Redefining Success: A Human Approach to Technology with Stephen Wiggs, Kyle Shaffar, and Ryan Siemer

[INTRODUCTION]

Alex Cullimore: Well, hello, Cristina. 

Cristina Amigoni: Hello. It's been a while. 

Alex Cullimore: It has been a while. And yet, we are here on our usual Friday while this is being released on our usual Wednesday. 

Cristina Amigoni: It's Friday. Yes. Always Friday to Wednesday. Not consecutive. Takes some time in between. 

 Alex Cullimore: Yes. Time traveling backwards. We are actually – kind of we are. I guess this is now something from the past. Anyway, that whole pontification aside, we just had a really fun conversation with three of our clients actually. People we've worked with for the better part of the last couple of years, Ryan, and Kyle and Wiggs. And we've just gotten to work with them in all kinds of capacities. But we've been bugging them and joking with them that they needed to be on the podcast for a while. And we got them in the last month. So we got them to this. And so, this is a very exciting conversation to have, to share. They're very real. They're very human.

Cristina Amigoni: They are. They're human. They care about humans. And you'll hear in the podcast why they came on and shared and why we wanted them on the podcast. And a lot of it is – not a big part. It's about who they are. But an important part for us was the fact that they work in a technology department organization. 

And so, that's part of what we talked about. And it's like you're technologists. And yet, here we are valuing, and talking and focusing on the humans. And why that's a big connection and why it's needed. 

Alex Cullimore: And they have a lot of great metaphors for explaining it. And so, it's a great one to just tie in why this is important and how it really works. I really appreciate all of their perspectives. So big thanks to Ryan, Kyle and Wiggs. And also, I hope everybody enjoys this. 

 Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Enjoy it. 

 Alex Cullimore: Welcome to Uncover the Human where every conversation revolves around enhancing all the connections in our lives. 

Cristina Amigoni: Whether that's with our families, co-workers or even ourselves. 

Alex Cullimore: When we can be our authentic selves, magic happens.

Cristina Amigoni: This is Cristina Amigoni. 

Alex Cullimore: And this is Alex Cullimore. Let’s dive in.

Cristina Amigoni: Let’s dive in. 

“Authenticity means freedom.”

“Authenticity means going with your gut.”

“Authenticity is bringing 100% of yourself not just the parts you think people want to see, but all of you.”

“Being authentic means that you have integrity to yourself.”

“It's the way our intuition is whispering something deep-rooted and true.”

“Authenticity is when you truly know yourself. You remember and connect to who you were before others told you who you should be.”

“It's transparency, relatability. No frills. No makeup. Just being.”

[INTERVIEW]

 Alex Cullimore: Welcome back to this episode of Uncover the Human. We have a number of firsts on the podcast today. First of all, this is our first time with three guests. We have Kyle, Ryan and Wiggs here. Second first, we have clients who have had the either misfortune or fortune of working with us depending on how you look at it. And third, I don't know, just it's fun to have all three of you on here. 

Let's start with what brought you guys to the podcast? And welcome. 

 Cristina Amigoni: Welcome. You got lost on the third one there. Did you? 

 Alex Cullimore: Yeah, I didn't have a third one. I thought it would come along. It did not. 

 Kyle Shaffar:Kind of like your acronym. 

Alex Cullimore: So close. So far. Kyle has been the subject of many of my acronyms. 

Kyle Shaffar: I mean, I think we always have fun talking. Always learn something. I'm always happy to do more of it. It's always a good time. It's better time when there's cocktails involved. Not just on Cristina's shirt. But, yeah. I just enjoy the content and always leave the conversation smarter and happier. That's why I'm here.  

Alex Cullimore: And to put a name to that voice, that one's Kyle, for people who are not on YouTube. 

Cristina Amigoni: Tall order. Let's see how we can reach that. Wiggs? Ryan?

Ryan Siemer: Oh. Okay. Steve passed me. This is Ryan. I wholeheartedly agree with Kyle, which shouldn't be a shock. 

Steve Wiggs: That's not starting off normal. We haven't got the true authentic Ryan yet, if he's agreeing with – 

Ryan Siemer: Oh, he's coming. He's coming. 

Steve Wiggs: He's coming. Okay. 

Ryan Siemer: Depends on where we take this thing. 

Cristina Amigoni: We're getting nice Kyle. It's easy to agree with nice Kyle. 

 Steve Wiggs: Why am I here? Well, I'm here because I'm actually a listener, right? And I'm also here because I was shamed into participating because you guys wouldn't leave us alone until we agreed to do this. That's the two reasons that I'm here. 

Ryan Siemer: Truth. 

Cristina Amigoni: The secret to uncovering the human is uncovering the shame. 

Alex Cullimore: Yeah. That's our next leadership course. It's about how shame can drive productivity and podcast guests. 

Steve Wiggs: Driven by cocktails. 

Cristina Amigoni: That's a good jumping point actually, Alex. Productivity and humans in the workplace. You're all technologists. Well, except for Ryan, who's a humanist. You've had your careers in technology all your lives. And the two of you, Kyle and Steve, are very human-focused. As in ridiculously human-focus in a good way, ridiculously way. But very unique for technologists. Why is that? And what do you find that to be valuable? 

Steve Wiggs: Early on, being a technologist was you're such a nerd, right? I mean, you were looked at like as somebody that came out of a cave with secrets. And I think I figured out early on that I couldn't be successful in doing anything with tech if I didn't make the people believe that it was for their benefit instead of their temperament, right? 

Originally, it was all about people. I mean, still said today, but then it was you're just trying to replace me, right? You just want to make the machine do this faster than I do. And then why should I help you create that? 

Early on, I couldn't be successful with technology unless I worked with the people who needed it and figured out a way to make them like it. And that was it. It became less tech talk and more people talk meant more success. 

Kyle Shaffar: Yeah. I think early on, too, I realized that you can get so far going alone in this type of business. And you can probably get further now with technology, and LLM, and ChatGPT and everything. But to really move the needle, it's a team sport. And teams is made up of people. And so, how you really accelerate is working on those connection points between people and making sure the team has what they need to be successful. 

To me, what drives the best outcome is when somebody knows why they're doing something and who they're doing it for. And they can connect to that purpose and have that empathy, then the truth problem solving comes out. Because if you don't do it that way, you're sort of just an order taker. And it's a commodity. 

But the real skill and a really good technologist is their creativity and their way that they solve the problem. And then, again, being able to scale it with others is really a lock to true efficiency. Because you can only go so far alone. Just a core truth. 

Alex Cullimore: Ryan, how about you? What brought you into this kind of work? What made you human-focused? 

Ryan Siemer: Well, I think it's cool you call me a humanist, Cristina, for one. I'm like, "That's a title I'll take. Thank you." I think I'm on here with a bunch of humanists by the way. I think it's a cool way you ask the question for Steve and Kyle and working with them and sort of the capacity I do. I do get to see them lead in the ways that they're sort of talking about. That's pretty cool. I mean, I'd love to talk more about that, too, because I like acknowledging you guys for the good stuff you do. 

For me, I didn't really know. I spent most of my career not really knowing what I was sort of good at. I also wasn't really connected to who I was in my core. The fact that I work in a technology team feels very familiar. Kyle, you talked about the creativity and sort of the art of the teams. I stand In Awe actually of a lot of our technology people. I have a lot of friends in engineering and technology. 

And so, for me, the things that sort of brought me into my current work around motivation and measuring motivation, and continuous improvement and productivity enhancement, a lot of those principles have existed in technology teams and organizations for a number of years. I feel fortunate that I get to work and sort of the position that I do. Kind of doing what I love every day. 

Steve Wiggs: He's too modest. We're blessed in the technology department to have people like Ryan there, okay? It changed the outlook of what the leaders and the staff recognize for what's important, right? I mean, it shifted the mindset from, "I have a really cool piece of tech. Sure, hope I can find a problem." Right? To, "What do the people need? And how can we help? And how do we engage with them?" We're fortunate in that our leadership group realizes that you don't solve every problem just by throwing tech at it. 

Kyle Shaffar: Well, yeah. I mean, the thing I love is how you do it is more important even than the outcome. Now that's tested in times of difficulty like we're in right now as a country as financial stuff happens or whatever. But we take care of the people, whether they're our customers or our own teams. And I think that's super important because you can get hyper-focused on just the outcome. But that doesn't last you the long haul. 

Ryan Siemer: I like that we approach problems optimistically like there are solutions to these. I feel like that's sort of innate in who we are. That's pretty cool. There's no problem you can't solve. And we do look at them together. It's not an individual sport. Like you said, Kyle, it's a team sport. 

Kyle Shaffar: Optimism is harder for some of us. 

Cristina Amigoni: Nobody in this room. Well, sometimes you need realism. And sometimes you do need the other side of optimism just to play the devil's advocate. It's not always rainbows and sunshine. What are we not seeing? What are the problems that are still there? What problems are we dancing around and avoiding to solve instead of solving them? 

Steve Wiggs: Never seen that occur. Never seen really the deep-rooted issue ignored and we'll slap a new coat of paint on the top of it and call it done, right? It's a bad habit. The concept of they need something now. We don't have time to redo the plumbing. Just change out the color of the fixture and pretend that it's fixed. 

Kyle Shaffar: Yeah. I mean, that's like the old adage. There's never a good time for having a baby or making a big change or whatever you want. I mean, there is no perfect time for it. But absolutely, that's putting lipstick on a pig or whatever is not. You may get a little endorphin rush from checking that box. But like you're not really doing anything, right? 

Ryan Siemer: I like to say that we need to experience enough pain in order for change to happen. I don't know. Just in this moment I'm like, "No. There's a lot of pain sometimes." The pain is not necessarily in the right place. 

Steve Wiggs: You should be really happy then working around us because the pain threshold seems to get higher. And it's not because we don't have good people and it's not because, like I said a while go, as a group, we're trying, right? Maybe we're too self-aware. I don't know. I mean, it seems like every time that we attack one thing it uncovers four more and it just keeps compounding. 

Kyle Shaffar: I mean, I think a lot of it though is, whether it's pain or happiness or whatever, it's a force that pushes you out of the rut you're in. And our ruts have gotten deeper. It takes more to move us out, right? Yeah, you build up a tolerance I suppose or a grin and bear it mindset or push through. But I sure would like it to be more of the happiness or the fun stuff pushes you out than the pain. 

Ryan Siemer: I think the solutions that we have to problems, too. Especially when you're dealing with people who have, I mean, obviously, smarts. But a lot of experience in a situation or in these circumstances, you tend to disagree on what the right way is and you only have so much energy or resources to apply to solving that problem. 

I think it's also the brilliance of the teams and what we tend to see in technology with self-management. But solving those problems at the team level, that can take a little bit of time to do that. I mean, you have to push those problems down. You have to allow for solutions to come up from teams. 

My experience has always been there's opportunity. Because I think to some degree, I mean, we're humans. We like to control stuff. And so, there's usually a person or a group of people trying to control an outcome and rather than relinquish a solution to a group. 

Steve Wiggs: Trust that it's going to work, right? Trust that if you enable the people, you give the people the autonomy, you get smart people, you give them the framework. But trust it. And the need for speed is what I'm seeing lately is a very large contributing factor to not trusting people. We say we do. But then we don't allow that person to have the time to reach their own conclusions, and to do their own trials, and to make their own mistakes, and to get better and to learn because we have this desire for speed. Get things done faster. 

When you lose patience with somebody, you've just set back that trust that you were trying to build with them and then you got to start over. And if we, as leadership, can't say, "If it takes one month to figure it out, I trust that they'll end up in the right place. And if a month is too slow for somebody, that's where my job comes in. To take the arrows. To stand between the person that we're enabling and we're trusting to solve the problem and the person who thinks that it should be done tomorrow."

Kyle Shaffar: Yeah. I think patience is key. And I think also, we're trying to get speed. Some people think you're trying to get speed here. When in reality, you want it here, right? So that initial investment may slow you down at first. But if you end up faster in the long run, that's what you want. We're optimizing for the long run, the long haul. Not the micro sort of – 

 Steve Wiggs: Not this month's deliverables. Not this quarter's deliverables. We're trying to optimize and to build highly productive teams for the long haul. 

Ryan Siemer: Yeah. We're running different races with different lengths. 

Cristina Amigoni: Well, and there's a sacrifice for long-term success when there's short-term gain or perceived gain because it's perceived. Because it's not gain. Like you said, you can go fast. You can look like you're going fast now. And then, when you're redoing that over and over and over, then are you going fast or are you just slowing down? 

I mean, we saw it. Alex and I saw it over and over and over in an HCM system implementations. Sure. Try to do it in 90 days. And then you're in support and redoing the implementation for the next three years because you actually couldn't do it in 90 days. 

Alex Cullimore: Cost that long-term speed. But you also cost all the energy of people. For the three of you, that patience is definitely an important one to keep in mind. And I like the idea of it not just being a month or a quarter or a year. But thinking about what the long term ones. That might be a way to access some of that patients. What are some other ways you would have to let go a little bit? Let that control go and trust that process? 

Steve Wiggs: My favorite saying is I have to let them fail, right? And even when you can see it coming, even when you see that they're collecting information that you think is necessary to make the right call that you can tell they're going to make the wrong call. And you can either intervene and say, "Nope. You're wrong. You gotta do it this way." And then even if you try to explain why, okay? It's not as good as – then I try to step back and say, "Okay, now how do I prepare to do my job to protect that individual when it doesn't work so that they get a second chance to reevaluate their decision-making process success? And the next time, they'll come to a better conclusion." It's letting them fail but ensuring that they don't get punished for it. But instead they're rewarded with another chance. 

Steve Wiggs: Yeah. I think, somehow, convincing the teams or the people that that is a safe to fail environment. A lot of people say that. But when there's no evidence of it, no one really believes it. I think you hear the term celebrate your failures. I don't know if anybody likes to fail. But I think that's that safety and knowing we have their back. And as long as they learn from their mistakes, it's a learning opportunity. That's all failure is to me. 

But we also got to fail fast. The cycle time is really important. You don't want to wait till the end of a two-year project and that's when you fail. You want to fail early and often and then pivot. And so, I think that's giving the teams a way to know how they're doing and get those touch points. And that feedback loop is sort of a way to enable them to take control of that problem solving themselves. 

If they don't know how they're doing, I don't really know if they're solving the problem or not. You got to get them exposure to whether stakeholders or customers or people that can approve or tell them if they're on the right path. Otherwise, it's just an echo chamber of they think they're doing great. But, yes, Steve. Letting them fail and then helping them pick back up and pivot is super important. 

Ryan Siemer: There's a huge unseen here that I just want to call out. Some people probably see it. You have to take a stand as a leader of a team. Sometimes take some hits in order to do what, Kyle and Steve, you guys are talking about. Because who's on the line for a result or for an outcome or for a deliverable? 

In order to intentionally develop folks or bond the team and bring them together and inject some of that accountability within the team, you may have to take those hits and do some – I mean, things have to get done, right? I think it's a line we walk continuously. But I think that success absolutely comes from that. I just think that like those behaviors that you guys are describing, it goes unseen a lot of times. And therefore, unacknowledged. 

I think it's important that we acknowledge the leaders out there who do what you guys are talking about. And frankly, you do, too, every day. It is difficult for me personally sometimes not to just take it and do it, especially when I'm like, "I could just do this. And a hell of a lot faster than it would be for you to complete it." 

And sometimes I wonder if the folks that I'm like intentionally kind of setting up, I'm like, "Oh, they're going to hate me for this. Or they're going to see this down the line and see it as kind of a benefit." But it is important that you – Steve, I think you touched on this. You recognize that if this is maybe a skin their knee type of a moment, and I think we all need those to get something from that more than if somebody just told you. But having that experience and then really learning from that. 

Kyle Shaffar: Right on. And I think how – I think this is an important point. I think if we're sort of honest and transparent with our stakeholders or whoever we're solving the problem for, whether it's users or customers, if they understand that it is a skin your knee moment and we're building upon that for the long run, they're a lot – they're human, too. They're willing to invest in that. 

But if you sort of hide it away and they don't know what's going on, you just sort of cover it up, then it just looks like we're slow or incompetent or whatever. But they're willing to give a lot of grace if you communicate effectively and say, "Listen. We took our own path. But we're going to pivot and be better from it. Because mistakes happen. Bugs happen when you develop software. And if you're not, you're not trying hard enough."

But I think how you communicate and giving them a chance to be a true partner and give you that grace and that cushion to allow you to overcome and win in the long run despite a short-term failure is crucial. But that requires a lot of trust and a lot of humility to kind of go hat in hand to your customer or to your user and sort of explain what's going on. 

Steve Wiggs: You're right on. We use that phrase all the time, the transparency, right? But then we don't always want to do that to the people who are afraid of or going to get upset because I just shared with them all of our warts, right? We know we're weak here. We know we're going to go slower there. 

Well, to your point, Kyle, I agree that you always want to do that. I always want to be fully transparent and say, "Hey, this is not my varsity team, okay? But this is a team that, if they start here with you today, could be your team for the next three or four years. And they can take you far. But you're not going to get varsity-level play here in year one. But if you'll work with me, you'll end up with a team of your own. That is invested in you, your business and your product, right?" 

But boy, you're talking about walking out on the edge of the plank, right? You've got to have what you just described, Kyle. They better have a little human in them, right? And want that success as much as you do. 

Kyle Shaffar: If they don't, then you're building it for their own people. 

Steve Wiggs: Yeah. Wrong customer. 

Cristina Amigoni: I definitely agree. Yeah, it's interesting because it happens everywhere. But it's very common to forget or to assume that the other is not human. We are human. We make mistakes. We feel shame. We won't forget – we beat ourselves up way more than others could possibly beat us up most of the times. And yet, when it comes to the other side, we forget that that person is human. And when we do provide transparency, it's hopefully, most likely than not, we get a human response. We get a human recognizing the humanity. 

Ryan Siemer: I mean, what are we doing here on Earth, in business? I think all of that really matters. And as you're talking, Cristina, it reminds me of Covey's win-win. You have to know who you're coming into conversation or contact with. If the other person wants you to lose, you can't win. And I think the transparency is critical in a situation where it's about we both can win here. And you can do that by showing the warts. I just think that's really important to pretend like that you are infallible or perfect is just like that's ridiculous. 

Kyle Shaffar: It's not a zero-sum game. But we act that way sometimes, right? I agree. The win. If you can get a win-win even if it's small win on one side. Tt doesn't have to be a tit for that zero-sum game, right? 

Ryan Siemer: That's no fun. 

Kyle Shaffar: No. It's not. Unless you win all the time. That's not fun. 

Steve Wiggs: Yeah. I was going to say, it's not for me because I lose too much when I try to do that. Yeah. Loser. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yeah. It's interesting. Why is it that there's so many interactions or within organizations or between organizations even? Like in consulting, there's a lot of competition that it's almost like the motivation is to make sure the other side loses? Instead of what if we just provide value, and we went together and we figure this out? 

Ryan Siemer: How much time you got let's unpack that one? 

Steve Wiggs: I'll start with one. There'll probably be an incentive and measured wrong, right? I mean, especially when you get in – sorry. I'm going to bad-mouth professions. And I apologize if there's anybody listening. 

Cristina Amigoni: We do it all the time. 

Steve Wiggs: Consulting and salespeople, right? They're measured by defeating the competition, okay? They're not measured on customer and customer referrals enough or customer satisfaction enough or close sales happiness, right? I mean, they're measured on did you take the business from the competitor. To them, it's what Kyle was saying. It's, "I got to win. You got to lose." 

Kyle Shaffar: No. It's a spot on. I mean, same thing happens inside of business, right? If they're incentivized to micro optimize their own P&L themselves but then the company P&L suffers, that's the wrong incentive. 

Steve Wiggs: Yeah. I was going to use the budget, right? Oh, I heard what the budget was this year for capital investments. I got to go get mine first, right? Instead of saying, "Gee. I hope we can all sit down and pick the right things for the company." I've never seen that happen. Never seen that happen. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yeah. Now it's a whole other podcast episode. 

Ryan Siemer: Your question is a whole other podcast episode. 

Kyle Shaffar: We can do a whole podcast episode where everybody is sarcastic the whole time. 100%. 

Cristina Amigoni: Isn't that your Friday morning meetings that we are no longer part of? 

Ryan Siemer: Hey, we get stuff done in those meetings. 

Kyle Shaffar: We do? 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, you do. 

Ryan Siemer: We still are. It's movement. 

Steve Wiggs: Best one ever today. 

Cristina Amigoni: That's what I've heard. All you need is for us to not be there.

Alex Cullimore: Yeah. We should get out of there. Get out of the way.

Cristina Amigoni: Yeah. Get out of the way. 

Ryan Siemer: Now we need you to bring us to a point. 

Steve Wiggs: All parents have to let their children go out on their own at some point, right? You had to let us go because you have others to save. Now you need to move on. Fix other people. 

Kyle Shaffar: I think though in all, all kidding aside, there can be a lot of different outcomes of a meeting. And what strikes me on some of those meetings is the cathartic nature or just the, "Hey, we're not in this alone," is an enormous win that we don't probably take enough credit for – yeah, we probably get through problems and we probably get to solutions. But that investment is sort of what keeps us whole and sort of keeps us from feeling like we're alone. And that has a lot of value. 

I mean, it sort of presents itself like it's a bitch fest or it's a therapy session. But that's not really what it's about. It's about knowing that, again, you're not alone. We're part of a team. We're here to pick each other up. 

Steve Wiggs: Is that where we go to discover the human? Is that what I'm trying to plug? 

Cristina Amigoni: I think so. 

Steve Wiggs: Send me my check.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. In the mail. 

Ryan Siemer: Kyle, you're onto something. I feel like – I mean, so many thousands of books written on leadership and effective teams. And there's so many standouts. But like it is the team having the ability to come together and connect in that way. I mean, that's how the work gets done. A shared experience. A discussion about what is real. And some of those things are in your control. Some of them are not. But how can you influence the things that aren't? 

And I think maybe even settling in a short term potentially of things. It's like I disagree with that. But, hey, we got to move on. Sometimes it just feels good to vent it. If you can't do that as a team, you can't be effective. You need to have that space. 

Also, you need to be able to fix shit, too. Because if things don't change, well, then it just becomes pointless and meaningless. And then I think any good person who isn't just sitting and collecting a check wants to move on to the next thing. 

Kyle Shaffar: Well, and you need teammates that can sort of tell you when you're spiralling right now or you're just – come on. You've come with the same gripe seven times in a row. It's time to fix it now. And so, that's sort of the best asset we have is having teammates that can not only help us with what we're doing but help us recognize when we're stuck or recognize this time that I do just need to listen. Because this person, that's what they need, right? 

You talk about a long-term investment of people then you want to go to war with or whatever, the opposite, have a party with, I guess? I'd probably rather do that than go to war. 

Alex Cullimore: Probably. 

Kyle Shaffar: But that's it. Yeah. I don't know. War? 

Cristina Amigoni: Depends on who's on the other side. 

Alex Cullimore: Depends on which day of the week. 

Kyle Shaffar: Yeah. I have trouble with that optimism. We established that. 

Cristina Amigoni: You can assemble your army. We'll be having cocktails on the other side. 

Steve Wiggs: Civil War reenactment. We'll be on the hill with our picnic baskets and our coolers. Kyle will be aiming. Let's go.

Alex Cullimore: Party? War? Porque no los dos. You bring up an interesting point that there has to be both the kind of commitments to caring for each other. And guys have identified the team sport nature of so much of business. And it is a team sport. And then it's so easy still then to forget. I mean, there still needs to be meetings like that where there can be that connection. There can be that – whether it feels like therapy. Whether it's a moment of taking action or just a moment to have that space. There ends up being both of those – both of the sides being – it's interesting that we can know that it's team sport and still forget so quickly and need that space so much. And so, I'm curious what you guys think about creating more space for that and just how people could do that in general workplaces. 

Steve Wiggs: That's a Ryan question. Let's see what the doctor has to say.

Cristina Amigoni: The humanist. 

Ryan Siemer: No doctor here. I'll take the humanist. Maybe I've earned that. I don't know. Still need to earn it. Part of what is going through my mind right now, Alex, is, well, how many teams are we talking about? 

Cristina Amigoni: All of them. 

Ryan Siemer: Well, I mean, in the National Football League, you can be a team and then you can be in the National Football League, right? I think there's this perception of, "Well, are we teams that compete in an organization?" And some of it, which I think we've talked about here, "Do I try to control my own P&L and try to control resources? Because I'm trying to control work. Because I'm trying to get things done and I'm trying to deliver. And at what cost?" But the cost to the greater good. 

If we do see ourselves as like part of a larger team or organization, the better. But sometimes that could be challenging. I do struggle – like as much of an optimist as I am, I do struggle to see I don't know that everybody operates that way. 

And so, if you're the type of company that says, "No. It's a value. And this is important to us." Then you also need to be committed to rooting out where you don't see it. And I think that that is a real struggle because then that puts you into potential conflict or confrontation not only with a value first, but then with sitting across the desk maybe from another human being and saying, "It's not working out." 

Wasn't it like a Jack Welch famous thing or maybe this is fake? Maybe it's fake news. But famously, firing the person that delivered results at GE so many years ago because they did it the wrong way. It's that kind of mentality. You have to be more committed to the organization than to an individual or a team. 

Kyle Shaffar: Yeah. I mean, I think it comes back to what you incentivize. You got to incentivize both. But you can go the other way, too, of if you're not careful and end up in an entitled world where it's all about feeling good and you don't deliver anything. It a balance. You've got to find a way to incentivize both. It's just as important that you deliver, as it is about how you deliver, as it is about how you set up your team to deliver the next time. 

Finding a way to reward or incentivize all three of those things is the trick. But it's really hard because some of it's hard to measure, right? It's pretty easy to know, "Did you deliver or not? Did you hit your revenue goal or not?" It's a little bit harder to say, "Did you build a team that can do it next time?" 

Steve Wiggs: We can take the same thing and deal with the issues that we're dealing with a lot today, right? We take our micro teams within our delivery units within technology, right? We're measuring them. Definitely measuring them on how quickly they can produce and what their velocity is, right? We figure that one out a long time ago, okay? But on the other hand we also want them to be technically sound in those development efforts. 

And then the third angle is we want to be innovative at the same time, right? You take a business unit. You take your football teams, okay? They're competing in each other but they're all supposed to do it within the same confines. They all have the same set of rules, right? And those rules are set to ensure that the whole league benefits from it. 

Kyle Shaffar: Unless you're the Patriots. 

Steve Wiggs: Unless you're the Patriots and then you don't have any rules. You're right. Especially against the Rams. Okay. In our world, we got these smaller business units that are told to act like entrepreneurs. And by the very statement, it's like all shackles have been removed and they're allowed to ignore the framework that everybody else has to operate with that. 

But on the other side, you've got a larger organization, right? And it's told to absorb all the overhead and expense to make sure the entrepreneur is successful. Because we want them to innovate. But then, whatever the crap is they innovate, we expect somebody else to own and operate, right? 

I don't know how we create an NFL model because it doesn't allow for innovation. It doesn't allow for trying new things. But it delivers great results, right? The most popular sport with the highest ratings and the most revenue of anybody else. 

The model can be solid if the product that you have is perfect in their case, right? But when you're creating products, you can't operate each one of your business units the same. That is a problem when you're in technology. That is a problem when you're in HR. That is a problem when you're in marketing, right? Because those supporting divisions have to be as nimble as the most nimble startup within the company and is structured as the most structured historical business unit company all at the same time. That's a problem for people above my pay grade. I mean, you can see it in everybody. 

Alex Cullimore: NFL comparison is interesting there, especially with the Patriots idea. Because that does point – I guess there is a game to game competition where these two teams are pitted against each other and one's going to win by the end of the fourth quarter there, right? There is win-loss there. But there's also a whole season to play. But then there's also a whole career of each of the people that are all being swapped out between teams. And then when somebody like the Patriots come along and there's a scandal because they've cheated on deflating some of the big, then you end up kind of rocking faith in the full system. Aand the full system exists to benefit each of the teams even if it's not the winning team of the season. 

It does show that, even then, when you have your incentives to win as a team, you can kind of rock the boat. You can rock the full ship by trying to get your team ahead and stop, to your point, Steve, the exact framework confines that exist. It's to try and promote the whole league. 

Kyle Shaffar: Well, I mean, even further than that, if you go into the sort of the concussions stuff in the NFL, like, sure, you can look past that and maybe you'll win a game. But in the long run, you may destroy your whole product. I mean, that's an extreme example. But I think it's an important – 

Ryan Siemer: Yeah. What you fund or defund, I mean depending on what your situation is, can have an impact. Because kind of back to our races analogy, where every race you run, some are short sprints and others are marathons. And you're funding all of these things at the same time. You have to manage them all differently. Yeah. I mean, it's good what you said, Steve. It's got me thinking about how all that stuff works. You have to be both or all of the above. 

Kyle Shaffar: Well, I think to further your race analogy, you tell people ahead of time which race they're running, too. They don't show up and then just hit the start gun and then hit a stop gun. Like, you know whether you're doing a sprint or a marathon. Because you're going to run it differently. And I think that's important, too, is sort of you know it whether you're greenfield doing a new – you're going to treat it differently than I'm in operational mode and being aware of what type of thing it is, is super important. It's hard sometimes. But I think it's super important. 

Steve Wiggs: We bring a team trained to do a marathon. And all at once, they're asked to run a 100-yard sprint. And we've watched it. It doesn't work. This team was great. They were successful last three years, okay? Well, great. Go have them build the Springfield event. Nope. Won't work. 

Kyle Shaffar: Without at least transition time, and training time, and refitting, and wearing different shoes and all of it. 

Cristina Amigoni: Being clear on why are we doing this is what's the purpose? What are the results? I mean, maybe it's redefining the results. Is the results money? Is the result speed? Is the result what's the success? 

Ryan Siemer: Yes. Well, Kyle's favorite phrase of all time, right? Let's start with what and why. And if we can't define why, we don't need to go into the starting blocks. 

Kyle Shaffar: But we do. 

Alex Cullimore: Well, and the multi-layered response that, too. If you are going for speed, what does the speed mean in this context? And to Kyle's point, is it speed over the short distances or speed over the long distance? What are those results and what does that result in the greater ecosystem? You can go for speed right now. What are you sacrificing to do that? What are you gaining if you do it a different way? 

Kyle Shaffar: Well, it's like, yeah, you showed up for a hurdle race and they didn't tell you ahead of time that you're going to lose 30 seconds every time you knock a hurdle over as a penalty. That doesn't actually happen. But like in some races, it could, right? It'd be good to know those rules before you start. It would change how you run the race. 

Alex Cullimore: An interesting point. Because we are working in life. We have force-measure events like a pandemic will suddenly come up and derail everything. There'll be just be some – something will demolish the plans that we had. Or there's rules we didn't know or a new rule will change. And it's not even necessarily anybody's fault or by creation. It's just something we didn't know about. There has to be that extra layer of grace for, "Oh, we didn't know when we planned this whole thing that every hurdle you knock over cost you 30 seconds. Now we do. What are we going to do differently?" 

Steve Wiggs: Let's run the race where if you knock over the hurdle you have to stop and drink a beer and then start again.

Kyle Shaffar: Yeah. I like that. I like that. I think it is fun, though, to live – I was just thinking. If you said grace. Again, we've said that a couple times. But I like to think we can live in a world where we're talking about business but we are talking about things like grace, and patience, and empathy and – 

Steve Wiggs: Trust and humility. 

Kyle Shaffar: That's all of them. I mean, again, I'm not optimistic by nature. But that does give me hope that it feels a lot better to operate that way than it does to just these are entries on a spreadsheet or whatever, right? It just feels better it's worth. It's worth so much more to me. 

Cristina Amigoni: That's a good wrapping up the podcast. And we're done.

Steve Wiggs: Awesome.

Cristina Amigoni: Awesome. 

Steve Wiggs: Never thought you'd saw – you didn't see that one coming out of Kyle, did you? Look at that. 

Alex Cullimore: We found optimistic Kyle. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yeah. See? You start with shame and then you get optimistic Kyle all the way to the end. 

So we have at least two other podcast topics or podcast episodes planned. And one of them will probably have to be in Cape when we're all in-person in September. And actually, we're going to Cape twice in-person. There's two podcast episodes. 

But to wrap things up, what is your definition of authenticity? Each one of you. Ryan, you've been quiet. 

Ryan Siemer: Yeah. I'm not good at definitions. I can't give you a definition. I can give you that, when I first met you all and I first started listening and reading to your stuff and I said, "Authentic self. Authentic self. I said, "Well, shit, nobody's more authentic than I am." And I think I've always been that way, right? This should be a cakewalk. 

And then I realized that, well, no. Just because you tell the truth, which I swear I do. Just because you tell the truth and you try to be yourself, I've learned doesn't mean that you're being authentic. And what's the difference? The difference is that, to be authentic to somebody, you have to first understand what they are. What is their authentic self? So that then I know when it's appropriate to be loud, and crass and obnoxious. It's just my best traits. And then when is it time to just try to be somebody who has empathy and who listens and who has trust? And so, authenticity to me meant that I thought that everybody's had to accept me for what I was. But I learned it's a two-way street. And that was the big change. 

 Kyle Shaffar: Yeah. It's funny. I was going to say the definition is sort of showing up the same whether things are good or bad. But that's not really true. Because you don't want to maybe show up the exact same way. But you want to be recognizable that it's still you. You're going to have to change your tactics depending on the situation. But you still got to be you. 

And so, finding a way so that you're true, what drives you to come out in all those different situations, but they're slightly different. That's authenticity to me. I mean, if people can recognize, "Hey, you're still you," whether it's things are great and we're having a party or we're all the way things are crap and we're at war. Your behavior is going to be different. You can't show up the same. But you can show up and be recognizable I think is how I would say it. 

Ryan Siemer: I've worn a lot of masks in my life. 

Steve Wiggs: Haven't worn Big Bird yet. 

Kyle Shaffar: Haven't worn Big Bird. That's a suit. 

Cristina Amigoni: Big Bird. Yeah. 

Kyle Shaffar: That's more than a mask. 

Cristina Amigoni: That's coming to Cape. 

Ryan Siemer: Well, great. You are the instigator of instigators. Steve and Kyle were pretty quick to see that that was the case with me. And I think the most genuine individuals who are most in touch with who they are can kind of see that. They can see what the masks are. 

I wore the masks for reasons. Mostly protection, especially in an organization. Projection of intelligence, confidence for various reasons. Both for your team to look up and say, "Does this guy know what the hell he's doing?" And for people at the top to look down and say, "Does this guy know what the hell he's doing?" Right? 

And I would imagine that the degrees we all deal with that. We wake up every day and like when you physically look in the mirror, who do you see? What do you see? And is that the person that you take with you to work? And in fairness to yourself, there is judgement in the world. So you need to be aware. You can't go purely ignorant out into the world and say, "Oh, I'm being my authentic self. I'm saying everything I want to say." You do need to filter. And whether it's to protect someone's feelings or for whatever purpose. 

I mean, this is probably a whole other podcast, right? Which will be kind of fun to explore. Those are the things that I think matter and not to overthink this whole thing. I mean, I get in touch with who I am. And then I need to feel comfortable with the people I'm around. I need to deeply trust those individuals for them to see me. Because I need to feel comfortable with them that the person that they see, that isn't going to be there. I try every day to sort of wake up and say, "I'm going to leave these 10 masks actually here today. I'm not going to take those with me today. And it's a journey." 

Cristina Amigoni: It is a journey. Well, thank you. 

Alex Cullimore: It is all around. Thank you, guys, so much for coming on. It's wonderful to talk to you, Kyle, Wiggs and Ryan. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Thank you. 

Ryan Siemer: Thank you. 

 Steve Wiggs: Thank you. 

Kyle Shaffar: Thank you. It's been a blast. 

[OUTRO]

Cristina Amigoni: Thank you for listening to Uncover the Human, a Siamo podcast. 

Alex Cullimore: Special thanks to our podcast operations wizard, Jake Lara; and our score creator, Rachel Sherwood. 

Cristina Amigoni: If you have enjoyed this episode, please share, review and subscribe. You can find our episodes wherever you listen to podcasts. 

 Alex Cullimore: We would love to hear from you with feedback, topic ideas or questions. You can reach us at podcast wearesiamo.com, or at our website, wearesiamo.com, LinkedIn, Instagram or Facebook. We Are Siamo is spelled W-E A-R-E S-I-A-M-O.

Cristina Amigoni: Until next time, listen to yourself, listen to others and always uncover the human.

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