Working better, together‪.‬ Hi5 Technologies

Our first podcast of 2021 featuring David Donde, CEO Founder of Minimalist Chocolate and award-winning Truth Coffee. Read Full article >

David Donde is the Founder of Truth Coffee Roasting, which specialises in sourcing and roasting some of the world’s most exclusive coffees. Truth Coffee was named the world’s best coffee shop by MSN Travel in 2013 & again by The Daily Telegraph in 2015 & 2016. In 2018 the FNB Coffee Magazine Awards nominated Truth for Best Café Design and Excellence in Coffee. Their steam-punk interiors by lauded designer Haldane Martin won a Golden Loerie award in 2016.

With their well-known adage of “no sugar required”, David has applied his team’s combined expertise in coffee roasting to chocolate making with his most recent endeavour, Minimalist Chocolate. Minimalist chocolate contains no sugar and relies on the roasting process to bring out the sweet flavours in the cocoa beans.

On the question of how he began Truth Coffee, David tells the story of how he needed a new income and was down to his last 15 bucks, and on his way to get some fast food he received a phone call from his first investor. From there on, he focused on strategic brand building and figuring out what it was that made Truth Coffee different from others.

“Brand without culture is worthless, and vice versa.”
Their culture strategy is to win hearts one customer at a time, and David firmly believes that culture cannot be driven by HR or some kind of “culture team” — everyone in the company is part of the culture team!

Moments of genius hardly happen in the office.
Timestamp notes:
0:10 — Introductions

1:08 — How David got into coffee

1:56 — How David built the Truth Coffee brand and created a successful business in a crowded market

2:35 — Does brand and company culture go hand-in-hand, and how do you ensure employees buy into the culture?

4:33 — Making company values more than words on the walls

6:13 — How South African cellular provider CellC got it all wrong with their Trevor Noah campaign

7:37 — Learnings through the process and what David would have done differently

8:55 — David’s experience working at an “extremely autocratic” company

10:00 — Advise for hiring

13:00 — How to become the best waiter in the world? David reflecting on Tom Peters’ In Search of Excellence

14:15 — An average day for David

15:10 — On productivity and ‘busy’ culture

19:23 — On the function of middle management and their role in building the culture

20:43 — What David’s been reading and listening to: The One Thing by Gary W. Keller and Jay Papasan

23:17 — How to reach David: Linkedin, Twitter, Instagram

If you have any feedback, comments, ideas or suggestions, contact us on twitter @giveahi5 or email us on podcasts@get5.io

Our first pandemic podcast featuring Carin-Isabel Knoop, Executive Director of the Global Research Group at Harvard Business School.  

First published at www.get5.io/podcast

Carin Knoop is the Executive Director of the Global Research Group / Case Research & Writing Group at Harvard Business School, supporting faculty research and the development of about one-third of the School’s case study output and other types of research. She is a published researcher and co-author of the book Compassionate Management of Mental Health in the Modern Workplace, published last year.

Carin started attending HBS in 1992 to study her MBA, moving 10 metres from her dorm room to her office when she stayed on as a research associate. She explains that she came to HBS because she was interested in how organisations work, but fell in love with the academic side of things and decided to stay.

On the question of who should be managing and measuring culture in an organisation, Carin argues that everyone in the company is responsible for this. Why? Every person in an organisation makes decisions based on the company’s culture, for instance whether they will leave the company or whether to reinforce behaviours they deem as productive, etc.

“It’s really important to create an environment at work where you can have an open conversation.”
Carin believes that, as s a manager, you should be making even more effort to ‘touch’ your employees — to make a difference in their lives and help them make a way through these difficult times.

“You need to change and think about how you’re going to build the culture.”
Carin had met Clayton Christensen, the HBS professor who developed the theory of disruptive innovation first described in his 1997 book, The Innovator’s Dilemma. He also developed the concept of the Job To Be Done, which is something Carin often thinks of in terms of education and what it needs to accomplish in the world today.

“It’s a time of amazing reinvention.”
Timestamp notes:
0.11 — Hilarious introduction

1.54 — Carin’s background and what she does at Harvard Business School

2.30 — The global impact of research at HBS

3.10 — Mental health in light of COVID-19

9.22 — Stressors in the workplace and the low-hanging fruit for managers to help

10.14 — What’s the culture like at Harvard Business School

11.40 — The impact of the pandemic on higher education

13.15 — Carin’s career & the HBS ecosystem

14.50 — Who should be managing & measuring culture in an organisation? What is culture?

16.29 — Is recognition & feedback important for teams working from home right now?

18.47 — Communication and inclusion in the remote workplace

22.38 — Clayton Christensen & his books

24.23 — An average day for Carin & her fave reading material

26.16 — How to reach Carin: LinkedIN, cknoop@hbs.edu

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If you have any feedback, comments, ideas or suggestions, please get in contact with us on twitter @giveahi5 or email us on podcasts@get5.io.

Full article published at https://www.get5.io/podcast/18-siobhan-mchale-culture-change-insider

Siobhan McHale is an acclaimed culture transformation expert and global executive. She currently holds the title of Executive General Manager of People, Culture & Change at Dulux Group.

She recently published her book, The Insider’s Guide to Culture Change, which walks readers through her four-step process to culture transformation.

One of the ways she catalyses culture change in companies, is through role reframing. She explains how each of us wear many hats during our day (parent, spouse, sibling) and even take on many roles at work (boss, subordinate, peer), which requires shifts in our approaches and behaviour. She maintains that, in order to change the behaviours in your workplace, you don’t have to get people to change their personalities; you can reframe their role/s to shift their behaviour.

What is company culture?
Culture is the patterns of thinking & relating between the parts in the company, i.e. it’s at the collective level. She illustrates company culture as the dancer & the dance — the dancer is the behaviour, but the dance is the hidden patterns and rules of that behaviour.

“Culture change is leader-led.”
Culture has always been important, but has been misdefined in many parts as being about employee engagement only, yet it’s so much more. Every aspect of your business — design, manufacture, supply chain — so we have to redefine & examine culture from a commercial lens, not purely an employee lens.

“Culture comes from strategy.”
Timestamp notes
1.09 — About Siobhan

1.55 — Why are you an insider?

5.47 — Definition of Culture in the workplace, and where’s she’s seen culture change. Case studies: Bank Australia & an infrastructure company.

11.30 — Why is culture so important right now?

12.50 — If you were to form a culture team, who should be in the team?

14.57 — How can the HR team convince the Exec team that a culture change is needed?

17.00 — An average day for Siobhan.

17.30 — Reading material: She enjoys articles LinkedIN and the Harvard Business Review.

17.48 — Fave productivity tool/software? She uses her calendar to structure her day and makes time for thinking strategically.

19.07 — How to reach Siobhan: LinkedIN, website, Twitter.



If you have any feedback, comments, ideas or suggestions, please get in contact with us on twitter @giveahi5 or email us on podcasts@get5.io.

We chat to Jane Garza (Managing Director of culture change company, NOBL) on the benefits of culture change.

Originally published at https://www.get5.io/podcast/17-jane-garza-organisational-sub-cultures-how-to-set-up-culture-team

Jane Garza is the Managing Director of NOBL, a radical team of culture change experts whose mission it is to improve work and culture for more than 1 million people before they’re 10 years old.

She worked in HR for 8 years before joining NOBL. She became interested in HR consulting, was moving to LA, found a position at NOBL and is now the MD of their LA team.

HR is traditionally very reactive, which is good but can be exhausting in the long term. HR needs the opportunity to plan and exercise organisational skills. Culture has a big part to play in this.

“At NOBL we talk about sub-cultures a lot. Culture varies from one department to the next.”
She believes culture can be changed, but it does take time. It’s less like a turnaround and more like an evolvement. Most often Jane doesn’t deal with totally toxic cultures (where people are rolling their eyes at each other in meetings), but more with companies that want to scale their precious happy company culture.

“There is a much larger success rate in companies that invest in their culture.”
Jane on culture committees
The intention of having a team drive a great company culture is great, but the danger is bucketing culture in a team of 10 people who are now forced to carry culture for the entire organisation, where this should be everyone’s responsibility.

On the other hand, these teams are able to listen to the rest of the organisation and act upon the feedback they receive. Jane suggests that when you’re putting together your A-team for a culture committee, don’t make it legislative; rather choose the people who are most excited in your organisation.

“Ultimately, your culture is the way you get work done.”


Timetamp notes:

0.17 — Jane’s background in HR.

2.00 — HR as reactive vs. proactive.

3.33 — Can culture be changed?

6.28 — How to change culture.

8.17 — Who should lead a culture team in an organisation?

11.08 — Case studies of culture change.

13.00 — Fun facts about Jane. Favourite podcast: Adam Grant’s Worklife. Book: Orbiting the Giant Hairball: A Corporate Fool's Guide to Surviving with Grace by Gordon MacKenzie.

15.00 — Productivity tools: Feedly for reading RSS feeds.

15.37 — Get in touch with Jane at jane.garze@nobl.io or on LinkedIN.



If you have any feedback, comments, ideas or suggestions, please get in contact with us on twitter @giveahi5 or email us on podcasts@get5.io.

Previously the MD and Talent Manager of Brighthouse (now known as This Way Up), Nadia has worked at Gitlab since 2017 simultaneously recruiting to scale the company from 75 to 767 hired team members and building up her career in People Operations at the company. She moved into a management position at Gitlab a couple of months ago.

All 767 Gitlab employees work from home. It was decided from the start by the founders that the company would always stay remote.

“If we say all-remote, we really mean it. We have no offices anywhere in the world.”
How does Gitlab maintain a productive remote company culture? Nadia lists some handy tips and tools.
When she interviews people in different countries, she can almost immediately tell if it will not work out depending on how open the person is to other cultures. As a global all-remote team, it’s imperative to be able to get along with people from diverse backgrounds.

“We are non-political at work.”
The Values-driven work at Gitlab is not only the responsibility of the management. It’s very bottom-up as opposed to top-down and Nadia reckons it’s up to everyone to help each other stay aligned.

Currently Nadia’s team is working on on-boarding and off-boarding and making sure it’s more of an experience than “train-stopping” for the employees entering and exiting the company.

In a discussion around Hi5 pulses, Nadia mentions it could be better to run 90-day pulse surveys than to run bi-annual 360 degree reviews. It’s also great to go back to what was said in the crucial time of on-boarding in the first 90 days to assess growth and alignment to values.

“Sticking to values-hiring as opposed to ‘bums in seats’ has definitely been game-changing.”‍
Timestamp notes:
0.11 — Intro

2.35 — About being an all-remote company

8.15 — Scaling the culture at Gitlab

13.28 — An average day for Nadia

15.12 — What she’s reading at the moment: The First 90 Days by Michael Watkins. Crucial Conversations by Al Switzler et al.

16.07 — On employee feedback & bi-annual 360 reviews

18.37 — Favourite productivity software? Gitlab for building tables and for onboarding, her calendar for blocking time on schedule.

20.46 — How to reach Nadia: Twitter, LinkedIN, nadia@gitlab.com.

If you have any feedback, comments, ideas or suggestions, please get in contact with us on twitter @giveahi5 or email us on podcasts@get5.io.
‍Want to run 90-day employee pulses? Check out Hi5 Pulses 👉

In this episode of Working better, together, we chat to Melissa Hui from Context Leap on people + culture design.
Originally published at https://www.get5.io/podcast/15-melissa-hui-how-design-thinking-helps-hr

Melissa is educated in social sciences & anthropology, but has worked most of her career as a designer. With 15 years’ experience in the tech sector, she’s worked with major companies like Google, Microsoft and CapGemini, as well as startups, with her expertise in strategy, product-service innovation & operationalization, digital transformation and experience design.

She’s the founder of Context Leap, a people + culture consultancy in San Francisco that creates solutions for thriving workplace cultures, authentic leadership and empowered talent.

“Performance as a concept is very limited and narrow… Culture sets the cadence for everything.”
Melissa practices design-thinking in every aspect of her life; in finding solutions both for her own business and for clients. This comes with the belief that building a company is the same as building a product — and this is where design can help HR flourish.

Even though HR is the “logical home” for growing organisational culture, much better results are seen when cultural design is implemented on a consulting basis across many companies.

“For culture to be successful, it has to come from the top… there’s a huge responsibility on middle management, too.”
Companies are oftentimes prescriptive about their company culture, choosing the adjectives and values they think are “cool”, without really working on embodying these within the company. It’s very aspirational, but management need to focus more on continual feedback to understand what’s really going on. This will help them establish a more authentic culture.

“Performance follows when you have great culture.”
Timestamp notes:
0.16 — About Melissa and Context Leap.

1.57 — Why there is such a move from Design and Engineering to People Development?

3.45 — Who is responsible for culture in the company?

7.43 — What’s more important, culture or performance?

8.46 — Where companies go wrong with retaining culture.

10.36 — An average day for Melissa as a remote worker.

12.16 — Melissa on Ultra Working & design sprints.

13.00 — What is Melissa reading? Brené Brown, Adam Grant, Change Agent podcast by New York Times.

13.45 — Tools & Software she uses? Trello, pen and paper, Monday.com.

Want to reach out to Melissa? Find her on LinkedIN, her website or Twitter.‍



If you have any feedback, comments, ideas or suggestions, please get in contact with us on twitter @giveahi5 or email us on podcasts@get5.io.