237 How to Lead and Build a Culture That Can Thrive Through Any Crisis with Shaara Roman | Greater Washington DC DMV Changemaker

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[00:00:00] Mahan Tavakoli: Shaara Roman, welcome to Partnering Leadership. I'm thrilled to have you in this conversation with me.

[00:00:05] Shaara Roman: Mahan. I am thrilled to be here. Just so excited to talk about culture and all the great things that go along with it.

[00:00:11] Mahan Tavakoli: Can't wait to talk about the conscious workplace. Fortify your culture to thrive in any crisis. We've been through a crisis. I think we will be going through many more crisis in the coming years. You touch on it in the book also. 

But before we get to talking about organizational culture, would love to know whereabouts you grew up and how your upbringing impacted who you've become.

[00:00:35] Shaara Roman: Yeah, thanks, Mahan. I love this question and not everyone realizes that it often takes quite a bit of time to explain where I've come from. But I was born in Bombay, India, and my family moved to Lagos, Nigeria when I was a toddler. Grew up in Lagos, did my elementary school years there, then went back to Bombay, did middle school for a couple of years, and lived with my grandparents.And that was a pretty pivotal moment for me. 

A pretty traumatic moment in some ways, because I was separated from my parents at a fairly early age and then my grandmother, who I was very close to, realized that living in India was not gonna be the right place for me.So she helped me get to school in England. So I did my high school in England. 

Then I went back to Nigeria after I finished high school. Yeah, like I said, the story continues and I was supposed to be on a gap year and I was gonna ponder where I wanted to go to university and all that kind of fun stuff.And as what they say about best light plans I met my husband who at the time was an active duty Marine. He is a Puerto Rican by way of New York and ended up in Lagos, Nigeria. 

We meet, we fall in. Totally not in the plan. End up moving to Greece, living in Greece, getting married and coming to the us. All of that to say that, I grew up in many different countries, lived in different countries, traveled a lot, and all of them really instilled a sense of curiosity in me, a desire to learn about others and to really. Build bridges and to look for commonalities, cuz even as a young woman you wanna feel like you belong. 

You wanna feel like you're part of the tribe and moving around a lot. And changing my surroundings certainly made me more resilient. Made me more independent. And it also made me appreciate the richness that comes from all the different walks of life that are out there. The other important thing, I think that is part of who I am is I didn't grow up in a very traditional Indian household. 

My family is Zorastrian, so they are ancestry is from Persia. And the Parsis, as they're known in Bombay, are a little bit more independent. It's a very small community more western than many of the Hindus and Muslims and others that lived there. So they don't hold onto traditionalism. My grandparents, my dad's parents divorced in the fifties. Pretty unheard of, maybe even in the United States. 

My two aunts and my mom have two sisters, and both her sisters got divorced. They raised kids single parents.So no one subscribed to stereotypical male female roles. It was a lot of girl power. Always felt encouraged and supported to do what I wanted to do, when I wanted to do it, how I wanted to do it, to find my voice, to be authentic. 

Questioning the status quo and challenging the way things are has just been who I am and what I bring to the table.

[00:03:29] Mahan Tavakoli: What an outstanding journey you have had. There are so many sidetracks I can take with this Shaara. Everything from the fact that my many trips to India and to Bombay. I fell in love with the Parces community and loved the restaurant as an Iranian American.

I had a special fascination for the Parces and the culture there, but also you moving around to all these different places you said you a lot more resilient. And able to fit in with the different cultures that you had to live in.

How were you able to do that? You didn't have a manual of how to adjust and adapt to the different cultures. How were you able to do that?

[00:04:16] Shaara Roman: I think for me it was quickly learning that I had to ask questions and I had to be curious about how other people lived, the food they ate, how they ate it, the music they listened to, the dancing that they might have done. I remember even as a little girl, growing up in Lagos we had help in the house. 

But I would always, when my mom was napping, I would run out of the house to the back where our maid lived and I would eat with her. I had just eaten my lunch and I would eat the lunch that they had prepared, which was way more interesting and way more spicy. I just got exposed to that, like being curious about what they did and how she'd spend that afternoon combing her daughter's hair and tying it in little braids.

That was just part of how I did. So I was being curious. It was asking questions, it was experiencing and not judging but also sharing about myself because the more that you ask questions and you invest that time in getting to know other people and why they like queen or whatever, the music they might've been to, the more then they wanna know about you. 

And it becomes that of natural give and take. And I felt that I could fit in but really be who I was. I didn't have to compromise so much or change and of. Not to say that I never did that as a teenage girl, living in England, there's a lot happening between the years of 14 and 17. But I feel like it allowed me to be stronger and to really understand who I was.

[00:05:43] Mahan Tavakoli: One of the points that you mentioned is that need for curiosity. In talking about culture, you also reference that a change in mindset from a judging mindset and a fixed mindset to curious and growth mindset. 

What I see Shaara, if we were to go to the typical organization and ask the leaders of the organization, whether they have a growth mindset or a fixed mindset, everyone would say, oh I have a growth mindset. 

Definitely, what is a growth mindset as opposed to this judging and fixed mindset? And what determines whether people have the growth mindset or maybe they should reassess in trying to find more of that growth mindset and curiosity. 

[00:06:27] Shaara Roman: So let's just be clear, a growth mindset is not about growing the top line or the line, or growing in revenue or employees is what you hear. Of course I have this growth mindset. But a growth mindset is really coming into the world with knowing that you don't have all of the answers. 

With knowing that there is power in sharing power, in understanding that there is power in the collective versus the individual. There's a few different mindsets and shifts we talk about in the book. But I think, particularly in this country, in the US and in the Western world, we approach life I think from a scarcity mindset. In order for me to win, you have to lose. And when you are really shifting into a growth mindset, you're recognizing that there is enough for everybody and that you all can win. 

And if you think about, my boss actually used to say this over CGI. He'd always say, Shaara, it's not about taking a bigger piece of the pie, it's about making the pie bigger so we can all benefit from that. And so that's what I think about as a growth mindset is how do you make it better so that everybody can succeed. 

So power needs to be shared in an organization. Super scary for people, That means that you can let people make decisions. You can give people information. You can be more transparent with what you're doing so that then everybody is informed and you can have those discussions.It's not about debate. It's really about good discussion and laying out the pros and cons versus in a debate, it's who wins. 

Who gets their point across more succinctly. Who's probably, you know, potentially a better orator. And those are not necessarily the signs of success or victory. So it's shifting from this win-lose mentality to a win-win mentality. It's shifting from thinking about your personal problems are just your problems and they need to be checked at the door, which is a very old mindset that I certainly grew up with here. 

But in order for us to really allow ourselves, our organizations to grow and for us as individuals to be open to that. We have to recognize that everyone is coming in with their unique stories and situations and they need to be able to bring their whole kind of beings into the workplace, I just shared my personal story. I can't leave any part of that at home, that's who I am. 

That's the fabric of what I'm gonna bring to the table every day. And the last couple of things is that, I think in terms of a growth mindset is that we leaders need to understand that they're no longer experts, and that really they are facilitators of the conversation and they need to speak less. And really listen more and allow that dialogue to happen and to recognize that questions actually get you to a better place. 

I, when I talk with clients, I say, When we have kids at home and we have toddlers, they're asking all these questions around. Why? And most of the time we answer them, sometimes we get frustrated. But in the workplace, we shut down and we're just like, we'll do what I tell you to do. 

That's not always the right answer.

[00:09:35] Mahan Tavakoli: So Shaara, I wonder, you were mentioning the fact that leaders need to be willing to allow their team members and others to engage to own decision making and move on.

Just before we started recording, I was having a conversation with the CEO of an organization that I work with, and he was saying, I'm accountable to the board. Part of his difficulty is letting go of some of that because he feels, at the end of the day, accountable. How do you balance accountability with enabling others to own the decisions?

[00:10:12] Shaara Roman: You know your CEO is right. The buck ultimately stops him, but the analogy I often use is if you do things for your kids, they'll never learn to do it for themselves. So in the workplace, yeah, there are certain that absolutely need to be made at the top that are going to have huge consequences. 

And it's not an all or nothing, there are a cascading of a series of decisions that you start to build, trust in individuals and pushing down that accountability. It could be a budget authority that is given to someone. Instead of having get permission, like literally I worked a client that in order for the manager to bring in cupcakes, 24 cupcakes that might have cost them 50 or 60 bucks, they had to get permission. 

And that's real story from three or four years ago, and if you can just say to a manager, here's a budget that you have. Use it as you see fit, and then if they make mistakes, you can correct it. But you've got those guardrails of 5,000 or 10,000 or $20,000. So it's about putting up those guardrails, letting people experiment, learning if they've made mistakes and growing. And that goes back to that growth mindset. 

We grow through making mistakes. And so mistakes are good things that we wanna learn from and talk about. And of course, yeah. So if you're gonna go buy a company for 10 billion, that is not a democratic decision. That is a decision that's gonna be made by the CEO, by a group of people who are doing the m and a, and they're going to be very serious and meticulous about that decision. 

But overall there are thousands and thousands of decisions that get done every day. And so that's where I think you have to let go of those things and you don't have to be providing oversight on every single line item.

[00:11:59] Mahan Tavakoli: I love the way you put it, which is framing it with respect to guardrails and within those guardrails, people are allowed to make the decisions and then own up to the decisions and be accountable. 

At times though, when people do that, there ends up being mistakes, problems and issues. You talk a lot about the kind of culture and the importance of culture to the success of the business and serving as a cornerstone. 

What role do mistakes play within those guardrails in the kind of cultures that are important to thrive as organizations go through future crisis.

[00:12:47] Shaara Roman: Yeah, I think are absolutely important. That's how we innovate, we collaborate, think through, make learn and grow. I'm trying to think of a couple of  different clients or research that we did. But one of the organizations that we looked at that really pivoted very well during the pandemic as a company called Lisa, which is a mattress company. 

And they were always a nice place work, and connected to their community. But they wanted to bring hospital beds to hospitals that were in crisis and needing more beds for patients during covid. And so they were able to take a nine month cycle of building a bed, creating and shortening it to three weeks. Now, they did that by involving and democratizing that decision making. 

Letting people experiment, letting employees who had not been a part of the decision making be a part of how do we really solve this problem. And so they were very quickly able to do that and make mistakes along the way. Fix things, collaborate, just churn through that innovation cycle and get to the other end. 

So mistakes are a huge part of a growth culture. It's a huge part of culture of innovation. But mistakes when they are recognized as learning opportunities. I've certainly been in companies as an employee and I've been in companies as a consultant where someone makes a mistake. And they're either put in the penalty box for the rest of their lives or, they're fired even. 

I've been reading stuff about Elon Musk and Twitter and how he handles that. And then there are places where you screw up and you learn, and you work through it. I've personally made mistakes along the way and actually one of the biggest mistakes I think that I've made, I made a lot along the way was actually my early twenties when I first came here, was first married, I decided I was gonna be a real estate tycoon and insurance sales tycoon.

And I had what I believed was gonna make me successful was being really, Functionally at the work, I was gonna know everything I needed to know about real estate. I was gonna need to know everything about insurance and mutual fund sales, and that was actually not at all what I needed.It was all about networking. It was all about cultivating that while I flamed out in about 14 months. 

Needless to say, the market was also really bad at the time, but I flamed out. But what did I learn? I learned I needed a really network and I really couldn't come at this from being the expert, but that I really needed to rely on a lot of other people. I may not have known it at that exact moment, but when I started the business seven years ago, the Silvering group, I knew that and before I did anything. I talked to a whole bunch of people. So mistakes they really are, if you can put those into the learning context and you can feel safe at work.

[00:15:39] Mahan Tavakoli: I love that Shaara most specifically, because I talk a lot about the fact that leadership is an example and you are a leader in the example that you just shared. One of the things that I tell the leaders that I work with is if you want people to own up to their mistakes, have the humility to talk about your own mistakes and what you learn from them.

So I love the fact that, yes, you have written this book, but you shared a mistake that you made and a lesson you learned from it and sets the culture for a team to say it's okay. People understand we are flawed individuals anyway, We might as well be willing to admit it exactly and what we learned it and move on.

So that's a big part of culture, and I love the fact that you didn't only talk about it, but you shared a specific example and showed this is the kind of leadership people like to see that sets the culture and you keep talking about intentionality and the importance of intentionality behind having the right culture.

How can teams and organizations intentionally have the kind of culture that it takes to thrive? 

[00:17:04] Shaara Roman: Great question. So the first I will say is that if you aren't intentional with a culture, you will end up with a culture that you don't want because we all have a culture. And so, you do need to be and you do need to think about what is gonna work for your organization. And the second thing, I'll say before I get into what helps organizations thrive is that you can't copy someone else's culture. 

And you can't go surfing and saying, oh, Google does this and so this. Quick side story about the whole Google culture. I walked into a client's office several years ago, and they had pong tables and foosball and all the bells and whistles. And as we were talking how they needed help, they're like, yeah, no one's using this game room. 

Come to find out that, as we did our assessment and we get in there with the staff and doing focus groups and doing surveys and all this stuff, is that the moment you went in there, you got punished. You got bad looks from your manager. You got questioned where were you? Why were you playing games? 

The reason Google was successful years ago with that setup is because that's how work got done. Like the golf course, but the more modern version of, or the frat boy version or whatever it is of the golf course, right?So you have to really be intentional on what are you gonna do? Why are you gonna do it? 

So what I've seen, you do need to be conscious. You do need to think about what you say, what you do, And people are very discerning and quite candidly, millennials and Gen Zs in particular aren't super particular about that. They're gonna call you out, they're canceling you. We can get into a whole conversation about canceling culture, but they wanna see that gonna actually actually walk the talk. 

So don't say that have diversity or you value diversity and inclusion.But you go to the website and seven white men and one brown woman on the leadership team,and you know what they are talking about. So you do really have to be conscious and intentional and really think about how you wanna design the culture for your organization. Secondly, you need to really create a sense of community, because particularly in world where we are,Spread out, whether.Virtual, fully hybrid, all in the office and everything in between we're more global. And this has been a trend that's been happening for some time, The pandemic just accelerated it. .When you create community, you're creating a sense of purpose and connection that connects people's inner purpose with the purpose of the organization and makes them feel a part of something bigger than themselves The Navy has a purpose, or the Marine Corps has a purpose, but that purpose doesn't gel for me, I am not necessarily a service oriented person. I don't wanna put my life at risk to save the world. Sorry,not me, . So you can't just say that, oh, this is great purpose and people are gonna automaticallyconnect.It has to be something that they feel strongly about,  The second one is aroundReally nurturing talent.And I used that phrase,andI really thought about, what are the wordsI wanna use? I had a lot of different sort of phrases that evolved over time.But nurturing talent is intentionally used because you really wannaThink about who do you have on the team?how do you build a team that has different.strengths? And then how do you get everyone for you as the manager to help them understand and to have a conversation around what do they really bring? And What do they want to leverage as a strength in the workplace?How can you harness that? How can you connect it, and how do you make sure all the peace. Really work.And I love it when I look at teams and you don't need to have a superstar on the team,you need to work with the people you have,help them learn,help them grow, help connect through mentoring, through sponsorship through all of those things, and you wanna create that space where people can, Improve their skills and improve their contributions and see that connection.And the last piece is around, ownership. I always think about actually the stories that my mom told me about how I acted as a little girl that I was very independent. at a very young age. I was a year and a half and I wanted to put my own shoes on.I wanted to put the own buckle on. I wanted to pick own clothes. And I saw this in my kids too, and it's not that just we're so special. Ashumans, we crave a sense of autonomy and independence and so when you create a sense of ownership, whether it's through sharing the profits of the organization, whether it's through decision making, whether it's through accountability,all of those elements of ownership,you can actually create that kind of culture where people feel almost just as vested as you as the founder or the business owner or the c e O,O, you and I both have our own businesses,you know that,, I spend I think every waking minute and probably half my sleeping minutes, thinking about the business, not healthy, I know, but it's like my kid. . So we do that, and when you create that kind of environment where people are just as vested or almost just as vested in the success of the organization, Because you're letting them direct their own path, then you're gonna get that great culture,so it sounds very simple, but it comes to life in very different ways for every organization.

[00:22:22] Mahan Tavakoli: So I wanna unpac kthat a littlebit there. Shera would love to eventually then come back tothis sense of ownership, which is a big challenge that I hear frommany executives and leaders in organizations. But you mentioned a lot of greatperspectives with respect to howintentional leaders canbe with respect tothe culture.One of the concernsthat sometimesI hear from leaders or podcast listeners write in, they say,my God, this is going to take full time all the time.So how do I do this?That's one of their big questions is, how much time when already overstretched over anxious have more work than I know what to dowith howmuch time, effort, focus should.Beplacing onculture. Whether the c eo of our organization,or many instances is team leaders that want to make sure that they have a good culture withintheir team.What are your thoughts andperspectives with respect to the effort and time that culture takes as opposed todoing other things that are part of moving the businessor the organization's agenda forward too?

[00:23:37] Shaara Roman: I know many of your other podcast speakers have talked about this. There is no magic bullet for culture, It's like losing weight or getting in shape. I'd like to look like J Lo, she and I are the same age.But you know what? I'm not willing to work out four hours day every day. So It's on me, that I don't have abs that looks like her abs, but this's the same thing with culture. If you really want a great culture, you're going to have to decide That You're gonna prioritize it. And my sort ofpremise is that if you put your people the purpose first.The culture comes along with that,you're going to end up achieving. Thegoals that you want in terms of your revenue, in terms of yourprofitability. So it isshifting thatmindset and really ensuring thatyour foundation is right andthat you are putting in all the right ingredients to get where you want to go.But It's like a risottoas an example. Dunno why I'm goingthere. But gottakeep stirring it to getjust the right consistencyand texture.You can't just throw it in a pot and walk away that you might be able to do ifyou're boiling, bosma tea, rice as an example for, 18 minutes or whatever.So it doestake time and youdo have to prioritizeit. And you have torealize, we've heard all these quotes of culture eating strategy for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, it istrue. And one of the things too,Mahan is thatMany companieshave achieved successin spite of not havinga great culture.Andwhat Iwould love for people toJustpontificate on for a minute iswhat if I actuallydidthings where I put people first?where Ireally created this deep sense Ofcommunity, where I really nurtured that talent and did all thosethings. Whatexponential benefits wouldIget as a result of that?And I think that's the challenge when you're having success, it's hard to then dosomething that you don't see asworth it.But what happens insituations. When we have situations ofcrisisis if you have of a culture that's made out of a house of cards or an organization that's made out ofa house of cardsyou've been focusedexternally, thenit all starts to collapse.And we've been very luckythatfor the most part we've lived in kind of growth times.Butif you think about the percentage of c. that existed in the past on the Fortune 500, back when it was created and who exists today? It's something like 10 or 12 companies that still exist.Yeah,they were successful for a really long time, but now they've been eaten up, gulled up. Disappeared,whatever. So you do have tomake time.And anorganization that I think hasbeen very intentional. They're a small startup. I actually sit ontheir advisory board.It's a company called Enabled Intelligence. They are an AI firm. And the c eO is a techguy, he's a GovContech guy.Super smart. But He saw an opportunity in the AI space of working withthe intel market and he realized too that he neededget cleared.People who could sit there and focusand do the work of annotation, so it's very repetitivework. , but hesaid, howdo I solve this problem? How do I get the talent that Ineed and how doI build a culture that's gonna allow them tothrive?And that drove his work. And soalmost 50%,ormaybeit's even more than 50% ofworkforce arewith neurodisabilities.And hehas createdculture where they do performance management differently. They wea lot of breaks in so that people cancan step away.Train theirmanagersexcessively. They've managed todo it. They're raising money, they're growing, so if you start with that mindset of, Hey, I'm gonna putthis work inand really get this right, then all these other things come.

[00:27:28] Mahan Tavakoli: What a great couple of examples in that it takes effort. It is not just wishing it whetheryouwant to look like J Lo it's not just wishing itand saying, yes, it's important. It'sputting the effort inon aconsistentdaily basis,whether it's with respect to exercise or to diet.or the same thing with respect tothe culture.intentional cultureis not just somethingonce a year or once everycouple of yearsExactly. Weup with, this is what we want our culturebe. There is a consistenteffort that needs to. Go into it. And the AI company that you mentioned is a greatexample of that consistent effort, includingtraining forthe managers, which is a critical part of it.Shara,One of the challenges that I see in many organizations is that many of the. Mid-level managersdon't have the trainingand capability tosupport the culture that has been intentionally planned, but it's not intentionallylived. So it'simportant to do thattraining and development to support that intentional culture.For

[00:28:41] Shaara Roman: sure. And on that note of thethe manager,we'veactually done our middle managers a hugedisservice. Back in theeighties and the nineties when we startedto cut out those hierarchical layers because we wanted to flatten the organization andcut costs.we basically tookaway the people who were caring for their employees, and so now we've got thesetheoretically flatorganiz. , but they still have all ofthe hierarchy and thebureaucracy that existed, from the 1950s. We haven't really modernizedhow we work,we lead,How we. Justrun our businesses. And so now what you have are these, player coaches and you havemanagers who literally are doing the job ofand leadingon the side of their desk.Andthis is what wesee time and time again when we go in. And I'myou see it aswell, that.managers havebarelyany time, theycan barely get their work done,their functional work done, and then the way we'veConstructed this is the way youget promoted is tobe a manager and have people, so they throw a bunch of people underneath them.Get them the title.And, they're not equipped. They don't have time and thespace, To do their work. Everybodysuffers. Youget burnout, you aren't getting productivity because, people are working around the clock and so you'reyou're actually just likefueling this very vicious cyclethat we're in.And the time isjust soripe to radically rethink how we structure our work, our companies,how we think about what it means to lead and tomanage.This is the time. 

[00:30:22] Mahan Tavakoli: It is, and Axios had.a report onthe level of anxiety, which is at an extreme high, specificallyat the mid to upper management levels. Iinteract with a lotofmanagers thattell me I don't really have the time to meet. . Every one of my direct reports every week,and I tell them you have too many direct reports.But as you said,there are these player coaches.I feel likein many organizations we havebecome so efficient the sameway the supply chain had become efficient.Where we're the smallest issues in the supply chain? Therewere huge problems.problems. That'sthe same thing in organizations.So that middle management levelis really important to.Nurturingthe right kind of culture. Another thing you mentioned that I wanna touch on, you talked about that ownershipmentality and I wanted to see whatare things that leaders, whether at the senior levels of the organization or Mid-level managerscan do tofoster an ownershipmentality in their teams?

[00:31:35] Shaara Roman: I think there's a lot. We talked a little bit about distributingdecision making in the organization, we talkedlittlebit about exploring models or I've mentioned an esop, but you can look atcommissions, you can look at bonus basedincentives, you can look at profit sharing, you can look at employees, stockownership. . Fun fact companies That are ESOPs tend tooutperform thosethat are not so there's a lot of that sort of financial piece, but I think . Even justat a manager level, you can empower them so they can come up with their own ideas.Oftentimes we wanna tellour people what to do, andthen we also wanna tellthem how to do it, andwe don't need to tell people howto do it,What we need to say to folks is,here's what Ineed you to get done.I need this reportby five o'clock tomorrow, or , I wantyou toup withA mock idea for this new product,By the end of nextweek, but you don't need To prescribe to them.Empowering them and givingthem autonomyover their own. is,I think, one very good idea.The other isto reallyconnect them back to the why, and connecting that inner purposeand that outer purpose and why they'redoing it.Oftentimes, again,people throw things over the transom and say I need you to get this to me to bytomorrow. Why do you need it bytomorrow? What's the relevance of this document? Or,Here's this report. We've been doing this. , what do you use this report for? Because I actually mightbe able to give you something else when youneedit, as opposedGoing through these machinations of thisSorooting itIn the, why I mentioned letting themchoose the how and then theThe delegation andthe trust delegation is such a bane of managers, and leaders, even at the very highest levels, they tend to havetheirgo-to. They keepgivingmore and more of the same stuff to the go-to people who endgetting burnedoutand they're likeI don't trust anyone else to do it.How do you know you don'ttrust themyou don't give other people anSo really try to, find other people to givethe work to do and to trustthem.And again, it's one of those guardrails, talkedabout give them something little, seehow they do, and you can keep working it that way.And if you're just, again, notto overuse the word intentional, but if you're just intentional abouthow you'redistributing work, what you aredoing with work, how you're reallyThinking aboutownership.You can have it done it doesn't have to be this sort of big thing.When we're talking about ownership, we're not talkingabout giving away 80% of your company,It doesn't have to be that People can just ownlittle parts. Of what they do and howthey contribute to the organization. And then you have to holdpeople accountable, accountabilityis not throwing them under the bus or screaming at them, but it isSaying, okay, youdidn't get this done,or, there were a lot of mistakes. Let's talk through what happened. Maybe thiswas not something that played to your strengths, please don't give me any detailed spreadsheets to look at cuz I can probably get itdone, butnot gonna bethe best workthat I.

[00:34:25] Mahan Tavakoli: Shara, actually, that's one of the thingsmy soloepisode inNovember was about that accountabilitybecause withclients that I interact with, it's one of the biggest challenges that many of them haveWherethere is aof accountability, but part of that lack of accountability iswhat wewere talking about earlier.There isn't that consistent touchpoint toGive people the feedback and hold them accountable, which is an important part of that ownership mentality. Ownership is not just washing your handsand telling people, doyou want to do, that accountability is a criticalpart of it and helps people growand thrive inthe organization as well.So it's really important. Now, I lovedthe fact that you touch on some of the shift and challengesahead. I'veread a lot of books, had podcast conversations,and trulybelieve that if we think the. Two years weredisruptive. We are in fora surprise because the next five will be a lot more disruptive. So what arethe shifts that you see happening and what roledoes having aconscious culture and workplace play in organizationsbeing able to adjustand thrive through those 

[00:35:45] Shaara Roman: shift? If I had a real crystal wall about what wasgonna happen in the next five years, I'd besuper rich . Weknowthat demographically, we've got Gen Zs more and more ofthem cominginto the workplace. And we'vegot, the great resignation, the quiet quit. We've got warin Ukraine.only knows when that's going to end.So I think going back to, first of all what we talked about, a bit about being intentional, butreally making sure that as a leader you're reading about everything that's changing.That you recognize that theway you did things beforeis not gonna be the wayIt is in the future. I do think that change is just gonna be constant.I We've said this nowfor a really long time, but change at this accelerated paceand living. Tremendous amounts of uncertainty. Before, even thoughwe would talk about change,there was a certain amount of stability that we expectedInthe worldaroundus, and we don'thave that.So even talking about burnout and stressthatis contributing, Our social feedsare constantly blowing up, so we're gonna havetothink about mental. , how that shows up inthe workplace. What are we gonna do for each other?How are we going toput programs and benefitsin place? And I'm nottalking about yoga and that stuff, ofcourse that'sreally good.But wedo need to think aboutourworkloads. We need to think about are we givingpeople the right resources and supports to get the help thatthey.Ourworkloads in particular are just increasing and we can't keep doing more with less. So we have to change that mindset, change that paradigm, and reallyabout what arewe doing in our organizations that'snot adding valuethat we need to stop doing because it isjust not sustainable to keep adding.Folks are gonna need torethink how they're leading in organizations. I think we're gonna need to rethink our organization's structures.Weare gonnahave tothink more creatively than not everyone is going to be anemployee. We're going to have  Tomanage a combination ofemployees and consultants and gig workers and Robotsand AI and machine, all of this is gonna come together.So our managers and leaders are gonna have to be much more sophisticated inmanaging that diversity. And also managing the diversityof the workforce. When wemight have come into theworkforce. It was a little different.Everyone was buttoned up,everyone wore suits, But nowyour Gen Z young adults are wearing cutoffs to work. Everyone's got tattoos,everyone'sgot piercings, my poor dad who's 80 something, he's wigging out what is going on? Why aren't people wearing a suit to go out to dinner?I'm like, dad no. This is the way it is.And that's asilly example,The pandemicreally accelerated that dress code shift. And so these are all thethings that are gonna behappening, the burnout, the stress the Gen Zs coming in the org structures, theThe perfectionism thatwe keep striving for.Allof that is gonna haveTo changeand we'regonna have togonna have to do it quicklyand not sit there ringing our hands on, I don't have time forthis, you're gonnagonna have.Fail fast. You'regonna have to try something.If itdoesn't work, you'regonna have to be transparent about it and keep going.And that's gonna be hard.I think we're gonnasee a lot ofimplosions of companies,andI think we're gonnasee a lot of consolidation and companies Collapsing. AndI do think that there will be a movement oran opportunityreally for B Corps to shine and forI'm hoping that E S G , thatwith boards really paying a little bit more attention to E S G,That helps to really driveall of this change in organizations, and I know that would bemore sort of public company and private companies, the bigger companies, but hopefully that will start to cascade down as well.

[00:39:25] Mahan Tavakoli: The expectations, that employees who are key tothe success of anyorganization, have, of the organization are very differentthan the expectations that they had.20 or moreyears ago, even five in the E S G that you mentioned absolutely plays a big rolein that. So it'snot just doing it because it's the right thing to do,it's doing it because it's critical to being able to have the kind of talent you want to have for the organizationto thrive and not be one of the ones that implode.Soit's gonna be criticalfor that. So asleaderslooking at thisshift whatpractices and or resources do you recommendto them to be able to adjust to thisuncertainty and ongoingcrisisbetter thanothers?

[00:40:23] Shaara Roman: That's a reallygoodquestion.I think that leaders need to surround themselvesWith people thatdon't think the sameas them.And we alllike to be with people who think the same asus, but I think that,Many CEOs are ine o forums and groupsand things like that, and I think as theyintroduce newpeople into those forums or they join ones, theydo need to find people whothink differe.and who aregonna challenge their thinking and who are gonna bring some different perspectives to bearBecause I think that will helpall of us achieve abetteroutcome. Ialways think reading isgreat. I tryto read and it's just whatever floats your boat, but really try toread things from different sources.I read The Economist, I read H BR, I read Vox, I readThe Washington Post, I read whatever falls intomy Instagram feed I try tojust hear different perspectives onwhat's happening.Because everyone sort reads the tealeaves in slightly different ways,and then you have toJust take it and do that.Andthe more diverse kind of youris, so to speak,thebetter. I thinkthat they will beinformed. The last thingI'llis just be Be open torecognizing thatyou don't have all the answers, that you are not right all thethe time. and that the worldIs different.And that if you don't understand that fundamental piece, you'rehavehave a really hard time bleeding.

[00:41:47] Mahan Tavakoli: Itabig challengebecause the rules of the gameare changing at a faster and faster pace,whereit's makingit really hard, but alsoreally energizing.One ofreasons I enjoythe doing this podcast, having conversationswith authors like you, Shera, isthat it forces me to continually learn read great books and learn fromit.I think that is going to be critical as the pace of change Goes faster and faster. How can the audience find out more about you and your books?

[00:42:22] Shaara Roman: I'm on LinkedIn. That'sprobably one of the easiest ways to find me, and it's very simple.It's myname, last name.So ShaaraRoman, and there's three A's in my firstname they can go to my companywebsite@silvergroup.com.Theycan go tothe book website, which is shara roman.com. So followus on LinkedInconnect,reach out. Happy to engage inmore convers.

[00:42:47] Mahan Tavakoli: II really appreciate the conversation, Shara,mostspecificallybecause what you mentioned about culture and the examples you giveculture inyour bookcan help people thinkabout it, reflect on it, and make it aa practice. Because as you mentioned in theconversation, it'snot just intentionality with respect to knowing thekind of culture youwant, it's intentionality withto the ongoing practices that establish the kind of consciousworkplace that you wanthave.Thank you somuch for joining me inconversation. Shara Roman.my pleasure, 

[00:43:25] Shaara Roman: Mahan.Thank you so much.