:00] hit the mark?

[00:05:01] Jeff Walburg: Yeah I love this stat because to me, it seems sometimes like these counterintuitive things like, hey, it's a tight labor market, but at the same time, there's a pending recession.

[00:05:12] Jeff Walburg: And this isn't meant to be like an economics webinar, but I think it's important to realize what are the macroeconomic conditions that are impacting industries and businesses. And so that even as HR practitioners and talent professionals, when you think about and the conversations that I'm having on a daily basis are a lot on what is happening in the broader economy and what's the impact then on the business.

[00:05:36] Jeff Walburg: And a lot of times what that sounds like is, I'm in a conversation talking about, what are the HR goals that, that an HR leader or an organization is trying to accomplish, but it's out is under this theme of, hey, my FP& A team or my finance leader or CFO is saying, we have to be way more efficient with our spending.

[00:05:56] Jeff Walburg: And whatever we invest in has to show really [00:06:00] meaningful value. So I feel like HR leaders are now grappling with how do you. How do you develop meaningful programs that are engaging to the workforce in this environment of kind of economic or at least dynamic economic conditions that also strangely has a really limited talent supply and I know we're going to talk about attrition in a minute here but It's just these really unique tensions right now which are coming out in a lot of ways, but primarily if you're going to make an investment, you really need to prove the business value of what those talent programs are going to, what they're going to deliver to the business.

[00:06:38] Liz Palm: Absolutely. And I feel like that's got to be key when it comes time for asking for budget in these times, it's hard enough to ask for money to have those conversations with finance and to really get the right argument in front of the your key stakeholders, whether it's that the data, the the warm, fuzzy stories that support the outcomes.

[00:06:59] Liz Palm: It's a real [00:07:00] important mix. And when it's an uncertain economy and there's possibly even layoffs at organizations, I think it's an even finer tuned story that you need to tell in order to get those programs still pushed through in these times.

[00:07:15] Jeff Walburg: You hit on a point that I hear that's an underlying theme is, alright, if they need, if we need to be more cost efficient as an organization and with our talent programs, maybe that means that now HR leaders are being asked with a smaller team to still deliver on really meaningful development and meaningful talent programs where it's like, I not only do you have the provenance of this value, but now you have maybe fewer full time employees who can support a program. And so when you're thinking about, all right, well, how do we budget or plan for this?

[00:07:44] Jeff Walburg: There's a lot more that needs to go into what that ask might look like.

[00:07:50] Liz Palm: Absolutely. We can't forget the folks that are still there after some of these layoffs. You got to take care of them because they're the ones who are going to keep moving the organization forward. This [00:08:00] is a great time. I'd love to poll everyone here about asking for budget in these times.

[00:08:04] Liz Palm: Are you prepared to ask for budget and resources during an uncertain economy? Let us know in the poll. which response fits best with how you're feeling right now.

[00:08:19] Liz Palm: Looks like we're taking the lead on, on being able to do it, but we need some guidance, right? You know what, Jeff, while all these responses are coming in, I'd also like to take a quick second, part of what PILOT does is to help organizations as a consulting partner, as well as an employee development provider.

[00:08:34] Liz Palm: So what are the, some of the things that PILOT offers that can help with this uncertain economy.

[00:08:42] Jeff Walburg: You talked about the competencies that PILOT focuses on. I think those are becoming really exceptionally more meaningful now as organizations think about, again, how do they be really cost efficient with the programs that they're creating, the programs that they're delivering to the business.

[00:08:57] Jeff Walburg: And that's specifically what PILOT was meant to do [00:09:00] and built to cover like the 80 20 of what every employee needs across a wide range of roles and experiences. And that's just become uber critical right now. Still focusing on these core career competencies, but a program that can now address a really wide range of an organization.

[00:09:18] Jeff Walburg: And that doesn't take an implementation time of Hey, well, we've got to plan for this for three or four months. And the implementation takes six months, HR leaders are being asked. to deliver these programs to a wide range and in a timeline much shorter and with a smaller team, which is really putting pressure on, hey, what can we do with the budget and the resources that we have now?

[00:09:39] Jeff Walburg: What's something that can deliver value to the business, cover a lot of who it needs to cover and still be really valuable for those end users.

[00:09:48] Liz Palm: I know one of the other things that I'm hearing from our customer success team and even from a recent customer panel is the turnkey nature of the program.

[00:09:57] Liz Palm: So with everything going on, you're getting pulled in [00:10:00] multiple different directions. So we like to offer something that we can take that burden off of you in some ways and run the program. So it still achieves your goal, but you're able to acknowledge some of the other things that you have going on.

[00:10:13] Jeff Walburg: Yeah, exactly.

[00:10:14] Liz Palm: All right. Let's take a quick look at the results of the poll. Thank you everyone who responded. We actually had quite a few folks on here respond. Looks like about a quarter of those who responded are able to have those conversations and that's phenomenal.

[00:10:29] Liz Palm: Congratulations to you. I may actually want to reach out and have you join a future webinar to help talk others through that. But it looks like the majority really is in the center. Almost 60% have some confidence but could use a little more support in getting through those conversations. Well, there's good news.

[00:10:47] Liz Palm: Our mission at PILOT is to help everyone feel powerful at work and that doesn't start with or stop with the members that go through our program. That includes our HR partners and our industry colleagues. So I'd love to offer you a [00:11:00] resource to help you get through the sharing. So here's a webinar that our CEO Ben Brooks actually did with this Co-founder and CEO of the diversity movement, talking about smart strategies to get your HR initiatives approved.

[00:11:17] Liz Palm: They have some phenomenal advice in here. All you have to do is scan the QR code with your phone, or Laura's gonna drop the link in the chat. No emails required. This goes directly to the recording. So even if you just want to pop it up and then circle back later, feel free. We really love to share these resources we have with everyone.

[00:11:37] Liz Palm: Wonderful. Now let's move on to our next theme, talking about preventing attrition. One of the most or the biggest concerns during an uncertain economy is attrition and retention. And I want to walk through this this, these statistics here. I actually use this during a different [00:12:00] webinar for the shockingly high cost of employee turnover.

[00:12:03] Liz Palm: And I will tell you, it was shocking. Just about everyone, both on our crew and attended the webinars was really surprised by some of these numbers. The voluntary turnover from the Bureau of Labor Statistics is around 30 percent, and it seems to be sitting there, which means there's a lot of folks moving, but the irony of that being the voluntary turnover is there's probably a good chunk of that can be prevented, and there's certain items that are causing them to leave that they, you probably could address and keep them on your staff.

[00:12:33] Liz Palm: That turnover Gartner's prediction that turnover rates were going to be about 20 percent higher. than pre pandemic levels.

[00:12:42] Liz Palm: The pandemic empowered employees a lot to realize there are things that they can ask for and that they should be looking at to make themselves happier. Of course, I'm sure you're all looking at how you can bring those to your staff and employees to make their experience better with your organization.

[00:12:59] Liz Palm: The [00:13:00] conversation with finance and your stakeholders will likely revolve around the last two. As of right now, Gallup has reportedly U. S. businesses are spend on this voluntary turnover. And as I mentioned, some of that is completely preventable. Are you shocked? Have you seen the report before? Or is this a new number and surprising to you all?

[00:13:25] Liz Palm: The cost here is in part the recruiting fees, the training fees, onboarding, but it also starts taking into consideration the The fees that you don't see as much the drop in productivity, the extra stress that are, is on the managers to not only hire somebody new, but make sure the other work is covered in the meantime.

[00:13:44] Liz Palm: And the list really goes on. It is, they boiled it down to say that the cost of replacing an employee is somewhere between 50 and 200 percent of that employee's total compensation. That often goes up the higher they are in the [00:14:00] organization, but it also aligns with how much effort and lost productivity is there as well.

[00:14:07] Liz Palm: So, Jeff, are you hearing similar struggles with this with the turnover? Do people realize the amount of cost that is going into this really significant levels of turnover?

[00:14:19] Jeff Walburg: I would say definitely yes. And it's not like an, it's not a surprise probably to any talent leaders or HR practitioners that attrition and retention are top priorities.

[00:14:30] Jeff Walburg: But, going back to the economic situation, I think it's very unique right now where some industries are seeing You know, higher layoffs like in, in technology or software and cost cutting, but then you have a lot of other industries that are still dealing with this record low unemployment.

[00:14:46] Jeff Walburg: And so from both those perspectives, developing and retaining talent has become, or again, the top priority. And what I'm hearing is especially It's top talent, it's leaders, it's [00:15:00] managers, it's a range of those groups that are diverse, that are equitable, that are inclusive and a lot of times what that sounds like.

[00:15:08] Jeff Walburg: in the conversations that I'm having is, hey, we really need programs that get our leaders engaged with the organization, that develop meaningful relationships with their teams, and that these individual contributors feel like they're connected to their manager and their leadership with an organization.

[00:15:23] Jeff Walburg: I know we're going to talk about the manager employee relationship, but I think it's really closely tied to, hey, fighting attrition means engaging employees in meaningful ways.

[00:15:34] Liz Palm: I think you touched on that in the beginning, Jeff, tight market, but people are still getting laid off. Same thing here. Alexandria shared that they're still pushing to downsize, even though that's going to exponentially increase then because of the voluntary turnover that follows.

[00:15:49] Liz Palm: It's a unique and interesting place to be right now, for sure.

[00:15:54] Jeff Walburg: Yeah, and that's it. That's what I was going to say is like this combination of low unemployment and cost savings initiatives and [00:16:00] it's become, it's combined now where we're developing and retaining talent. Again, always been a priority, but it's really magnified just in, in the current situation for a lot of organizations and related to what we said already, we're finding meaningful programs that develop and retain talent and engage a wide range of employees are really hard to find.

[00:16:22] Jeff Walburg: They're hard to buy, they're hard to develop or create, especially when you've got constrained teams or resources. A lot of those are RV magnified right now.

[00:16:31] Liz Palm: And that actually leads us directly into the next poll we have. I'd love to hear from everyone. If you could invest money to save employees and turnover costs, would you do it?

[00:16:42] Liz Palm: Like all things aside, all those other challenges of finding the right program and being difficult to deploy, just if you had the money, you could invest and knew you were going to get those returns. Sounds logical, right? Would you do it?

[00:16:55] Liz Palm: And Jeff, I know we've done a lot lately at PILOT, also talking to folks about the [00:17:00] rate of voluntary turnover and ways that we see that you could possibly stem that traffic going out of the organization. What would you say are some of those conversations you've had or perspectives that are circulating?

[00:17:14] Jeff Walburg: Yeah, from the PILOT perspective, a lot of times the conversation that I'm having, what we're uncovering with organizations that are really missing a key component of engaging employees in meaningful experiences that drive change. their desire to stay with the organization. And it's really comforting a lot of times in these conversations to be able to talk through the experiences that PILOT delivers, where we've got individual reflection, you've got group coaching, you've got manager feedback and engagement, you've got these executive firesides with senior leaders who come in and act as almost like a mentor at scale.

[00:17:51] Jeff Walburg: And these are experiences that a lot of time organizations want to do and want to deliver. but they're really hard to find that are scalable or not too expensive [00:18:00] or to create a kind of on your own. And each of those experiences within PILOT's program are specifically designed to drive engagement and develop these key skills and competencies which are directly tied to retention.

[00:18:15] And I would like to share a very unique statistic here from PILOT and something that we're very proud of. We focus on the data and our results. So we pull the members when they're going into the program, after each engagement they have, and at the end of the program. And we have found that after the members complete the program, 80 percent of those PILOT cohort members intend to stay with their employer for at least two more years.

[00:18:43] Liz Palm: This is significantly higher than both the starting rate of about 60 percent and the industry benchmark, which is also 60%. So we definitely have seen some retention benefits coming out of our program and people feeling more energized and seeing that [00:19:00] path forward that they didn't before they had a development program.

[00:19:04] Liz Palm: So it definitely impacts for sure. Let's take a look at our poll.

[00:19:08] Laura Mastrorocco: In terms of the polling responses, we have 44 percent chiming in saying, Yes, immediately bring it on. We have another 48 percent saying, Well, it depends on the initiative. We have one individual saying, skeptical sounds too good to be true.

[00:19:28] Laura Mastrorocco: And we have three participants chiming in saying, I don't know. Not sure. So, yeah I can tell you all, I, as a producer, I've sat through many sessions. I've had an opportunity to meet so many of our members who've gone through the program and I can tell you it is very real. I've seen some amazing turnarounds in people.

[00:19:50] Laura Mastrorocco: I've heard such great success stories. It is very real. So with that, Liz, let me turn it back over to you.

[00:19:57] Liz Palm: Thank you so much, Laura. And I [00:20:00] will say the one critic. Thank you. I'm a devil's advocate with most things myself, so it's always good to hear when somebody's saying, all right, hang on, I need a little bit more info before I'm jumping on board with this.

[00:20:12] Liz Palm: And that's actually the next resource I'd love to share with you all is something we had created. It's a calculator to help you calculate the cost affiliated with programs and against turnover costs and really justify that argument when you take it to your stakeholders. Now this is a little more complex, so it is a one on one workshop meeting that we will walk you through the exact calculations, taking a look at turnover for your organization and the number of employees you might be considering putting into a development program, the cost of a program.

[00:20:46] Liz Palm: Now, of course, we can gauge this against PILOT because that's who we are and what we do, but you could really apply it to any program that you'd be interested in deploying. It's just a matter of knowing the right calculations in the right spot. So if you are interested, [00:21:00] another QR code, I'm loving those today.

[00:21:02] Liz Palm: Scan it with your phone or take a look at the link in the chat and it'll take you to a spot where you can schedule right away to talk more about justifying programs when you do have high turnover costs in an uncertain economy. Fantastic. Well, let's jump into our last item here today. Fostering manager employee relationships.

[00:21:27] Liz Palm: This to me, started getting steam at the beginning of the year and I've been hearing more and more about this idea and how it really impacts Other aspects of the organization, not just like those one-on-ones you have on a weekly basis or periodic performance reviews. Better work study actually was, had a lot of really great information that I wanted to share.

[00:21:52] Liz Palm: A few things with you. It was a global HR research report, the state of performance enablement. [00:22:00] So, regular and effective manager employee conversations about performance and development are tremendously important to the employee experience, especially when it comes to engagement, inclusiveness, belonging, value, and satisfaction.

[00:22:15] Liz Palm: In particular, BetterWorks focused on managers and newer managers. That want and need help having conversations with employees on career advancement and professional growth. So if you take a look at a few things that I shared here, the very top section is looking at employees who are indeed satisfied with career and development.

[00:22:36] Liz Palm: Check-ins. They are more likely to see a path forward for advancement. That's up to 750 percent. Yes, that zero is supposed to be there. That is 7. 5 times more likely to see that path if they are satisfied with these conversations. They also say that they are more engaged and more productive. They feel more valued and they like working for their [00:23:00] company.

[00:23:00] Liz Palm: I saw somebody mentioned in the chat earlier, likely because they feel valued and they're being recognized by the organization. But as I mentioned, many of the managers feel like they're not getting the support or the training they need. There's a statistic actually says 46 percent of managers don't feel confident.

[00:23:18] Liz Palm: coaching for career development. So there's definitely a gap in the process. And as BetterWorks stated, and we're saying here, your coaches need the coaching now. Jeff, I know you've talked about this a little bit, especially in reference to the pandemic. How are these manager employee conversations going?

[00:23:37] Jeff Walburg: Yeah, you're exactly right. Especially since the pandemic, like good managers have always had a really high value position within most organizations. There's similar themes in the chat already, but people, join organizations, but they leave managers, right? A lot of us have heard that. And I can't tell you how many times I've heard things and even the last few months Hey, COVID drove [00:24:00] the business growth of our company and we had lots of changing roles and led to a lot of like upward mobility for a lot of roles.

[00:24:07] Jeff Walburg: Hey, you're an individual contributor. Now you're a manager. But the training and the development for these roles have not caught up and these organizations now just like this data that we're looking at here are starting to see the impacts of that and they're hearing in anecdotal conversations or from their HRBPs or in employee engagement surveys that development and these manager development conversations are not happening from an IC level or from even a manager to their manager. And then the managers also don't feel equipped to even engage in those conversations.

[00:24:41] Jeff Walburg: They don't have the tools and resources to make them meaningful.

[00:24:46] Liz Palm: That's really, it's interesting insight. And I know we all were just rushing around and trying to figure out what to do throughout the pandemic. And now I think we're all getting that opportunity to stop and look backwards a little bit and say, [00:25:00] okay, we made it through.

[00:25:01] Liz Palm: Now, where are those gaps? What's missing? And this is clearly becoming a bigger and bigger area that needs to have some focus for sure. Let's go back to another poll. And I'm curious to hear from all of you here. Do you feel confident in your manager's abilities to lead and to facilitate these high value career development conversations?

[00:25:27] Liz Palm: Let us know.

[00:25:29] Liz Palm: It looks like we're trending very similar so far. As you all continue to contribute here to the poll, let's go back to Jeff and see some of the things that PILOT is doing and can do to help managers in these areas.

[00:25:45] Jeff Walburg: So one of the things that I hear a lot related to managers needing development is also we need development that fits within the flow of the work that they're already doing.

[00:25:56] Jeff Walburg: Like it can't just be like a one time offsite. It can't [00:26:00] be so burdensome that they can't get their core job done, or they don't have time to engage with their team. It needs to be focused, but it also means to be incremental and deliver meaningful development so that managers, employees are on the same page as far as what does a development conversation look like?

[00:26:18] Jeff Walburg: What does a growth conversation look like? And then specifically, we've touched on already by why one of our for experiences through PILOT's program is manager future focused feedback. And it's very distinctly not about just a performance review. Well, it can dovetail with that. It's really giving the manager and the individual who may themselves also be a manager, the resources to have a conversation about their future development.

[00:26:46] Jeff Walburg: Not only just the resources, but the prompts. And a lot of times it takes just, you've got to get over the hurdle of, hey, how do we have a development conversation? All right we have a performance review conversation because we have to do that. Well, how do we get over the hurdle of being like, I want to [00:27:00] talk about what the next step looks like for me, or what the next best version of myself could be, and where I want to go with my career, and PILOT does exactly that.

[00:27:08] Jeff Walburg: Delivered in the flow of work, in a way that's incremental and not burdensome, but also delivers really meaningful value to that individual employee as well as their manager.

[00:27:20] Liz Palm: And I know creating those development objectives that go along with this is very challenging. It's challenging for us.

[00:27:27] Liz Palm: Like we, we use our own tools internally and we work through creating development objectives for our crew and working with our managers like we recommend to others. And we were realizing that it took some time for folks. to get to the core objective that wasn't performance or was really a growth oriented aspect.

[00:27:45] Liz Palm: So our product team jumped in and we actually created a tool to help you get there. It walks through some very simple questions that get you thinking in that growth mindset. instead of always just looking back to those KPIs. [00:28:00] They're important, I will never argue that. But there's the performance side, and this growth side is a little unique and takes you out of that comfort zone very often.

[00:28:08] Laura Mastrorocco: Liz, I'd like to jump in and just talk about these poll results. So we have a bunch of managers that need training. 55 percent of our responses said their manager needs training. We had 14 percent who said, yep, they're strong leaders, which is awesome. Congratulations to those of you who were in that position.

[00:28:28] Laura Mastrorocco: And 27 percent said, they're doing their best, little rough around the edges. And I'm so sorry for the two of you who said it's a disaster but we can help. That's the good news.

[00:28:41] Liz Palm: Yes, definitely sending some good vibes out to the folks in the disaster mode. But for everyone really, there, there is hope.

[00:28:50] Liz Palm: I think you're in good company right now being in any of the two, three and four responses, just like Jeff's hearing. Everybody is trying to deal with [00:29:00] this in the market and find something that's going to help them get their managers more up to speed. So everybody is back to focusing on growth mode.

[00:29:08] Liz Palm: So interesting. Thank you all for sharing that with us today.

[00:29:15] Liz Palm: Now, I do have one last resource. Going back to the QR codes for y'all, but I just I love the insights that our CEO, Ben, is able to pull out when these conversations with industry partners or others that we do. So this is another webinar that we did, and this one was with an organization called BONUSLY.

[00:29:33] Liz Palm: Vicky Yang is the VP of People Operations there. So in this conversation, we focused on Management Training 101, and realized the key to building stronger, more engaged teams in 2023 is building stronger leaders. So they talked about how you can do this, some simple resources, and tips for getting started with training today.

[00:29:55] Liz Palm: So y'all, folks, you don't have to look for a program. Take a look at this webinar, and maybe [00:30:00] we'll pull y'all up a level from our poll so you're not quite in disaster mode anymore. Scan the QR code with your phone if you'd like, or again, the link is in the chat. Still, no email address is required.

[00:30:11] Liz Palm: You're going directly to our recording, and I do hope you enjoy listening to these brilliant minds talk about management training for this year.

[00:30:22] Liz Palm: So that wraps up our themes for today. I've seen some different comments in the chat. Actually Earl, I see one recently, the perceived organizational support shares when people feel invested in, they will reciprocate back into the environment. You're absolutely right. Looked over a number of different reports when I was grabbing these stats for our conversation.

[00:30:44] Liz Palm: And the one statistic that I did see is the exponential reciprocal. correlation between that investment and back into that. Do they feel valued? Do, are they engaged? Are they productive? The more you invest in [00:31:00] them, the more you're getting that benefit. So even like earlier, there's a cost savings affiliated with it, but it's like a double bottom line because you have a cost savings, you're saving employees and you're the developing the ones that are there so that they don't start looking in other ways.

[00:31:16] Liz Palm: Great point to pull out. Thank you so much, Earl. Anyone else? I'd love to answer any questions. Have Jeff, Jeff answer any questions you may have, whether it's about these insights or things you've heard in the market, or about the PILOT program as well. We're happy to share anything on either side.

[00:31:37] Liz Palm: And while we're waiting to see if questions come in, Jeff, do you have any additional thoughts that you wanted to add and share with everyone?

[00:31:46] Jeff Walburg: I would just say that I feel grateful in many ways because I'm in a unique position, sitting in a webinar like this with HR leaders and talent practitioners, where I'm having a lot of these conversations across a [00:32:00] wide range of roles and industries and even geographies.

[00:32:03] Jeff Walburg: And so these are the things that I'm hearing, but I get that maybe many of you who are sitting on this webinar right now. Like you, you probably don't have the same perspective where you're not necessarily always talking to colleagues outside your organization and being able to hear Oh, that's a problem.

[00:32:17] Jeff Walburg: Or you're trying to address that challenge of developing better managers and relationships, or we have that problem too. And so I hope you feel even just in this time today that. Like the challenges that you're facing are not necessarily atypical, although they're likely very unique within your organization or industry.

[00:32:34] Jeff Walburg: And that we at PILOT are really excited about helping individuals and organizations understand what are your unique pressures to your industry? And what are the objectives that you're hearing from your CFO or your CHRO or your CEO around what you need to do? And then what are the challenges to those that we can help you address and deliver value through meaningful employee experiences knowing that [00:33:00] we've got all these challenges, even just the three that we talked about today.

[00:33:04] Liz Palm: Yeah, thank you so much for that, Jeff. I definitely, I'll do a real life plus one on that one. That going back to that mission, we're looking to help everyone feel powerful. And part of that is also just helping you figure out what's going on. So that's part of what Jeff does, part of what Josh does, who you may have seen in the chat today as well, is really just talking to folks and figuring out what's going to work for their situation and what is going to work for their situation where do different things fit in?

[00:33:28] Liz Palm: Our program is definitely unique and something that can layer into a program you already have and give it more value and extend what it is. So it's a bit of a puzzle piece fitting in with other things. It doesn't have to replace. And we would love to chat with you all to see if this is the right option for your organization.

[00:33:47] Liz Palm: So if we want to flip actually the last slide, we'll go ahead and start closing this out today. Last QR code, I promise. If you are struggling in any of these areas and would like to talk through ideas with [00:34:00] someone, or you think we could be a good fit, please click on that QR code, it'll go directly to a calendar, and you can schedule with one of our crew members.

[00:34:09] Liz Palm: We really appreciate everyone being here today, your engagement in the polls and sharing your insights there and letting us know what's going on in your area. Please let us know if there, Jean, we would love to touch on that before we go. The program, Jeff, do you want to take take this question?

[00:34:26] Liz Palm: What exactly is the PILOT program?

[00:34:28] Jeff Walburg: Yeah, sure. Yep. No, that's a great question. PILOT is a, it is a six month comprehensive employee development program. It is powered by software and technology, but it's really delivered by our team. And so it's not necessarily a separate platform that employees need to go to, but.

[00:34:45] Jeff Walburg: The weekly reflection activities and the manager feedback components are delivered via software so they come straight to someone's email, whether it's on their desktop or their phone. We do monthly group coaching sessions that happen virtually on zoom similar [00:35:00] with the executive firesides. And so it really is this unique combination of software technology, but also real team and activities interaction that happens virtually. And PILOT has had this virtual model even before COVID. So this is not a program that we took and said, well, how do we make this work now when everyone is remote, even though they're likely not now. But it's a program meant to reach employees in their current flow of work, in a way that's incremental, that's delivering value, in a way that's frictionless, that's seamless, because of the way that the tools are delivered, the way that the activities come via technology. Yeah, great question.

[00:35:41] Liz Palm: Yes, thank you for that, Jeff. Are there any other questions surrounding the program?

[00:35:45] Liz Palm: I know a big area that we didn't touch on a lot here that is pretty popular with folks are those fireside executive chats. This is a layer of connection I think that helps with engagement, it helps with accessibility within the organization. And it gives [00:36:00] the cohort members the unique opportunity to talk to a stakeholder or an executive who may not have been accessible to them before.

[00:36:07] Liz Palm: So it's another part of the program trying to create connections between members, between members and executives, members and their managers. So it's a lot of great opportunities to, to get the folks engaged for sure. Thank you again for that.

[00:36:22] Jeff Walburg: Yeah, great question. I would say if you're curious, even just about any of the questions that we talked about, or the challenges we talked about today, or any of the experiences that PILOT delivers, individual reflection, monthly group coaching with a professional certified coach, manager feedback and engagement, or executive firesides, which is really like, Liz just said, bringing in almost someone who can act as a mentor at scale for a larger group.

[00:36:48] Jeff Walburg: If those are experiences that you're interested in, those are the kind of conversations we're more than happy to have to explore, what are the unique challenges that, that you're facing today?

[00:36:59] Liz Palm: [00:37:00] All right. Then if there are no other questions, I'm going to go ahead and wrap us up today.

[00:37:05] Liz Palm: It was a pleasure chatting with everyone. Definitely keep an eye on your email inbox. We've got a lot going on right now. A lot of different webinars that all touch on different trends, different parts of our program and different insight from our CEO. So there's a lot of others. If you'd like to join us again, And we do hope to talk with a few of you one on one.

[00:37:23] Liz Palm: Jeff or Josh would be looking forward to booking those calls. So thank you again for being here. Thank you so much, Jeff, for your phenomenal insights and sharing the, what you're hearing in the market. And Laura, of course, keeping us on track and tech working properly. Thank you all.