40. Why does community matter for organisations?

Brandon 0:06

Hello, everyone and welcome to another episode of the operations room a podcast for CEOs. I am Brandon Mensa, once again joined by my lovely co host, Bethany Ayers, how're things going, Bethany,

Bethany 0:17

in: 1955

Brandon 2:57

s and: 2000

Bethany 3:53

We did a training at peak around how we're in privileged is what it was called. And one of the things that really, I took away from that was, you are blind to your privilege, but you can see other people's privilege. That is, for me an example of that. So you were blind to the fact that you have a level of privilege where people can just ask about your family and you don't think anything about it. And that's a privilege that he did not have. And so he was not blind to yours. And it was probably a moment of you just seeing your own privilege without even realise it because you're blind to it until somebody points it out. Yep,

Brandon 4:34

I think that's pretty accurate. And I think this is where the probably the most important growth can happen for individuals very personally, I think which is like having that reflection back on them and having a cold out in that respect. We all have something to learn

Bethany 4:48

all the time by listening.

Brandon 4:51

So we've got a great topic today, which is what can a CEO do to combat the loneliness epidemic? We have an amazing guest for this which is Jacqueline pesca cielo The founder of fabric. And before we get to that, Bethany, I just wanted to ask you a couple questions back in November of last year, the who declared loneliness a public health concern. And loneliness transcends borders and is becoming a global public health concern affecting every facet of health, well being, and development, which means from a macro standpoint, this has a very clear direct impact on organisations and enterprises and people that work within them as well. So I guess my first question to you is, when you think about hybrid, you think about remote, you think about this loneliness crisis. What do you make of all this? What is the impact on organisations as it stands right now.

Bethany 5:40

So I believe that hybrid working is here to stay, I suspect, it'll even go more than that to almost remote working. And I think that that's like a trend, that there'll be ups and downs along the journey, and there'll be a bit of return to work, but ultimately, return to work is going to fail. And our social fabric that we got from going to work isn't going to be there anymore. But we're also lonely, and we want to be more social. And wouldn't it just be easier if we all went back to work, and when that solves the problem, but it just doesn't seem like it's going to partially maybe because people don't want to spend time with work. There's a lot of commuting, you go into work, and you sit on Zoom calls. And so how do we shape the world that we're going to live in in the future, and the pandemic sped it up, but it was something that's already happening? Yeah,

Brandon 6:35

it feels like the pandemic tore the band aid off in some respects. And when you think about it, the number of relationships and marriages that previously came out of a work environment, because you were there, five days a week are quite substantial, when you think about your social circle of friends that also are derived from a workplace. So if you're not going into the office on a regular basis, you're not developing those bonds, whether it's with a partner or whether it's with friends, then clearly there is a hole, and that hole is now being filled with loneliness. And the question is, how do we now think about that going forward? And I guess my second question off the back of that is, given that fact, what is the responsibility of the organisation to now think about this as an active issue, to ensure that their organisation is going to be as successful as it can be? We

Bethany 7:19

had a conversation with Geffen around what's the responsibility of the company for wellbeing? Loneliness, is a humongous contributor to well being. So providing a meditation app, or figuring out ways that people can make true connection and be less lonely. I suspect the latter is going to be the one that is actually better for everyone and for employees. But the question is, what can you do as an organisation and I don't have an answer, go into a party with a bunch of co workers that I see a few times a week, is not actually going to make me feel any less lonely.

Brandon 7:55

My former company, we had a wonderful guy, he was a software developer join us and get to know him a little bit. And he just moved in from a different city didn't know anyone, it was kind of expecting you to get to know people at the company, be in the office and develop friendships and whatnot. And obviously, with the pandemic, that didn't happen. And I remember checking in on him periodically. And you know, he was very expressive about the fact that he felt lonely, he felt like he was by himself didn't know anyone had no real relationships, and so on. And you could see it continuing kind of like every quarter where we had the same conversation and the same level of palpable loneliness was there. And I remember at some point, he was saying that, you know, in his previous company, he knew everyone, right, and had wonderful relationships across the board. And lo and behold, 12 months into his employment, nothing to do with the company that I worked for in terms of our practices, or the role itself or anything like that. He basically quit, went back to his previous job, simply because he had these pre existing relationships where, you know, we had a bunch of friends there, and the days that he had on Zoom calls were just more enjoyable because he actually knew who he was talking to. And I just remember, at the end of that employment cycle, like there's a problem here, as a company, we're not doing enough to help this software developer to feel comfortable, and to really put them in a position where, you know, he's being highly effective and wants to continue with the company. So what do you make of that?

Bethany 9:19

My only hesitation with this is of all of the people that you've worked with in your career. How many of them are you still friends with?

Brandon 9:27

I don't know, maybe a dozen.

Bethany 9:29

I'm not even sure I have that many. What combats loneliness. I don't think it's just hanging out with people. It's actually making connection and having a shared experience and being seen and seeing somebody. And so I wonder how many work relationships are actually friendships or actually combat loneliness. There was a point in our marriage when we had young children. I did not feel seen by my husband. I was incredibly lonely to swiping married. And despite having somebody that like I sat next to on the sofa every day, so I don't think we can equate not being alone as the same as not being lonely. And I think a lot of work relationships are not being alone, rather than actually a connection that feeds your soul. Yep,

Brandon: 10:20

no, that's completely fair. This kind of leads on to the next question, which is to combat that, which is the actual loneliness of actual connection and feeling that you're not just with somebody, but you're actually having conversations that are meaningful to you. And taking away from that in a way that satisfying which an organisation do to be proactive about that truly help that individual or the employees be in the best position to not be lonely. I

Bethany: 10:45

think we're all feeling through this. It's a new world for all of us. I'm answering just entirely personally, and it's the opinion of one and my own experience, not my experience. As a leader. I have made fantastic connections this year, I have learned tonnes I've met amazing people. And that has all been through community. But lots and lots of different communities like I have my pottery class, and the average age is 65. And they're all women. And it's amazing to learn and experience that I have my writing class where everybody basically is my age. And we are bonding over sharing our souls and our writing. I have the CEO roundtable where we all have connection around being the only one in the company who does our job. And I'm not sure I've felt necessarily those connections always at work because of the professional. And what are you going to say? And is it going to be misinterpreted? And is there going to be gossip? And does my title pre seed cede anything that I say or connections that I can make? And so for me, I've actually found it very freeing, and making deeper connections sooner, because it's not in a work environment, there's less risk. And there's less downside. It

Brandon: 12:06

seems to me that getting the coffee cup and the hoodie when you join organisations, every company does this now, right? There's money spent on that. And I want to point this out specifically, because this is where you get the periphery stuff of welcoming somebody where you're spending cash on that. But yet, you're not as a company spending money on this topic, which seems wrong to me, a lot of companies don't. So you think as the first step, the most obvious thing to do is to take budget, wherever that budget is coming from, maybe it's coming from the coffee cups or the hoodies, maybe it's coming from elsewhere. Step number one is providing some level of cash or subsidy to allow individuals in the organisation to join professional organisations of interest in this case, which is you know, in our sphere, this is things like the CEO roundtable, or the CEO, Alliance, or what have you, where you know, it does cost money, it costs x amount per month, we're paying as part of these subscriptions, we become a part of something where we get to elements of value, one element of value is just professional peers to talk to you around challenges that we're having in the business, which obviously directly benefits the company in that respect. And then equally important is the emotional support or that connection with the individuals as well, which is personally around this topic of loneliness. Because in your role as the CEO, you're quite lonely in that sense, because you have nobody to talk to about some of these challenges, like my SEO is driving me bananas. That's a very clear cut one word organisations should be spending all that. I'm just curious what you think.

Bethany: 13:25

I think that makes a lot of sense. And also, stepping back from my super negative, nothing about work is good and never go into the office again, bias. If I think about one of the things that worked really well for me, pre COVID in the world, was being funded by the business to create our own groups, there were a group of us who hired a personal trainer, and on a Thursday all did personal training together, and it was open to anybody who wanted to and that was amazing, because it was all levels, the organisation all different parts, all different functions. And we bonded because we all wanted to run and lift weights, whether it was sunny or wet outdoors. So I think that there's a professional organisation funding. And there's also probably internal funding, that letting people self select what it is that they want to be part of.

Brandon: 14:18

Let's go on a quick break. And when we come back, we will have our conversation with Jacqueline Pescarolo. She is all things community and really is at the forefront of what we're talking about here in terms of community building. And that'll be a fascinating conversation. So let's go take a quick break and we'll come back with Jacqueline.

Bethany: 14:38

People want to be hybrid working from home. And people want to make connections in ways and in places that they want to with people that they want to meet who aren't necessarily who they work with, and how is it all going to happen. I'd love to hear your views on the trends and your predictions.

: 14:58

I think We're seeing a rise in what we're calling the modern communities, right? You know, we try to love our jobs, we spend so much time at our jobs. But that's not always the case. I know a lot of people who don't necessarily love it and not are not finding that connection with the people that they work with, because it's not a shared passion. So how do we start building our communities more so from the place of a shared passion from the foundation of your interests, your identities, where you want to be with the people you want to be with talking about the things you want to talk about, and having, of course discussion and getting those different opinions and those varying opinions, sometimes those varying opinions and those discussions won't happen at work, because they don't feel like they can happen at work, because they might not be appropriate, or whatever it is, we live in kind of this society where you're supposed to talk about very specific things at work very specific things at home, you know, we want to be able to be with people, we feel like we can be open and connect and be accepted. And that I think is the future.

Bethany: 15:56

A lot of the communities I'm involved in, they're actually still very related to work. And that's fine, like professional communities. We belong to the CEO roundtable, because there's one COO at work, and you need to be able to talk to others. And it's really helpful. And you have a member of fabric who has brought together all of the lonely corporate lawyers, you know, so there's like maybe one or two corporate lawyers, but it's really great when the we can all talk to each other about the world of corporate law. And then there was like a no code one the other day, almost all of the communities are actually bringing functions or industries together for the most part, which is where I think it starts to become interesting of is this where l&d budget should be spent? Is it part of the company's responsibility to help foster connection that's not within the company? Or is this like, actually, we should just try and foster as much internally and it's up to you as an individual to figure out your community externally?

: 16:55

I think in a perfect world, both play a role, and is there an l&d budget that could potentially be for building community internally? Sure. I also think it can be used to give people access to joining communities externally, a lot of the communities that were finding it fabric are either just starting or more mature, some of them monetize, some of them don't. And the precipice of starting with community builders at fabric was, let's bring people together who have shared challenges and shared opportunities the same way we bring founders together, because it's, you know, lonely at the top or female executives, because it's lonely at the top. So Can these corporate companies be able to help monetize external community so that their employees can be less lonely? I think that's a world that I want to live in. I think that's super interesting.

Brandon: 17:40

So on the one side of it, you have the example of legal counsel when there's one individual in the organisation or a CFO, as we've just talked about. So very clearly, from a company point of view, from an l&d standpoint, it definitely makes sense to have a programme to encourage that person to have professional relationships that are pure level where they can learn a tremendous amount to be just more effective at the role within the company. And from a community standpoint, the organisation sponsoring that in some form or having some spin around it to to allow it to occur. That's very pointed, I think in terms of a company wanting or willing to spend money on that. The next level up is what you talked about, which is on the mental health side, whether it's loneliness or other issues, that an individual might be encountering the same idea of putting some organisational spend around that to have a programme whereby you can encourage the mental health front at least that these individuals have an opportunity to go out and seek community and there's some level of subsidy coming from the company to allow that to occur as well. So do you see those as the two primary pucks of organisational focus or sponsorship to support community within the employee base that

: 18:46

they have? To the extent Yes, you know, something that we didn't talk about that I think is really important, and that a lot of companies do really well, our employee resource groups. So making sure that you have space within your companies to meet with people that you want to talk about certain things with, that you might not feel comfortable talking with others with? Or, you know, being able to have that safe space at work? I think that is like the bare minimum that's what we should absolutely be doing within our companies and we should have that available to our employees that our jobs. But otherwise, yes, we do it already. And I think we will all catch up but we do it for our physical health. You know, so many companies will subsidise your gym membership. And here in the States, we're starting to see people subsidise therapy. We're seeing premature death increases we're seeing isolation increases we're seeing people just not being connected and this causing terrible health impacts that are making us less productive at our jobs. I think that the next wave should be helping to monetize and helping to match people meet people with communities that they would benefit from, for their social engagement, connection and belonging, one

Bethany: 19:50

community that we haven't spoken about, and I'm wondering why none of us are thinking about it our customer communities because like kind of COVID Pre COVID A bit post, everybody wants to build a customer, community, customer advocacy community community. And I've never really been particularly excited about any of those as a customer, I have to say, are you seeing any customer communities working well, or have you started to talk to any,

: 20:18

we are definitely seeing a rapid rise in customer communities for brands, you know, I think the point of them, or the goal of them is that they provide support, they provide feedback loops for the brand itself and the products that you're selling. And then you ideally what the company wants, what that brand wants is loyalty and advocacy. I think that is the right way to get that today. Because that's what the consumer is looking for. If it's done intentionally and done well, I think we're going to see a really big rise at it. Because

Bethany: 20:45

also like, if you Google community building, it's all the customer stuff that comes up. And there's lots and lots of consultants around building customer communities. And then there also seems to be this new industry that's rising, which is the paid for or the free community. And there are a lot of paid for communities where people are basically solopreneurs. And they create a community. And then that's what they spend their entire time doing. And there's just so many of them. And then now there's like communities of communities and like courses to teach you how to do communities. Are we at the top of a hype cycle? Are we on the way to it? Is there more to come? It seems to be like a new industry.

: 21:24

I don't think we're at the top, I think that we are seeing community move from digital to physical. And we're going to be living here for a while people want to be together people want to meet in real life. So I think this is I think that's where we are right now.

Bethany: 21:38

And that is 100% true for not just community. I guess I find this dichotomy really strange in that nobody wants to go back to work. And I am 100% in the I don't want to go back. I don't want to deal with the commute. I don't want to go the Northern line at seven in the morning. But yet, I don't want to be online. And how do you fit the two together? And then it's not only community like I was reading an article about dating apps, and they've all had the highest churn that they've seen in ages across the board, like they were seeing, stagnating, gross, but they're actually all declining. And there's apparently like this big uprise of speed dating again, at least in London, I don't know, if you're seeing it in New York,

: 22:17

I get that. I think we're all right. You know, we've been on our phones and computers for years, when you think about third places, third spaces that are really kind of irrelevant term to what we're talking about. I have probably read every article on the internet about third spaces and third places. Most of those articles say, where are they we need them. A lot of the stats say that people think they could find community in their gyms, or you know, when they're co working spaces, and you're leaving, they're completely unfulfilled. So where are these third spaces. And I think that's what you're going to see trying to be solved.

Brandon: 22:50

This idea of rethinking team gatherings within companies to ensure that within the company itself, there's really good in real life relationships that are being built not necessarily in the office, per se, as it is getting together for specific events. There's the kind of secondary layer of community that resides outside of that a little bit, which is, from a professional standpoint, getting together with peers, and just being better at your functional kind of skill set. And then there's the third layer of the loneliness fear a little bit too in that remote hybrid scenario, where it's more broad based communities and organisations supporting that. So it's feels like there's like three layers to be rethought a little bit in terms of what is a good look like for the hybrid worker? How do you see that for the optimal conditions for the hybrid worker?

: 23:39

It brings me right back to kind of where we started, which is what do budgets look like to give employees the access to design their days as a hybrid worker for productivity and connection, if you are a company that is hoping to bring your hybrid team members together when they want to be together or in places that are going to be inspiring and uplifting and productive for them? I think there's a way to do that. That is not forcing people to go back to the office, but giving them the optionality that they're looking for, to do their work in places where they feel inspired, where they can find community and can find connection. Being lonely, they say, is that equivalent of smoking 15 cigarettes a day? How productive would you feel if you felt as terrible as you would if you smoked 15 cigarettes a day. And I think that that is really like being us now having the data and you know, the surgeon general warnings and all the statistics of the research and the money that's being spent to really look at loneliness and a post pandemic world. If we really take if our companies really take time with those statistics. I think it points them directly to what you're saying. You feel happy because you're feeling connected and you're making new connections, which means you're learning more from new people. All of this is fulfilling to us as humans. That's what we need. This goes back to the beginning of time. We need connection to be happy with skewed away from it. Now how do we get back to it, and our companies are going to have to play a really big role in doing that. A big chunk of that is wellness programming, it's mindfulness, it's getting us to move our bodies in a way that feels good first thing in the morning to set us up for productivity and connection. It's meditation in space group meditation, which, for me, you know, I leave a group meditation feeling like I'm floating. When you're doing in a room with people, there's an energy and a vibration that you benefit from as a human. So I think being specific about programming in our community spaces could potentially solve those problems, you could solve a lot of the problems that we're using our wellness budgets and our l&d budgets on how

Bethany: 25:38

to get started, are there resources, anyone you would recommend using? Are there consultants who do this? And if so, what are those kinds of consultants called,

: 25:47

a lot of this is hyperlocal, which I think makes it tricky, right? Because now you're you're going back in person, and you're going back to what's close to where your employees live. So there's a bit of hyperlocal research that needs to be done with what are the communities that are where you are, that plus giving your employees optionality to join communities that resonate with them, potentially just creating a budget for it and having some guidelines around it and testing it and seeing if that works. I think the hardest step for companies, the bigger the harder is just the first step, just kind of dipping the toe in of hey, you know, we're going to provide this small amount of budget for you to help you be more connected. And being willing to kind of take a little bit of a risk in doing that, because you might not know exactly, you know, immediately where that money should be allocated or what people should be spending that money on. But being willing to trust your employees, put some small guidelines around how the money spent, and then tracking the data. If we don't then follow up and say, How does using this money to do this thing you're doing making you feel there won't be incentive to keep doing it and to keep doubling down on that budget. So I encourage people who are going to start doing this to put the systems in place to track the data, and see how your employees are feeling and be able to track the productivity that comes after you implement this, I think is is the most important thing. So

Brandon: 27:05

number one, it has to be available and accessible as your point and number two, having a subsidy from the company that's very helpful to kind of encourage that a little bit as well. And coming from my generation, again, this kind of Generation X thing. And being an operations person, I know that for myself, personally, when I get involved in companies, sometimes you kind of lose yourself a little bit and you don't necessarily mean to, the only thing that's in front of you is like work, you almost you'd like it to be present available role models from others, to just keep reminding you that you don't have to live this life, there's actually a different way to live your life when you work in organisations where you can work hard and have a phenomenal contribution, you can also ensure that those really healthy balance there because as you burn that candle of your myopic focus, it will come to haunt you in terms of either your ultimate productivity for the company or being burnt out at the end of it and having to leave when there's really this healthy balance to be had. And encouraging that isn't a Gen X or I find this problematic. I suspect on the Gen Z side they don't they're wanting these types of programmes and less older folks that are more senior and companies were like, Does this make sense? I'm not quite sure that seems quite radical, like,

Bethany: 28:16

can you just come back to the office? Like why would you think about

: 28:21

you know, as someone who sits in between these generations, as a millennial, I've experienced both, you know, I built companies for the last 10 years, I've burned myself out in every way possible. And now being surrounded by your people that younger than me and building fabric and, and really understanding what is important to them. But I think a lot of it is mental health, making sure that you feel really good that you can be great at your job. I think that people that I surround myself with better in this category are wonderful at their jobs. And I think a lot of it is because they have a little bit more balanced than I did when I was younger when I was throwing myself in 150% into what I was doing. Being able to have a little bit more balanced, I think is healthy. So it'll be interesting to see. Like how the generations that are coming up and that will come next how they will assess the balance of what is the portion of my time that I'm really gonna focus on work, what's a portion of my time that I'm going to focus on community you're seeing people want to make their own schedules, they want to be able to have community and they want to be able to focus on their families and they want to be able to make money doing something that they really love. But I think what we do know is that people want to make time for connection and ultimately feeling lonely, feel really bad. And we want to feel healthier. So how do we do that?

Bethany: 29:39

I think if you'd asked me a year ago if I were lonely I would have said no and I don't think I was sometimes you receive lonely is like in your flat all by yourself eating ice cream watching Netflix with nobody to talk to with the curtains drawn down and isn't actually that and you can be with your family. You can have loads going on. And, and it's not just connection, it's meaningful connection. It's being seen. It's seeing somebody else. It's getting excited by other ideas. It's having that lifeforce that like you feel coming out of you, because you're so excited to be with other people. And what they're doing, I think is like a kind of encourage everybody, if you're not making those connections, and you don't think you're lonely, because you're not in a dark room all by yourself, you might actually be able to be happier. If you go and talk to other people. I

: 30:26

really believe it's a courageous act to do it. It's not something we're necessarily used to. walking into a room full of strangers is not comfortable, it is scary. Something that I would encourage people to really truly believe is that when you show up in that room, there's countless other people who feel the exact same way you do. And being the person to engage in that conversation is so wonderful, and it's doing that other person a favour that you think is so well connected, and so not lonely. And you know, it's doing that other person a favour, too.

Bethany: 30:57

If our listeners could only take one thing away from the conversation, what would you like them to know, or to remember,

: 31:04

but I think we don't often feel lonely. We spend a lot of time on our phones pay attention to how much time we're spending on social media, trying to fill the gap of connection, and seek out your local communities. Bethany, you've said it a couple of different times today, like how you feel when you leave these gatherings, I feel exactly the same way. You know, I leave a room full of a bunch of people that I didn't know when I walked in, and I am on a new level of vibration, and it's accessible to everyone and seek it and you'll find it and you'll and you'll make those new connections and those serendipitous connections that I think we're all really missing.

Bethany: 31:37

For the introverts listening who I am, by the way, an introvert where Jacqueline just said isn't just for the extroverts, like even those of us who only maybe want to talk to three people in the evening can leave feeling buzzing, you don't have to talk to 15. I

: 31:52

am also an introvert, I recharge alone. So it's to design spaces for connection but also so that everyone can feel comfortable. So yes to the introverts. There's a lot of us out there,

Brandon: 32:02

love it, seek it and you will find it so I think that's a good way to live it as well. So thank you, Jacqueline, for joining us on the operations room. If you like what you hear, please subscribe or leave us a comment and we will see you next week.