54. Leading Inclusion

Intro: Duration: (00:54)

Opening music jingle & sound effects

Jeff Hunt:

I'm Jeff Hunt, and this is Human Capital by GoalSpan, where we uncover the deeply human aspect of work. One of the deeply human aspects of people is that they generally want to feel included. From the earliest age we all want to be accepted, have our voices heard and be respected. This is amplified at work, and when we build inclusive cultures, not only are they better environments to work in, but the evidence shows they also deliver higher financial rewards.

Today, my guest is an expert on the topic of inclusion at work. Gina Cox has a doctorate and industrial and organizational psychology. And is not only an author and a coach and a business counselor, but has just published a new book titled “Leading Inclusion Drive Change Your Employees Can See and Feel” Welcome, Gina.

Gena Cox:

Oh, it's great to be here with you, Jeff.

Topic 1. Who or what inspired you the most along the way? (00:56)

Jeff Hunt:

I'm super excited to have you on the show and to discuss your new book. But before we jump into that conversation, start by telling me briefly about your career journey and maybe share who or what inspired you most along the way.

Gena Cox:

Yeah, absolutely. So the most important thing to know about my career journey is that I'm a frustrated journalist.

If I really had had my way, you would see me in the Wall Street Journal or something, cuz print journalism is just the most exciting thing as far as I'm concerned. I've wanted to do it since I was very young. But my father had worked in the newspaper business in England and he said all newspaper journalists are alcoholics who smoke too much.

This was a stereotype from way back when, obviously, right? But he was serious and he said why don't you study something else and you can write about it. You can always write about it. So, I took his advice and studied psychology, as an undergrad, I met a woman from the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan, and she said industrial psychology.

And I said, what? And I fell in love with it. So, I studied a master's in IO and I studied a PhD in IO. But really I haven't told the line within the discipline like many others have. Because I'm a bit rebellious, I have so many different interests that I found that idea of sticking to one path, a little bit restrictive.

And so, over my career, what I have intentionally done was trying to build something that would give me the maximum flexibility, which is, I hear that word a lot, but I did that partially because of for my desire to explore, but also because I had gotten divorced I had a young child and I wanted to create a work environment that I could sustain something I really wanted to.

And so over the years I've had the privilege of being an employee of companies, on the inside, advising them and their leaders, and also being an advisor from the outside to global companies, helping them figure out how they could build better cultures, have leaders that are more impactful and that sort of thing.

So I always say to people who ask about this, there's really only one thing I know about a lot and that is humans at work. I know a lot about that, both from intentional observation and study and just sheer interest and curiosity in what humans do.

Jeff Hunt:

Well, it seems like your diversity of experiences coupled with your rebellious nature makes you a great fit for someone to advise executives and also to put together a book like you've done that we're gonna discuss today.

Gena Cox:

Oh, well thank you to that. I certainly think though that one of the things I wanted to do with this book is to write a book, Tony Morrison once said, if there's a story that you think needs to be told and it hasn't been written yet, then you need to write.

I'm paraphrasing, and I wasn't seeing a book that was really explaining some aspects of this issue in the way that I thought it needed to be explained. And so I wrote a non-traditional business book that I hope fills a void.

Topic 2. Inclusion in the workplace; how is everything working now? (03:45)

Jeff Hunt:

Well, I've read it and it definitely does. So I'm excited for our listeners to go check it out. I'd like to start our conversation about leading inclusion by getting the attention of anyone that really cares about corporate financial performance and profitability, cuz that's usually an attention getter. Financial health and organizations should matter to all of us because when they perform well financially, it benefits everyone.

And, and if you look at the evidence about inclusion at work, inclusive organizations have 2.3 times more cash flow per employee. These are some stats, Gina, that I just looked up before we began. They are 120% more likely to hit their financial goals. They're 1.7 times more innovative. If you look at the CEO community, 85% of CEOs with diverse and inclusive cultures recognize sustainable increasing profits.

I'm starting us with this because I guess my question for you, Gina, is why is it so difficult to get the C-suite to focus on this topic even though we have statistically compelling financial reasons?

Gena Cox:

So obviously there's not an easy answer to that, but what I have observed over many, many years is that this is a sort of a socially taboo topic.

It is a socially taboo topic, especially up until the spring of 2020. And so when I have talked to executives, they have said, I'm not sure this even belongs in my plate. Somebody else should be handled in this. Or they'll say, you know what? No matter what I do, if I do something I'm criticized if I do nothing, I'm criticized.

So maybe I gotta just sort of wait and see, let these social norms play out cuz I really don't think they belong to me anyway, and that's what my advisors tell me. And another thing they would say is, I'm not even sure that I understand what it is that the people who are meant to be the beneficiaries of this kind of work really want, and how I will know when I'm delivering on what they want.

So, I hear all of those things from leaders, but fundamentally I think the issue has been that we have framed this as either a business case issue or we've framed this as a moral imperative or something of that sort, neither of which are arguments. I don't argue with either of those points of view.

However, my framing is that this is really a leadership obligation. And so, if you are thinking about leading an enterprise, it doesn't seem to me to be a reasonable thing that you would say, I have this whole pie, but I only know about 75% of it, and the other 25% oh, it'll take care of itself I don't really have to understand.

And so from my perspective, we have not ever framed this conversation in the right way. And if I do, and I do talk to professors in business schools and people who write about this issue, for example, if you read a book called Leadership Reckoning which is one of my favorite books of 2020.

Tom Colts, what you will see is that when we train people to run organizations, we underemphasize the human experience in general. And we don't ever talk about this stuff in the curricula when we graduate people from some of the top schools in our country. That is starting to change.

By the way, I did just see that a couple of our Ivy League, MBA programs are adding a conversation about this. So, there's all of that meaning to say that there is no, there has never really been any social obligation or pressure to say that this should be focused on as a leadership imperative. We don't train leaders to talk about it.

There is an emotional barrier as well, because let's be completely honest about it, people might have personal social, political, religious, or who knows, whatever kinds of reasons why they think this is not an appropriate topic in the workplace. And if they do, I think that is going to cause them to either do nothing very little or to do whatever they do in a very sort of slow and under the radar way.

And then the last thing that I have observed about what is holding leaders back on this issue is that in some people prefer not to get their hands dirty with it. Not just that it's taboo, but they just prefer not to. And so we hire over and over people to lead diversity and inclusion functions regardless of what we call them.

We say, here, take care of this. We give them the hot potato, we say fix it, and then, oh, by the way, we don't give them the resources, a political cloud or the things they need to be influential. They stay for 18 months to two years, and then they leave. And then we just start all over again. I mean, there's so many and all of these issues, so many issues.

And most of them come down. What do you believe? Leader, CEO, C-Suite member, board director, personally.

Jeff Hunt:

So you're really setting the table for us. Well, because it seems like that's a fantastic question for every single C-suite executive and leader to be asking themselves. So that's my first reflection on what you just said.

My second reflection is that many of the actions that we're seeing are reactive. They are not proactive. So it's the path of least resistance, not to lean into these difficult topics and conversations, which by the way, the only way we're gonna overcome these challenges is by having these difficult conversations.

Gena Cox:

Right. That's right. And the reason we should lead into them I think is really for our children sake. Like, at the very least, I think about my own daughter, whenever I think about this, I don't want her to go through this whole, this stuff for another generation or another two, her children and what have you.

And so, yes, I do feel that there is this need for leaders to see the opportunity to be proactive, strategic to guide an organization around these issues. But I don't think anyone will ever do that unless they have a personal why, unless they truly believe that these issues matter.

Topic 3. The difference between REDI & DEI (09:35)

Jeff Hunt:

So core values really need to change and be in alignment with these inclusion areas that we're gonna talk about. Otherwise it becomes a check the box event based initiative, it's not sustainable, right? It's something that eventually returns back to that state that it was before. When I think about your book, one of the premises, if I understand it correctly, is really that human variation.

When it's embraced in business, it can have profoundly positive impacts that human variation is a really good thing. And we've heard so much about diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging. But you have a little bit of a different twist in your book called REDI, R E D I, and I'm wondering if you can explain what's the difference between REDI and D E I?

Gena Cox:

Yeah, sure. So, first of all, human variation is profoundly normal. That's probably the most important thing. So, it is the lack of variation that is abnormal. And so we should never have ever, we should assume that in everything we do, we are going to encounter human variation. That is sort of a fundamental point of view, but with regard to D E I B, The acronym that is much more common, or DEI or, without the b, that sort of thing.

I didn't wanna throw the baby out with the bath water because people know what those ideas are and they're very valid and very useful. However, in the research that I was doing, what I discovered is that, I think I told you before some of the things that are holding leaders back and when I did a survey in the summer of 2020 and talked to approximately 500 working folk about among them being about 149 black women specifically.

I wanted to have the representation of black women on purpose. What they said was that, yeah, we know this. We can see this in the day-to-day behavior of our leaders. They tend to avoid rather than approach literally. And we see it in the way they handle these issues or don't handle them at all.

They avoid these issues and in they're avoiding what we interpreted that to mean is that they're, they disrespect us. They don't care enough to be curious so that they can understand and then connect with us and then we can all build this comfort together from a place of common understanding.

And that was when I started to really think a little bit more about this respect issue, cuz they would use the word respect. And what I instill ready, R E D I respect equity, diversity, and inclusion. It puts respect first, and I, so I call it a respect first model and it does that for the reasons I just explained.

But also as I sat back and thought a little bit more about this, respect is one of those fundamental currencies that every human deserves, right? It isn't anything special, and we all want it. We all know when we're getting it, it's almost a visceral reaction that we have to the spaces that we're in. So it's a very common concept for people to get their hands around.

Nobody walks around saying, belonging, I yearn for belonging. People don't really talk about some of these concepts in the same way. And so I thought the other thing is that, you know what? I noticed that one of the behaviors that interferes with people's ability to deal with this issue, or I can tell when people don't wanna deal with this issue, they can't even make eye contacts with people in a hallway if you can't do a fundamental sort of respect things that just acknowledges another human.

I don't know about these other things that you might measure or care about. I don't know if they matter, at least not in my interaction with my manager and my team, or my colleagues, right? So, respect is powerful by virtue of its universal potential for universal application and understanding, but also because everybody knows what it feels like when they don't have it, and most people yearn for it.

Jeff Hunt:

That's almost like you're saying respect is the precursor, or it must supersede the equity component, the inclusion component, right? You have to have that first.

Gena Cox:

Yes. I think especially at the individual level when you wish to do whatever you do, because if you don't, because it does lead to that curiosity, right?

That interest, that fundamental, oh, here's another human I wanna know something about that human as opposed to avoid. So, yes.

Topic 4. The lack of education around black history in the US and its effects in the workplace (13:44)

Jeff Hunt:

Would you say, Gina, there's a lack of education among C-Suite executives about black history in the United States?

Gena Cox:

I wouldn't, I would say that, but I would step back even further.

And this is strangely there's a lack of education among Americans about this issue. I did not know that until 2020. I didn't know that because I didn't grow up in the United States and I had learned a lot about the black experience by virtue of arriving in this country, being treated in a way that lets me know, aha, there's a code.

I must know the code cuz I have to know why are people reacting to me this way? So I studied and I learned some things, but I still don't know everything that I need to learn. But what I discovered in 2020 was, certainly most Americans are very segregated with regard to the way their educations are, the way they're taught and the way they live.

I mean, I knew that, but I was confirmed. And then when you go to think about this issue from a socioeconomic perspective, you recognize how we are so segregated by socioeconomic status and also professional status. And so it is very likely that senior leaders of organizations, people in these very special positions.

You know, they've worked hard and it is sort of isolated in a way. I, it is unlikely that they're gonna encounter a wide swath of America. And then we've, I've learned that certainly in schools there isn't a pattern in practice of talking about these issues. And so I know the same thing about, for example, the Native American experience.

I wouldn't say just CEOs, but on the other hand, because I have focused this book and my work on the business enterprise, it was important to point that out, which is the reason why I did include a whole chapter where I spent months and months studying a little bit more about the African American history specifically, so I could put it in there as a quick cheat sheet if you would.

You know, just some real key things that might help you understand why it feels so awkward and difficult to connect. Opportunity for us all to learn, and I think it is a prerequisite to being effective in leader in enterprise.

Jeff Hunt:

One of the things you mentioned is that using the word minority is actually not helpful when referring to underserved or disadvantaged groups, and I'm wondering if you can say a little bit about that.

Gena Cox:

This is a conversation that takes place quite a bit in communities of color. And I know this because I have been part of those conversations and I've heard those conversations. And so the origin of it, I'm not a hundred percent sure. So I'm not, I'm stating this more from my personal experience and observation, and of course things I've read.

But really the issue here is that by definition, the word minority implies something less than something else, right? And it almost sounds like a permanent state of affairs as well, right? So that is why some people who might be described in this way object being described in this way. And then of course the averse of that is majority, and that's also another opportunity for a whole bunch of sociological analysis.

Both on the basis of demographic trends and just the power dynamic. I mean, so much goes wrong when you use those two words from the perspective of people who've been traditionally disadvantaged. So that's really the fundamental thing. If you call me minority, or if you call a group, I'm part of a minority.

It doesn't personally offend me, but if you have the opportunity to avoid using words that perpetuate the problem and the power imbalance, then I think it is advantageous to do so and it adds some credibility when you are then talking to me, because the minute I hear you use words that I already have flagged as sort of problematic, I might.

I wonder if that person is paying enough attention and knows what's really going on. I mean, I'm not gonna dislike you or hate you or anything as a result, but I do think there's an opportunity to think about the language.

Topic 5. The power of language and relationship between employee experience, inclusion, and leadership (17:29)

Jeff Hunt:

So, one of the things you mentioned earlier was kind of connecting the dots between employee experience and inclusion.

When you think of employee engagement and experience problems in organizations, where are those coming from?

Gena Cox:

Yeah, so I love employee experience, I love employee surveys, I love employee measurement, employee opinions, I love that stuff. And I will give you a little, I mean, I will say this. I could almost be blindfolded and put into any organization and ask that question, and I can have a few directional pointers already to know where I might look.

And the first place I might look because of all I've seen over the years and looking at employee data is that employee experience is primarily influenced by manager behavior and there's lots of research, we can talk about what proportion of employee experience, variance of employee experience is explained by manager behavior.

And we generally conclude that 70% of the time the experience that you're gonna have as an employee is probably gonna be related to something your manager is doing or not doing. In the end, it usually comes down to the relationship between an employee and a manager in terms of the experience, the employee will have.

But the experience of a manager or the behavior of a manager is really something that I think is a great opportunity in this conversation because most managers haven't really been trained to think about the impact that they're having. We have people who are really good at task managing tasks, and we have some who are good at managing people.

But what we really select for is general managers. And we say we want a manager. And when we say we want a manager, we're looking for someone that we think is mostly gonna get something done. And where the human experience falls in that equation? Doesn't get as much examination as I think it should before we decide who we're gonna put in charge of our precious humans in an organization.

So organizations at large have an opportunity to think about what do you express as the behavioral expectations for how employees managers will behave and how they will influence employee experience. And again, that sort of starts at the top, because fundamentally, managers should say they should have an obligation to do no harm or to do as little harm as possible.

But we know it doesn't really play out that way. So, employee experience is related to this whole conversation in the sense that this applies to every employee, but for certain groups of employees. What we see, if we look at employees data over time or across organizations, and we array favorability scores on most of the things that we measure, including engagement, including perceptions of career development, career mobility.

Equity and decision making and access to opportunity recognition and those sorts of things. When we array these data points we typically see that employees from traditionally disadvantaged groups have lower favorability scores. They could still have fairly strong engagement scores in the sense that we, how we've traditionally measure engagement they're there and they're proud to be associated with the organization.

They're working hard, they're putting in discretionary effort, but when they go home at the end of the day and talk about the experience that they have had, in spite of the fact that they worked, they did their job, they talk about these experiences that many of which are not positive.

We gotta train managers to recognize that this is their responsibility. I call it 100% leadership, lead, everybody on the team. And so when someone, an attendee in a webinar once asked me last year, he said, you know, a young man, a wonderful person. And he said, you know, I've got two black women on my team and I don't know how to lead them.

And I said, someone has sold you a bill of goods because, people of color, people who are LGBTQ + women, people who knew are diverse, are not really asking for anything special or new. They're just asking for the same high-quality leadership that you might be meeting out to other people that they're not receiving.

Jeff Hunt:

I see what you're really saying is that it's a combination of a number of different facets to develop the highest performing leaders that are gonna help create inclusive environments. And it's not just limited to training, because sometimes organizations can get tripped up on that, right? Because they can check the box on training.

But then it doesn't actually create systemic change. It sounds like what you're referring to is actually creating a language around what behavioral values are so important, what behaviors are so important in the organization and why, and then actually providing managers and leaders feedback perhaps even in real time if possible.

About how they are either upholding those behaviors and creating more inclusive environments or how they may actually be degrading the inclusion and the employee experience for people, is that a fair statement?

Gena Cox:

That is a fair statement and very well said and nicely packaged. For anyone who's listening to me ramble on because yes, indeed that is the case. But the thing about that is it does have to start from the top of the organization. Because if I listen to the words that you used, which summarized a variety of ideas, the truth is that these are the culture.

If you think about it as like a carpet upon which everything else sits, employees including managers can discern whether they can, this is an environment where they can get away with behavior that lacks integrity or that lacks honesty or that isn't supportive of all employees.

So people figure this out, right? So, if you bring a person into an organization as a leader who isn't human centered, if they might have an opportunity to just play to the lowest common denominator if no one tells them otherwise. And if you bring a strong leader in, they might just regress to the me, which is like, well, nobody else seems to care about these things.

So, it is important to establish those behavioral expectations from the top of the house with clarity, and then to hold people accountable, especially if they have manager responsibilities for exhibiting those.

Topic 6. Understanding and addressing racial trauma; how can leaders talk about it at work? (23:40)

Jeff Hunt:

And so Gina, let's shift and talk a little bit more about understanding and addressing racial trauma in the workplace. How can leaders actually do that?

Gena Cox:

Wow, this is a huge topic. I do think that the starting point is that there is such a thing as racial trauma. Now, I don't think most people knew this until a few years ago because the folks who might have experienced might have been having these experiences, including myself, would not talk about these experiences at work.

And the last person we would necessarily tell is other leaders because the issue with racial trauma is that the whole system is set in such a way that talking about it puts you in a situation where you are at risk for being criticized, for being somebody who just provides Wolf, who's a complainer, who likes to pull the race card and language that I have heard others use.

And so I think what we've taught people is if you have bad experiences, but you come from a traditionally disadvantaged group, keep your mouth shut, keep your head down, we've taught one another. I should say, our families have taught us this and then go home and, talk about this with other people outside of work.

But that is a reality and there are books about this and Mind Hearts has written a couple of good books on this topic. So I think leaders of organizations and colleagues of all types in organizations have just got to start from the point of view of believing that this is true.

Because my personal experience tells me that not everybody even believes this. But you do have to start there because if you can't start there, then there's no way you're gonna be able to lend support or even think about, this is related to the respect issue. You don't care enough to know that there's a problem, so how you're gonna possibly fix it.

So yeah, it's real, but the thing about it is that even without using the language of racial trauma, it is very important for leaders of organizations to know what is the day to day experience of all employees. And another thing that I know is that many leaders do not know, regardless of what those employees look like.

And some of the reasons why leaders might not know is not because they're bad leaders, but there's this other pattern that happens in organizations where people don't like to tell leaders the bad news. They tend to sift the data and give them very selected pieces of data to guide them in a certain direction.

So every leader really needs to have a board of directors a separate board of directors of people who are selected strictly for the purpose of telling them what's really going on and this will help all employees.

Topic 7. The importance of surveys and technology as a tool to fight inequality (26:11)

Jeff Hunt:

It sounds like what you're also saying is that it's important to actually capture data, and I know you talk a lot about surveys and surveying the workforce, and so this is really understanding the pulse of what's going on, but talk a little bit about how surveys can help us really understand what employees are experiencing.

Gena Cox:

People ask a lot about this and people often say, well, isn't there some new technology that I ought to be trying in place with surveys? And I'm here to say, sure, there could be other technologies, but the value that I have found in surveys and why I continue to be a fan of surveys in terms of helping leaders understand what's going on is that there are highly definable, manageable, relatively low cost in comparison to other technologies that one might use.

And if used consistently you can triangulate different kinds of data to figure out what's really going on here. So, I think surveys are an extremely a relatively pain freeway for leaders to get the information that I'm talking about now.

One thing I would say though is that over my professional career and even through my training, leaders have tended to focus primarily on quantitative data and quantitative data has a great value in this conversation. But what I have noticed is that more executives are starting to ask a little bit more about the comments data, about the qualitative data and other kinds of data that tells the story.

X number of years ago, if I had written a business book, I always wanted to, it's gonna be kind of dry, it's gonna have lots of facts and recommendations and actions, and that was gonna be the book I would write. Well, because of what happened in the last several years, by the time I actually had the opportunity to write a book, I was very clear that what leaders really need aren’t just facts.

But they also need some clarity about the emotional experience that I was talking about, which is how I wrote my book. It's similar thing with understanding employee experience in general. I think leaders have got to make sure they're getting enough of the true day to day experience, not just did favorability go by one or two points or go down.

And I think that's what's gonna make the big difference. So you can get that in the design of your traditional surveys and other, you know, of course there are other ways, but it is a really useful tool. And still, when I talk to leaders, I find that many organizations aren't doing surveys, they're just not, and I'm thinking how do you know what's going on?

Jeff Hunt:

Exactly, and the written word provides so much context associated with any numerical ratings, doesn't it?

Gena Cox:

Oh, absolutely it is where all of the secret sauces and all the things, the nuances that you and I are talking about that I have tried to make explicit in the book, are hidden in the comments.

Now, I will say this, anyone who has a survey program of any kind also needs to ask, well, what is the culture of honesty and feedback that is built around all of this? Because even if you have a wonderful survey if people aren't comfortable telling you honestly how they feel and so on, they still won't do it.

Jeff Hunt:

It seems like the other caveat too, at least from our experience, because our software has a survey module in it that our customers use all the time. They use it for things like employee net promoter score and strategic planning and leadership assessments of the leadership team. But if they're not willing to publicly share the information that they found in the survey along with the initiatives that the executive team is going to take as a result of the information they received, then it can actually backfire, isn’t that true?

Gena Cox:

Oh yeah, absolutely. And it is really important, it's like anything else. If you ask me a question, I presume that you wanna hear the answer. So sometimes when you're in a one-to-one conversation with someone, not you, because you're very good at this, a person will ask you something and before you get a chance to answer, they've gone off on something else or they're telling you about their experience.

And so it's just like that with surveys employees they will give you the benefit of the doubt the first time around and share what they have to share. And then what they're looking to see is what is the reaction? It's a two-way thing. So it's a fundamental idea that if you're doing surveys, you must be taking action on those surveys.

You must let employees understand what actions you're taking. Another interesting thing about this cluster of content and ideas that I call REDI this whole conversation. Is that one of the very unusual behaviors that I observe in this domain is that leaders don't tell employees what they are doing about the things that they identify specifically about diversity, equity, and inclusion.

And it goes back to this emotional discomfort, right? And fear that they will step on a landmine inadvertently in their efforts. And so it's a perfect example of how not to handle a survey about anything, but in particular, not about these issues.

Jeff Hunt:

Exactly, one of the things I found quite interesting was social distance relative to increasing empathy, can you talk a little bit about social distance as it pertains to this topic?

Gena Cox:

Oh, absolutely. I think we all know intuitively that part of this issue that makes it so intractable, I think is this discomfort, I call it discomfort, the awkwardness that occurs when people with all kinds of variations show up to do their jobs together in a certain space.

And so I talk along the book about the need for curiosity, and connection to build that comfort, it is really essential. Given the segregation that we've talked about in this country as the norm, most of us, all of us are likely living in situations and working, more so living in situations, going to church, in situations, going to schools, libraries, parks and grocery stores in situations.

Where primarily most people look like us, but we don't have a great deal of human variation. That's just a norm. So it is very hard to get to understand somebody who you've not seen or have very little contact with. So that plays out. Then when people come into the workplace, and I think there is I don't think we need to do artificial things to get people to get together and to create this sort of proximity.

But I think each of us in our lives really needs to ask ourselves about that stuff. What is our experience? How do you get past that? You have to reach out and so I say the best thing to do, practices in your neighborhood when you're walking down the street and you find somebody and walking the dog or going on a run or whatever, find somebody who doesn't look like you.

Think of an excuse to reach out to that person, you know, in the grocery store or whatever. Ask them about their dog, just find some excuse. Because the thing about proximity is that it sort of brings familiarity. So, it's almost like a little bit of a habit, you know, you practice talking to people who don't look like you and eventually you go, wait a minute.

Well, that wasn't so difficult. The first kind of outreach is important, is hard. But what does this have to do with leadership? It does have a lot, because that awkwardness is telegraphed on people's facial expressions and in their body languages, and of course in their leadership decisions.

Jeff Hunt:

Well, and partly what you're saying is that it's a matter of getting to know people personally because when we break down the barriers there, then all of a sudden it, it is okay if we have disagreements too, about positions and opinions. And I'll just throw one thing too out there, Gina, and I'm curious as to your response to this, but isn't the beginning to healing in this area, actually accepting other people's experiences?

So, for instance, I could go to see a movie with my wife and she may love the movie and have a wonderful experience, and I may not like it at all. But I can't take that experience away from her. That is what her experience was and so often at work, we seem to try to take those experiences away from people rather than actually just recognizing that they're okay.

We don't necessarily have to agree, but we can come together around that and we can create more inclusive environments, right?

Gena Cox:

Yeah, absolutely. That is that fundamental idea, and it relates to something earlier when we were talking about racial trauma or we were talking about, you know, employee experience that from the perspective of a black woman, you know, myself.

I think that the reason I don't talk about these issues in the workplace or haven't traditionally is because of this whole idea like, who would I talk to about it and what would their likely reaction be? And there's always this notion of, I would have to explain it, justify it, provide the evidence and the data 10 million times to convince somebody that this is what really happened.

So yeah, we have to and that's why I try not to use the word difference in my book. I use human variation over and over on purpose. And even sometimes I do slip, but I try because the whole idea of human variation is that we are different and we have different experiences.

It just is. It doesn't require any kind of judgment call or evaluation of good or bad.

Topic 8. Lighting round questions (34:59)

Jeff Hunt:

Okay. Gina, I'd like to shift into some lightning round questions, are you okay if I ask you some quick questions here? As we are entering the holiday season here in the US, the first one seems very appropriate and it's what are you most grateful for?

Gena Cox:

Oh, I am most grateful that I have had what I feel to be this blessing of this opportunity to write a book that can support my goal to transform the world by transforming workplaces so that we can all just be more comfortable at work.

Jeff Hunt:

I love that. What's the most difficult leadership lesson you've learned over your career?

Gena Cox:

I once had a young lady from Duke University who I had just hired, come to me a few weeks later and says, you know, you walk into the office so purposefully and you're always on a mission and we feel like we don't get to know you. And ever since then, I can see her face. I remember her school all of this years later.

It was very painful cuz I thought that I was connecting. I put jelly beans on my desk the next day and ever since then, I tried to look for ways I've learned that I can just get obsessed with ideas and people perceive that as a lack of interest, and so I've had to learn how to do better on the interpersonal in that sense.

Jeff Hunt:

That was a real gift that she gave you, right? Even though it didn't feel like it at the time. Who is one person you would interview if you could living or not?

Gena Cox:

Yeah, it would be Maya Angelo. I talk about her incessantly because I met her meaning in a book when I was a teenager, and it was the first book I had ever read.

I know why the Cage Bird sings. That sounded something like an experience that I might have had though very different. I was in a different country at the time. And then over the years I just, her idea that she'd stays not in my house. She holds people to standard of humanity that we can all learn from.

Jeff Hunt:

Do you have a top book recommendation?

Gena Cox:

Well, my favorite book I guess the book that I read that I have read multiple times would be one of Maya Angelo's books. But if I were gonna pick a book that is sort of fundamentally important to me with regard to just a human experience in the workplace.

I think I still go back to any of my sort of old fun basic psychology books. And then it gets really hard to pick a favorite to just pick one. But last year I read a book called Unapologetically Ambitious by Shellye Archambeau, Shellye Archambeau, who was the first black CEO in Silicon Valley and is still on the Verizon board and very active.

And I would recommend that book because what she talks about is how to succeed. And so it's a very useful guy for anybody who wants to figure out how to get past challenges. And still, you know thrive.

Jeff Hunt:

Well, Gina, I've loved our conversation and I would just want to ask you, if you had to try to summarize the most important takeaways for our listeners what would they be?

Gena Cox:

Yeah, I would say inclusion tops diversity, make sure that as you are headlong, trying to do what some people call diversity hires, that you think a little bit about the culture and the behavioral patterns in the organization at the same time, if not before. And then the other idea is that, yes, I argue for systemic change led from the top, but I also say this requires humans, each of us, to be willing to have that one-on-one connection with another human being.

And in the end, that's the only thing that's gonna make the difference.

Jeff Hunt:

And how can people find you?

Gena Cox:

Yeah, they can go to my website, genacox.com, Gena with an E G E N A C, O X, .com or check me out on LinkedIn, you can find me by my name.

Jeff Hunt:

So much wisdom today. Thank you for coming on the show.

Gena Cox:

It's been a lot of fun. And yes, I think the whole thing felt like a lightning round because you've asked so many great questions and I've had a lot of fun answering them.

Jeff Hunt:

Thanks so much, Gina.

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Outro(38:48)

Closing music jingle/sound effects

Jeff Hunt:

Thanks for listening to the show this week. We release new episodes every other Tuesday. Let me know what you thought of this episode by emailing humancapitalgoalspan.com. Human capital is produced by GoalSpan. Subscribe, wherever you get your podcasts. And please share this podcast with your colleagues, team, or friends. Thanks for being human kind.