Dear Desk Diary
Ever felt overwhelmed by the challenges of creating the perfect workspace? You're not alone.
Your employees are likely to spend around 90,000 hours of their lives at work. I'm here to help you make every hour better. Whether you're leading a team, managing an office, or creating spaces people want to work in, join me, Hollie Sanglier, in solving real workplace dilemmas.
Each week, I'll bring in experts to tackle all your issues from boosting team creativity, boosting productivity to designing welcoming workspaces.
As your Workspace Agony Aunt, I'm here to bring insight, solutions, and a touch of calm to your office.
Got a question? Email helpme@deardeskdiary.com or drop me a note on LinkedIn.
Join me on Dear Desk Diary – where we turn workspace woes into workplace wins.
Dear Desk Diary
Unleashing the Power of Company Culture with Janine Jacobs
Discover the transformative power of company culture with our special guest, Janine Jacobs, from Happy HQ. Janine shares her fascinating journey from communications and marketing to becoming a leading culture consultant, and we promise you'll gain invaluable insights into creating a people-first workplace. Understand the critical reasons employees leave their jobs and learn how a positive culture can enhance employee retention, talent attraction, productivity, and revenue.
We'll walk you through the practical steps to bring core company values to life in your organisation. From feedback mechanisms to onboarding processes, Janine provides a roadmap for embedding values like "communicate with courage" into daily business practices. Hear inspiring success stories that reveal how values-based recognition and authentic integration of company values can foster an inclusive and supportive work environment.
Leadership takes center stage as we delve into the importance of active listening, transparency, and actionable feedback. Janine introduces proactive strategies like "stay interviews" to retain employees and maintain a positive workplace culture, especially in remote settings. We also share tips on welcoming newcomers, celebrating achievements, and ensuring your company values are genuinely lived out to avoid the pitfalls of "culture washing." Join us for an enriching conversation that will help you cultivate a cohesive and empowered team.
Hello and welcome back to Dear Desk Diary. We're here for episode two and I'm your host, polly. So today we're talking about a very, very important topic, that is, company culture and how it impacts your teams. So it affects everything employee retention, it attracts talent, productivity and it increases your revenue. It's something that is so important to talk about and potentially isn't focused on enough. I think some founders maybe think it's like fluff is what I've heard before. Yeah, um, but it is actually an incredibly important part of your strategy, and particularly with revenue and profitability. So there is a study that by Glassdoor that says that you can actually reduce turnover by up to 30 to 50 percent compared to industry average if you invest in culture. It's incredible. And there's another one by Deloitte stating that there is actually a massive gap in how much we invest in culture. So, with 88 percent of employees and 94% of executives believe culture is crucial, but only 12% think their companies are effectively cultivating it. So I'm very excited to introduce my guest today We've got Janine Jacobs from Happy HQ.
Speaker 2:Janine is an advocate for people-first cultures. She's the co-founder of culture consultancy Happy HQ and co-host of the culture shock podcast. She's regularly featured in the likes of courier, glamor and startups magazine. She's on a mission to guide workplaces in creating more fulfilling experiences for employees everywhere. With director level communications experience, janine has worked with global brands such as LinkedIn, hilton and PepsiCo. Her career has spanned various countries and cultures, involving both agency and client-side roles. Driven by a passion for understanding people, she studied at the School of Positive Psychology in 2017, where she now applies the science of human flourishing to the benefit of individuals and companies. Together with her co-founder, louisa, happy HQ provides companies and HR professionals with workshops, tools, frameworks and hands-on support. Janine is also a Girls Network mentor, helping teenagers from disadvantaged backgrounds see their futures in a more positive light and gain essential skills and build confidence. Welcome, janine.
Speaker 3:Thank you, holly, you actually make me sound really good confidence welcome, janine. Thank you, holly you actually make me sound really good, you are really good so tell me about happy HQ.
Speaker 2:Where did it start? Why did you start it? Why is this topic so important to you?
Speaker 3:yeah, so, yeah, I didn't really start out as a culture consultant. I started out working with brands in communications marketing, did the big agencies, the small creative agencies, as you've said. There I worked with lots of big brands you know cool brands, small brands on lots of different campaigns. It took me to living in, you know, london we're here in Shoreditch spent a lot of my 20s around these parts of the world, this part of the world, lived in Sydney for five years, did a stint in Singapore for four years and it got to the point where I'd had children as having two children, I got to lead a leadership level, director level, and I started to really care more about the culture than the actual client work was doing. Not that I didn't, you know I was a grafter and I love the work that I was doing, but studying positive psychology at the same time. I started to to really realize there's this passion towards like bringing a lot of what I've learned into the work environment, into my team. You know lots of things that I just felt like. You know I've gone through 15 years of work and a lot of this has I haven't come across before.
Speaker 3:There's a real need for to create an agency like happy HQ that can support companies with the know how and the understanding and the tools and the frameworks to really be more people. First, my co-founder, also louisa, who is amazing. She's been running a b corp positive impact recruitment company called I love my job for 13 years. She's been hearing why people are leaving their roles constantly and thinking you know this. You know sometimes it's an easy fix. It could just be that they needed feedback or you know you could have tweaked a policy to to make it, you know, more fairer for everybody. So, yeah, we got talking and collectively, as friends, we came together with a shared mission and Happy HQ launched about. Well, it's coming up to four years ago in October.
Speaker 2:So yeah, yeah. What are some of the main reasons why people leave? What did you find?
Speaker 3:things like, well, flexibility, wanting more flexibility, which obviously become huge a topic since COVID. But you know it could be, you know it's. Yeah, it's as simple as appreciation, like not feeling appreciated, not having a sense of purpose, like so often. You know people are expected to work, you know, just for the salary. You know you're here just to get your head down, crack on, get your job done, but actually people want to know and you know this is where vision is so important, like leaders being able to to communicate that vision so that people feel really empowered and, you know, excited and engaged and energized by the vision.
Speaker 3:So it's like I'm not just coming to work to earn a paycheck. Actually, the contribution I'm making is going towards something so much bigger than selling the product or service or making a profit. You know, and when we talk about things like purpose, you don't need to be saving dolphins, planting more trees obviously do all those things. That's great, but it could just be. You know we bring people together and make them happier because we're an event agency, so it's just about how you're, I guess, defining that as well and getting people along, that I hate the word journey, but it's true. It's like bringing people on that with you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's interesting you say about purpose. I wonder how many people don't actually know almost what their company they work for do so many people.
Speaker 3:I think you know, when we have purpose workshops, for instance, we're saying to founders you know, why do you exist? And often you know there's more than one founder and they can't quite agree and it's like, well, 10 years ago, why did you set up this company? Because it wasn't to make money. There was something there that made you set this company up. Now, what was it? It's about pinpointing that, and I think then you can sort of find people that will join you and be part of a culture that all you know carries that shared mission for sure yeah, and it's not just about like their job role.
Speaker 2:They need to understand what the whole company actually stands for and what the what the next sort of five years will look like.
Speaker 3:Yeah and even if you're an intern, you know it's all around job meaning, isn't it? It's like I, you know you might be, you might be filing files, I don't know like you might be doing something like a task, but if you know that this contributes to something so much more than the task itself, then yeah so you talk at happy hg about purpose, values and people being the kind of the foundation of culture yeah, can you talk us through that yeah, I think.
Speaker 3:Well, people first essentially just means knowing what people want and need from their place of work to do a good job. Like when we talk about culture, essentially it's everything we do, it's in every email we send. It's you know, it's the way the reception person greets you at the door, it's the way you interact with the clients, everything you do and unfortunately, I think it's such, it's been such a like abstract, dynamic, complex thing you referred to it before is that lots of people say it's fluff. Well, that really me. That's interesting to me that so many people call it fluffy when it's everything your employees are doing.
Speaker 3:So if you think that's fluffy, I think it's because, like, culture itself has had a bit of a bad reputation in the past where we've we've not defined and described it properly. We've described it by beers in the fridge ping pong table. You know, social activities. That's great, but that's just really a small part of what culture is. That's perks and benefits and that's also maybe linked to, like, how you connect as a team. That's not culture. That's doing culture a massive disservice If your employees are going out there and saying come and work at this place, we've got, you know all these things and that's how they're describing it. They're doing your company a huge disservice. You know you want. You want people to be describing it as come here, you're going to have a great career, you're going to get lots of training, you're going to be contributing towards x, you're going to have these kind of goals, you're going to feel really appreciated. That's what culture is.
Speaker 2:I wonder if people found us think it sounds expensive uh.
Speaker 3:I think, yeah, but just that's the thing as well, like culture, isn't like this thing that we can like just shoehorn in operationally. And this is why we talk about values so much. If you really get your values right and you nail them and you, you live them daily, you're guided by them daily, you employ people that embody them, you reward people that embody them. You know that's the way you do things around here, because that's what matters to you. And I'm not talking about words like integrity and customer centric, by the way, that are like done a, done a, you should be done, you know. Kill them, you know, because they're just, you know, just, you know ethical. For instance, don't set up a company or a business if you're not going to be ethical or customer focused or lead with integrity. But these values, that they're what differentiate you, and so you know really they, if they're fed into the operations like, if they're like people have values, aligned goals, for instance, if people are rewarded, all those things like operationally, that's how you're doing business and you make money.
Speaker 3:Yes, revenue increases, profit increases yeah, we hear a lot about employee advocacy and you know it all links back to, you know, creating this culture where there is this shared language of the way we do things around here can you tell us about happy hq's values?
Speaker 2:and how you live by them and what you do to empower your team with them.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So I always think with values, there should always be stories that back them up right, because that just shows that they're core and they're being lived by. So, yeah, our values are well. Health before wealth is one of them, and that you know what that came from being a conscientious co-founder? Louisa, my co-founder runs another business. Do you know what that came from being a conscientious co-founder? Louisa, my co-founder runs another business. So you know the Happy HQ and I love my job because it's hiring. They marry really well together. We're like partners.
Speaker 3:But basically I'd go, you know, I'd be waiting for Lou to call me, say I'm thinking I really wanted to go for a run and she's got stuck on a call and now I didn't go for a run. And then we made, we had this chat. I was like you know, I five she's the first to admit like five minutes to her means maybe 20 sometimes. And so health before wealth is like us saying you know, let's not burn out, let's not put the company before things that really matter to us, like our health and well-being. And so, yeah, go for that run. And I'll just say to her I waited, but health before wealth. So it's like as a like, it's almost like, instead of having to have those awkward, difficult conversations, some sometimes it's just like health before wealth and it reminds us, it anchors us down sometimes when we're not. You know gosh, we used to laugh end of last year we were recording our own podcast series and we were both, you know, working all hours around the clock and we used to describe ourselves as cleaners with dirty houses, because we were. We needed rest and so, yeah, health before wealth was born. Things like trusted to achieve.
Speaker 3:We're not on top of each other. You say you're going to get something done, just crack on and get it done. We've got strictly no jargon, so we try not to use acronyms or anything like that, just because it's like plain speak. We're not corporate, you know. We're quite, you know, down-to-earth people, so we want that to translate in how we interact with other, with people as well. We're radically curious, so we learn constantly. We never know everything, you know, I learn every day, and so we continue that through. And so if that means like paying for courses or, you know, I don't know like going yes, paying for courses, or anything like that training and development, then that's it. That's a thing that will always be. And the last one is being transparent constantly. So there's no, no secrets. Everything's led with transparency.
Speaker 2:I love that yeah and did you go through a whole exercise to get those values or were they kind of born quite organically?
Speaker 3:so for us, because there was two of us at the time of creating them. This is why I always say do them as soon as you can yeah because for us, it was about looking at.
Speaker 3:We did the whole work around what our both our strengths were and what made us feel energized, and you know what they weren't like written overnight. You sit with them, you go with these right, and also, once you've and we do a lot of this work with our clients as well once we've co-created values with teams, we're then going right. How can this value live on? How can this be baked into how you run your business operationally? Like, if you've got a value, let's call. Let's say like, communicate with courage, like Netflix, for instance, have that value. It's like, how do you give feedback with that value in mind? People aren't going to wait for their appraisal to like be shocked by feedback. They're going to, you know. So it's like all of those elements like how you interact as team members, little rituals, practices, like you know what does onboarding look like? If this is a value that we have in mind, what policies do we have in place that support this value so it runs right throughout the company?
Speaker 2:oh, that's amazing, it's so, it's so important and I'm sure there's so many people, so many companies that just have them written on a piece of paper yeah, on a google doc and it just sits on their drive and no one knows them or reads them oh, absolutely or some people put them on the wall well, and the thing with the wall, if I like that.
Speaker 3:Well, the thing with the wall is. I think again, this goes back to, you know corporate jargon on the wall, words like ethical and integrity, and what does that even mean? So what we say now is do the work like.
Speaker 3:I almost treat it like as if I was coming up with a campaign say you know like it's activating a campaign and these are the words, but they need to live once. You know that they're like living on. You've got things like values, rec awards. You know you've got people. You know people need to remember them and be guided by them daily. So absolutely whack them on the walls but get them off the walls to get you know name. I've just been speaking to someone else and I was like you know name offices after the office rooms, after them. You know all of that stuff like you know.
Speaker 3:That's all okay as long as you're living in them day to day as well, yeah, 100%.
Speaker 2:So have you got any recent next success stories that you can share as in from our values or from yeah where you've seen kind of um a company implement some values well and it's had a good impact on them yeah, I think, just generally, like we I mean we work with lots of companies, you know, big and small.
Speaker 3:I would say, from a success point of view, the, the clients that you, that you work with, where you are in a room with them. Like, we do a lot of pre um workshop insights collection anyway. So before we even get to a workshop, we already know, like, what the consensus is like. We ask for stories and backup and obviously that we use the workshop to come together as a team to collect, collectively, decide and and sort of hash out, you know, get creative as well. Yeah, but it's the you can really tell with the clients that are like I really want this to come from the people because they're, you know you're not having leaders. Then go right, these are our values, you know, and everyone's like, oh great, like now is, how's it going to change things?
Speaker 3:Yeah, the success stories, to be honest, won't feel any different from the day-to-day because they're the core value. Yeah, they're not like done for marketing gains or done to just, you know, sound cool or culture wash or put a pretense on like, if you're saying inclusion and diversity really matters to you, is everyone getting know your bias? Training like, how are you hiring? Are you doing blind? Like make sure that all of you know that value? You can really like stand up to it, yeah so fascinating.
Speaker 2:Well, you're doing an amazing thing, thank you. So let's listen to the questions. So we have four.
Speaker 3:So Hi Janine, I have a question. Right, you see, ceos or founders are like asking their LinkedIn community. Has anyone got any good ideas for, like team building activity? Like, have you asked your people? Yeah, like, we seem so scared of like listening and getting actively listening as well. I should say, so that you're actually going to action and do something about the feedback that you receive. But, yeah, I'd say listening and then, even though this isn't one thing, it sort of leads into being transparent as well, because it's all very good and well listening and you're getting the feedback, but what are you going to do with that? You can't like please everyone and do everything. So it's about being transparent with we hear you. We've've listened to you.
Speaker 3:These are the things we're working on now. Here's a roadmap like people don't expect perfect cultures. They are quite okay with you being human as a leader and saying, or company saying you know, these are the things that we're doing. Great at these things. We're going to work on. It's progress over perfection. Let them be part of the whole. I'm going to say that word again on my journey. Let them be part of the whole. I'm going to say that word again, aren't I journey? Let them be part of it and let them like, co-create and come up with solutions with you and I think that, yeah, that's that would be my one piece of advice like a good value would be.
Speaker 3:We are human yeah, but then you get. You get the. You know. The question that comes back to us then is well, how do I know what to ask? And that's where you know we. This is why we've got a culture audit, because we know all the right questions to ask and we know that it always links to what people really need and want from their place of work. You know links back to things like empowerment, appreciation, well-being, positive leadership.
Speaker 2:So it's making sure that you are asking the right questions too yeah, and what do you think is a good mechanism for asking those questions, like should it be a anonymous box? Should it be? Like an entire forum of sitting everyone together, like a town hall. Yeah, ask people individually in their one-to-ones like what? What do you see? Is my question?
Speaker 3:yeah, a combination for sure, because there are some voices that talk the loudest and aren't. You know that's unfair, so it's. You know you want to make sure there's a sense of belonging, so you know there's psychological safety there, so people feel like they can open up.
Speaker 3:This is why companies come to us because, like employees, like that it's anonymous when they work with us and that we're like you know, we can constructively give that feedback back to companies in a way that's like this is what people are saying, but I would ignore that. We always do also this ENVP school now with clients where we can figure out the percentage of people that are detractors, because you always have detractors in every company. You know you're always going to have the people that are quite negative and maybe it just isn't the right culture for them. Or you've got your, you know your people that are really like, invested in the culture and think it's a great place to work and would recommend it as a great place to work. So it's about looking at that feedback as well and being able to to ignore some of it and action the right, the right things as well, I would definitely say a mixture because I imagine like some employees might feel like I can't say how I feel because I could get in trouble.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then from the leader's side, that if we ask them how they feel, we're opening up a can of worms. Yeah, because what if someone says something and someone else agrees and then everyone quits?
Speaker 3:yeah, yeah I think that, like a lot of, so a lot of, you know, we hear, we understand the pushback or the has you know, where companies are quite hesitant to sort of ask feedback. They don't want to open up a can of worms, say so. It's about asking questions that you know, that you could, you want to action like already you're just you know it could be something like you. You want your benefits package to be like hyper personalized. You just want to stop wasting money on a one-stop shop package that people aren't even using, that bupa thing, so. So it's like if you're going to open it up, just at least be able to action it as well yeah, yeah, that's a, that's a good point yeah, to make sure that you can actually do something about yeah and then.
Speaker 3:And then it's about putting in like we call them culture foundations. That's things like have regular one-to-ones with managers. Forget exit interviews. Have stay interviews like make sure people are happy and that they you know. If they were going to leave, what would that reason be you?
Speaker 2:know, yeah, that's tell me more about that all right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think it's just like it comes from a again, like exit interviews is often when we we've all left jobs right and we've all had exit interviews and it's it's a really weird meeting because it's like, right, I'm now being honest with you. Yeah, we didn't. I didn't have that chance to maybe be honest before. I didn't really know who to come to. Maybe it was even something like I just needed to leave work half an hour early to pick up my kid from nursery and you know I couldn't quite make that. What could you have made that work for me, potentially, yeah, if you would have known. And now I've just cost you absolutely fortune to replace me and retrain someone to take this position. So, stay, interview is more about avoiding that and keeping the right people. Yeah, okay, next one hi.
Speaker 1:Holly and Janine. It's uh Darren here from Zitcher, just wondering if you had any good tips on how to create a culture for a remote working team. A small, small team, uh, but we all work remotely, so any tips and ideas would be brilliant.
Speaker 3:Thank you yeah, so for remote teams I mean, and there's so many now, isn't that? Yeah, like, just to tell a story, you know I've I've had, I've worked like I've known people that have started their first day and they're like, how did it go? Just loads of meetings, really boring, didn't even get, like you know, a little pen or paper or any you know like literally. So I guess just onboarding is all about giving someone that warmest first day, that warmest first start. So I think, in turn, right from the first day, or even pre-boarding right through, it's about how can you have those intentional touch points, like I think with remote work it can be very lonely sometimes. So you know, as a team, are you actually meeting for a face to face to have those anchor days, for a face-to-face, to have those anchor days, you know, even if it's every quarter, for like team bonding?
Speaker 3:I'm, I am a massive fan of like getting together as a team, like physically. You know I'm I'm a pro flexible working and remote working for my own lifestyle and, you know, working in and around the kids. But I think, just from you know where people we need social connections, like you know, and if, if you're, if you're not able to get together as much as you'd like in person. Is there a local, like community group that you can encourage employees to be part of, like you know, for instance, my mentoring with the girls network? That's a lovely way. Or I'm, like, member of local community groups that all support each other. It's like how can you help that person create that sense of community in and around the work they're doing as well?
Speaker 2:yeah, and I wonder because I just from experience and talking to people, I think when people think about like company get togethers they often think about like going to the pub and it's all quite like alcohol, yeah, base and I just. I often think like I don't know how inclusive that is yeah or helpful no because I just I don't know if teams get together and end up getting a bit drunk yeah, and start being like oh and talking about each other yeah what are some activities or?
Speaker 3:yeah, do you know what this came? I run culture cohorts for like small groups of businesses that we do like courses on culture, and lots of questions always come up about this and it's like but I ask the team what they want and then we put this event on and then no one wants to show up or no one really cares, and it's like it is. It is really hard. I don't think there's like a magic solution. I do think you've got to keep asking people what they want. But I would say, you know, absolutely like, celebrate as a company, celebrate accomplishments as much as you can and use that as a reason for everyone to come together.
Speaker 3:You know, how many times are we not feeling like we've?
Speaker 3:You know, we ask one of the questions in our audits actually when in the last seven days, is someone like acknowledged or like shown appreciation for the work you're doing and I promise you have all the audits we've done it's it's appreciation is always where people fall down, really, because we don't take the time to just go Holly, thank you, you're doing a great job.
Speaker 3:We don't, we don't do it enough, and so, you know, even for remote teams, just like sometimes I think I can imagine you know, you're just, you're there thinking am I even doing a good job? I need to be told and reminded constantly like and you know little things, like we, we do things with the team where it's weekly good news on a Friday, so we call it WGN, we branded it. It literally is on team just us sending bullet points every friday of like these are the amazing things that have happened this week and everyone sends like stupid memes and stuff, but you're leaving the weekend on a high, like it's something that I guess for remote teams as well, it works really well because you're going oh, wow and I I understand now what that person's been doing this week and sometimes we forget to communicate. So as long as there's that element of like communication, connection, team building and appreciation, like you know that, I think that's the key the C's communication oh yeah, I just did all the C's.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah cool.
Speaker 2:Okay, so next one what's the number one top tip when onboarding new team members? To get them to understand and be part of your company culture yeah, we've covered some of this already.
Speaker 3:I would say that was more remote.
Speaker 2:I guess this is more general yeah, this is more general.
Speaker 3:well, we talked about values a lot. As always, I can never stop talking about values, but hopefully by now people are already aware of your values. So that first day I think sometimes we often, with onboarding, confuse it with this big checklist of like, these are the things we've got to go through, all of these policies, like all of these, this information for me, that first day needs to be, I guess, just re-imagined as giving someone the warmest possible welcome you could ever give to really get to know them. Forget getting them to know your company They've already bought into your company. Let's get to know them Like just you know. Keep it very, very, you know, focused on who are you, what energizes you Like, so people can like be their authentic self. I think so often in those first three months we would like hide ourselves away and then all of a sudden, we press our probation and we're like woo, you know this is me and that's when we do our best work, when we feel authentic.
Speaker 3:So you know, there's a really lovely culture practice that companies are doing now. They call it things like the user manual, the personal profile, where you know, like, if you're going to buy a washing machine, it comes with instructions. But as individuals, we're often just, you know, we all have really different working styles. We're different reproductive like, different communication styles, all those things. So you can put loads of different types of questions in that user manual and get people to like present it back to the team like this is me. You know, this is the time of the day I feel energized and I think that you know, even again like, let's get, let's link that back to remote teams as well. That's a really nice way you can have that like captured on file or a notion or something, so that when you're dealing with someone as well, you're like oh, we have a shared interest in x and it just like helps build those like bonds as well yeah, it's so true.
Speaker 2:Do you know what, from like personal experience, just talking to like friends and whatever, whenever people start a new job and then they'll after a couple of months, I always speak to them how's your new job? And they're like yeah, it's fine, you know it's rubbish being you and I know I always say to people when, in that first couple of months where they aren't enjoying it, yeah, I don't know if it's the right move. I'm not really enjoying it. I don't really know anyone. No one knows me.
Speaker 2:I'm shy, yeah, I always say, like give it three months, you'll after three months. I feel like that's when you feel like you're integrated into the team. And you're actually enjoying yourself, but like that's crazy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it takes like three months for people to actually feel like they're part of a team. Yeah, and I guess that culture practice would like use a manual and getting to know. That's people first. That's what we mean by being people first, because you know that's not fluffy when you think I want that person to like do the best job possible. So you give them the environment to. You know you're trying to grow a plant. You're like. You know you water it, you do all the things to like.
Speaker 2:Let it harvest fruit like come on, you know it's not fluff at all no, and if you're losing three months of productivity because someone doesn't feel like they're part of a team for three whole months, yeah, that's a long time. That's quite a long time yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:So I'd say you know that should be, you know and you've got. Yeah, you think about someone's first day. It really matters, you've got. Probably they're like parents or boyfriend, girlfriend, wife, like all those people just going. How was it? And you know, I remember starting at a creative agency and I was so brought in by the clients, the brands, the work they do, everything. First hour that I was there I got sat down and taught by the HR person how to fill in time sheets and I just remember thinking we're doing and it's a PR agency, we're doing a really bad job here of PRing, like the company to me right now, like you know, this could have been so much different and there's loads of research actually that says that that first few days has a massive lasting impression on your output as well. Like I hate. I hate saying you know, the case for hulk culture is about productivity. It's so much more than that. You know. It's not like happy cows equal more milk.
Speaker 3:Like that's not what we're doing it for. But we're doing this is the right thing to do. But in saying that, there's loads of studies that show, like you know, people in sales positions, for instance, if they really had that opportunity for people to really get to know them and they could be themselves, they, they like were miles ahead of you know, in terms of output really.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's amazing. And I feel like whenever you join a new job, whenever you go home like you say you'd speak to husbands or whatever I feel like all people say is oh, were people nice yeah, that's always.
Speaker 3:The thing is that no one says like what you know, what's your computer like, or like what's your workload like, because all people what people like, yeah so it's so important that in those first few days that people get a good impression of the people yeah, and you know, if you are gonna get to know someone as well, and if you do want people to get to know the company, then get the leader, the MD, the founder, the CEO, ideally like take that person out for lunch. Tell them what the vision is, get them excited. Let them feel like they're. I'm going to say that word again Holly Journey. I need to replace that.
Speaker 2:It's true, though it fits.
Speaker 3:Experience there you go.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the experience Amazing. Okay, last one.
Speaker 3:How can you implement your brand's core values into your culture? Branding can often be associated with sales and marketing. How do we make sure our teams live by our brand values? So brand map values and core company values are different, but should definitely be synergy with them. So you could have a brand value like let's think of something here like performance, but you're internally you're going to call it performance to your customer right, but internally you're going to call that innovation. Because if you, if your people, aren't like constantly innovating, you're not creating products that people are going to perform better with. So internally, that looks very different.
Speaker 3:And I think, when it comes to using your core values as like for marketing gains, like I always say, I think they should attract clients and partners, say for sure, but don't try and do that without them living on internally. And obviously we've talked a lot about that. But if they're not like there every day in practices, ritual systems, the way you do things, the way you onboard people, the way you give people feedback, all those things, then don't go and shout about them externally, because you're going to annoy your you know, you're going to annoy the people that work there. So it's actually all a load of rubbish and you know we call that culture washing, which can have a an absolutely negative effect on how people feel, because it all just feels on insincere feels like the core value exercise is probably going to be taken on by the marketing person.
Speaker 3:Yeah, like me. Yeah, yeah, exactly, because we understand the need for it and the value of it.
Speaker 2:But it almost feels a bit inauthentic.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like it shouldn't be that person.
Speaker 3:Well, this is why we have. So we have values workshops and we have values in action workshops. So, after following the, once you've discovered and defined, you feel really happy. These, these values are great, they're sounding great, people feel energized by them. They vary us, they're unique to us, they make us stand out all that stuff. Then we have values in action because it's like right now we've got this value. How can it live on and you get your employees to sort of, we have like loads of? Really I love these workshops because they're really fun. They're like you know, if you had all the money in the world, you're going to activate this value. What would you do with the you know like? So you, you know how, what would an interview question be like based on this value? So you're looking at behavior, not skill, like, oh, you can get really creative and you know people always have the best ideas amazing.
Speaker 2:I just have one final question, and if you can't answer it, that's okay. Yeah, I know that we're recording, but I'm just going to tell you what it is. Yeah, just one final question actually from me. So we obviously do fit ups, we go into companies and change their entire environments in a few weeks, and I think it's a bit scary, or it can be. What would you recommend for companies that are either having a big refurb in their office or moving to a completely different location? How? How do they sort of keep culture alive? Because I think environment is actually really important for culture when you say how do you keep culture alive?
Speaker 3:do you mean?
Speaker 2:I'm thinking more of like a sort of change management point of view, because I think we've noticed a lot of people, particularly if they're doing some kind of branding exercise or I say branding like a culture exercise and looking at their internal values. It sometimes goes alongside moving. Yeah. Would you have any advice for people who are moving into a new office? Yes, or a new environment, to make sure that they don't get all in a tizz? Yeah, because it can happen. People are in new worlds and they're like I don't know what's happening.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Jo, I've actually been through this. It's a company that I worked for in Singapore. We moved to a brand new office. We got a brand new fit out. We worked with a really like I can't even remember the name of it now, but the company was, like you know, great, a great well-known designer. We had input into, you know, at different stages so it felt like, oh my gosh I'm gonna say the word again we've, we were part of it. Right, it was co-created. I remember on the day we called it like launch day, we all got given passports, we had, you know, on our desk, we had these little bits, so it was all like there was, you know, we did the whole like office launch party. We've. It was really exciting time.
Speaker 3:And the office itself, you know all the name, the, even things like the, the names of the offices. We all got a chance to like name them together and so, yeah, I guess just involving the employees at different stages. And this is where, like, I get excited, because my background in communications it's all about how you communicate it to the employees and you know, we were in a different location that you know had its downsides because there wasn't as much food options and stuff like that. So it's like, well, how do you make sure that you're you know that that bit that people are missing, like the, the, you know the thing that maybe, if you are in a different location, say like how do you, what do you put in place for that? Do you cater, do you? You know, do you, do you get a list of like takeaway menus that you put in the? Like you know how do you make it so that people feel like, actually this is the best thing.
Speaker 2:When people are doing their moves, they think like, okay, we need a meeting room. How many times? Then I'll look at, kind of, how many times is that meeting room being used in a day. But I don't know how much people actually say to the employees like, how does this feel for you? Moving like what is it that you need? Like what is going to change when we move to this new location?
Speaker 3:yeah, yeah, and I guess it depends on, like what what's being impacted on their day-to-day. Like I've worked in agencies where it's we've moved and you know, now we're gonna hot desk instead and it's like right, okay, this is gonna feel really different because that photo frame that you had on your, your desk is no longer gonna be there and when you get in, you're gonna you're not maybe gonna be sitting by people that you your mates, yeah so how do you like what's the work around there?
Speaker 3:so again you know what it all comes back down to listening doesn't it and making sure that you're listening and, like you know, making sure that everyone's being seen, valued and heard as well amazing.
Speaker 2:Good. Well, we've done it, we've completed our questions. There you go. Thank you for having me. Thank you so much, it's been great. It's been great so you can connect with janine on linkedin, and the links for happy hq and janine's linkedin is in the show notes below, um. So thank you so much for listening. Thank you you.