Transforming Workplace Culture with Gianna Driver, CPO at Lattice

What does it really take to build a thriving workplace culture? In this episode, Kristen and Mike sit down with Gianna Driver, the new Chief People Officer at Lattice, to explore the human side of leadership. From her unconventional path into HR to her insights on transforming company cultures, Gianna shares candid stories and practical wisdom that will challenge how you think about work. She includes a team meeting tactic that transforms how people view mistakes and gives practical tips for having tough conversations with senior leaders. No matter where you are in your career, this down-to-earth discussion will give you new ideas for bringing more heart and humanity to your leadership style.

Main Topics:

• Gianna's unique background and its influence on her leadership philosophy
• The importance of observing potential hires' behavior outside formal interviews
• The dynamic nature of company culture and how to actively shape it
• The crucial role of promotion decisions in maintaining organizational culture
• Strategies for approaching and improving a company with known culture issues
• The value of diverse perspectives in understanding company culture
• Balancing vulnerability and strength in leadership
• Celebrating mistakes as a tool for fostering innovation and learning
• Effective approaches to giving feedback to executives
• Gianna's advice for leaders aiming to make a significant impact in their organizations

About Gianna:

Gianna Driver is the new Chief People Offer at Lattice, a leading AI-powered people platform, where she is taking a people-first approach to ensure Lattice continues to grow and scale thoughtfully with a world-class HR function at the center. She is also responsible for driving product innovation forward, elevating Lattice’s AI-powered platform to meet customer needs and empower HR teams to be more strategic and impactful. Prior to joining Lattice, Gianna was CHRO at Exabeam, a global cybersecurity leader, where she led the global human resources function. Gianna has been in the HR and tech industry for nearly two decades and is passionate about the intersectionality of people, productivity, and business results. She’s a recognized HR industry speaker and is frequently quoted in the media in publications including Forbes, US News and World Report, Insider, and The Wall Street Journal.

Follow her on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gianna-driver-6183391/

Other Links & Resources Mentioned:

• Gianna’s new company Lattice
• Adam Grant (known for his work on leadership and organizational psychology)

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Mike: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-s-364970111/

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Transcript

[00:00:00] Welcome

[00:00:06] to Love and Leadership, the podcast that helps you lead with both your head and your heart, plus a bit of humor. I'm Kristen Brunsch Sharkey, a leadership coach and facilitator. And I'm Mike Sharkey, a senior living and hospitality executive. We're a couple of leadership nerds who also happen to be a couple.

[00:00:23] Join us each week as we share our unfiltered opinions, break down influential books and interview inspiring guests. Whether you're a seasoned executive. For a rising star, we're here to help you level up your leadership game and amplify your impact.

[00:00:46] Kristen: Hello, and welcome back to Love and Leadership. I'm Kristen,

[00:00:50] Mike: and I'm Mike.

[00:00:51] Kristen: and we are so excited today to air our first guest interview episode, which is with Gianna Driver, who is actually, as of the week we're launching this, she's the brand new Chief People Officer at Lattice. And I've known her professionally for a while now.

[00:01:10] I'm a big fan of her leadership style and the way that she integrates her values into what she talks about. So I thought she would be a great guest and she did not disappoint.

[00:01:22] Mike: Gianna was awesome. I can absolutely see why she's the Chief People Officer.she just had a very, like balanced, human focused, results driven approach.

[00:01:34] I mean, she's like a genius of people. You can see that.

[00:01:39] Kristen: Absolutely. And we get into so many interesting topics. We talk about her childhood and how that influences her perspective on leadership. We talk a lot about culture, like how do you actually build and transform culture? And she has some awesome tips, in there as well, one of which Mike immediately took back to his 

[00:02:04] Mike: stole, shamelessly appropriated.

[00:02:10] Kristen: Yes.

[00:02:11] Mike: Yeah, Gianna was, Incredibly authentic. I know that term gets thrown around, but not having the background with her that you do, I just really listen to her and she's just so genuine.

[00:02:23] Yeah.

[00:02:24] Kristen: I agree. All right. Let's start the interview. Enjoy. 

[00:02:28] We are so excited to have Gianna Driver with us on our guest interview today. And Gianna has a really interesting, storied career. She has nearly two decades of experience in HR and tech. And at the time that we're recording this, she's the outgoing Chief Human Resources Officer of Exabeam, which is a global cybersecurity company.

[00:02:59] She's been managing the strategy and processes related to building, investing in, and retaining talent. But when this episode airs, she will actually be the brand new Chief People Officer at Lattice, which is a fantastic top HR software company. So we're very excited for you, Gianna. 

[00:03:16] Mike: The crowd goes wild. 

[00:03:20] Kristen: And 

[00:03:20] I also have to note that you were recently named a 2024 CHRO of the Year by HRO Today Magazine as well, which is an amazing honor. So congratulations.

[00:03:32] Gianna: Thank you. And truly a testament to the team. 

[00:03:34] Kristen: we're really excited to have you here with us and have the listeners hear a little bit more about your background and your philosophy towards leadership and as well as we'll get into culture and a couple other things like that. But talking about your background in a little more detail first, because I think it's always really helpful for people to hear what your path has been to, to being in the C suite.

[00:04:01] I found it really interesting when I was doing research on this episode, learning a little bit about your, some of your early childhood and your mother's background and, some of the influences that has had on you and your approach to leadership. Could you share a little bit more about that?

[00:04:19] I think it would be really interesting for our listeners to hear. 

[00:04:22] Gianna: Yeah, certainly. First of all, thank you so much for having me. And I just, I'm super excited to be a part of this. so about my mother, we'll start there. she's from the Philippines, so I'm proudly Filipino American. And my mother immigrated as a mail order bride from the streets of manila. 

[00:04:41] So when you think about,truly the American dream and wanting to have better opportunity, not so much for herself, but she wanted to have that for any future children she would have. So she marketed herself and really the only marketable thing that she knew of at the time was herself. And so she signed up for a service and, met my dad through that process and immigrated to a small town in East Texas. 

[00:05:09] And that's where I grew up. 

[00:05:10] Kristen: Yeah, I think it's really powerful to know that, that background. How does that kind of influence your leadership values today? 

[00:05:19] Gianna: Yeah, it's one of those things where I'm not consciously thinking about this on a daily basis, but when I take a few moments to pause, step back, and reflect, that's when I realize the impact of my upbringing and my mother's, and then also my story. So I guess to elaborate a little bit more on the historical piece, and then to answer your question, when my mother came over, it was a short marriage to my father.

[00:05:47] I was the product of that marriage, and, when I was an infant, my mother and father separated and divorced. And I spent time going between both of my homes, so my dad,he's now passed, but he was a very traditional farmer, cattle rancher in East texas, beef cattle. And I spent part of my time with him.

[00:06:10] And then my mother is a janitor. And that was my experience with my mother. So I grew up with these very drastically different ideologies, cultures, influences, both very poor, I should add, and both very underprivileged, might be a word that we would use in today's vernacular. And I carry with me those roots.

[00:06:35] And in what I do today, I think ways that this manifests itself and shows up is when I approach groups of people, one on one, small teams, large teams, I don't think that I or anyone is better than anyone else. I've been on the other side of the tracks and I try to approach things from the standpoint of humility and equality and equity. So we're all in this together. 

[00:06:58] We each have something to learn. We each have a very valid and wanted perspective and viewpoint. And so having that sense of true equality, I think is something that I look back on and believe has its roots in my childhood. 

[00:07:16] I often saw my mother treated a certain way by folks because she was a janitor in a hospital growing up. And one of the things that I'm known to do, so if anyone is interviewing, you should listen carefully. I sometimes will take candidates out for lunch or dinner or drinks, and part of that is to get them out of an office type of environment, and see how they interact and engage with the world. But part of that also is I want to know how do they treat people for whom they have no vested interest.

[00:07:48] So how do they treat people like my mom? 

[00:07:51] Are they disrespectful? Do they order them around or are they kind? Are they, do they listen? Are they compassionate? Do they give them the benefit of the doubt? If an order is messed up or, the seating is in the wrong plate or whatever it might be. 

[00:08:04] These are ways that my upbringing and childhood, I think really impact what I do today.

[00:08:10] Mike: you said cattle rancher and janitor, both of those are very hard working physical jobs. 

[00:08:16] When I was in restaurants, we would have people that went to culinary school, and they would come with a certain level of expectation of their own position, of the way people would treat them, of the lifestyle that they were going to lead, and they put pine nuts on everything and instead, actually, what we needed for them was to go wash three hours worth of dishes, and most people did not want to do that as opposed to people who had to come up through hard working positions, physical positions, like a janitor, cleaning a restaurant, starting off in kitchens as dishwashers and working your way up. The product of what you got at the end in terms of the person, the way they worked, the way they interacted was very different than someone who had not had to go through that.

[00:08:57] Do you feel like, did you work on the ranch at all? 

[00:09:00] Gianna: first of all, Mike, I, a lot of what you said does resonate. I think that hardship builds resiliency. Hardship is one of those things when you're going through it is really hard, and you probably don't want to be there, but on the other side of it, you realize, wow, made it through that. What are the things that I learned?

[00:09:16] And those are the experiences that can be really formative and really resiliency building to answer your question about whether or not I did work on the farm. 

[00:09:26] So I did. I didn't, lasso cows and like that, but, It was more fixing fences or a lot of times when a cow would go away to give birth.

[00:09:37] I very much remember us scouting in the middle of the night trying to find the, 

[00:09:42] the cow and helping sometimes if that was needed with the birthing process. And 

[00:09:47] this was a working beef cattle ranch.

[00:09:49] Mike: Yeah. I think there's a humility to that, that you can't replicate, 

[00:09:53] Gianna: Absolutely.

[00:09:54] Kristen: That's really interesting to hear, and I love the example you gave of how when you are interviewing somebody now, observing, like, how are they treating people that they are not seeking something from? Who have no skin in the game that is what you can really tell a lot about somebody's character. 

[00:10:15] Gianna: Who are they 

[00:10:16] when no one is looking? 

[00:10:18] I think is very important to think about. And this translates into many real world experiences. Another example that comes to mind is if I am with a person and we're casually walking through the park, Down a hallway or something in the office and there's a piece of litter or trash on the floor and they step over it as opposed to stopping picking up 

[00:10:41] the gum wrapper or whatever it is and putting it in a receptacle.

[00:10:45] That's information. And I'm not drawing an absolute hard line and saying, this is absolutely wrong and this is absolutely right. I mean, context is everything and there could be reasons for stopping to pick up a piece of litter versus not, but it is information. And, I, I do respect when people will go out of their way to do random small things that make someone else's life and experience better. 

[00:11:10] Mike: When you said that, I kind of, I'm reminded of the way people treat those below and those above them in the chain of command differently. And, you know, sometimes when I'm the boss now, everybody's like very nice to me, and I think, oh, those people are very nice, and then someone else will go, No, they're really not.Polite to the servers or to the care. And I was like, Oh, okay. So maybe through that, you're seeing like, yeah, they're going to be very polite and friendly and show you a certain face because you have something to give them or take away from them. But the people that are below them in the order there, there's something to that. If they're rude to a waiter, they're probably going to be rude to their team. 

[00:11:49] Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:11:50] Gianna: And in a similar fashion, getting the input and perspective of the receptionist, the office manager, the recruiting coordinator, all of these folks prior to making a hiring decision is really important because that, again, is information and it gives you data around how someone treats folks for whom they have no vested interest.

[00:12:12] Kristen: Yeah, that is very powerful. Yeah, going a little bit more into your career too. I think one thing that, that both Mike and I were interested in is you. So I know you had started a fair trade e commerce company coming out of college, which is amazing. And I know it speaks really deeply to the values with your mother's background and all of that.

[00:12:35] Which is so cool. And then you ended up moving into a HR role for an e commerce company, and it seems like you made it up to a VP executive role, like pretty early in your career. I'd love to hear kind of more about like what was that, that path and what did you learn from it? 

[00:12:55] Gianna: Yeah. Well, I have a bit of a non traditional path into HR, although it begs the question of what is a traditional path in HR, right? So I think that's a whole other TED talk and conversation. 

[00:13:10] But my experience was, you're right, having my own small business. And in that process, I got a lot of data around the stuff I'm good at.

[00:13:20] And I love doing the things that give me energy and goodness, the things that I'm really not good at and the things that I need to rely on folks who have joy doing those things. So that was a very personal experience that was important because I think knowing yourself is critical to, to career success.

[00:13:44] So you're, you're right. I ended up joining a startup e commerce company. 

[00:13:50] And when you're a company of three, four or five people big, you're not the HR person. You are one of a small group of operators. And it was only as we started to grow and expand that I realized that I naturally gravitated toward these things that are called human resources or people operations.

[00:14:12] So whether it was the hiring of folks or the mentorship, the performance management, the, all of those types of things are activities and areas that naturally felt right to me and they gave me energy. And I also was getting a lot of positive feedback around that. So I think that being at the right place at the right time with the right opportunities made for a really wonderful experience that you're right, did culminate over the course of roughly 5, 6, 7 years into being a VP of HR VP of people. 

[00:14:52] Kristen: And that was when I realized this thing that folks call HR. really is my jam. this is the stuff that is this beautiful space, in my opinion, because you're mixing the emotional, human, sometimes messy stuff with the business, ROI, profit, bottom line driven stuff. And that intersection to me is really exciting. as you're reflecting on your path and your various leadership roles you've had throughout the way. Like what is one moment in your career that you really feel has helped shaped who you are as a leader today? 

[00:15:32] Gianna: I could go multiple different directions with that question. And goodness, 

[00:15:40] I'm just going to speak 

[00:15:41] from my heart and try not to overthink this. 

[00:15:46] For me, the experience of trying to become a parent and being unsuccessful in that multiple times, and then eventually becoming a parent has really shaped who I am, and it's shaped a lot of my professional trajectory and the way that I view people and work and my relationship with work and my life outside of work.

[00:16:09] So I know that's quote unquote personal, but I do believe in the interweaving of life with work. I don't believe in these very siloed, separate parts of our lives. I think that we are able to hold both and. And so for me, to answer your question succinctly, it would be the process of becoming a mother and then eventually being a mom. 

[00:16:34] Kristen: That's amazing. And I think that feeds so much into authentic leadership, right? 

[00:16:38] Which is 

[00:16:39] Gianna: yes. 

[00:16:40] Kristen: such an important trend and something that people are expecting more and more of their leadership. 

[00:16:45] Gianna: Exactly. I like to think and say we are humans first and employees second. And so we need to honor the full human and create workspaces where real, full, authentic, expressed people can thrive. Because I think when we do 

[00:17:01] that's what leads to good business. 

[00:17:04] That's what leads to great business.

[00:17:06] Mike: So that's interesting that you,

[00:17:09] when you think of HR, I think a little bit of the traditional view, probably especially outside tech of HR is a little bit like a counselor is what most people will think. You're like, I have a problem. I go to HR. That's not exactly right. What HR does in the functionality of the company.

[00:17:26] And 

[00:17:26] , 

[00:17:26] Mike: I see there's a real trend, exactly what you're talking about. People want work life balance, they want meaning in their work. It used to be you got a job, you went to the job, you paid bills, and then that was your life. And now people want to feel appreciated, and engaged, and challenged. And what you were talking about resonated.

[00:17:46] Where you found the stuff that you were good at not just good at but gave you what you said specifically that gave me energy and that's so important right in growing your own career I'm curious the trends you've seen In what employees are looking for and how companies adapt to that but then also. 

[00:18:05] Ultimately, most of these companies exist, really all of them exist, to make money either for themselves or for their parent company or a stock, their, how do you balance all of those things in your hiring and how you structure your, I know we're going to get into culture very deeply, but this is such an important part of what people are looking for now. 

[00:18:26] Gianna: Yeah, absolutely. So I guess a starting place for answering your question would be to state an assumption and core belief that I have, and that is I fundamentally believe that humans and people are good and want to be successful in whatever they do. 

[00:18:45] And I think that important, that starting place is a really important differentiator because if you start from there, you assume good intent, and that's a very critical place from which to start. 

[00:18:58] After that, as we think about career trajectories, as we think about career paths in different organizations, sometimes, oftentimes, people love what they do when they're successful and they work at a company that can really create an ecosystem and environment that rewards that and recognizes that. 

[00:19:15] That said, there are also times and places where folks struggle and either they're not meeting their goal, they're not delivering. And then we start to see various different negative, I call it below the line behaviors that start to happen. Right. I mean, it recently, not too long ago, it was called quiet quitting, but there are other ways that, these behaviors can manifest themselves in ways that are not opportune and not good.

[00:19:42] i think in those instances, it's important for companies to help people find what it is that gives them energy, bringing this back to finding your joy at work. And ideally companies are able to be matchmaker in some sense, right? You're fulfilling a business need and also speaking to whatever someone enjoys doing. However, there are times where that alignment might not be there. Certain people thrive in organizations at certain sizes, but then start to not really blossom when organizations are 

[00:20:17] Either significantly larger, significantly smaller, et cetera. And so I think creating spaces where we are really honest with people, we're kind with people, and we allow them to either find a role that enables them to self express and to be joyful at work, Or we also make it safe for them to leave. And I think there's, I think a lot of times organizations start to shy away from some of these harder conversations. I believe these hard conversations are mission critical to building incredible work cultures.

[00:20:53] Mike: I was going to ask you later about giving feedback. 

[00:20:58] So

[00:20:58] Gianna: You can probably guess what I would say.

[00:20:59] Mike: That seems pretty in there, but 

[00:21:01] those are amazing answers. It's interesting, like you reach a certain for a long time, you at least the background that I had, I just had a job, I had a job that I was trying to just survive, pay the bills.

[00:21:13] there was a time I was making 10 an hour as a cook in New York City. It wasn't about what's my joy. It's can I pay the rent? but at some point, if you stick with it long enough, you start to have to be responsible for your own career. And to be honest, I never really thought about, 

[00:21:29] I know people will blossom and fit in different roles, but it hadn't occurred to me that like the size of the company is actually really pertinent to somebody's success.

[00:21:38] And it sounds like you have that really dialed in 

[00:21:41] Gianna: Well,it's the size of the company. It's the culture around. It could be the industry. it can be a number of different things. And this is where I go back to, there's not an absolute right or wrong. It's like there, there's thankfully there are many different types of companies and there are many different types of people. And when someone is not thriving at their job, then I think we, as leaders and companies would ideally help find the right fit for that person. Or, if that's not possible in our organization, help them fly and find something that is the right fit for them. 

[00:22:17] Mike: see why you're the chief people officer. 

[00:22:22] Gianna: thank you.

[00:22:23] Mike: I have a, I have another question about being a chief people officer, in my company, the recently hired chief people officer has a juris doctorate. have you seen that trend in HR and do you feel like somebody that wants to grow in HR? Do you need a law degree to sit in the C suite in HR nowadays?

[00:22:42] Is that, do you have a law degree or?

[00:22:45] You don't, right? 

[00:22:46] Gianna: don't. No.

[00:22:47] Mike: doesn't seem affect you.

[00:22:50] Gianna: I think that for folks who may want to have a law degree, a, a PhD, whatever it is, There's nothing wrong with that by all means, but I don't think that it's a right of passage and prerequisite for being an effective enterprise level leader of people can be very helpful, but it's not mandatory to have. 

[00:23:13] Kristen: I think some of that gets into culture nicely, which is a big topic, but you have a lot of experience with coming into companies and building and transforming cultures and being accountable for that as the head of people, what are like some of the critical factors for success that you've seen when you're looking to create or transform a culture. 

[00:23:40] Gianna: Yeah, I think it's important to note that culture is not a static thing. It's something that is present, whether you acknowledge it or not. Culture is present and it evolves, it morphs, it lives and breathes and transforms as the various people that comprise an organization also shift and transform and go in and out of an organization, move upward and laterally throughout the company.

[00:24:08] And that's okay. I think those are, that's part of the beauty of. of culture. I think having clarity around this is the culture we have. So naming it, naming and describing your culture is very important. And then also having focus groups and circles where you can say, here's the culture we aspire to have and be. And hopefully those things are relatively congruent. There could be instances though, where maybe you got three out of five or four out of five, but might need to work on some of these other things. So I'd say being very clear, first and foremost about the culture you have and then the culture you want to be is really helpful and in ultimately achieving that type of culture.

[00:24:54] And then once you have that framework, then there are other things I think we can add on. So for example, coming up with a,a matrix, a chart, a list, but basically being very clear about the behaviors and attributesthat we want and that are important. And then also the ones that are not who we are and who we want to become.

[00:25:15] And then it's incumbent upon leaders. To ultimately bear accountability for that. and that might mean if someone is not embodying the culture and the values that we have, having again, kind, respectful, direct conversations about that, giving them an opportunity to succeed. But then if that's not ultimately, what happens then might not be the right fit anymore.

[00:25:39] And similarly, it might be like, like that person may not realize that they come across this way or that certain behaviors are perceived certain ways. So I think this is something where communication, authentic communication is really important.

[00:25:53] Kristen: Yeah, I absolutely love that because I think there are so many important things in there that are often misunderstood about how you actually affect culture. There are so many companies who basically you have the leadership team sits in a room and they're like, these are our values and here's what our culture is.

[00:26:12] Here's what we want our culture to be. And then they like presented it in all hands. And then it's okay. Cool. This is what, this is our culture. And then that's as far as it goes and relating it back to both the, what are the actual behaviors that this translates to, and then looking very carefully at leaders, especially, and how well they are embodying those values and that, that culture you've defined is so important and it's hard, but it's so important. 

[00:26:41] Gianna: I think also looking in the mirror and saying, who are we promoting? 

[00:26:47] Right. It's not just the senior level leaders that matter. When you think about culture, every person at the organization impacts culture in some way. And so if someone is performing the work attributes and delivering on whether it's a sales number or target, an engineering product release milestone, like whatever it is, if someone is doing the functional aspects of their job.

[00:27:10] So the what is there, but the how is not there. Right. But I think there needs to be a serious 

[00:27:15] conversation about that person's promotability or not. Because what you promote speaks volumes as to what you value and ultimately the culture you're creating.

[00:27:25] Mike: That word really resonated. When you said it, behaviors, when we talk culture, I think people don't know what culture is, to be honest. I think they just, it's a, it's a buzzword. 

[00:27:39] And when you talk about really sitting down and defining what are the attributes and what are the behaviors of culture, that's,that's a deeper level. That's going to get you, a better result. 

[00:27:54] What is the behavior the attitudes, the, we just did a book review on Boundaries for Leaders, which is one of my favorite books. But like when you break it down, he talks about you get what you create and what you allow, and you have to consciously like create the culture and create the culture to drive to an objective, right? To, to whatever that objective is. And you reverse engineer it.

[00:28:22] Gianna: yeah. And naming culture is really important. We have to be able to name it and articulate it and talk about it because otherwise it's something that will be created unconsciously. And I think that's where we start to have things that are suboptimal when we're not truly being intentional about creating culture.

[00:28:40] Kristen: Absolutely. Yeah, going into Boundaries for Leaders, what he says about race for leaders, about culture is what you create and what you allow the talking about, like who you promote that you talked about is so important too, because it's, what are you rewarding? what are you tolerating? Yeah. 

[00:28:58] That, that means so much beyond just what the words you're putting on the screen. 

[00:29:03] Gianna: Exactly. 

[00:29:04] Mike: That, goes back. Everybody wants to feel valued, appreciated. They want an inclusive culture. they, you have to somehow achieve results while still having those attributes. And if you don't have them, yeah.

[00:29:18] Gianna: Yeah. A hundred percent agree. 

[00:29:21] Kristen: What kind of advice would you give to somebody who's coming into an organization that's known for not having great culture, having like retention issues,what are like, what are some of the things that you would recommend as a starting point to ultimately transform the culture? 

[00:29:42] Gianna: The first thing I'd ask is why are you joining that company? 

[00:29:46] Kristen: That's a fair question. 

[00:29:49] Gianna: If you're joining a company that you know has a reputation for high attrition and turnover and a poor culture, then perhaps think twice about joining that company would be my starting place. 

[00:30:03] But I think that the, spirit of your question to, to go there for a second is, I would, I'd be really intentional about talking to folks about culture. One of the things in an interview processes that I personally like to do is ask different people who are interviewers to describe and talk about the culture and if I get drastically different answers, then that's a sign. There's not a cohesive culture. I also think now to answer your question more succinctly, I think this was Mother teresa could have been someone else.

[00:30:38] But, she said it's could have been Dr Martin Luther King Jr to what one of those a very smart person from his from history said be the change you wish to see in the world. 

[00:30:48] And I think that's true. So if you are in a work environment, that's not ideal for whatever reason, first and foremost, make sure that you are exemplifying the culture and values that you believe in. 

[00:31:01] Number two, I think take accountability, try to work with the people on your team with leaders, folks throughout the organization to start doing something about the culture and helping to make it. better. 

[00:31:15] So depending on whatever the problem is to, localize, okay, maybe it's that we don't have hard conversations. Maybe it's that no one takes accountability. Maybe it's a culture where people are not communicating up and down and across the organization. It could be any number of different things. But 

[00:31:31] I think being clear about, Okay, these are the things that I'm not super excited about with this culture.

[00:31:37] Let me start doing something about that. A lot of times folks want to stand by the sidelines and be that, what is it called? An armchair quarterback where they can dictate to everybody how things should be. No, no, no. If you want to dictate, then get in the ring with everybody else and start doing something. Pick up a shovel and start digging with the rest of us to try to figure out how to make it better. 

[00:31:58] Kristen: You gave another good interview tip in there as well too with the, when you're evaluating the culture of a place you're joining, ask people to describe the culture and if they have different answers, even if they're positive, if everybody has different answers, that's a good flag that there may not be a consistent culture there.

[00:32:21] Gianna: I mean, I'd be that cohesion and clarity. 

[00:32:24] Kristen: For sure. 

[00:32:25] Gianna: How do you recommend dealing with resistance when it comes to actually, like, putting some of that, that change in place and in, and making those changes in the culture. I believe that change often happens person by person slowly over time when it's truly sustainable. And so when I witness or observe interactions, debates, whatever it might be that I don't think are truly emblematic of the culture we want to be, I don't believe in publicly calling someone out and criticizing and chastise like that's just that's not good. But I do believe in pulling you know that person or individual aside in a private one on one setting and in a non accusatory way saying and asking questions about whatever it was that felt like it was wrong or not part of the culture 

[00:33:24] that we want to be. And I think through these single touch points, these one on ones, I think you can really start to have macro level change.

[00:33:35] when we think about culture shifting and culture transformation and change, it begins person by person and so gently calling out one on one privately, the behaviors that are not culturally aligned, I think is important.

[00:33:50] And similarly, celebrating publicly and praising the behaviors and cultural values that we want is also important. So I think both of those working in parallel help to start to really transform a culture.

[00:34:05] Kristen: Yeah, and I really like that you started with the pulling people aside, like it happening one person at a time, pulling them aside and asking questions in a non accusatory way. I think that's also so important is starting with listening and curiosity instead of an interrogation. 

[00:34:23] Gianna: Exactly. Approaching from a place of inquiry and seeking to understand before drawing assumptions, because I've personally used this approach and sometimes it could be. The person just had a speeding ticket coming into the office that morning. So they were starting on, you know, a five out of 10 in terms of just they're feeling poised and like they were ready for whatever the meeting was.

[00:34:47] And so, you know, in this specific instance I'm thinking of. He apologized profusely and was like, Oh my gosh, Gianna, I didn't realize that I was coming across as belittling and demeaning and et cetera, et cetera. And I realized, like, I was holding all this frustration because I got a ticket for going four miles over the speed limit. so the point is there's context that I think is really important. And when we approach from a place of inquiry, we're able to fill in the blanks and have a more holistic picture. And it helps us also have empathy for the other person.

[00:35:16] Kristen: Yeah. It ties back into people are humans first, employees second. 

[00:35:21] Mike: That's a nice aspect of a culture where if you go to work and you're not having a great day, they don't, scream at you. They pull you aside and go, Hey, is everything okay? what's, are you all right? You know, that's, that's human first, right?

[00:35:35] Human.

[00:35:36] Gianna: exactly. Yeah, because we each carry so much underneath the 

[00:35:41] surface. Like we, we present a certain way, but underneath we're humans and we've got struggles. We've got ups and downs. 

[00:35:50] We've got families, friends, personal situations that are ever evolving and changing. So we absolutely should seek first to understand and approach these situations from a place of humility and kindness.

[00:36:02] Kindness does so much So much for culture.

[00:36:06] Mike: Do you find the farther up you go in the chain of command, the less likely people are willing to admit that something's wrong or something in their personal life? Like I could ask, a cook like, Hey, are you okay? And he'd be like, I got a speeding ticket. if my vice president asks me, is everything okay at home?

[00:36:23] I don't know that I'm that likely to be like, Oh, I just had a fight with my wife. She's mad at me. She kicked me out. I'm like, You know, there's a vulnerable, like vulnerability at work now. That's, it's not on our thing, but, that's a thing now where it's okay to be vulnerable at work. All of a sudden, I haven't got that, memo.

[00:36:42] And I think a lot of older people haven't, they keep their struggles close to their, close to the vest.

[00:36:48] Gianna: I do think it's a balancing act. Right because. we, throw around these words like transparency and vulnerability and these types of things. And sometimes there's a tendency for people to take that to mean, let me just be a hundred percent communicative and overshare, et cetera, et cetera. And that is not what vulnerability is right.

[00:37:12] So we do need to think about the context in the situation. And I think there's a balancing act. 

[00:37:16] So if we just take your example, Mike, that would never happen, by the way. But to take your example, 

[00:37:21] Kristen would never do that. 

[00:37:24] If we, if we roll with that for a second, a way to approach that, 

[00:37:31] But when, one way that you could approach that, if let's say you showed up as not your best self in a meeting, instead of laying all the dirty laundry on the table about everything going on at home, you might be able to say, Yeah, I've had some really difficult conversations on the family front right now.

[00:37:49] So I realize I'm not at my best. So apologies. So that might be a way to share, but to not necessarily overshare and go to places that are not appropriate.

[00:38:00] Mike: it. That's helpful advice. Actually. I think all of us in, leadership roles, we want to, We have to project a certain leadership presence. We have to seem like we're calm and in control, but at the same time, it's a lot of pressure running a business and, having a family at the same time.

[00:38:19] And that's a lot to juggle. And, I've also, heard and read that, people don't follow people who seem too perfect or they don't have struggles or everything's very, you know, too polished that, and that's been a struggle for me because I, she says I'm recovering, she's also, we're recovering perfectionists.

[00:38:36] so to show anybody weakness or at all is, is, it takes conscious effort. so that's pretty helpful 

[00:38:44] Gianna: Adam Grant talks. And I think that's a lot about this, the Wharton professor who has great books and podcasts and that kind of stuff. And one of the things he talks about is when leaders are able to also exemplify what it looks like to be imperfect and flawed and human, that then creates an environment and culture where other people also feel that it's safe to make mistakes or to be slightly flawed, right?

[00:39:14] Because the reality is. We're all flawed in some way. Nobody is perfect, even though there are those who might try to project that they aren't perfect or only want to portray the successes and the high moments. I think what a lot of folks don't always understand is those social media posts that are triumphant and, picture perfect, et cetera, et cetera.

[00:39:38] Those are snapshots moments in time. They don't actually capture the hours and weeks and months and years of mistake making and toiling and learning and picking yourself back up in the hard days in the hard times. 

[00:39:53] Those things are part of success, but we don't often talk about those because those are not pretty.

[00:39:59] Those are not something in our society that we feel always safe to talk about. But I do think it's important to at least acknowledge that is part of success. 

[00:40:09] Mike: We don't celebrate failure as a culture in general. 

[00:40:14] Kristen: No. Yeah. I talk a lot about that in, in my work when I first took an improv class and we literally celebrated mistakes. Every time somebody would make a mistake, you celebrate it. It was so jarring because it's just not. 

[00:40:28] Mike: I'm a little uncomfortable just hearing that.

[00:40:30] Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:40:32] Kristen: Yeah. 

[00:40:33] Gianna: One of the things we've done on different teams at various different companies is 

[00:40:38] having a question that we start team meetings with. And sometimes that question is, what's a really great mistake you've made lately and when you open with that and you can talk about that and usually a follow on question is, okay, would you learn because mistake making is one thing and that's okay, but we have to make sure that we're also learning and not repeating mistakes.

[00:41:02] And I like to tell my teams mistakes are okay to make. Let's learn from them. Make your mistakes quickly and please try to make them cheap if you can. 

[00:41:10] Mike: I'm totally stealing that question. That's an amazing question. That's an 

[00:41:15] Gianna: Yeah. 

[00:41:15] Mike: Yeah. That's so good. Yeah. 

[00:41:17] Stealing. I will give you credit though. 

[00:41:20] I want to say I learned this from Gianna. 

[00:41:23] Kristen: No, that is powerful. Cause yeah, you're, you're building that into again, culture. Like how do you create a culture where failure is not paralyzing people?

[00:41:32] Because if you want people to be creative and innovate, they can't do that if they're too afraid to admit they've made a mistake. So I love these practices that you can actually build into your meetings are so useful. Do you have any other questions? Oh,so many. I know, we could, yeah, we could go for forever. 

[00:41:52] Mike: We could go for forever. yeah, maybe, so, let's talk more about this, way of having a direct conversation and giving feedback. You touched on it with okay, we're human first, we're addressing behavior, not the person necessarily.

[00:42:05] How do you approach that, especially when you're dealing with,maybe higher level executives, who sometimes maybe they've been in their positions for a long time, but like you said, maybe they were the right person at one point, but they're not anymore. what's your, overarching philosophy on giving feedback. 

[00:42:23] Gianna: Yeah, it's useful to point out the behaviors and not criticize the person, because if we go back to that starting place of people being fundamentally good and well intentioned, then sometimes they may make poor decisions or there could be bad behaviors. They might show up in a meeting that is, behavior that is below the line.

[00:42:49] And I think gently pointing that out and then talking about. Why that was inappropriate, offensive, not ideal is important, and then talking about what are things that I might be able to do that could help to create an environment where these types of actions and behaviors don't happen again. 

[00:43:12] So these are ways that you could start to engage in that conversation where similarly, sometimes I've had this with folks on my team, a conversation of I noticed in this particular meeting when so and so said this, you responded with, X, Y and Z.

[00:43:29] That felt a little odd for me. It almost felt as if it was triggering. Can we talk about that? What was your, what were you experiencing during that time? But approaching it from that type of a place, I've found typically opens a person up to receiving feedback. And it also helps to get everyone on the same page so that we're a team and we have a shared goal of creating this type of a culture, of achieving whatever this milestone is, and what can I do to help?

[00:44:01] Is there anything that I'm consciously, unconsciously, inadvertently doing that's creating an environment that is triggering for you, or an environment where you feel like that's, that's, how you want to respond. So approaching it from that place to have let me also see if I can be in the action driver seat with the person is helpful.

[00:44:24] Mike: That's nice. That's like a humble way of saying, am I doing something? Have I created a culture? Am I doing something in my leadership that is, triggering you in this way? Generally, that seems like that will go over well. You, you do this for other people, right?

[00:44:39] So you have to self manage yourself. And in your position too, do you feel like your, your more solid, humble background has made you more personally introspective or personally in tune with how you're showing up at work that you're able to like self modulate your behavior or kind of find out when maybe this is not your best day, and adjust without having to have a visit to HR because you're HR, uh, 

[00:45:07] Gianna: Well, I would start by saying, Mike, I am highly flawed 

[00:45:11] Mike: Great. We all are. Yeah. Okay.

[00:45:18] Gianna: meter. I, I am constantly seeking feedback and starting the conversation by also mentioning areas that I have self observed then creates safety for the other person in the conversation to also give me their perspective in ways that I can also grow and improve because you're right.

[00:45:39] I have bad days. I mess up. I, sometimes I make really good mistakes. And, um, you're right though. If you don't have this personal group of advisors in your life to make sure that you're not in an echo chamber, listening to your own self, you, 

[00:46:01] you need to have that personal life advisor group. And also make sure that you're working in an environment where you're, direct reports, your teams, your colleagues are comfortable giving you feedback.

[00:46:14] , I don't think that I necessarily am more reflective because of my past and upbringing. 

[00:46:24] I think, and that's debatable, of course, but I think that it's through reflection that I have come to understand my past and to be at peace with it, and to truly accept it, and to accept the gifts that it has given me, because it was a really hard life and upbringing, growing up in a women's shelter, growing up impoverished on welfare and food stamps.

[00:46:47] I mean, These are things that were incredibly formative, but super crazy hard to live through. So it's a reflective process that helps me make sense of it all. 

[00:46:57] Kristen: Well, thank you. Thank you so much, Gianna. This has been. This has been incredible. I really appreciate your vulnerability and talking about all these aspects of life and how they, because they all feed into leadership because leaders are humans first and foremost.is there anything else that, that we didn't really get into that you would, that you want to say or any like parting words of advice for somebody who's, who's, It's really looking to, make an impact as a leader on their organization. 

[00:47:29] Gianna: Yeah, I would go back to thinking about culture for a moment and thinking about where am I working? What is our culture? And perhaps most importantly, how am I impacting that culture? 

[00:47:42] And is that who I want to be and how I want to show up and the type of leader and person that is, that feels really right for me, or do I want to make some tweaks and changes and know that there's not a bad answer in this, there's not an absolute right or wrong answer.

[00:47:59] This is a very personal type of process, and it starts by having an authentic conversation with ourself. To understand, okay, this is where I am and this is who I am and this is how I want to show up and how I want to be and what are different behaviors and stop mechanisms and things like that to ensure that I show up as my best self to the extent that I'm able every day.

[00:48:20] And yeah, you're going to make mistakes, you're going to have hard days and that's okay. The cool thing is the sun's going to rise tomorrow and you'll have another chance tomorrow.

[00:48:29] Kristen: Beautifully said. I think that, that is great advice for everyone, really, not even just leaders, Thank you so much again for being here. This has been amazing. I think our listeners are going to get a lot out of it. if you would like to follow Gianna and especially be part of the journey as she, she starts out her new role at Lattice, you can find her on LinkedIn under Gianna Driver.

[00:48:55] We'll have a link to her profile in the show notes as well. 

[00:48:59] And otherwise, Thank you again so much for being here. This is amazing.

[00:49:06] Gianna: Thank you both.

[00:49:07] Mike: Thank you so much, Gianna. 

[00:49:09] The Love and Leadership Podcast is produced and co-hosted by me, Kristen Brun Sharkey and Co-hosted by Mike Sharkey. Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcast. We can't stress enough just how much these reviews help. You can follow us on LinkedIn under Kristen Brun Sharkey and Michael Sharkey, and on Instagram at @loveleaderpod.

[00:49:32] You can also find more information on our website, loveandleadershippod.com. Thank you so much for listening, and we'll see you again next week.