With HR tech, successful implementation goes way beyond deployment. Applying advanced tools and metrics to your HR processes won’t get you far without genuine support and participation from key stakeholders.
Implementing any new HR technology will raise practical questions and challenges and inspire enthusiasm for change. Forward-thinking organisations know that how you adopt new HR tech goes beyond just turning it on.
That’s why this on-demand webinar in our ‘Talent Table’ series for HR will explore:
Watch Rebecca Warren, Eightfold Director, Customer Success, in this conversation with Accenture and Bayer about why collaboration and buy-in are essential to turn all your HR tech investments into impactful outcomes.
The importance of collaboration, innovation, and employee engagement in HR technology was discussed. Speakers emphasized the need for diverse perspectives, inclusive design, and personalized experiences. They also highlighted the importance of simplifying technology stacks, experimenting with new solutions, and effectively communicating the value of new technologies. Storytelling, bottom-up buy-in, and cultural shifts toward employee growth and development were also discussed as key factors in successful technology adoption.
Rebecca Warren 00:00
Just want to get a few housekeeping things out of the way. So if you look towards the bottom of your screen, you’re going to see some widgets that you can use during the event. There’s further related reading. In the Resources section, you can ask us questions using a Q&A so we’ve got a lot of things to cover. So if we don’t get to your question during the webinar, someone will get back to you. And last of all, you can register proactively for next month’s Talent Table looking at demystifying AI and how it can help rather than hinder HR, where I will be joined by folks from Vodafone and Roy. So without further ado, let’s jump into our session for this Talent Table, I would love to have our guests introduce themselves, Jacob, if you would start then we’ll go to Beatrice, and I have a question for you as well. I like to throw a little kind of fun questions at folks, just to get us thinking and start our morning off, right? So the question I want to ask all of you as well that you can include on the answer here in your introduction is, if you had to buy only one of the following, a boat, an RV or an off roading vehicle, which would you buy? And why? So Jacob, we’ll start with you to intro and give us your answer to that really fun question.
Jacob Bradburn 01:26
Awesome. Thank you, Rebecca, thank you for having me today. My name is Jacob Bradburn. I am a senior manager, and I part of Accenture strategies talent and organization practice. I work with our clients across a host of talent and organizational challenges that they face, and spend a lot of time with clients in the energy space, but work with a range of clients outside of that as needed and and we decided to be part of this discussion today. And if I had to choose, I think I would go with a boat. And why is because I feel like when the zombies attack, the water might be the safest place to be. Oh my gosh, I love that. What a great answer. I could tell you some zombie stories down the road, but that’s amazing.
Beatriz Rodriguez 02:13
Hi everyone. Yes. Thank you for having me, and then so I’m Beatrice Rodriguez, and I’m the group head of Talent and DEI for Bayer. And I would probably say I actually an off road one, simply because I love to explore Rocky in a way, terrains, and you need to be ready in that exploration to go many ups and downs and and I think that an overall would sort of help you navigate that journey. So yeah, that’s my answer. Fabulous.
Rebecca Warren 02:59
This is so great. I love learning little tidbits about folks that you might not normally share in a work meeting. So thanks for that. So I’m your host. Rebecca Warren, I am with Eightfold AI have been here about three and a half years, started in customer success and recently moved over to a new practice that we’re developing around talent center transformation, which we may or may not work into this conversation, we will see so what I love about what both of you said when I would pick an off road vehicle because I have an FJ, and I love FJ and I love off-roading, so, but what I love about what both of you said and I did not know your answers ahead of time, is that both of you talk about being prepared and proactive, right? How can we be ready for a zombie apocalypse or for big rocks that might come in the way? So I love that you said that, because that helps us really dive into our topic of collaboration, being prepared, thinking about a bigger picture than just ourselves when it comes to HR tech, so when we think about that collaboration, that’s really critical for an organization to be prepared, both inside and outside that collaboration. So some things we may talk about today are diverse perspectives, inclusivity, adoption and buy in, innovation, problem solving, integration, risk management and maybe some other things as well. But all of those topics help us to be prepared when it comes to evaluating and understanding HR tech. So let’s jump in here by talking about the fluid state of HR tech and what’s happening in the space right now, more and more solutions are entering the market. We’ve got a lot more choices, and there’s also a lot more there’s a lot more depth to what we’re seeing in the market. So as we’re thinking about these increasing challenges that we’re trying to solve at work and also changing work practices. How do you think that HR tech stack has evolved in response? So Jacob, I’ll send it over to you first, and then, Beatriz, if you have things to add on that would be great.
Jacob Bradburn 05:15
Happy to take that. I think, as you mentioned, the space it feels like has exploded, especially over the last three, four to five years, due to, I’m sure, many, many variables related to covid and remote working, and the, you know, the pace at which technology is advancing. I think it’s, it’s interesting, as I observe it, because there’s been so many different solutions have come into the market, and there’s been such different uptake by different organizations as it relates to the volume of those solutions that they integrate what their philosophies are. A lot of it, I feel, is based on kind of where they are from an organizational maturity perspective, both externally, from an HR perspective as it relates to the employee experience, but also from an HR organization standpoint and the thinking of how they best leverage their various capabilities to drive an integrated and connected employee experience. And I think serving the hrs customers is always at the forefront of leaders’ minds and the organization’s mind, but it can be really challenging to do given the diversity of the solutions that are coming to bear, and I feel like right now, in this moment in time, that there’s a there’s more convergence that’s happening as it relates to how to drive that more seamless experience, at least for end users, while trying to more effectively manage the ins and outs of it on the back end, and not have that be felt by the broader organization or the business?
Rebecca Warren 06:43
Yeah, absolutely, yeah.
Beatriz Rodriguez 06:46
To that note, I agree. I think we’ve, we’ve seen sort of a from to shift. Actually, we’ve seen a move that it was two years ago we were all working on optimizing individual technologies to make them simpler, to make them, you know, easy access, efficient and so on and so forth. And what we’ve realized that that still had a lot of complexity in terms of access and in terms of, like, connectivity across the different talent, sort of, you know, thinking. And I think that we’ve evolved into more integrated end to end solutions. But what I do, think that we have evolved even further is around the democratization of access and the personalization. Think few years ago, yes, we could have a lot of different collections of like, you know, platforms that would sort of like, give you, you know, access. However, now I think we are in the intersection of democratizing access even further, and personalize it and customize it to your particular context, as an individual. And I think that that is an evolution of the HR technology stack that clearly we’re not there yet. There’s a lot of implications, as we can see with AI, and how machine learning and how AI learns about you, but we have, from an HR perspective, would definitely evolve into that personalization, customization, so that we make sure that what the talent sort of receives is exactly what he or she needs for their career.
Rebecca Warren 08:17
Yeah, well, and I love what you’re talking about, right? We were thinking initially about simplifying and optimizing and deciding if we were going to go with point solutions or if we were going to use end to end platforms. I’m not sure that we’ve figured that out yet, because I’m seeing kind of that fluctuation that some people are like, I want it all in one and other people like, No, I want to, you know, 18 things that are going to do exactly what I want them to do. So Beatrice to compound on that. How does HR at this point think about understanding and evaluating their current tax right? You talk about simplifying and optimizing. Should we eliminate some? Should we add more? How do we make sure they actually do what they say they’re going to do right? Can we utilize all of the things that are in each piece of technology? Or are people buying tech for tech sake? Or the worst, all are buying vaporware things that say they’re going to do something and they actually don’t. How do we decide what the right things are in the organization and what we want to add to our tech stack?
Beatriz Rodriguez 09:23
Yeah, so that one is probably the $1 million question, because what is the right balance between what you as a nature function as a practitioner, what you believe is the right technology to put forward, or what is it really what it is needed? So here, I think we’ve experimented at Bayer with many different things, but here my my two cents is now first we need to, we need to change the way that we think about technology in HR is not anymore about HR, putting out there the technology for our employees is not about any more than HR, sort of, you know, telling employees what is best for them from a technology perspective is the other way around. So I think the approach is more outside in and really go where the business pool is first. Less is more. So I do believe that there is a process of simplifying the technology stack that we have in HR, less is more. And I think the integration and the ones that really are business critical, and what the business really is pulling you to cover the needs, those are the first ones that we need to really address, versus potentially some others that we in HR believe they are great, and I’m sure that the employee will love having that are probably the ones that I would stop doing in the first place. So there you go.
Rebecca Warren 10:53
All right, Jacob?
Jacob Bradburn 10:56
I totally agree. I think a lot of times it feels as though we’re hammers looking for nails when it comes to the technology solutions. And I think asking ourselves the question of, you know, what does help look like for the business or for employees? And that being, you know, simplified and you know, Beatrice, as you were saying, that I was thinking about if it is your decision as an organization to go with many different technologies, which is fine, there’s there’s just a lot more work on the back end to try and create a more simplified, unified, seamless employee experience, so that they don’t have to feel the disruption of not knowing where to go, for what, or You know what, tool, when and how do I simply solve for what I’m trying to solve for today, and spend a lot of time searching for what I need to find on our internal sites, or whatever it may be, reaching out to folks. So I think it’s it is really like getting into the minds of the business and what help looks like for them and what would be useful versus what we may perceive as that help versus the reality right now.
Rebecca Warren 12:09
I don’t know about you all, but I have found in my previous career as a practitioner that if I either had a solution that I thought was great, or someone in the organization right, that we’ve learned that our folks say we want this doesn’t always mean that we get the buy in from the right people at the right time. So how do we, if we’ve bubbled up these solutions that we think absolutely are going to help our organization get to that final outcome, right? Focusing on that. Roi, how do we get that buy in from our teams all the way up to that C suite, to say we feel like this is the right solution, and get that engagement. Jacob, what do you think?
Jacob Bradburn12:57
I really think that this connects back to exactly what you said they’re at the end around buy in, or, excuse me, the ROI, I think it relates to the value, like, what is the value that this solution or capability will bring to the organization? And is that something, I think, connecting back to what we were just talking about, is that something that they’re actually looking for, that would look like help for them? It often again, just we can be very guilty of the shiny objects and thinking about like all the latest and greatest technologies that have come to bear in the market and how exciting they are, and not to take away from that they are exciting. But are those really where we are as an organization? Is that where we need to be, and will that look like value as it relates to trying to communicate that to those around us, but then also those leaders that need to have you know, the understanding of how it can be useful, the sponsorship to support the enablement of it, as well as, ultimately, the cost that it’s going to take to implement it.
Beatriz Rodriguez 13:59
I would, I would offer a complimentary lens to this one, which is actually how we as an HR organization bring this to life, to our stakeholders. And it’s more around the how, not so much the what. So sometimes you’ve seen over the years as an HR organization, we could have defaulted at times into telling we could have defaulted at times into you have to do it this way and be very directive in the way that we’ve been bringing certain either processes or technologies and so on. And I think that when you think about now technology to the next level, the implications that that technology could have as an HR organization, we probably want to hone a little bit in our storyteller. Storytelling skill, I think, is, is a complex subject. When you think about AI, when you think about technology, when you think about what technology is going to do for HR all, for our talent and our people development, talent acquisition, and I think that it does require a storytelling that people can actually relate to. It’s not anymore about showing not I mean, you definitely need to have a hand on your numbers that’s super important, and understand the return on the investment. But it’s not any more about telling people that they have to do this, because it is what it is. So, because this is the process of the technology, that we have decided at a company level, that’s know how the world operates this day. So I think, as an HR organization, how we evolve into less tell but more, share the stories. Bring the story to life. What technology can do to you what is seen for you, we don’t spend enough time in that part of the equation. And I think it’s critical to make sure that moving forward, everyone across the organization, from top management to employees to any sort of organization, is actually able to be in the journey with you, because technology is going to evolve. And I think that this test and learn of technology is final things. It does require having this storytelling skill from an HR perspective to bring it to life. So that’s one that I would say is going to be keen in the future for us as an organization.
Rebecca Warren 16:17
Yeah, I think that’s right. When we think about how things have gotten passed down for centuries. It’s consistently through storytelling, through that thread that comes from person to person, that ties it all together. And we know that if we don’t tie it all together, we’ve got some problems. And I’ll tell you, I learned in customer success, and I had not been in it before, so I didn’t have any preconceived notions about what I was supposed to do or not do, but I learned that when we have organizations that sell to the C suite and we talk about change management, and we hope that folks figure it out before we Go Live, I will tell you that we ended up in in several occasions with the disconnect, because it was sold to the C suite, but didn’t get all the way down to the end users. And Jacob, you mentioned buy in and adoption, right? If you don’t have that all the tech in the world that could solve all of the problem, if you don’t have the end users actually committed to using it, huge disconnect. And we spent a lot of time, a lot of time with these folks and trying to get out of whatever we call it, tech debt, pit of despair, whatever we want to call it, trying to get folks to embrace the technology that we all feel is going to make their lives better. But if we don’t have that bottom up buy in as well as that top down engagement, it really falls flat. So how do we understand that end user? How do we understand what they want, what they need, and how do we make sure that there’s adoption, not just from the overall big picture ROI, but also from the end user who we’re expecting to actually use this technology that we’re putting in place. So I doesn’t matter to me, who wants to start Beatrice or Jacob, which either one of you have a point of view that you want to throw out there first. I’d love to hear it
Jacob Bradburn 18:20
happy to kick us off. I really think that this comes down to thinking about how we deploy and test different technologies moving forward. So historically, I feel like it’s been much more of, you know, waterfall mindset of big, big implementations, massive technology investments, if the market has become flooded with a lot of you know, smaller if you will. Or maybe that’s not the best word, but technologies or platforms that can be implemented much faster, much, much more quickly, can be used as enablers to your core systems, your your your work days, your success factors that can be stacked on top of them to enhance or augment. And so I really think that this comes back to thinking of it from much more of an agile perspective, and looking at it, looking at how you can test with a group of users, employees within the within the workforce, to get their feedback, to better understand is this what help looks like to them, before thinking about massive scaling across the organization, I feel like, you know, historically, again, we’ve we’ve just rolled out what we thought was best and and when you know, I love Beatrice’s comments around like with this is what is best for you, and we know, and we we understand what you need. I feel like getting truly to the voice of the customer or to the employee, Voice of the employee, to provide that feedback sooner than later, and in a much more agile and quick fashion, iterative fashion, helps us to learn more quickly and learn what works well and what doesn’t, and pivot is needed. And I think that that’s where a lot of organizations are continuing to experiment with that type of philosophy, and are deciding much more quickly whether a solution through a pilot or a proof of concept is fit for them, or perhaps it’s not. And I think also the technology organizations are becoming a lot more comfortable with that approach as they recognize that they’re going to have to start working with their customers to test those things, as opposed to just selling them the licenses every three years, and assuming that that will be the case moving forward. So I just I feel like we’re moving into a much more nimble state, and I think that that’s best, because it’ll help us experiment and find out what really works and what doesn’t for the organization based on our context?
Rebecca Warren 20:43
Yeah, that small group of a pilot or a champion group makes a big difference when you get people on board, yeah, yeah.
Beatriz Rodriguez 20:51
And I would also add, so we, we as well. We use, sort of a lot the concept of MVP early adopters. So we sort of like work through that experimentation. Now we actually start the co-creation of it way before we sort of ask our early adopters or our pilots to test it. So for me, what has been we recently kind of deployed a, you know, one of one of our AI talent driven management platforms, and one of the very important lessons learned is that the design, the co creation, the testing, the user experience, starts way, way, way before you actually ask somebody to test and pilot something. So we we’ve been in a journey of, you know, what, building design teams around how do we how do we build this solution? And those design teams, the importance of that was that they were truly diverse in nature. So one of the different things as well is that we typically have like, you know, it’s the same team working on that solution. Here, we actually brought diversity across many different disciplines, across many different countries, many different languages, many different ways of thinking, or what you can imagine. So we introduced that diversity in the co creation and the design of what the test environment and the pilot was going to be so very early on. So we ensure that by the time that we get to asking early adopters to be part of it, it has the most inclusive perspective it has been. It is it is it is with the most inclusive perspectives in that design. So I think, long story short, don’t underestimate the the early co creation and early diversity that you need before you even get to the point of launching a proof of concept. And that’s the biggest, the biggest learning. And I because that really tells you from the very beginning that that technology is going to work or no, so it is, it is already a really good understanding from the organization, if what we’re trying to do makes sense or it doesn’t, from the very early on.
Rebecca Warren 23:11
All right, Beatriz, we’re going to off road a little bit here, and I have an additional question to ask you then on top of that. So when you think about that, I think that is critical to pull in multiple perspectives, different backgrounds, different parts of the organization. How do you get folks, and this could be a two part. Do you have a formal wage for folks to get involved in those projects and or, how do you get people to say, on top of my daily job, I’m also going to put input into this project, whether they see value or not, whether they’ll actually get usage out of it not is a different story. But how do you get that buy in? How do you pick the folks that are going to be part of that co creation, getting the all of that intelligence upfront.
Beatriz Rodriguez 24:04
So I think there’s two ways to approach this. So one is based on the skills, the expertise that you need. So for that, you basically sit down and decide, okay, so based on this, based on what we need to achieve, what are the skills that we need from a multidisciplinary team. So we basically started building an HR organization that is more resembles more of a product organization than actually a purely HR practitioner organization. So even our So first, you start with the skills. And you kind of said, well, for this. I need it. I need this. I need data privacy. I need all of that. And you kind of try to make sure that that diversity of expertise is going to be included in that. The second is really the the other diversity that you probably don’t get via the expertise, which is, are we considering people with different backgrounds? Are we considering people with different from different nationalities? And the way that we do that, I think it’s also has shifted a little bit, because before we tend to staff projects, literally by just telling somebody you are assigned to this project, and then you might like it or you might don’t. But what I think we are changing and we are pivoting to is to really let individuals, self direct themselves where the passions are. So So we open, crowdsource some of those, some of those projects, and everyone is self directed as well. And in those projects, you actually have the time that is required for each project and so on and so forth. But it is really about, I think, the future around diversity, inclusiveness project, and how you go through this is really about letting individuals, you know, put themselves in those assign themselves into these projects that really their passions are. Because that is when you you ensure your engagement. You’re sure that those individuals are going to be there. So you look at it from two angles, so that you make sure that the overall compound of the project, from an skills perspective, but also diverse perspectives, is working together. And instead of mandating people to go to projects, we let people choose their own destinies, passions and so on. So we’ve started with that about three months ago, and the fact that we are receiving is great because it allows individuals to sort of build their own portfolios as well, from a career perspective,
Rebecca Warren 26:29
well, and that tends to get folks to stay in the organization because they feel like they are challenged, have growth development. They don’t have to leave to find that. And that can tack on top of their their current workload, so they get that dual experience. I think that’s great. And I think that also goes back to what we were talking about with that C suite buy in right? If your C suite already says, Hey, we’re aware that this is how we’re going to accomplish this project, they’re not going to get in the way of that collaborative approach to make sure that more folks are involved rather than less. Jacob, I’ve left you out of the conversation, thoughts, ideas, what, what’s on your mind.
Jacob Bradburn 27:13
I was thinking about that. I mean, I think one of the things that ran through my mind is I feel like a lot of organizations are actually shifting into a culture to where those types of efforts, you know, on top of the normal day job, you call it what you want, a side hustle, a plus one, an extra hat that you wear. I feel like that’s becoming more and more culturally expected within organizations, whether it be formal or informal, to an extent. And so I think that I fully align with everything badger said and you added on. I think really giving people that sense of fulfillment, and because they may not always get that through their their day to day job, right, or that the, you know, their role that they have. And so giving them that kind of, that extra thing that that hits on a personal interest or a skill set that maybe the organization didn’t even realize they had, that they get to then come to work and demonstrate, can really go a long way to, you know, providing them that sense of belonging, that sense of, you know, driving value for the organization, that that maybe they hadn’t felt before. So I think it’s a it’s a really powerful mechanism to be able to, you know, not only retain but fulfill your potential within your workforce.
Rebecca Warren 28:32
I love that so, and it’s okay if the answer is no, but I was wondering if either one of you had an example of a great integration or implementation, whether it was putting multiple tools together or an implementation where you actually did that from the very beginning of getting all of that buy in, all the way through the end result. So Do either of you have an example that you might want to share about a way that it was done really well, either in your organization, or that you’ve heard about from a friend,
Jacob Bradburn 29:07
I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a perfect one. Just be honest. You know what that I think is the perfect answer? I think that’s right, because if we go in expecting it to be perfect, it’s not never going to be a perfect implementation. I’ll share a story that doesn’t necessarily perfectly align with that, but I still find it a really interesting story, because I feel like a lot of times there is those efforts to get all stakeholders at all levels enrolled and supportive, and in certain times there that’s not always going to happen. And so I saw one organization where they were looking at implementing a learning solution. They had enough leadership support, but there was still enough pushback to where it was. They weren’t quite sure. They were on the fence, and they were going back and forth. They had done a few pilots, the one of the leaders in the Learning and Development Organization somewhat took a risk and just kind of turned on the system in the background, and the employees started using it massively, that the adoption and the consumption was so high that they could not even fathom what they were seeing from like the engagement and all of that that by the time, some of the leaders who were somewhat against it found out it was too late, like they couldn’t turn it off, because the draw and the pole was so strong. Now that was a big gamble on that leader’s behalf, but I found it really interesting, an interesting approach, and, you know, pros and cons to that, and I’m sure there was some behind the scenes conversations of whether that was appropriate or not. Let’s not ever do that again, right? But good job, because everybody’s really excited about it, and everybody’s really engaged, and they’re out there consuming more learning than we’ve ever experienced. So I saw that as just a really unique example. Again, not for every organization, not for every context, but something is we think about, kind of like how to experiment and test more, you know, iteratively or in an agile fashion. I thought that was a an interesting use case.
Rebecca Warren 31:18
Well, in that case, what’s the harm? Right? People don’t do it right? So it’s not like you’re putting in something that’s going to cause risk to the organization. The idea is it depends on how you find risk fair enough, to me that feels like a less risky.
Jacob Bradburn 31:38
No regrets, yeah, already paying for the licenses. There was a lot of things that in their mind that, like just went as towards the logic of it. But yeah, it was, it was a really exciting thing too. Because I think one of the things that often organizations struggle with is the, you know, the learning component, and getting people to want to engage with the learning beyond the required and mandatory and compliance or regulatory or whatever it may be, and think more of a from it, like from a personal development or self growth and all of that. And so for them to see that so quickly was was really exciting
Rebecca Warren 32:13
when it sounds like that might lend itself to some of the things that Beatrice was talking about in terms of learning new things, being part of something maybe you wouldn’t have normally thought about. Maybe they were taking classes or different learning tracks that they might not have thought they had time for, or they were approved to do, but if it’s available, and then you can see who are those curious learners? Who’s the biggest consumers? How do we pull them into other projects? How do we start partnering with those folks that are learning that broad swath of information? I’m sure there’s tons of learnings that come out.
Jacob Bradburn 32:47
Yeah, and who’s, who’s developing niche skills or, you know, market relevant or emerging, trending skills that are coming out. It was, it did expose a lot, gave a lot of data to the organization to think through as related to what type of talent they have and that they were building
Rebecca Warren 33:06
awesome. Thank you for sharing that.
Beatriz Rodriguez 33:12
Yeah, I actually would have, I actually the team at Bayer could they will feel really, by the way, so we we design a user interface where, basically we turn upside down all of the way HR interacted with employees, or the other way around how employees and people leaders interacted with HR. What I mean by that is typically in HR, you would kind of see many times, kind of a bit more of a push model, right? So we will push a process here, and we will push the other process there, and the process with the technology and so on. And here, really, what we did was to create a user interface that it was actually designed internally, and it was really about, what are the moments in time throughout the year when we expect an employee or a people leader to take an action on any people related activities? So it was not anymore about, this is the process a this is the time it is around from a talent development perspective, dear people, leader through January to April, this is what we expect of you, and we kind of created that interface that it was more with a user experience. And,
Rebecca Warren 34:36
oh no, I think we did come back. I was so involved in her Okay, looks like she’s having some issues with her technology. Everybody listening in. She’s having her roof repaired at the moment. They were banging away right before we joined the call. Maybe they got the internet line in the process. Could be yes, we said that’s, that’s how life goes, right? Of course, the roofers, who have been MIA for four months, all of a sudden show up on the day that you need to to actually have a quiet in the house. So hopefully she’ll be able to join back with us. So, but what we were saying, I think, was very aligned, right, thinking about how the and what I was taking notes on is doing a poll push. Instead of telling folks what they need, let’s pull it from them, what is important to them. How are they looking at driving that? And then how do we engage folks in that? So let me throw our next question out Jacob, and hopefully she’ll be able to join back and we can get some more details from her. But so the what’s in it for me, the with them, right? When we’ve got employees who say, Well, yeah, maybe I could do that. I don’t know. It’s a lot of work. I just kind of want to come to work and do my day job and not have to worry about, you know, adding in new HR tech, learning new things. How do we get and I think we’ve already talked about some of this, right? The storytelling, the early adoption, all of that. But how do we get folks bought in? From, I want to, instead of, I have to.
Jacob Bradburn 36:18
Yeah, it’s a great question. I think it connects back to me, related to and this isn’t a rocket science answer, but those folks that that have been bought in or engaged more so from the beginning, like Beatrice was saying around like even getting them involved in the design, from the initial even before you pilot or run through a proof of concept, they are you have No bigger supporters, typically, or advocates or evangelists of whatever you’re trying to do. And I think, honestly, one of the strongest things as it relates to adoption of new technologies, regardless of if it’s HR or otherwise, is word of mouth. I think having them be the voice of the power of it, versus the HR organization having to be the marketing arm, so to speak, as well, can drive a lot of adoption, a lot of engagement. And so you know, it coming from them, coming from the voice of the business, versus the voice of just HR, can can hold a lot more weight in certain circumstances. And so I think is often underestimated and underutilized. And so I think, you know, making sure that they, you know, play that role is, you know, making sure that they understand that as a part of this, you also would like for them to advocate on behalf of it. And obviously, depending on how things go and what direction you head, can can really help provide that what’s in it for them, because they’re hearing from a peer, as opposed to somebody that is like they may feel is forcing them to do something
Rebecca Warren 37:46
which ties into what we Yeah, that that storytelling, that champion, that I get to do this instead of I have to do that. So Beatriz, welcome back. We thought maybe the rumors had cut your internet line making up all kinds of stories technology, yeah, that’s right, that’s right. And so we were tagging on to what you were saying, so we’d love to hear the rest of what you were sharing, but that idea of of pull rather than push, and how do you get folks to want to be part of that? So I’ll turn it back to you to finish your thought, and then we can continue on this.
Beatriz Rodriguez 38:26
And then there’s two ways that I will probably think of this is definitely versus push. So I think pushing as an HR organization, the next thing is not the way that I think the world operates today. So it does requires from us to refrain a little bit and to really understand what is that pool really coming from? So you read, because the pool can be from many different ways, so you really need to do a lot of exercise around what is that pool coming from? What is that pool needed? And so on. And the other one a little bit, what I think Jacob was mentioning is not anymore. HR is not the next HR thing is really about peer conversations is really about even when you are into the city where you basically have peers, you know, sharing with you that experience with certain technology. It actually increases the likelihood of you going and tested and see, be curious that if somebody from HR tells you that that you have to do this or that is good, that you go through this process. So that’s a little bit of the two sides of the of the coin that I you know, I think, is a learning for HR in the evolution of what we are saying.
Rebecca Warren 39:48
And when you tie that, when you think about the skills that somebody might bring to the table, when you’re including them into this process, right that pull rather than push, what do they want to do? How are we taking advantage of their passions? Jacob, you mentioned that before. How do we how do we get folks thinking differently? That also then leads to, if we focus on the skill sets, then you have that built in diversity of background thought process, and there’s additional learnings that come out of that too, because you never know where they may want to go in the organization. Maybe you pulled in somebody from accounting that you’re like, they are brilliant, and I’d love to have them over in project management. Or what kind ways could we start utilizing those skill sets, moving them into different areas, right? Like, I think about me coming into customer success at Eightfold. I was a TA practitioner, senior leader of of TA processes and teams, but hadn’t done customer success, but somebody saw, and it was actually a former partner of mine, came over to Eightfold and said, Hey, I think the way you operate would fit well. Here came over here, learned a ton through customer success, but because of my passion, my interest in staying connected to the world. Partnered a lot with marketing, did a lot of these webinars right? Started really connecting and talking to folks. And they said, Hey, let’s have you come on over into marketing now and start this practice. Had I not volunteered? Had I not been pulled in? Had someone not seen that, had I not volunteered my passion, I wouldn’t be in the role that I’m in today. So that’s a whole other conversation of, how do we formalize that and talk about skills from the involvement as well as career pathing level, but great examples of that pull instead of push, storytelling, how do we get that? What’s in it, for me, embedded in the organization, so it’s part of the culture, as opposed to a special project. It’s just now the way that you work. Any last thoughts before we move on to some mistakes?
Beatriz Rodriguez 41:56
I actually want to a little bit on that, on that one when people ask me, so what about career like? How career looks like in the future? I actually, I also think about, don’t underestimate the power of adjacent skills. I think it’s in those adjacent skills to your current skills sort of track is, are the ones that are going to give you the broader perspectives and the branching out into other careers and other fields that you might have known. So when you think about skills, it’s great to think about skills in sort of like in your field of expertise, but the key is around the adjacent ones, the ones that we typically don’t pay attention, the ones that we don’t know. And technology today gives you a lot of insights on adjacent skills, and in those adjacent skills, it’s like what you were saying. So you were a practitioner of talent acquisition, but branching out into customer success, you could argue that you had it was an adjacent skills of your talent acquisition expertise, because you were in contact with you. You know your candidates are your customers. So how did you ensure the success? So moving forward, careers should, in my view, we should pay more attention around the adjacent skills that would allow us to broaden the perspective versus the traditional way of continuing thinking about careers. Perhaps not anymore with the next job title, but actually not anymore either with the next skill in your field is the adjacent ones, the ones that are going to give you broader perspective and opportunity. So that’s a thought that perhaps correlated with the audience today.
Jacob Bradburn 43:31
And I’d love to weigh in on that too, and to build off of it, because I think it’s, it’s the adjacent skills, and maybe we could call these adjacent skills, but also the unknown skills that a lot of our workforce possesses, that because we’ve put them into such rigid structures around jobs and roles, and we believe we understand what’s required to do that job or role and have that well defined in our job architectures and job descriptions and things of that nature, we often underestimate the other skills that the workforce brings, and their experiences and their educational backgrounds and their continuing education that they pursue on the weekend, because it’s a passion area or an area of interest, and leveraging and having line of sight to that will truly help. I feel like organizations accelerate their business and as well as think about, like the value proposition to the employee, to your to your point, Beatrice around, like the opportunities that they all of a sudden become exposed to, is a lot broader if we have better clarity on kind of the diversity of their backgrounds and the understanding of what skills that they’re they possess, and what They’re building, and where you know, those adjacent skills or proximal skills exist in parallel to that to be able to help them transition as they move from one role to another,
Rebecca Warren 44:51
yeah, for sure. And I think that ties back to a lot of different things we’ve been talking about. Oh, it looks like we’ve lost again, dang it all right, but I think that ties back a lot to what we were saying in terms of not just focusing on the ROI for the business, which is, which is clearly the number one goal, right? Like we want to focus on what’s important to the business, what are those outcomes? But you’re also by pulling people into different projects, by asking their opinion, by pulling them into these, these tech conversations, you’re also, as you said, engaging their passions. Engage them. Understand what their adjacent skills are, and your byproduct of that is longer staying employees right, happier lack of education, happier employees. Folks are moving into different areas. They’re learning different things. Exactly. That was one thing that I always said was that if we hire somebody with 100% of what we’re looking for, that’s called a consultant, as opposed to an employee, that they can learn and we can pour into right so we want to make sure that we are giving folks opportunities to continue to learn and to grow, to be challenged, to feel I know this is a scary word, but to feel uncomfortable. But when we get uncomfortable is when we learn right? That’s where we see a lot of our employees who come in and they’re like, I am just on this track. I come in, I process payroll, I do my eight to four. I understand how it works, but when we give people the opportunity to learn and to grow and to challenge them, we become uncomfortable. But my personal opinion is that makes us so much better. I can say pretty confidently that I’ve been uncomfortable in the every day the last three and a half years at Eightfold, and I feel better for it, and it makes people uncomfortable. It makes people uncomfortable when I say I’m that way. But if we talk about it as being challenged as opposed to uncomfortable, we’re continuing to help our organization learn and grow and stimulate those adjacent skills and that, that ability to pour into the organization, as opposed to feel like I come in, I do my job, and if I ever want to grow or do something new, I’ve got to leave. So that kind of ties up that what’s in it for me. So just welcome back. So let’s in our last few minutes. And I don’t want to spend a lot of time on mistakes, because I’m a positive person. I want to talk about what we’ve learned from that. But let’s just throw it out there and say, What do you think if you had to come up with a short list of, you know the top I don’t know, two to four, three to five, whatever you want to say, common mistakes that companies make when they’re thinking about putting in tech. What are some call outs that we think companies should first and foremost look out for before they start doing this process?
Beatriz Rodriguez 47:40
Yeah, very Thank you. Very clear to to keep it, to keep it short and sweet. So number one is no big ban. I think big ban of a new tech is a thing of the past. There’s so much that you don’t control these days, on the on the integrations and the AI APIs and all of that that you really need to make sure that you start a small, piloted, early adopters, pull versus push. So those that’s number one, and number two is we like the shiny things. We like to we like to show the nicest stuff, but spending enough and proper time on the non sexy part of the tech fundamentals, like data management, data cleanup and so on and so forth, is as relevant as the shiny stuff. So even when you when you bring some of these technologies, platforms into place, you need to work really for the long time around skills, taxonomy and data cleanup and data management and so on and so forth. And that is the non sexy side of it, because it requires time. It requires, you know, checking and validating and calibrating and all of these things that I’m sure it resonates, but that is critical for the experience in in the in the platform moving forward for the user. So really make sure that you spend proper time in making sure they will never be perfect, but proper time in the non sexy part of it is as important as a big lunch. Jacob, to you.
Jacob Bradburn 49:16
Absolutely. I come back to engagement in communication and and not just those words at a surface level, but like at a deep, meaningful level and in an effective way, it hits on a lot of things we’ve already discussed. I’ve seen so many implementations of new technology solutions and HR and other parts of organizations fail just because of the well, we’re just going to, you know, turn it on and they’ll use it. And the lack of, you know, whether, if you want to call it change management, the lack of driving of of the proper types of engagement based on your organizational context, and having those early adopters, those advocators, those evangelists, whatever you want to call them, in place, having everyone that is involved with the rollout and whatever that, whatever that looks like for you and I agree, hopefully it’s not big bang anymore, but more iteratively and quickly to be well versed and how to communicate with the various levels of employees and segments of their of their audiences is often just so underestimated, and that requires a lot of investment and a lot of time and a lot of work. But I think that a lot of the attention is often given to the technology side of the implementation or making sure, which is not to say that it’s, it’s not an or it’s an and it’s you definitely like everything Beatrice said around like you got to make sure that you have a solid foundation, that everything’s in place for this to be set up for success. But if you don’t pull through the other half of the equation of trying to get people to actually use it, then what’s the point? You just wasted money. So I really think that a lot of organizations fall down in that department, and I’ve seen so many wasted dollars on various technology solutions just because it wasn’t the attention and the dedication wasn’t given to how they effectively roll these things out or communicate or engage with the workforce properly.
Rebecca Warren 51:21
Yeah, and I think those things that you shared are very consistent with everything that we’ve been talking about right making sure that you’re pulling in the right people. You’ve got communication tap down. It’s that storytelling thread all the way through. Because if you do, if I think about, you know, these, if you do it the right way. On this, focus on the fundamentals. Start small, use that pull versus push, continual, constant communication, telling the story all the way through. By the time somebody gets to that end, right that go live. It’s kind of a no brainer. It doesn’t feel like a big initiative, because it’s already been woven into the thread of the organization. It’s already part it’s table stakes, right? Like, of course we’re going to use this, of course we’re going to turn it on. Because I understand what it is. I know what’s in it. For me, I understand why we’re doing this, how it ties back to the business results. You know, that’s one of the things I think it’s really hard for folks, especially if they are further away from the C suite. Like, I don’t get it. Why am I doing this? And the you know, just do it. You know, like, parent child, like, just do it. It’s good for you, as you said, Beatrice, like, that doesn’t work anymore. We’re just turn something on and tell them to do it. Because we said, You’ve got to, you’ve got to have that, that. What’s the why, right? Like, my youngest kid was always like, I’ll do it if you give me a good enough reason, like, give me the why. And so I have had to learn to sell from the here’s why, here’s the here’s what’s in it for you, here’s how it’s going to be better. So I think tying those pieces together are great learnings to take away. Now, in the last minute, two minutes or so, I want to give us a chance to Now, taking those mistakes that we’ve learned from. I think we’ve got a list of things that we want to do. But what’s the one piece of advice that each of you would give to HR leaders looking to purchase, buy it, pull in new HR tech. What’s one piece of advice you would give to HR leaders? We’ll start with Jacob.
Jacob Bradburn 53:29
Oh, goodness no, sorry, put on the spot. It is close to the can. I don’t think that’s not known by any of you listening in today. I just feel that the opportunity for HR organizations to truly in this moment where we have never had access to as much data and insights related to our talent, our people, and all of the things that come along with all of the great technology enhancements and advancements that we’ve seen over the last decade, plus really being at the hip with them as strategic thought partners of how they can leverage that to drive better business outcomes and create a better employee experience for their people, is the work for us of the future, and really ensuring that we have a seat at the table as it relates to strategic decision making and some of the areas that you know historically, HR has not been as strong in as it relates to mature workforce planning practices and some of those things. I think that way we can really differentiate in the market and in the organizations with with business leaders.
Beatriz Rodriguez 54:46
Great for me. What I would say an advice for HR leaders that are looking to kind of get employees bought into new HR tech. I would actually, I would actually say, don’t underestimate the onboarding side of it, because we tend to think about the experience of the user throughout the entire platform. But the very, very one experience that is critical to get right is the onboarding. This is true when you are hiding somebody the first week, two weeks, the first period when the gut feeling tells you, you know this is the right move or not, the onboarding into a new technology is absolutely critical as much as what is going to be the experience about it. And we typically don’t spend time in the onboarding side of it. We kind of like tick on the box somebody, and then we jump directly into how that talent is going to operate in the environment, in the in the platform. But we know that if the adoption in the onboarding side of it is not the right one, the employee will be less likely to actually come back to it, or the experience, or this doesn’t do anything for me, or these two tedious this, that experience on the first moment of onboarding is key. So spend a lot of time with your teams around the onboarding experience and make sure that that is absolutely perfect, so that at the end of the day it would be as well success of how that the likelihood of that person to come back to the platform and the technology. That’s my my advice.
Rebecca Warren 56:24
Yeah, I think everything that you all have shared during our time together has been super valuable. I know I can go back and watch the recording, but I’ve been scribbling notes like the whole entire time. Yes, that’s great, awesome. So lots of learnings from this. Thank you both so much for your time. Thanks for fighting through all of the challenges that might have.
