The future of work, engaged leadership, and empowered teams. I am passionate about this topic. And why? Because I hate waste. I hate when people's work is wasted. I hate when people's careers are wasted. I hate when the project that they worked so hard on, they worked nights and weekends, and then that project gets canceled and all that work was wasted. Oh, it hurts me to see people suffer because they feel like their work is wasted, not worth anything. I have been very fortunate. I have had wonderful opportunities and I love my work and I was able to lead teams to deliver innovative products. My team delivered the first commercial version of RPC, a revolutionary mechanism for devices to talk to one another. I've led teams who love to come to work. They were inspired to propose new features. They were excited to deliver products that people would line up to buy. I'm Leslie Martinich, and I'm going to talk about why we need RPC. New types of leadership, and you'll see that in just a minute. But part of the reason is that technology and society have changed. Society has changed dramatically because of COVID and technology has allowed us choices that we did not have before. Now we need a new kind of leadership, a leadership that will see teams delivering products faster and more happily. because they own their projects. A leadership that will inspire teams to aspire to targets that they previously didn't even believe were possible. Leadership that builds careers, leadership that builds companies, leadership that builds entire industries. So what is the problem and why do we need a new type of leadership? here's one reason. Currently, 65 percent of employees are not engaged. And of those, 20 percent are actively disengaged, which means that they've got one foot out the door. They don't enjoy their work. They don't even come to work if they can avoid it. They're not focused on getting anything done. They're just there, if they're there at all. Only 20 percent are actively engaged. We want everybody to be actively engaged, but right now only 20 percent are actively engaged. That's just not going to cut it. We need everybody to be actively engaged. Leaders goal is our, leaders have a goal, and that's to hire and retain a productive workforce. So here we have a productive workforce looking all happy because they're getting their project done. They're getting their work done. They're seeing the light of day with their project. they're happy about that. But what is the big challenge? Why, and especially for remote workplaces, why are people not engaged right now? the number one issue is trust. That's the challenge. For the workplace of the future. And that's what we're talking about. The future of work, the future of work requires trust. Trust can boost productivity by up to 50%. It can improve retention by up to 65%. And that is huge. And it can boost the speed of decision making as well. What are the economics of trust? When trust goes up, the speed of product delivery goes up and the costs go down. When trust goes down, the speed goes down and the costs go way up. Think of the amount of money it costs and the slowdown in speed that it costs you and me. To go through an airport since the 11th of September in 2001. Now people don't trust each other on airplanes. We don't trust that everybody is a reliable flying partner. And so we have all these TSA security places and security lines to go through. What's the, what are the costs of that? Oh my gosh. Putting in gigantic scanners in every airport, in every country in the world, putting in all sorts of logistics to handle that. Hiring all sorts of security agents, not to mention their dogs, but all sorts of security agents to manage people going through lines in airports. That is a lot. When, when Warren Buffett wanted to buy, a company called McLean Distribution from Walmart, he sat down with the Walmart executives and had a two hour meeting. They trusted one another. They came to a conclusion based on that two hour meeting, and the deal closed in one month. There's no wasting of months. of due diligence, of millions of attorney's fees. Trust made that faster and much lower costs. So I just wanted to give you that example of how trust can enable things to go so much faster. So people want choices, but leaders still want control and that's a problem. And it's a problem because the leaders are focused on the management side of things. They're focused on, they go to training for leadership development for meeting management, product management, risk management, performance management, and all sorts of things with the word management in there. And they're all important, but they're all about control. And that's It's not getting to what makes employees happy. They're very, these are very last century things and Jack Welch's style no longer works. So here's a thought from Steve Jobs that I like. Management is about persuading people to do things they do not want to do, while leadership is about inspiring people. to do things they never thought they could. I love that quote. that's just so right. So trust also requires ethical behavior. You don't trust people who you perceive to be unethical, taking, making shortcuts, not doing things that you consider trustworthy. that's the word, trustworthy. So the ethical challenges are taking shortcuts, financial considerations, maybe it's cheaper if we take this shortcut, and then there's also political considerations. So let's talk a minute about ethical behavior, and this will be a, really fast lesson in the history of the philosophy of ethics. So ethics is a practice of making choices and decisions. You make one choice, it's fine. It's an ethical choice and you make another choice and maybe it's a not so ethical choice. but ethical behavior results in trust and it results in a lot less risk of disaster. So let's look at this history of philosophy. So philosophers try to understand how the world works. So with each time there's a new. area of understanding than yet another leaf sprouts on this tree. So we start at the bottom, with, say metaphysics and physics. And we have some philosophers trying to understand those ancient Greek philosophers, and then they get that down a little bit. And then, we move on to mechanics and then the tree branch on the right is logic and then linguistics. And then out of that sprouts artificial intelligence. Each time we get a pretty good understanding of one of the branches of this tree or one set of leaves, a new set of leaves sprouts. So out of logic and a few other things comes linguistics. And out of linguistics and logic and a few other things comes artificial intelligence. We're going to look at that more central branch, the one with ethics. It's up top, and let's take that, take a look at that. And we're going to talk about four philosophers who are critical in the history of ethics. The first is Aristotle, way down at the bottom left, and then Immanuel Kant, and then Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. So let's start with Aristotle. Aristotle and Plato's the guy on the left there, Aristotle and Plato were concerned with virtue and character and practical wisdom. Remember, philosophers are always trying to figure out how the world works, how people work. What does it mean to be a good person? What does it mean to be a person? And so they were consider, concerned about virtue and character. And I want to reduce that for you for, to make your job to be ethical really quick. So you have one question to ask, can you sleep at night? So when you're faced with an ethical dilemma. You might try asking, can I sleep at night if I make this choice? Okay. The next guy up is Immanuel Kant, a German philosopher who lived in the 18th century. And he was very concerned about duties and rights. He had a focus on standards and the categorical imperative. And categorical means in all cases. categorically. Declare this to be false, whatever, in all cases, I declare this to be false, categorical means that, in all cases, an imperative, something that has to be. So a quick question to ask yourself when you're considering Kant's offering to the ethical tree is, what if everybody did this? That's the category, that's the categorical part, everybody. What if everybody did this? That's a good question to ask. And then we come to Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, late 18th century to early 19th century, and they, and John, Jeremy Bentham came up with the idea of utilitarianism, and he was all about happiness, and so he was looking for what was the greatest good for the greatest number, or Alternatively, what's the least harm to people? So Bentham and Mill really laid out and defined the ethical concepts of utilitarianism. now you have three questions to ask yourself, three approaches when you're faced with any ethical dilemma. Can I sleep at night? What if everybody did this? And what's the greatest good for the greatest number? And I. I think these are writer downers, you should write these down because you can ask yourself or just take a picture of your screen. You can ask yourself these questions whenever you're faced with an ethical dilemma. And usually at least one of them is going to work out to be useful to you to think about which path you should take. So let's look at the Challenger disaster. Happened in 1986. And this is a picture of the scaffolding, and that's the gray tubing you can see with ice forming on it. And right behind that is one of the rocket boosters right behind it. It is a really cold that morning that the Challenger is getting ready to take off. So here is the situation. This was the coldest ever launch date. The previous cold temperature had been 53 degrees Fahrenheit. The forecast temperature for that day is 38, I'm sorry, 28 degrees Fahrenheit, which is below freezing. NASA and their supplier, Morton Thiokol, which I'll call Morton Thiokol Engineers, get together the, or have a conference call the night before to discuss the O rings and cold temperatures. For And Morton Thiokol engineers know that they really haven't tested their O rings in these cold temperatures, but they don't really expect them to seal properly in that cold. They expect them to be, not pliable enough to seal properly. So the Morton Thiokol engineers recommend against the launch. They come to an impasse in their discussions, so they take a recess. And after the recess, the Morton Thiokol group said that their evidence was inconclusive, so go ahead and proceed with the launch. Now, we all know what happened, This is an O ring, just to, just to give you a sense of how big they are. When I first heard about this disaster, which was the day it happened. I thought O rings were probably something that were about the size of a bracelet. but that O ring was too cold to seal, and it allowed hot gases to pass through. Not good. So after the launch, after 68 seconds, the entire rocket ship was engulfed in flaming hot propellant. And in 71 seconds Once the Challenger exploded, it was a terrible day. So what would you have done if you were a Morton Thiokol engineer? And you could ask yourself about what your recommendations would be, and you can ask yourself, if I make this recommendation, will I be able to sleep at night? Or, what if everybody made recommendations like this or took risks like this? Or, you can ask yourself, what's the greatest good for the greatest number? Yeah. what happened? they come back from their recess, and the Martin Thakal engineers say, it's inconclusive, we don't really have the data because we've never tested the O rings at this temperature. Whoever made the final decision to, to launch, did they not take the engineer's concerns seriously, or did they want to take a shortcut so they wouldn't be blamed for holding up the launch? This was a, a launch that had been delayed many times already. People were anxious to get this off the ground. This was the first. Space Shuttle launch that involved a teacher in space. So every school room in the country is watching this as it happens. Every parent was watching this as it happened. It was something that had a great deal of publicity and everyone was excited to see it happen. And so everybody's looking at TVs and then it blows up. what happened to make, to allow them to make that decision? I don't know. I think it's important to consider how to communicate effectively. Now, you don't want to be Chicken Little running around yelling, Oh, this guy is falling, this guy is falling. Every time you see a risk. You wouldn't be able to, get out of the house in the morning if everything were a risk. Also, you don't want to be the old lady who waits till the damage happens and then says, Injured? I told you But you didn't listen. Call 1 800 BOO HOO. You don't want to be either of those people. You don't want to lose your credibility by claiming everything's a disaster before you know for sure it is. You don't want to be chicken little over there and you don't want to just salt and wait until the disaster happens and then say, I told them They should have listened to me. that's not. Not gonna win you any points. So communicating is everyone's job. It's important for the leaders to communicate, but it's also important for the individual contributors to communicate because the individual contributor is probably the one who knows best when there is a risk. When there is a risk of making a decision, and that is the ethical dilemma, what decision shall we make? when they have to communicate to their leaders what the risks are so that the leaders understand them and take them seriously. So in order to do that communication, you need to understand what your audience cares about. What is important to them. Put the communication in their terms. So here's an example of a way to communicate. I know we all want to help this launch proceed smoothly, and we all want the Challenger to launch and return to Earth safely. In order for us to feel confident that can happen, we need to wait until the temperature is warmer. That would be a way of communicating it, a way of communicating it. Communicating that you understand that the other person wants to get this launch off but they want to get it off safely. And so you're not confident that can happen until the temperature is warmer. That communicates that. That's not just the leader's job, it's everybody's job to learn to communicate. So know what your audience cares about. In this case, NASA cared about you. NASA was the audience. They cared about getting this launch off the ground. Of course, everybody was anticipating it. They'd already been delayed and delayed, and they didn't want to be delayed again. So they wanted it to take off. And then, once you understand what the other person, your audience, cares about, then you put it in their terms. I know you care about this. Getting this launch off and helping people to come back smoothly. So what's your action after I've just talked about all these things? Your action is to become a trusted, engaged leader. What does that involve? That involves, first, behaving in an ethical manner. And I told you the three questions you could ask yourself. Will I be able to sleep at night? What's the greatest good for the greatest number? And, what if everybody did this? what if everybody took these shortcuts? The world would be pretty crazy pretty soon. becoming a trusted, engaged leader takes practice. You need to practice those ethical behaviors, making decisions in an ethical manner. You need to learn to be an engaged leader, and that means to be present. Being there, being present, you're not, when someone's talking to you, you're not looking at your devices, you're not looking over their shoulder to see if somebody more important is coming down the hall. You're not, checking your watch. You're not saying, I got to run. I've got more meetings. Of course you have more meetings. You always have more meetings, but be present when someone is talking to you. Be respectful. That's number two. Be respectful. When an employee brings you a problem, you don't, and you think It's not serious and you don't just say, Oh, you worry too much. It's not a serious problem. Instead, be respectful and say, I see that's a concern to you. Tell me more about that. Okay. Now that's easy. So when you're thinking, this guy must be crazy. He's worrying about everything. Instead, pull this one out of your back pocket. I see that's a concern to you. Tell me more about that. And the third one is to listen. When an employee brings you an idea and you think the idea is wacko, say, I see you think that feature X would improve the product. Tell me more. How can we implement that without bumping the schedule? Don't just say, I don't think we can do that. It's just not going to fit in the schedule. Instead, listen and ask for more information rather than just dismissing them. Listen when they bring you ideas. I see you think that feature would improve the product. Tell me more. And can you figure out how we could implement that without bumping the schedule? This is just something you can say. To not just be dismissive of the employee, but listening to them. And then this is the really fun part. Listening gives you opportunities for creativity. So somebody may come up with a really good idea, but you didn't see how it could be done without bumping the schedule. And that's what you care. You care about the schedule. You want it done on time, right? no, you just not even going to entertain ideas for new features. But instead, listen to them. Maybe they have a way of implementing that without bumping the schedule. Another aspect of being an engaged leader is to enlist your team. Enlist your team. You hired them because they were smart. You hired them because they were talented. You didn't hire a bunch of dummies. Enlist them to help solve some of the problems, to help define some of the processes that you're going to use, to help them define some of the products. Instead of you mapping out the architecture, the chunks of work, the dependencies, the schedule, everything, and then just saying, okay, here, you do this chunk and I need it in five days. You do this chunk, and by the way, Joe has to finish his chunk of work before Susie can start hers. Now, you don't map it out and tell people just what to do without really helping, without really letting them help with, that definition. So instead, you enlist them. They're smart. They're talented. So ask them to help you. Say, here, we have an opportunity to work on this project. Here are the basic outlines and constraints, like it has to be done in time for this big trade show. but you enlist them and you ask them how they would architect it. How they would define it. How they would, break down the chunks. Who the chunks would get assigned to. Ask the people who wants these chunks of work. and then work together to come up with a reasonable schedule and remember that they're going to count into their schedule just how long it would take them to do that work without being interrupted by other people asking them questions, without meetings, without emails, without all sorts of things that just get in their way. So put buffer in there and then ask them. Okay. you wanted five days. How about if I give you eight days, will that work for you? Oh yeah. That'll work for me. That's good. Now I'm the engineer. I own the product. I own this because I only thought I needed five days and my boss gave me eight. So great. I'm all on board with that and help your team become empowered. And that takes practice. here are the outcomes when you are an engaged leader and you empower your team. You have trust. You have empowered teams. You've improved retention. And let's just take a moment here to talk about retention. Retention has the opportunity for huge cost savings. If you have a problem with people leaving and really bad retention, then you have a huge expense. Let me give you an example. Suppose your employees make, on average, between their salaries and their benefits, let's just say they make 175, 000 each. And 10 of them quit in the last year, so you had to pay them. Replace 10 employees. So the formula is, you take their salary, and you double it. And that's your cost to replace them. It does not include their salary. It's just the cost of the recruiters working, the cost of the hiring manager, reviewing resumes, interviewing people, making the offer, negotiating it, it's the cost of the team members doing the interview, getting, and a huge cost is the team members working to get the new person up to speed. That's, it takes weeks, months. So getting the new person up to speed is a big cost. if you have 10 employees at 175, 000 each, times 10, that's 1, 750, 000. Times two, because it takes weeks. That's 2x the salary to, replace them. That's 3, 500, 000, 3, 500, 000 per year. So what if engaged leaders could do better? They could improve that by half. Say only five people quit the following year. That saves you 1, 750, 000. That's a lot of money. So retention. And building an engaged team and having a productive, happy, empowered team can save you a lot of money. So that's a, retention is a really good outcome here. And then it's easier for you to recruit. That's the next outcome, recruiting. So when your employees are burned out and disengaged, You really don't want them interviewing potential candidates because they're not really happy about working here, and that's going to show no matter what they think. but when you have a trusted team, an engaged and empowered team, and they, a team that owns its projects and can hardly wait to work on them, then, that shows through to the candidates. Also, The team will tell other people in the community, wow, this is a great place to work. I really love it. My boss is fantastic. So the recruitment becomes so much easier if you have trust, engaged leaders and empowered teams. And of course you have better productivity. just imagine if you will, a workplace where everyone felt heard. That'd be nice. A workplace where everyone felt seen and a workplace where everyone felt like their dias and their work mattered, like they mattered. That would be nice. That's what you get with a trusted workplace, empowered teams, and engaged leaders. It's a great thing. I've experienced it. Everyone loves it. Just take some time, practice these skills and you can have that too. So if there's questions, I'm always happy to answer questions. I put up my LinkedIn connection and I put up my email and my mobile phone. So thank you very much for your attention and Just let me know if you've got some questions. I hope you have a wonderful day. Thanks.