- 1 day ago
What separates organizations that consistently execute from those that struggle with culture, retention, and performance?
In this episode of The Mason Duchatschek Show, Mason sits down with Jackson Lynch to unpack why talent management is one of the most overlooked drivers of business performance and execution.
This conversation goes far beyond HR trends and employee engagement surveys. Jackson explains why 94% of execution problems are system problems, not people problems, and why CEOs, CHROs, and executive leaders must align talent strategy directly with business outcomes.
You’ll learn why top performers audit company culture, how clarity drives workforce productivity, why succession planning often fails, and what HR leaders must do to earn influence in the boardroom.
If you are a CEO, CHRO, business owner, executive leader, HR professional, or team leader trying to improve organizational culture, employee performance, leadership development, and business execution, this episode delivers actionable insights you can apply immediately.
In This Episode
-Why talent is a core execution issue
-The evolving CEO-CHRO relationship
-Moving HR from cost center to ROI driver
-Why employee engagement is a symptom, not the root issue
-How top performers audit organizational culture
-The importance of clarity in job expectations
-Why decision rights and autonomy matter in HR leadership
-How business fluency changes boardroom conversations
-Rethinking accountability versus reliability
-Why succession planning often fails
-The role of learning agility in hiring and leadership development
-How culture becomes “decision residue”
Key Takeaways
-HR strategy must connect directly to business strategy
-Organizational culture reflects leadership decision-making
-Workforce productivity improves when expectations are clear
-CEOs and CHROs must align on outcomes immediately
-HR metrics should support measurable business outcomes
-Learning agility matters more than years of experience
-Reliable systems outperform reactive accountability models
-Talent management drives long-term organizational performance
Episode Chapters
00:00 The Importance of Talent in Business Strategy
07:11 Understanding the Role of CHROs
11:08 Shifting from Cost to ROI Mindset in HR
24:33 Aligning Expectations Between CEOs and CHROs
27:10 Building Bridges in the Boardroom
31:53 Understanding Retention and Business Outcomes
35:38 Shifting Focus from Accountability to Reliability
39:58 The Role of HR Leaders in Organizational Culture
43:40 Navigating the Complexities of HR Leadership
46:16 Rethinking Experience vs. Learning Agility
52:26 Business Fluency in HR Leadership
57:07 Clarity of Outcomes and Leadership Challenges
Connect With Workforce Alchemy
Website: https://workforcealchemy.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ReverseRiskConsulting
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/workforcealchemy/
X / Twitter: https://x.com/WorkAlchemist
In this episode of The Mason Duchatschek Show, Mason sits down with Jackson Lynch to unpack why talent management is one of the most overlooked drivers of business performance and execution.
This conversation goes far beyond HR trends and employee engagement surveys. Jackson explains why 94% of execution problems are system problems, not people problems, and why CEOs, CHROs, and executive leaders must align talent strategy directly with business outcomes.
You’ll learn why top performers audit company culture, how clarity drives workforce productivity, why succession planning often fails, and what HR leaders must do to earn influence in the boardroom.
If you are a CEO, CHRO, business owner, executive leader, HR professional, or team leader trying to improve organizational culture, employee performance, leadership development, and business execution, this episode delivers actionable insights you can apply immediately.
In This Episode
-Why talent is a core execution issue
-The evolving CEO-CHRO relationship
-Moving HR from cost center to ROI driver
-Why employee engagement is a symptom, not the root issue
-How top performers audit organizational culture
-The importance of clarity in job expectations
-Why decision rights and autonomy matter in HR leadership
-How business fluency changes boardroom conversations
-Rethinking accountability versus reliability
-Why succession planning often fails
-The role of learning agility in hiring and leadership development
-How culture becomes “decision residue”
Key Takeaways
-HR strategy must connect directly to business strategy
-Organizational culture reflects leadership decision-making
-Workforce productivity improves when expectations are clear
-CEOs and CHROs must align on outcomes immediately
-HR metrics should support measurable business outcomes
-Learning agility matters more than years of experience
-Reliable systems outperform reactive accountability models
-Talent management drives long-term organizational performance
Episode Chapters
00:00 The Importance of Talent in Business Strategy
07:11 Understanding the Role of CHROs
11:08 Shifting from Cost to ROI Mindset in HR
24:33 Aligning Expectations Between CEOs and CHROs
27:10 Building Bridges in the Boardroom
31:53 Understanding Retention and Business Outcomes
35:38 Shifting Focus from Accountability to Reliability
39:58 The Role of HR Leaders in Organizational Culture
43:40 Navigating the Complexities of HR Leadership
46:16 Rethinking Experience vs. Learning Agility
52:26 Business Fluency in HR Leadership
57:07 Clarity of Outcomes and Leadership Challenges
Connect With Workforce Alchemy
Website: https://workforcealchemy.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ReverseRiskConsulting
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/workforcealchemy/
X / Twitter: https://x.com/WorkAlchemist
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LifestyleTranscript
00:05welcome to the mason duke check show and before we jump in this episode is brought to you by
00:11workforcealchemy.com helping leaders uncover hidden profit leaks inside their business operations
00:18today's guest jackson lynch is a four-time chief human resource officer founder of talent sherpa
00:25and the trusted advisor to ceos and boards he helps leaders cut through hr theater and make
00:32people strategy show up in revenue margin speed and accountability rather than activity welcome
00:39to the show mason it's great to be here with you and all your viewers and listeners so you've said
00:46that leaders need to stop treating talent as a side conversation and start treating it as an
00:52execution issue can you expound on that yeah first i think you have to start with how do we
00:59put the function up for the ceo because it may not always start with the ceo as the challenge i
01:05think
01:05historically we still fall into the functional update and the functional update is always going
01:12to be at the end of the board slides they are going to be the ones that are disconnected from
01:16the main
01:16conversation right so that's how you can actually tell the altitude is see each ro is playing if you
01:22have the strategy oversight by the ceo in the financial lens from the cfo and then you have
01:28all of the operational lenses to execute that strategy and then at the end of the deck in a
01:35few slides that may or may not get their full time depending on how much fast the meeting is gone
01:40and how
01:41much time they need to compress you have hr updates that are unrelated to the first narrative so what's
01:48what's missing if you go back and you look at deming he would argue that 94 percent of all of
01:54your execution problems are system problems not people problems and so it's not only that ceos are
02:00missing that that talent constraints are enterprise risks but they're also misdiagnosing it as a people
02:07problem where it's usually a system problem and it's the underlying architecture that needs to be
02:12in order to connect things back in and when it works you know because you don't have a sidecar
02:20at the end of the board meeting you have a naturally occurring here's the strategy here's the financial
02:26lens here's the talent constraint lens and then here is the operational challenges to go execute it
02:32and the whole story flows much more fluidly and it everything connects in there it's funny you say that
02:39because i wrote an article recently talking about system and people the general gist of it was that
02:46if something as simple as a hiring mistake keeps occurring it's not one mistake it's a process with the
02:53system that keeps producing the same people that aren't doing a good job and what happens then as a result
02:59of that well then the the good people get tired of carrying the extra workload of the ones who aren't
03:06as
03:06capable or aren't as willing or don't have the work ethic and or they realize that they don't need to
03:13contribute super high effort because less effort and less of talent and less ability is acceptable
03:18and again what kind of problem is that that is a systems issue because the system keeps allowing the
03:24same mistake over and over and over again so anyway i'm getting off tangent on that one but
03:30yeah we all kind of fired up on that one so let me dive in on that one though because
03:34it's a really
03:35important point to double click on for for anyone that's listening your top performers are constantly
03:41auditing your culture amen you have got to do it yourself so that you understand what it is that
03:51that you're signaling to the people that you want to deliver discretionary effort and it's surprising to
03:58me how few people actually take the time to say what were my last 100 business decisions now let me
04:05look at it
04:06through a talent lens and understand what am i signaling to people because well i'm sure we'll talk about it
04:12later
04:12but culture we like to talk about culture culture is decision residue it is the unknown and unnamed things that
04:22everyone pays attention to and they understand innately and they apply so engagement scores are
04:29interesting but that's a symptom it's the architecture that gets people to make the decisions that deliver the
04:36residue that allows people to say this is how you win here and all of that is aligned that's how
04:42you create
04:43the magic agreed so when a new chief human resource officer steps into the role what are the first signs
04:52that they are operating too low in the organization and not yet thinking at the enterprise level so you
04:58have to look at the mandate and and so i work with chros who are either first time enroll and
05:03those folks
05:04have a very narrow path to get it right or i i deal with folks that are they're kind of
05:08navigating a brand
05:09new ceo they have an even sharper cliff to their left and to their right and what is really important
05:16in either of those situations is to understand what is the mandate and candidly this is where
05:21the ceo has ownership of providing the clarity of what it means we say strategic if you have 10 people
05:30you're going to get 25 different versions of what that means in practice and so you got to be very
05:35very thoughtful about what is that mandate and what does it look like a job that says i want you
05:40to
05:40look at my business strategy through a talent lens understand the talent constraints and then figure
05:45out plans to relax those constraints so we can drive performance that's at one altitude a brand new
05:52chro that steps into the role is probably going to hear something like well first we need to get the
05:56train drawing on time which is a functional level altitude and by the way that's important work and
06:01sometimes really hard but it sets up a loop that's reinforcing at a low altitude functional level
06:09which then has a chro identity that feels like it's it's just a more senior version of what my prior
06:17life
06:17was which by the way is not what the role requires but it helps you feel useful and functional and
06:24practical and you get all sorts of gratitude for that next thing you know it doesn't take long until you've
06:30locked yourself into an altitude that doesn't help drive enterprise outcomes so to answer your
06:37question really specifically where do you where do you look you look at what the altitude is and what
06:41that mandate says about where you should be operating and candidly that has got to be negotiated
06:49almost immediately upon joining if it doesn't happen before you start what does that negotiation look
06:55like i'll give you a real example i was talking about a really interesting opportunity
06:59earlier this week and as i was talking with a with a fund manager on it he said well what
07:06you know are
07:06you excited about that and i said i need you to look and and say 24 months from now if
07:11this if we're
07:12moving towards an exit over that time period if you're sitting in the role and you've hired me and
07:18we've had a marvelous outstanding experience together what was it that i did to drive the business
07:24outcome if they can't communicate that back and by the way the person i talked to was great but if
07:31they
07:31can't communicate that back you know that they haven't thought about the altitude and that mandate is
07:37going to default to to the baseline functional one however i've had conversations like i did with this
07:43person who was able to say you know i i expect us to have higher degree of talent density in
07:49the roles
07:49that matter i expect you to be the consigliere to the senior team and help us take a bunch of
07:54very
07:55highly functional individual contributors and and turn them from a bowling team into a football team
08:01where everyone's running the same play i want you to help us have it have the talent philosophy in
08:06place that says here's how we're going to operate and here are the rules we will operate by and here
08:11are
08:11the operating norms we're going to operate through and then you can build all of the functional stuff
08:15underneath of that if those three things are in place high talent density being the most critical
08:21of them we know that that will then drive a drive a over oversized outcome which is how we're all
08:27going to win so i know one of the strongest ideas in your work is that hr has to move
08:32from a cost
08:32mindset to an roi mindset what does that shift look like in practice and where do your leaders
08:40usually get it wrong at first yeah well it's a really easy fix most people start with it wrong
08:46because most hr people if i can be a little bit self-deprecating because i think we've all been
08:52there that have been in this role as an hr person you walk around with a bunch of functional programs
08:58that you're looking for a known problem to solve with what you already have built this is even even
09:04harder to avoid if you're a large company number two moving into an smb number one because that
09:11infrastructure differences is is you know it's palpable what do you what do you um how do you
09:19approach the the the world of um if you think about making the move from a cost mindset to an
09:26rl mindset
09:27what it what it really i think means is you move from having a functional set of programs to adapt
09:33it to you look at the business strategy through the talent lens and you say what is getting in the
09:39way
09:39of our performance and if it's talent related guess what we probably put the constraint on there so we
09:45ought to have a pretty good idea of where to toggle that back a little bit if it's as it's
09:50often the
09:51case a system architecture issue well then then you start working on on that piece as well and so
09:57you then add the term that that's your tell if if i'm doing x so that and it is one
10:05at max two steps
10:07away from something you can measure on the p and l you're still in a cost mindset if i'm driving
10:13engagement which seems like a noble goal and in many cases it is you've got to be able to say
10:20i'm driving
10:20engagement so that i can do x okay so let's let's let's play on that one for a second because
10:26i've got an
10:26example in my mind i've had conversations with peers about hr topics and we've talked about
10:34the being in a transactional role of hr and transformational role of hr and when the functions
10:43are transactional then that's viewed as a cost like when i mean by transaction i mean the hr director
10:52they produced payroll they answer employee questions about benefits they onboard new employees
10:57those are transactional things you these are part of the process and the things that you do
11:01and that is a there is a cost associated with that however the downside of that or the risk of
11:09that is
11:09an employer can look in that and say well gee if we could use a hr system that could answer
11:15all
11:15these questions with self-help then we might not need an hr or as many hr people on staff because
11:20the
11:20employees can go online to this portal and get all the answers themselves or hey if we outsource
11:24payroll we might not need another another hr person on our team we can outsource that and all of a
11:29sudden they're still look the employer is looking at how can i reduce costs without sacrificing the
11:35quality of the work that needs to be accomplished and if and if if hr executives are allowing themselves
11:40to be in that role costs are looking to be cut by boards now and ceos but if you talked
11:50about employee
11:51engagement but if a company is doing 100 million in labor costs a year and you've seen the gallup surveys
11:58that say 52 percent of employees are sleepwalking through the day doing enough not to get fired
12:03and 16.5 percent are actively hostile disruptive and trying to cause problems it's not a stretch to
12:10say oh employees are going to half speed and that's enough to keep their jobs if you got a hundred
12:15million dollar payroll half speed effort you're paying a hundred million for work but you're getting
12:21fifty million dollars worth of work accomplished that's a fifty million dollar a year profit leak
12:26so if i am a strategic hr person and you spoke in point in terms of employee engagement and i
12:33know how
12:33to increase the engagement of my employees by even ten percent that's a ten million dollar a year savings
12:40and if i'm an hr director worried about keeping my job it's a lot easier to justify what they're paying
12:47me in salary if i'm generating exponentially more than what they're paying me and now i am not a cost
12:52that's an roi that is exponentially greater than anything the company invests in me
12:57no doubt if there is a job that that doesn't have a return higher than the underlying cost
13:03than with every other allocation decision you should remove that cost so so it is incumbent upon
13:09all of us to do it but let me let me push back on on a couple couple notions that
13:13he had there
13:14please do one of them is is that uh we should focus in on on creating increased engagement
13:22and i think engagement is a symptom so the question is what do you need to do to get a
13:28different symptom of the underlying architecture and so let me let me let me stop you there i'll
13:33i will shift i will pivot with you okay give you a different example okay okay i happen to be
13:38very
13:38knowledgeable about pre-employment testing skill attitude personality behavioral based validated
13:43assessments in compliance with the eoc's 80 percent rule and so on and so forth let's just take a very
13:49basic thing like i and let's just say i have a a very large hourly workforce warehouse manufacturing
13:57etc and what do i care about i care about honest reliable employees with a work ethic if i if
14:04you
14:05want to reduce and um if you want to reduce labor costs hire people who have a work ethic who
14:11show up
14:11on time and give good effort they work hard because that's what they're taught they would they grew up
14:19that way and if i have a tool which they exist in my company in full disclosure my company provides
14:24tools which is why i can talk about this my company provides tools that can help you measure things like
14:28work ethic reliability and integrity before you hire somebody well gee if you're hiring people with a
14:34work ethic and avoiding ones that don't it's not hard to increase you call it engaging you call it
14:38output by 10 or 20 or 30 i mean you could do the same thing for employee theft well gee
14:45if you want
14:45to do some shrinkage hire honest people well you can measure integrity before you hire somebody
14:49those are things that can't that an hr director can do to produce roi job security raises promotions
14:59because they are now an asset to the company not a call yeah i i look i i totally i
15:06totally agree
15:07with with uh what you're what you're saying in fact i just i was laughing inside my head while while
15:14you were having the conversation i used to work in in rural texas and in the paper industry and i
15:19had
15:19one rule when i went on campus i would ask people what they did in high school what job did
15:24you have
15:25in high school and number one i wouldn't hire someone that didn't work in high school the second thing i
15:28would do is if they said i worked on a farm they skipped every other step and they went straight
15:35to you have a job when do you want to start because of the same thing right so i'm i'm
15:42completely with
15:42you it's been 20 years since i thought thought through that so like you and i can disagree maybe
15:48on on the best way to create that outsize value but here here's i think the point i'd love to
15:53to have
15:53to sit with for a minute it is not activity for activity's sake and by the way when you do
15:58activity
15:58you get this wonderful dopamine hit it is awesome which is why we keep doing it over and over but
16:05i
16:05think the most impactful highest roi activity for an organization to increase the throughput of their
16:12workforce is provide clarity and clarity in terms of outcomes and we don't do a good job of that at
16:18all and so i think engagement is a is a byproduct of understanding what is winning they look like
16:28am i getting regular feedback on my performance against that does somebody actually care about
16:34my development as a as a human being and do i have consequences both positive and and negative
16:39for how i'm performing relative to the feedback relative to that clarity that's right that feedback's
16:45important and so but this is why why i will push back on the engagement piece a little bit because
16:52that is a downstream symptom of the upstream architecture from my experience and if you
16:58can figure out like just step back and if i'm a ceo and i say i want to increase my
17:04my organization's
17:06throughput measured with all sorts of of measures so that i can deliver better revenue less risk better
17:14revenue retention you know margin margin accretion whatever it is that is important to me market
17:20share whatever is important to me for that business i think the most important thing that you have to
17:25start with is i'm going to provide you clarity on what your job is expected to deliver and if i'm
17:33an hr
17:34director and i'm looking at my business and i look at our job descriptions which are kind of art
17:39artifacts from a you know i kind of expected to see them when indiana jones went in to find the
17:45holy
17:45grail like that's how old that structure is and second only to our performance management process in
17:51terms of things that that seemed like a good idea at the time and we need to rethink in in
17:56the world
17:57beyond the agrarian calendar um and trust me that's the first our first and last uh agriculture
18:02reference i'll make and it's got to be around providing the clarity for people to know what is
18:08expected of them at work both in terms of what their managers are and then also up and downstream
18:14and whatever systems and handoffs they have and it's that architecture i think has a sense of outsized
18:20value which comes all the way back to the question you had how do you move from from a cost
18:24mindset to a
18:25return on investment mindset it is all based on how you are framing the work and i think the best
18:33way that you can gauge whether you're framing it right is you ask the question i'm doing this so
18:39that and if you can't come up with the answer to the so that you are probably managing a cost
18:46space
18:47i'm gonna i'm gonna piggyback on what you're saying you you might be getting a little bit more
18:50alignment with me where i think we're coming together here we may be using some different words but
18:54i'm gonna ask you to ponder the answer to three questions number one have you ever been mismanaged
19:00multiple times what was your productivity like during that period of time really really high but
19:05the productivity was finding a different job okay fair enough and did the person who was mismanaging
19:11you make any effort to fix it first step is to admit you have a problem and and that was
19:18that was
19:19not there so no i agree with you on all three okay so when we start talking about roi versus
19:25cost you
19:26said so that so if i am a business owner or a ceo and i'm looking at and chief human
19:33resource officer
19:34that's going to talk to me about we'll just say employee improving employee engagement reducing labor
19:37costs whatever i might say i'm willing to invest in training and coaching some of my leaders to reduce
19:45friction and to stop mismanaging people so that they quit doing enough not to get fired and don't
19:54walk around my office like no good deed goes unpunished and if i do a great job i'm gonna get
20:00hit with more
20:00work and what i you're i'm trying to convey back to you is i agree with your comment so that
20:06this is the
20:07problem i.e too high labor cost disengagement but we're going to invest in training our people to do
20:12these things so that we can reduce friction and increase discretionary effort which is an roi yes
20:20and hr directors that know how to have that conversation and frame things in that way
20:24are way better off than those who don't and employers who give the latitude to the hr executives to
20:30actually execute that stuff those people win too that's a win-win as far as i'm concerned yeah the
20:36decision rights and the autonomy to act fall fall nicely in there you have to package all three of
20:41those things together and oftentimes they don't so you've talked about the importance of ceos and
20:46chief human resource officers agreeing on what good looks like what are the most important expectations
20:51in your opinion that should be clarified in the first 30 days of that partnership yeah so i would
20:57any place that says strategic you need to work together to redefine what that means in operational terms
21:03and and again i'm a believer that that clarity of outcomes is critically important so back to the
21:10question that i asked the person i was talking to 24 months from now we're having a successful exit
21:15what do you what do you define my role in that process to be like that's the nature of the
21:21question
21:21you need to get to what does winning look like for this role to be fair about it we have
21:27not developed
21:28that skill in a lot of ceos and so it is incumbent upon us as senior hr leadership human capital
21:36leadership to to help get them what that help them get to where that definition needs to reside
21:43in ways that you both can finish each other's sentences and and answer the question we will know
21:49that this was a successful hire when boom boom boom okay and if one says i'm strategic and the other
21:57says
21:57i keep the trains running on time you need to stop because everything else downstream is going to be
22:03a fight the second thing i think is is you need to align on decision rights on what can i
22:09decide by myself
22:10what do i need to decide with your input what things do i recommend that you decide and where is
22:18my autonomy
22:19to act because the autonomy to act the clarity of outcomes and the decision rights are critical
22:26and what you're actually trying to get to which is an altitude that allows you to diagnose look at
22:32the business strategy through a talent lens say here's what i think it's going to happen here's
22:36why i think it's going to happen here's the root cause then here's what we do about it and then
22:40and
22:40only then is when you reach into your bag of hr programs and you figure out which one meets the
22:45moment that is a very strategic moment but to be fair most of our jobs are are dirty hands jobs
22:51outside maybe the top 50 companies in in in the world i yep it is so by by talking strategic
23:00like
23:00that means so many different things to different people you've gotta you've gotta narrow down what
23:05that scope is and what winning looks like you've said that the chief human resource officer has the
23:12data while the ceo has the anxiety and knowing no one is building the bridge can you share a real
23:18example of what that bridge looks or sounds like in the boardroom or executive meeting yeah so i think
23:25we've all been in board meetings where the hr person is talking at the end and there's an engagement
23:29slide and it says engagement is down 10 or we say hey we're worried about retention risk or we show
23:36a
23:37broad number and it's disconnected from the anxiety the the ceo is really feeling because the ceo is is
23:44worried about execution we are answering a question about vibes that's the that's the disconnect if you
23:51have a chro that walks in into that very same discussion and answers it this way i've mapped i've
23:59looked at the business strategy and i've mapped out the 12 pivotal jobs the jobs where outsized impact
24:05will have outsized performance will have the most outsized impact and our ability to achieve that
24:10business strategy i have looked at that i've then you know made sure we understand what the outcomes
24:16look like for each one of those roles and as i've gone through that i've found that half the jobs
24:20haven't clearly defined outcomes that is going to be our next step in the talent strategy and as i move
24:25all the way through what i what i've looked at and worked with the operational leader is for four of
24:31those 12 jobs what the incumbent can do relative to the definition of outcomes isn't there those four gaps
24:38we need to figure out what we do about that as we move forward is it something we can teach
24:44them
24:44quickly if so that becomes the plan is it a matter that they are just not going to get there
24:49great now
24:51i need to help build the talent density transition plan so where can i reallocate the person where can i
24:57how do i make the change where i have the biggest benefit the lowest lowest risk of the change all
25:02the way
25:02through the other one of them is talking about an esoteric vibe and the other one is saying for us
25:09to hit that number that is important to you that's causing you anxiety i've diagnosed i've assessed here's
25:18what here's where the problem is and here's where we need to do about it that's the difference and
25:22that's the bridge and honestly i think it's on us as human capital leaders because we talked about
25:28wanting that proverbial seat at the table which i think is a is a participation trophy in in corporate
25:33form we need to be a voice in the debate about how the business runs and the only way you
25:38do that
25:38effectively and consistently is to place everything within the context of business outcomes which is
25:45in fact what the ceo has anxiety around it's i'm gonna i'm gonna get your take on this situation
25:53that i found myself in several years ago i actually got to sit in one of those meetings and the
25:58chief
25:59human resource officer very experienced very knowledgeable and has strategic ability knew not
26:04to come to the executive meeting with vibes and feelings literally we've got this tool on our website
26:13workforcealchemy.com that's called the human capital calculator and she literally plugged in and they have
26:19over 1000 employees plus 1200 ish and plugged in the payroll data from that morning so up to date as
26:27of
26:27a few hours before the meeting went in and said big this conversation but i'm gonna bring the focal point
26:35to one big issue it was employee turnover and she had the data she said our average hourly employee earns
26:40this it costs 16 of their annual salary to replace each one this is how many we lost here's what
26:47hourly turnover is costing us then she looked at professional level positions she said here's
26:52what their average salary is it costs 21 of their annual salary to replace each one of them
26:59here's how many of them we lost so this is what turnover is costing us here senior level positions
27:04skilled positions cost between 150 and 213 of their annual salary to replace each of them so she said
27:12let's shoot right down the middle like 182 salary how many we lost she literally laid out the data just
27:18we talked to her the ceo had the data said this is what turnover is costing us and then and
27:22the guy's
27:23like it doesn't feel like that i don't think we're doing that bad the ceo was the one going to
27:29the vibes
27:29and the feelings and the hr director laid out the data and said this is exactly what it is costing
27:34us
27:34and the ceo was like almost head in the sand like no i'm telling you the truth this is the
27:41data those
27:42numbers can't be accurate she said they came from this morning's payroll they're down to the penny
27:48what would what would your reaction or assessment of that conversation be i so the first thing i was
27:54waiting to hear was what's the what's the so so what because that sounds like we've identified a
27:59problem but we haven't necessarily come to the solution you you may you may have skipped that part of
28:02the story i'm sure you did so she had some plans on how to reduce turnover but that would have
28:08required an investment from the ceo to be able to accomplish that that would have been the the gist of
28:14it yeah so i would the first thing i would tell you is you started from the wrong frame you
28:19started
28:19functionally on retention which is generally speaking something that people think hr cares about
28:26in my experience once you take a really smart business person and you make them think about people
28:33they turn off the smart part of their brain and they only think about things in terms of of you
28:39know
28:40well i gotta be careful how i say that i'll give you a real life example a long time ago
28:45i was in the
28:46paper industry and there was this there was this thing it was called a yankee dryer and you don't need
28:51to know anything about it other than it is really really expensive like 10 million bucks it is made
28:58specifically for the machine that that you need to put it on and if you need to replace it it
29:04takes 10
29:05to 12 months to get a new one built installed and installed and so you are down production of that
29:11of
29:11that line so in a in a world where you're fighting for working capital what is almost every paper mill
29:18across the world done they buy an extra yankee dryer they put the 10 million in working capital
29:24they put it in a shed and they they say it's worthwhile for me to take 12 months of downtime
29:30and turn it into two weeks of downtime in the event something happens it's a very smart rational
29:34decision we have pivotal jobs without benches the smart play using that same logical framework
29:41is i hire somebody so that i am not going six months without without having someone in that
29:48pivotal role where again having someone great versus good will have the most outsized impact on
29:52the business we make the absolute opposite decision say we can't afford it and here's the difference
29:57between the yankee dryer and and a dedicated backfill you can find something for the dedicated backfill to
30:04at least pay for themselves but what happens is mentally we shut down the business logic when we
30:12get into people logic because we think about it too much as cost so so the most important thing i
30:18think
30:18if i were to be coaching your your colleague is i would not start it from a retention piece i
30:24would
30:24start it from the business outcome piece and re-engineer it back and i would show the constraints
30:29that not having people in role executing will have on their ability to hit the the big number
30:37that will naturally then lead to the question of what can we do to relax that constraint and that's
30:45where you you pull in the first one you're doing and by the way i've done it just that way
30:50you you are
30:51trying to build math on the assumption that is not yet assumed okay on the other one you are starting
30:59from a frame of reference that is is what people are in that chair waking up and going to bed
31:05at night
31:05every day thinking about that's how you drive drive things forward so for business owners and ceos who
31:13want more accountability what are the rhythms cadences or operating disciplines that create real clarity
31:19across leadership teams instead of endless revisiting of the same issues yeah so this will sound a little
31:27counterintuitive but the first thing you need to do is not solve for accountability you solve for reliability
31:31instead and and here's why i think accountability tends to have two elements that are not that helpful
31:39accountability is backwards looking and it is blame oriented you rarely think about forward looking
31:46accountability you might think about forward looking ownership but that's just accountability with a slightly
31:51better name what i encourage organizations to do is focus on reliability what is the outcome and what has
32:00to be true for us to be able to consistently deliver that outcome the answer to those questions tend to
32:07get
32:07into design constraints that you work on the design constraints the the accountability question is who screwed
32:16this up and and how do we make sure that we that we punish them for having made that decision
32:20and usually
32:21accountability like we've all been in this room right where where something went wrong and someone says
32:28who is accountable for this and you're not solving for fixing it going forward because you've said
32:34it's a person issue or a collective people issue when deming would tell you six percent of the time that's
32:41true
32:4194 of the time it is a system architecture issue we miss that diagnosis at all that's why i think
32:48i think
32:48talking about reliability matters i think there are three things that ultimately though once you're
32:52focusing on reliability it's it's around commitment clarity it's around an early flagging norm um and and how
33:00you react to the early early flags are really important because if you if you react poorly when someone
33:05brings you bad news you'll never hear bad news until the last minute again at which point it's it's a
33:10crisis
33:10so you have to think about that and and they have to ask design questions rather than blame questions
33:17so what is it what has to be true that might not be true and what do we do about
33:23about changing that
33:24by the way the use of red terms i'm sorry red teams is super helpful in in that endeavor if
33:30you're
33:30familiar with that go ahead and expound that because that may not be a familiar term for everybody
33:34yeah a red team was based on on cold war u.s military planning that that wanted to say let
33:40me pretend something is going to go wrong what is the what is the enemy going to do so that
33:44i can have
33:45appropriate contingent plans for for for those so how does it apply it's really well used in technology
33:52but it should be used more more broadly as a change management technique but it gets people in the room
33:58from all stages of the process design and say what has to be true that isn't and let's move forward
34:0512 months let's assume whatever it is that we're trying to do failed why and that allows people to
34:12surface the uncomfortable truth in a way that has a permission structure that allows people to still
34:19feel like they belong to the team because ultimately that's what psychological safety is it's putting the
34:24uncomfortable truth on the table maybe even being wrong about it but still belonging to the team
34:28it's not about comfort you have to be uncomfortable and and the red team allows a permission structure
34:32that allows you to get that in in place which ultimately that is a discipline that allows you to
34:39pre to preview what might go wrong which allows you to design for the reliability because if you don't
34:46have that meeting that meeting will be had but it'll be called accountability assignment it'll be done after
34:52the fact and someone's who may have may have just made a well-intentioned mistake or someone that
34:57was just operating within a system that could not reliably deliver the outcome that they were
35:02looking for is going to take the shoulder and the organization doesn't actually get better as a result of that
35:07one
35:08so you have spoken about the three hats that hr leaders have to wear talent maven employee advocate
35:14and company defender which of those gets overplayed most often and what imbalance hurts the business the most
35:22yeah can i i'm going to answer it within the context of chros who struggle first time enroll
35:29and it's and it's because like of those three the company defender is like how do we stay out of
35:33the
35:33ditch the the employee advocacy in the in the auric model from hr champions in 1996 i think is about
35:40making sure that the organization understands the impact on employees and and as factoring that into the
35:46decision making some people have moved that into a i'm going to be the shop steward for the employees
35:52not the same thing and then the talent maven is making sure i have the right person in the right
35:57seat at the right time and all three of those have a normal collective tension that allows you to make
36:02better decisions the more junior you are in your hr career you tend to be you grow up in that
36:09compliance
36:10lens so you tend to be the company defender what happens when you when you grow in your career and
36:16you get to the c-suite if you are still over relying on that compliance lens you will you will
36:23necessarily
36:25be disconnected from the business decisions you ought to be a part of because you tend to lean into here's
36:32why we can't do it and in the c-suite role if you're a head of human capital the most
36:37important thing
36:38that i think you can focus in on is not why you can't do stuff so it has to be
36:43effective efficient
36:43defensible in that order but it is about i know the jobs that matter most do i have the best
36:50people
36:50in those roles that i can get in the market that necessarily requires a talent maven hat to wear so
36:57i
36:58think that's ultimately where where we where we stumble the most is not making that that connection
37:03between i need to move from a compliance lens to a to a business lens and if i get just
37:11double click
37:11on something else that might be helpful one of the challenges that every chro has encountered is
37:18through most of our peers growth they have learned how to work around hr not through hr and it i
37:25was
37:25true yeah i i think so and i think it's a large due to the fact that some hr people
37:31would say it's a
37:32matter of it's it's because we have to say no i don't think that's true you know who says no
37:38more
37:38than us the finance people okay but they say no through a business lens we say no through a compliance
37:45lens and even the legal folks that ought to have a compliance lens you would imagine tend to still
37:51approach it or at least the really good ones that i've worked with over the years approach it from a
37:55risk tolerance lens which is still a business lens so we get stuck in this in this compliance lens
38:03and we think about about defensibility above all else i'm not saying that's not important
38:09i am saying that as a business person you learn to work around that and that makes the chro job
38:16even
38:17harder that if you then signal that i'm a compliance person they'll keep working around you and you won't
38:23have the ability to influence the organization's outcomes to the degree that you really should and
38:29the business needs you to so you mentioned signals that leads to my next question when a company says
38:35it wants a stronger culture what are a few signals that you look for first to tell whether the culture
38:40problem is actually a clarity problem a standards problem or a leadership courage problem yeah it's
38:47funny i got into a linkedin debate with someone i respect highly on on whether or not courage is the
38:53the missing link i don't think it is he patrick seemed to think it was it's around it's around
38:57clarity and so one of the things that i do as i step into or i'm helping other people that
39:02are
39:02stepping into that role for the first time is is help them audit the last hundred decisions that they
39:08made and then look at those decisions from a people lens and do those match what you have nicely put
39:15in
39:15the corporate poetry that you put on the board and if those things are aligned great if they're not
39:22aligned now you have a have an interrogation of why and that can take you in a lot of different
39:27different flavors but but the first signal is does my decision residue match what i would intend my
39:35decision residue to produce for example can you give me an example
39:41i say i want collaborative people and then i i promote the non-collaborative jerk what is that's a good
39:50good performance except for all the dead bodies sitting to the left and right i can say
39:56on the poster that i want collaboration i can have it in my first three slides every time i get
40:03up to a
40:03town hall but the signal to the employee population is be like the jerk that's how you get ahead
40:10and in that moment of discretionary effort or do i do x or y when no one else is looking
40:17which
40:18ultimately is what engagement is a engagement score depending on how you design it is really
40:23helpful in helping you understand the degrees of psychological freedom that people feel like
40:27they have the autonomy to make those but if if you the the your real impact of those decisions people
40:37almost always if they're rational follow the signal not the virtue that you've signaled fair enough
40:44that's a good answer you've you argued that leaders often overvalue experience and undervalue
40:50learning agility how should executives rethink hiring and succession when the environment is changing
40:57faster than past pattern recognition keep up amen amen on that one uh and and we'll we'll set the
41:04succession stuff to the to the side for a minute i'd love to talk about that a little bit because
41:08i think
41:08that's a that's another artifact that we need to rethink how we how we do that because there's no
41:13forcing function associated with it but if you think about at its core it feels defensible to hire
41:21someone for a job and say here are the things i need them to be able to do relative to
41:27that job
41:28and here's the experience relative to that even assuming that that we've defined the outcomes well
41:33the defensibility part of us would say that's really helpful unfortunately the impact of that is
41:38you are really good at solving for yesterday's problems and maybe even today's problems but
41:44you're not looking forward in solving tomorrow's problems so how do you do that i would argue we
41:50should decrease our reliance on experience and increase our reliance on learning agility and
41:58resilience i love this and here's why i say that i have this conversation with someone the other day
42:04and they said oh i've got 13 years of experience in this one particular field i go no you don't
42:08you got one year of experience 13 times exactly and i can recall back when in the sales and marketing
42:14executive land when i'm making myself sound old here when the internets were coming out when when
42:19marketing shifted and things like where you ranked in search engines made a difference about how many
42:26leads you got and things like that and there were a bunch of very seasoned senior level vps of sales
42:31and
42:31marketing running around that that never bothered to upgrade their skill set and now all of a sudden
42:37all of the stuff that they used when i say stuff strategies tactics skills whatever to build themselves
42:44a successful career none of that stuff was working anymore and they hadn't stayed current and they
42:50hadn't stayed on top of things they just relied on underlings to handle it for them and now all of
42:53a
42:54sudden a lot of these folks had all this experience in these great track records which they did achieve
42:58using systems that were outdated and weren't going to work in the future and didn't work in
43:01the future and they would update their resume and then they go to a new job then they would last
43:06for about 18 months maybe and then they ran out of other people to fire or blame for the lack
43:11of
43:11results and they would update their resume and go somewhere else and that stuff kept repeating so
43:15like what you're talking about is right on the money i didn't mean to interrupt you but i like that's
43:20a
43:20that's a that's a very important point that i hope those people watching listening tuned into that was
43:26dead on yeah and i appreciate that and i would also tell you it's a pretty strong case for for
43:32bringing
43:33diversity of experiences onto your team because if you have folks that have a homogenous background
43:40you will likely have homogenous reactions to future events and and it's really like the ability to apply
43:51learning so i'm going to go way back to my paper company days again and and i was known as
43:57asking
43:57like the most wacky question until we hired them and i told them why i did it so my first
44:03it was a
44:04two-parter these are normally engineers so i'd say mason tell me tell me why is it that that you
44:09what do
44:09you what do you do for fun and so they would answer it and i'd hear this really kind of
44:14interesting
44:14story about what what they do and so there's a benefit you get to know them a little bit as
44:19a human
44:19being and then i'd say how does that make you a better mechanical engineer something no one has
44:26probably ever thought about in their life until i met this person named amy and amy was a computer
44:34scientist and amy said what do i like to do i like to compose music like why does that make
44:41you a
44:41better computer scientist and this is back when a computer scientist was on a you know trash
44:48trash 80 um commodore 360 or whatever i can't remember what they were 64 64 that's what it was
44:54oh then they came out with the 128 which i actually had fair enough i i personally liked the snake
44:59thing
44:59that you uh had to move around and on your dot file but and she said you know what what
45:04it allows
45:04me to do is it allows me to think how things come together in a broader systemic approach and the
45:10things can build on each other and you don't have to manage things sequentially you have to manage
45:15things holistically and that's when i compose music i do and i take those same skills and i apply
45:20them over to building computer code and i'm like holy crap batman you're hired and that ability to
45:27apply learning from one disconnected thing to the next and make the causal link for me was a great sign
45:33that like five years from now i can't predict what the world's going to look like and that was 30
45:39years
45:39ago i certainly can't do it six months from now today with with the advances but someone who has the
45:44ability to say i figured this part out in a disconnected part of my my world and i can apply
45:50it to something disconnected in this other part of my world and and connect those two i think they'll
45:56figure out tomorrow's problems about as well as anybody else that's what i think amazing insight
46:03what does a strong chief human resource officer or people leader say differently in a leadership
46:09meeting that immediately signals business fluency rather than functional fluency so i think every
46:16hr person in since adam has had the obligation to say i'm launching an hr develop a leadership
46:22development program like we've all we've all done it most hros will will i'd say most hr people
46:28human capital people broadly will say i'm we're launching we're launching a development program
46:32and that's that's the end of it the high altitude person says we've restructured how we're
46:38going to deploy high performers and we're going to put our most critical roles and we're going to
46:44fill in with the people most able to execute against the outcomes of those roles and we're going to
46:50then understand the skills we need to rapidly deploy into their environments to be able to execute
46:58precisely okay now i'm now i'm solving the first person is solving a broader system or broader general
47:08issue it might even be a the right one the second one is actually tying into the business outcome
47:13and working backwards from it so i think i think there's a there's a framing i'd also say the business
47:19fluent hr people don't update on hr metrics at all they they operate at a different altitude they
47:26talk about i want i want to talk about talent density in my important roles for the new market
47:35that we're going to go attack i'm going to talk about speed to impact which says from the time as
47:41we
47:41talked before that someone leaves the job how long does it take till i get someone that's equally
47:45good or at least matches the quality i expect out of that role i'm going to talk about the the
47:50clarity associated with with everyone's role today can they can they tell me what is expected of them
47:56at work both up through the manager inside to their to their system partners if they're part of a larger
48:03program those things are all going to be tied to a one step away so that okay that's i think
48:11that's
48:12that's that's how you do it and then you frame things in a risk management language you don't frame it
48:18in a in a risk and if i could i know we're probably getting short on that we talked a
48:24little bit about
48:25succession succession has no forcing function succession planning you can actually do all the
48:30work and you have the binders and and you you have the the sheets and everyone asks questions they
48:36nod approvingly and knowingly and lovingly and then and then how many times have you seen
48:42someone that leaves six months later and no one ever thinks to pull out the binder it's a brand new
48:48original artwork exercise that's been my modal exercise my modal solution throughout most of my
48:53career why is that so i think most of people's succession plans are a lie and the reason they're
48:59a lie they're well-intentioned lies but they're still lies because there's not a forcing function
49:04if you have a human capital talent portfolio optimization approach there is a forcing function and you're
49:11asking a different question it's not what would i do if this person left it is do i have the
49:17best
49:17people in the positions that matter most and how can i reallocate people out of those roles so i can
49:22open up a hole for those folks that that they could have that outside influence and those are completely
49:28different solution sets one of them makes you feel good about an hr program one of them has a
49:35forcing function in a real life example i was with a company that i was i was helping so i
49:41gotta be a
49:41little careful about the specifics here but they have like 10 people on their cfo backfill list
49:47the actual number of people they had on the cfo backfill list was zero but by helping us to feel
49:54good about having 10 people on the background background uh or the backfill list no one felt bad
50:01about not doing anything but if we instead had called out we have a crisis here that forces action and
50:08i think that is another way where human capital leaders can can change the elevation of the work
50:14it's by having the courage to name what what everyone kind of knows but no one says out loud
50:22interesting so if there was only one piece of advice that you could give to people who are listening
50:27today or watching what would that advice be and why i think the advice that i would get is you
50:33have to
50:34start with clarity of outcomes it makes everything else easier if i know clarity of outcomes i can
50:40give you better feedback if i know clarity of outcomes i can give you better reinforcement
50:44mechanisms if i have clarity of outcomes i have a better idea of whether you are set for a future
50:51role and what it takes to develop it if i have clarity of outcomes i know what you might need
50:56to be able to successfully thrive in your current role and i can work against that
51:00i can if i know clarity of outcomes i can hire better if i have clarity of outcomes i can
51:04i can
51:05fire better it makes every other thing we do in human capital work just much much more magically
51:14same note let's say you do have clarity what's the advice that you give leaders who need to
51:21challenge the ceo or the board without blowing things up or putting themselves at unnecessary risk
51:29yeah look and this becomes increasingly important when the when the c-suite is the dysfunction that
51:36you need to talk about that's why i asked it uh so the first thing i would tell you is
51:41is if any of
51:41your listeners want a a longer discussion on that i have a pod that that dropped here and i think
51:46in
51:46early early april on that topic but it's this one you have to be very cautious about not leaning in
51:55and becoming part of the dysfunction you're trying to name and the way you avoid that is picking where
51:59where and how you name it it's got to be third party removed it needs to be formed as an
52:05observation
52:06not a not an accusation and you need to pick your timing pretty well and there this is where the
52:11art
52:11of being a chro it's it's it's important because the science doesn't make it you might be right but
52:19you also have to be effective and those two employed there and and continue to be employed yes no doubt
52:25so like you pick your right time one of the things i have done in when i've sat in roles
52:30is i have
52:31always included a an element of my ceo one with one that includes the the five minute block watching
52:41and what i've told my ceos over the years is i want us to talk about stuff but when i
52:48bring stuff
52:49up in here it is not because i need decisions in fact i really don't want you to act but
52:56i do want
52:56you to know that i'm paying attention to something that might turn into something later so that when i
53:01bring it to you at the crisis stage it's not the first time you've heard about it and where you
53:08include that kind of operating norm it allows you to surface things as observations hey i've noticed
53:15this you know in the last three times we've talked about this meeting i've seen the cfo stop paying
53:21attention to the strategy conversation start managing email i think one of the possibilities is
53:26your chief revenue officer and your chief financial officer are having an issue that no one knows about
53:31i think we should be watching that listen for the cues right that's not a problem to solve that's
53:39an observation to deliver now generally speaking when i did that i knew those guys weren't talking
53:44but you can't live it with you have a problem with your cfo and your chief revenue officer because
53:49what happens there you're putting the ceo in a position to decide and sometimes their loyalty
53:56they're human sure they may not always think about about it that way but they are they have all of
54:01the same kind of blind spots that every other human on the planet has so how you especially if you
54:08think
54:09that their favored nation child is part of the dysfunction and i don't mean it like super negative
54:16like patrick glencioni five dysfunction teams dysfunction there's a trust issue between those two like
54:21how you how you bring that up is super important and that's where i use watching because i think
54:26it allows you to surface it in a way that is observational and non-confrontational and it
54:33allows you to navigate through and and stay employed that was excellent excellent advice and i'm glad that
54:41you delivered that i hope people anybody that stuck around this long to the very end that was that was
54:48the the cherry on top i appreciate your time if people want to know more about you the work you
54:52do
54:53what are the best ways for them to engage so if you want yeah if you want to learn a
54:59little bit
54:59more about the way i think about these things two places where you can have free access to it i
55:04do a
55:04sub stack that's a best-selling sub stack goes out every friday i think there's some pretty good stuff
55:09in there also do a podcast comes out twice a week called talent trip a podcast you can get it
55:14wherever
55:14you see your shows if you're that went fast i know what you said but for those listening talent
55:19sherpa podcast yes the talent sherpa podcast and uh you know our role in this endeavor is to help
55:26people get to where where they need to go and that's what sherpas ultimately do i think the other
55:32place to to you know if you are a first-time c-tro you're one that is i have a
55:36brand new ce and need
55:38some help in in that i have different options available for there including some private coaching
55:42you can find all of that at my talent sherpa.com and if i'm betting that there's some business
55:48owners and ceos listening today that learned what the other side of that conversation needs to be so
55:55that they can collaborate and work much more closely with their talent officers as well so i i think that
56:01people listening today if you were a business owner or manager then how you interact with hr and how you
56:07encourage hr to interact with you makes everybody better so yeah for my individual coaching mason
56:13roughly a third of the people i've worked with are the ceos because let's be honest they don't know
56:20how to manage this function it is not something that they've they've had to manage up to that point
56:25that is not true for almost every other part of the business it doesn't even matter how they grew up
56:31they were actively involved in the finance they like everybody else they had to work around our
56:35compliance lens and so helping them kind of unlock human capital because especially if you're in the
56:41smb market the the bain capital report came out and it said okay all of the traditional tailwinds are
56:48are god this is all about improving even the performances we go forward and the single biggest
56:53you know unlock for that is operational efficiency and by the way the single biggest unlock around that
57:00is the architecture with which you manage talent which is for most companies the the biggest p and l
57:07uh cost line so we can help you manage through that as well thank you so much for joining us
57:13and i hope
57:13everyone else enjoyed it and learned as much as i did thank you so much for your time appreciate you
57:18thank you so much
57:21you
57:21you
57:21you
57:29you
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