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You're listening to the HR Mixtape. Your podcast with
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the perfect mix of practical advice, thought-provoking interviews, and
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stories that just hit different so that work doesn't have to feel, well,
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like work. Now, your host, Shari
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Joining me today is Tracy Austin, Chief Talent Officer at
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Elevated Talent Consulting. Tracy helps organizations strengthen
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leadership and talent strategies, especially in frontline and
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Tracy, thank you so much for being on the podcast again with me.
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Thank you for having me. I am really excited about
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this topic because it's one I was just sharing before
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we got started that I don't think I've covered enough
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and or I actually don't hear a lot of other podcasts in the HR space
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talk about this and what we're going to focus on is the trades.
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and those types of roles. So I guess we'll start here. When you think
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about the different trades and you think about people leaving
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or staying, what are some of kind of the common misconceptions we
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have about, you know, why people decide to
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Yeah, absolutely. So why do folks decide to go
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into the trades? There are so many misconceptions around this.
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And, you know, some of them are, you know, the trades are for folks that,
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you know, can't go to a four-year school or for folks that don't
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have the ability to do other things. And that is so false. I mean,
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when you look at the trades right now and the dollar amounts that
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are being paid for folks in the trades, whether that's plumbing, whether that's
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electrician, whether that's a framing, whether that is a heavy equipment
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operator, you know, you're looking at six plus figure positions.
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and that's something that's definitely a misconception. One
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of the things with the trades right now is AI
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is not going to take over your electrician in a
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commercial building or in your home. AI is not going
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to take over the plumbing putting your toilet in. So these
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hands-on trades are so incredibly important and
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in a way Trades are, there's an art form to
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it. Whether you're looking at a heavy equipment operator that's
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looking at grading and how they're doing different things out in
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the field, it is very much an art form that
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is a lot of times passed down from individual to individual. And
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it takes that experience to do that.
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And so this misnomer around education is completely false
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within the trades and the dollar amount that folks
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I think the dollar amount thing, I completely
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agree. I have not, I have heard that argument before where people are
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like, oh, well, you can't make as much money. And I'm like, well, you're just, you're not informed because
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that's actually not the case anymore. Especially if
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you are in a trade that's unionized, you have that entire
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backing and pipeline and some of those things that come with it. When you've
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worked with people to help them understand that the
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way that they manage people in the trades is just as important as
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the way we manage people in not the trades, right? Those
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leaders also need leadership development, but I think it looks differently.
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So how are you working with organizations to paint that picture of,
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hey, it's just as important as it is in any other organization, but
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Yeah. You know, and a lot of times what we see is
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it's really important to meet people where they're at. You know, in trade
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organizations, folks are out on job sites. They're, they're out
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on the roadways. You know, their office looks very, very different and
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it changes significantly based on the time
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of year or where they're at. You know, it's like there's folks
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were recording this in January. You know, there's folks that are laid
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off from Christmas through March, you know, and they
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absolutely love that. Yeah, and there's some folks that don't
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love that and go to try to find something different and end up kind of
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hopping between different employers. That doesn't have to happen, right?
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But kind of going back to the leadership in
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the trades and how that's different, it's when we meet
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folks where they're at for conversations, for checking
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in, for one-on-one, They're in their environment that's comfortable.
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The second we call them into the job trailer, the second we call them into
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the office, it's like, oh, gee, something's going to happen, which is
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that the same when we're in an office environment? Yeah, but it's very different
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in the fact that they're working in a completely different environment. And
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the thing that is similar is it's based
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on relationships. And that relationship piece
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is so incredibly important. Like when I'm working in manufacturing, those
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supervisors are on the floor. They're walking around, right? When we're
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working in trades, when we've got 50 different jobs
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that we're running, guess what? There are superintendents out
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there, yes, or foremen, but you don't typically
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have as much kind of on-site time with folks as you do
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in other areas. There's jobs where you may only have two or three people
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on it, especially when we're looking at folks, let's say, in
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landscaping or in fencing and some of those things, you're
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sending out chignon crews. And so you don't necessarily
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have that face time or that hands-on mentoring
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that you get in other areas. And that's what makes it a
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little bit different. So what are the skills that those
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And I guess, how do we think about developing them? Because I think about, you
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know, when I've been in manufacturing before, one of the
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challenges I had in talking to those on the floor who wanted
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more, right? They wanted either to be a people manager, they wanted to
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have, you know, more scope. One of the most hurdles
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that we had to deal with is finding the time to carve out,
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to give them that type of training that they need, because
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they are hands-on, right? They're doing the job, and they have to
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learn alongside it. So how are you helping HR
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leaders think differently? Because that's what I had to do, right? I had to
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think differently about how I executed training and
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Yeah, absolutely. And I love this, right? Because in
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manufacturing, you can now have training where it's
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actually on the machine that it's walking you through it, right? We're
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not that far yet with technology that we can do
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that in all of them. I think it's coming, and that is definitely a beauty of
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AI, right? So one of the things that we've really
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focused on is First and foremost, we
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looked at how do people learn? And so, you know, what's been
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found is 70% of the learning happens on the job,
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right? 20% of that learning happens like
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hand over hand, almost mentoring. It's still on the job, like you're
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still there. And 10% is in a normal training
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environment, right? And so when we look at
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those three different areas, and we look at what do
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folks need, this is where those two-man crews
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that are going out, we're saying, okay, so that
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first person might be one just coming in, and that second person may
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be there a year. So how do we, over the course of that first
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year, really instill what we need
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that person to know? And guess what? That's going to be through,
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we call these mentoring programs, And what
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that is, is essentially we have exactly our
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processes laid out. We know exactly what
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winning looks like, right? It's not just putting up a fence, right?
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That's not it. It is very specific surround,
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and I'm just using this as an example. how we do that, how
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we clean it up, how deep that is, the concrete, all
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of the different things that go into that so that there's measurables
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around what winning looks like. It's not just about the quality
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of the craftsmanship. It's also what is that interaction with
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a homeowner or with a business? What does the cleanup after look
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like, right? Because when we have clarity in our expectations
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and we have those early check-ins in that first 90 days, that's
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going to instill here's our culture, here's our expectations throughout
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the length of that employee with the organization. So
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we've got a great onboarding program. We couple that with
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training for that person as they're shifting into kind of
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the lead in our two-man crew that still has
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folks that are checking in. The biggest thing that we see when
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I'm talking to trade organizations and working within them
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is I said, hey, how often have you gone out and talked to Johnny? Oh,
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man, I haven't been on a site with Johnny in a year. OK, why? Right.
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So, you know, I don't like calling them trainers, but
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that supervisor that really their job is being out
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on site. And sometimes in a way it's like, hey, what do they do? They just go on
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site with folks every single day, different ones. They're they're
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mentoring. They're seeing how things are going. They're checking in.
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They're asking. questions, they're giving feedback that
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hand over hand that it's much easier to get when we're all in
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one place than it is when we're completely spread out.
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For sure. And you mentioned culture. And I'm
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chuckling because I have worked in local government before. I
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have been fortunate enough to work in a fire
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department and it has a very specific culture. So I'm going to kind of use that as my
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example. And there is a level of
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camaraderie that gets developed in those organizations. And
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there's this level of toughness or this is
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the way we do it. And so when I think about culture and I
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think about what we know about feedback and
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recognition and how that impacts retention, but
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I marry that with this tough it out
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mentality or like this is just the job, like this is how
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we're supposed to do it. How do we start to break that barrier so
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that You know, I don't think it's that these
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scenarios, these people don't want the recognition. It's just that the culture hasn't
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Yeah. And so, I think first and
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foremost, we need to figure out what folks actually want. And, you
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know, we use something called predictive index. I know that that's built into Paylocity
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now, which is so exciting. But with that being said,
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you know, knowing what folks want, and sometimes it's just as
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simple as asking them, not asking them when they're in a group of 50 people,
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asking them when it is that one-on-one, like, hey, what
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do you really want? Here's what I saw today, and you did a phenomenal job
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on those things. And sometimes it is that receiving
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it that we all have a really hard time with. And so how
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does that change? It changes through the visibility of it changing from
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our leaders, right? And so if our leaders aren't
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taking that on, guess what? Our folks aren't taking it on either. And
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so that that's definitely something to look at,
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you know, and metrics are important. And so
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often we focus on the negatives. We didn't hit this. We didn't hit that.
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That went bad. You know, if we shift our narrative and
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one of the easiest ways to do that is start your morning meetings with
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a win. Hey, what was a win yesterday? Like that is one of the
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easiest ways to shift it is, hey, what was a win yesterday? Or,
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you know, if you have folks that come back to the office before
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they leave, whether they're cleaning out their trucks or whatever that is, you
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know, hey, what went well today? Our questions
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have tremendous power to them. And so sometimes it's
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as simple as changing what our questions are, because
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I love that, especially because a lot of these organizations
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are heavily safety and compliance driven. So they have
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a lot of pressure in that space where
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they don't have wiggle room. We don't have necessarily the
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same opportunities to have progressive conversations when
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it comes to safety and compliance in some of these scenario. So being
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able to ask the questions that help uncover some of those things, I
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absolutely love that. There's a way to be curious and
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not condescending, right? There's a way to be curious and celebrate the
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things that we know that people are doing well and are having an
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impact on things. How do you, in that safety environment, or
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how have you helped leaders understand that Psychological
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safety in that environment looks a little bit different, meaning
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that what we want is to create an environment where people feel
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safe to tell us about unsafe things. Correct. It's
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a little bit different. How have you coached leaders to develop that skill?
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Because they are often seen as like, hey, I, you know, got
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to do this. My manager's coming. Like, I can't screw this up. I
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don't want to show them that like I have done something unsafe. But
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the same aspect, it's like they like you said, you know, you might have a leader who's in charge of
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40 sites. They don't they don't know everything that's happening. Right. Right.
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And we don't want. performance or
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performative only when somebody shows up, right? Yeah.
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So there's kind of two things here.
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And one of them is I like to ask a number of questions. So let's
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say I'm out and I see something that's unsafe, right? Instead
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of me saying, hey, that's unsafe. What are you doing? I might say,
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hey, tell me a little bit about your environment. What's working within
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this environment? What's not working with this environment? What do you see? Because
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when we can get curious and go the route of coaching questions, does
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this take longer to get to the point? Yes, it does. And I'm just going to
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name it. It 100% does. Yet, what
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it does is it is embedding thinking in
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the individuals that you're talking to versus just giving the answers. So
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let's say that they don't have their harness on or their harness isn't connected in
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the right way. We can say, hey, tell me about your environment. Tell me about this.
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What happens? You know, hey, I just saw you go up to on
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the roof with this. Tell me about that situation. If they're not getting
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it, I'm going to say, hey, there's a couple of things I noticed. Do you have any idea
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of what I noticed before I name it? Because I much rather have
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you tell me than me tell you, because that's going
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to build trust within this. Because if we have an
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ownership mindset, which it could be, or
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integrity or whatever those key core values are, we can build
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that in with our questioning. I'd always rather have them
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come up with it and then have a conversation of, hey, so, yep,
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I heard you just say you didn't clip in. Tell me a little bit about why.
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What was the barrier to clipping in? And let's talk about
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it. Because now I'm trying to
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get an understanding as to what is the barrier to
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that that has them not doing it, especially
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when I'm here, versus when I'm not. Because if I
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can understand that and what's behind it, now we have the
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opportunity to actually brainstorm to solve the problem. Well, hey,
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it's X, Y, Z happens within that. And I
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actually feel it's more unsafe when I do it this way. I feel like it
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takes me an extra five minutes and I'm getting the pressure over here. Right.
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Whatever that is, now we can have an open and honest conversation about
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it. It doesn't mean the answer is going to be you don't have to do it. Right. You
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know, we still have to follow what the rules are, but if I
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can understand what's behind it first, there
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may be another way of doing it, or it may be something super simple
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that they don't know yet that will make this easier.
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Well, and it ties in a little bit to that idea around design
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thinking. If you start to have those curiosity conversations and
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you find out that, like you shared, maybe
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using the harness in that way actually makes the person feel unsafe.
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Well, is that reality? Is it the wrong kind of harness? Is
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it the wrong environment? Is there other things you can put in place? You're
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never gonna get to be able to design those things if you can't get curious
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with those questions, so I love that. Exactly. I'm
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going to flip this a little bit. So you're having that conversation with
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somebody, and let's say they don't want to participate. I'm
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trying to play this out in my head, right? And the ideal employee is
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sharing, and you're having these collaboration conversations. But
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there is also going to be that employee who's like, yeah, you caught me. I
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didn't do it. Write me up. How do you coach leaders to
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Yeah. So when we get the combative employee, right?
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And what I love about this is they're showing you who they
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are, but they're also showing you where there's a fear here, too. And
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so, hey, write me up. I didn't do it. I'm
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probably just going to kind of look at him and be like, I don't really want to write
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you up. there's probably another way to this. Do you want to play? Like,
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you know, and that's also my playful nature is like, I don't.
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My purpose of being here is not to write you up. I don't want to write you up. I
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want you to go home to your family. So is
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there another way that we can have this conversation? And then I just stop
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talking and like stare at them and wait for them to talk. That's
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Yes. What's one leadership trait that
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you have seen in the trades that needs to die because it's
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Um, one of them is the yelling and
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that it's my way or the highway. Like, those are two that
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Do you think that comes from these professions in
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general, not having the same sort of emotional intelligence
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I think there's some of that, but I also think
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there is, you've got, You've
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got the old guard that typically the
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quality of their work is phenomenal, yet it is truly,
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you do it this way, I'm going to bark at you if you don't do these things. And
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it's causing this huge riff with this new generation coming
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in who's like, no, I'm I'm not doing that right like I'm not
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like that's not happening. Here's what I typically find most
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of these, they're mostly guys or some gals, the big
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teddy bears once you can kind of get through what is
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there and some of that as you said earlier, is this. we
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have to be really hard, this is what we have to do kind of mentality. And
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so when we can understand what folks actually need
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and repeat it back to them, when we both want
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the same things, we have a want match, you know, got
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to figure out what do we both want, then how do we get there? So when we have a
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want match, we can 100% get there. Are there times where
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we have to 100% draw the line and say, we're setting a
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very firm boundary here that this behavior is no longer acceptable in
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this organization and here's the limit and the boundary of what happens
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if this continues? Absolutely. And that has to happen. And
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typically it only takes one to start to shift the culture because
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it's like, oh, we're not doing this anymore. Okay, you're right.
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So there is that, but I don't ever wanna kind
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of throw the whole thing out because there's a work ethic that
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is significant that we typically see
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with the older workforce that's there. And
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there's this craftsmanship that is typically beautiful
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because they truly see what they're doing as an art
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craft. And they figured out the flow of it, where that's
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taken them 30, 40, 50 years to do. And so
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it's this finesse almost of a dance of, Getting
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that transferred into our
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younger workers coming in while also integrating the technology, while
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also integrating sometimes a softer way kind
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of a being in those situations. So it's definitely an
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and both. There's not a one size fits all to this. But
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what is imperative is trust and building
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the relationships with the folks that are out there. All
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One last question. It's kind of a big one. You know, there
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has been a decline in attraction to
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these roles, to the trades, to the military, to public
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safety, public service, those types of roles. What are you
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recommending for HR professionals who are sitting in this space going,
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I just can't keep people in the door? How
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should we be advertising trade jobs differently now
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You know, I truly believe it's experiential. You
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know, if we think about kind of what's happening within
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our middle schools and our high schools, what is specifically happening
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of, I think about in my hometown, we've got, it's kind
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of like a touch the truck day, right? We've got something in our community called
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Hendricks CareerTech, which truly brings trades
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in every career, really into the middle schools and the high
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schools. It is giving them those experiences, having
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them go out in the field with folks, having them have that hand on
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experiential training to it with saying, hey, Here's
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a guy that's making $170,000 a year in a non-union environment.
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Here's a guy making the same in a union environment. Here's the distinctions between
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union and non-union. Here's the distinctions specifically between
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a heavy equipment operator and a framer.
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Here's what those are, and here's some ways that you can do some hands-on to
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see what you actually like, right? So like the Crafts Know
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a Character program that is going across the country is beautiful for
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this. What's happening with our youth apprenticeship programs is
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phenomenal. So it really is those hands-on. So what
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I'd say to our HR folks is really get involved in
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these programs in your communities. and really tap
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into the experiential piece, figure out how do
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we get our organizations involved to be in front of these young people.
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I don't just mean the job fair at the high school. I mean, how do you
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create opportunities for a 10-week internship over
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the summer to get the interest in
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I love that. And if you're listening and you're like, hey, my town doesn't
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have anything like that, go ahead and create it. I give you permission. It's
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one of the greatest things to be able to walk into a
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school or another business and say, hey, I'm working on this. I think it
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can elevate us both. Would you like to explore it with me?
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So I've had so much fun doing that in my career. So please feel free
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as listeners to take that on, because I think it's really good
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for you as a practitioner, but also for your organization. Tracy,
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as always, amazing conversation. You always bring such great
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insight and advice for those listening. So
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I hope you
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enjoyed today's episode. You can find show notes and
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links at thehrmixtape.com Come back often
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You're listening to the HR Mixtape. Your podcast with
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00:00:05,845 --> 00:00:09,308
the perfect mix of practical advice, thought-provoking interviews, and
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00:00:09,408 --> 00:00:13,190
stories that just hit different so that work doesn't have to feel, well,
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like work. Now, your host, Shari
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00:00:19,274 --> 00:00:22,456
Joining me today is Tracy Austin, Chief Talent Officer at
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Elevated Talent Consulting. Tracy helps organizations strengthen
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leadership and talent strategies, especially in frontline and
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Tracy, thank you so much for being on the podcast again with me.
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Thank you for having me. I am really excited about
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this topic because it's one I was just sharing before
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we got started that I don't think I've covered enough
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and or I actually don't hear a lot of other podcasts in the HR space
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talk about this and what we're going to focus on is the trades.
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and those types of roles. So I guess we'll start here. When you think
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about the different trades and you think about people leaving
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or staying, what are some of kind of the common misconceptions we
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have about, you know, why people decide to
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Yeah, absolutely. So why do folks decide to go
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into the trades? There are so many misconceptions around this.
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And, you know, some of them are, you know, the trades are for folks that,
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you know, can't go to a four-year school or for folks that don't
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have the ability to do other things. And that is so false. I mean,
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when you look at the trades right now and the dollar amounts that
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are being paid for folks in the trades, whether that's plumbing, whether that's
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electrician, whether that's a framing, whether that is a heavy equipment
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operator, you know, you're looking at six plus figure positions.
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and that's something that's definitely a misconception. One
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of the things with the trades right now is AI
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is not going to take over your electrician in a
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commercial building or in your home. AI is not going
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to take over the plumbing putting your toilet in. So these
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hands-on trades are so incredibly important and
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in a way Trades are, there's an art form to
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it. Whether you're looking at a heavy equipment operator that's
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looking at grading and how they're doing different things out in
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the field, it is very much an art form that
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is a lot of times passed down from individual to individual. And
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it takes that experience to do that.
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And so this misnomer around education is completely false
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within the trades and the dollar amount that folks
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I think the dollar amount thing, I completely
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agree. I have not, I have heard that argument before where people are
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like, oh, well, you can't make as much money. And I'm like, well, you're just, you're not informed because
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that's actually not the case anymore. Especially if
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you are in a trade that's unionized, you have that entire
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backing and pipeline and some of those things that come with it. When you've
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worked with people to help them understand that the
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way that they manage people in the trades is just as important as
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the way we manage people in not the trades, right? Those
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leaders also need leadership development, but I think it looks differently.
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So how are you working with organizations to paint that picture of,
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hey, it's just as important as it is in any other organization, but
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Yeah. You know, and a lot of times what we see is
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it's really important to meet people where they're at. You know, in trade
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organizations, folks are out on job sites. They're, they're out
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on the roadways. You know, their office looks very, very different and
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it changes significantly based on the time
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of year or where they're at. You know, it's like there's folks
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were recording this in January. You know, there's folks that are laid
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off from Christmas through March, you know, and they
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absolutely love that. Yeah, and there's some folks that don't
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love that and go to try to find something different and end up kind of
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hopping between different employers. That doesn't have to happen, right?
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But kind of going back to the leadership in
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the trades and how that's different, it's when we meet
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folks where they're at for conversations, for checking
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in, for one-on-one, They're in their environment that's comfortable.
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The second we call them into the job trailer, the second we call them into
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the office, it's like, oh, gee, something's going to happen, which is
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that the same when we're in an office environment? Yeah, but it's very different
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in the fact that they're working in a completely different environment. And
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the thing that is similar is it's based
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on relationships. And that relationship piece
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is so incredibly important. Like when I'm working in manufacturing, those
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supervisors are on the floor. They're walking around, right? When we're
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working in trades, when we've got 50 different jobs
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that we're running, guess what? There are superintendents out
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there, yes, or foremen, but you don't typically
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have as much kind of on-site time with folks as you do
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in other areas. There's jobs where you may only have two or three people
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on it, especially when we're looking at folks, let's say, in
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landscaping or in fencing and some of those things, you're
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sending out chignon crews. And so you don't necessarily
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have that face time or that hands-on mentoring
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that you get in other areas. And that's what makes it a
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little bit different. So what are the skills that those
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And I guess, how do we think about developing them? Because I think about, you
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know, when I've been in manufacturing before, one of the
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challenges I had in talking to those on the floor who wanted
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more, right? They wanted either to be a people manager, they wanted to
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have, you know, more scope. One of the most hurdles
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that we had to deal with is finding the time to carve out,
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to give them that type of training that they need, because
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they are hands-on, right? They're doing the job, and they have to
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learn alongside it. So how are you helping HR
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leaders think differently? Because that's what I had to do, right? I had to
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think differently about how I executed training and
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Yeah, absolutely. And I love this, right? Because in
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manufacturing, you can now have training where it's
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actually on the machine that it's walking you through it, right? We're
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not that far yet with technology that we can do
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that in all of them. I think it's coming, and that is definitely a beauty of
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AI, right? So one of the things that we've really
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focused on is First and foremost, we
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looked at how do people learn? And so, you know, what's been
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found is 70% of the learning happens on the job,
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right? 20% of that learning happens like
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hand over hand, almost mentoring. It's still on the job, like you're
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still there. And 10% is in a normal training
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environment, right? And so when we look at
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those three different areas, and we look at what do
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folks need, this is where those two-man crews
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that are going out, we're saying, okay, so that
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first person might be one just coming in, and that second person may
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be there a year. So how do we, over the course of that first
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year, really instill what we need
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that person to know? And guess what? That's going to be through,
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we call these mentoring programs, And what
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that is, is essentially we have exactly our
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processes laid out. We know exactly what
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winning looks like, right? It's not just putting up a fence, right?
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That's not it. It is very specific surround,
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and I'm just using this as an example. how we do that, how
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we clean it up, how deep that is, the concrete, all
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of the different things that go into that so that there's measurables
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around what winning looks like. It's not just about the quality
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of the craftsmanship. It's also what is that interaction with
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a homeowner or with a business? What does the cleanup after look
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like, right? Because when we have clarity in our expectations
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and we have those early check-ins in that first 90 days, that's
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going to instill here's our culture, here's our expectations throughout
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the length of that employee with the organization. So
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we've got a great onboarding program. We couple that with
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training for that person as they're shifting into kind of
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the lead in our two-man crew that still has
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folks that are checking in. The biggest thing that we see when
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I'm talking to trade organizations and working within them
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is I said, hey, how often have you gone out and talked to Johnny? Oh,
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man, I haven't been on a site with Johnny in a year. OK, why? Right.
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So, you know, I don't like calling them trainers, but
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that supervisor that really their job is being out
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on site. And sometimes in a way it's like, hey, what do they do? They just go on
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site with folks every single day, different ones. They're they're
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mentoring. They're seeing how things are going. They're checking in.
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They're asking. questions, they're giving feedback that
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hand over hand that it's much easier to get when we're all in
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one place than it is when we're completely spread out.
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For sure. And you mentioned culture. And I'm
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chuckling because I have worked in local government before. I
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have been fortunate enough to work in a fire
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department and it has a very specific culture. So I'm going to kind of use that as my
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example. And there is a level of
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camaraderie that gets developed in those organizations. And
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there's this level of toughness or this is
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the way we do it. And so when I think about culture and I
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think about what we know about feedback and
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recognition and how that impacts retention, but
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I marry that with this tough it out
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mentality or like this is just the job, like this is how
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we're supposed to do it. How do we start to break that barrier so
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that You know, I don't think it's that these
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scenarios, these people don't want the recognition. It's just that the culture hasn't
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Yeah. And so, I think first and
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foremost, we need to figure out what folks actually want. And, you
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know, we use something called predictive index. I know that that's built into Paylocity
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now, which is so exciting. But with that being said,
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you know, knowing what folks want, and sometimes it's just as
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simple as asking them, not asking them when they're in a group of 50 people,
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asking them when it is that one-on-one, like, hey, what
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do you really want? Here's what I saw today, and you did a phenomenal job
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on those things. And sometimes it is that receiving
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it that we all have a really hard time with. And so how
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does that change? It changes through the visibility of it changing from
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our leaders, right? And so if our leaders aren't
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taking that on, guess what? Our folks aren't taking it on either. And
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so that that's definitely something to look at,
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you know, and metrics are important. And so
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often we focus on the negatives. We didn't hit this. We didn't hit that.
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That went bad. You know, if we shift our narrative and
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one of the easiest ways to do that is start your morning meetings with
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a win. Hey, what was a win yesterday? Like that is one of the
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easiest ways to shift it is, hey, what was a win yesterday? Or,
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you know, if you have folks that come back to the office before
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they leave, whether they're cleaning out their trucks or whatever that is, you
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know, hey, what went well today? Our questions
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have tremendous power to them. And so sometimes it's
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as simple as changing what our questions are, because
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I love that, especially because a lot of these organizations
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are heavily safety and compliance driven. So they have
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a lot of pressure in that space where
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they don't have wiggle room. We don't have necessarily the
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same opportunities to have progressive conversations when
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it comes to safety and compliance in some of these scenario. So being
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able to ask the questions that help uncover some of those things, I
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absolutely love that. There's a way to be curious and
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not condescending, right? There's a way to be curious and celebrate the
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things that we know that people are doing well and are having an
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impact on things. How do you, in that safety environment, or
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how have you helped leaders understand that Psychological
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safety in that environment looks a little bit different, meaning
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that what we want is to create an environment where people feel
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safe to tell us about unsafe things. Correct. It's
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a little bit different. How have you coached leaders to develop that skill?
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Because they are often seen as like, hey, I, you know, got
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to do this. My manager's coming. Like, I can't screw this up. I
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don't want to show them that like I have done something unsafe. But
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the same aspect, it's like they like you said, you know, you might have a leader who's in charge of
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40 sites. They don't they don't know everything that's happening. Right. Right.
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And we don't want. performance or
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performative only when somebody shows up, right? Yeah.
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So there's kind of two things here.
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And one of them is I like to ask a number of questions. So let's
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say I'm out and I see something that's unsafe, right? Instead
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of me saying, hey, that's unsafe. What are you doing? I might say,
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hey, tell me a little bit about your environment. What's working within
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this environment? What's not working with this environment? What do you see? Because
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when we can get curious and go the route of coaching questions, does
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this take longer to get to the point? Yes, it does. And I'm just going to
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name it. It 100% does. Yet, what
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it does is it is embedding thinking in
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the individuals that you're talking to versus just giving the answers. So
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let's say that they don't have their harness on or their harness isn't connected in
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the right way. We can say, hey, tell me about your environment. Tell me about this.
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What happens? You know, hey, I just saw you go up to on
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the roof with this. Tell me about that situation. If they're not getting
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it, I'm going to say, hey, there's a couple of things I noticed. Do you have any idea
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of what I noticed before I name it? Because I much rather have
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you tell me than me tell you, because that's going
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to build trust within this. Because if we have an
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ownership mindset, which it could be, or
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integrity or whatever those key core values are, we can build
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that in with our questioning. I'd always rather have them
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come up with it and then have a conversation of, hey, so, yep,
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I heard you just say you didn't clip in. Tell me a little bit about why.
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What was the barrier to clipping in? And let's talk about
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it. Because now I'm trying to
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get an understanding as to what is the barrier to
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that that has them not doing it, especially
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when I'm here, versus when I'm not. Because if I
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can understand that and what's behind it, now we have the
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opportunity to actually brainstorm to solve the problem. Well, hey,
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it's X, Y, Z happens within that. And I
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actually feel it's more unsafe when I do it this way. I feel like it
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takes me an extra five minutes and I'm getting the pressure over here. Right.
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Whatever that is, now we can have an open and honest conversation about
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it. It doesn't mean the answer is going to be you don't have to do it. Right. You
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know, we still have to follow what the rules are, but if I
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can understand what's behind it first, there
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may be another way of doing it, or it may be something super simple
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that they don't know yet that will make this easier.
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Well, and it ties in a little bit to that idea around design
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thinking. If you start to have those curiosity conversations and
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you find out that, like you shared, maybe
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using the harness in that way actually makes the person feel unsafe.
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Well, is that reality? Is it the wrong kind of harness? Is
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it the wrong environment? Is there other things you can put in place? You're
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never gonna get to be able to design those things if you can't get curious
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with those questions, so I love that. Exactly. I'm
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going to flip this a little bit. So you're having that conversation with
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somebody, and let's say they don't want to participate. I'm
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trying to play this out in my head, right? And the ideal employee is
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sharing, and you're having these collaboration conversations. But
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there is also going to be that employee who's like, yeah, you caught me. I
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didn't do it. Write me up. How do you coach leaders to
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Yeah. So when we get the combative employee, right?
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And what I love about this is they're showing you who they
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are, but they're also showing you where there's a fear here, too. And
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so, hey, write me up. I didn't do it. I'm
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probably just going to kind of look at him and be like, I don't really want to write
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you up. there's probably another way to this. Do you want to play? Like,
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you know, and that's also my playful nature is like, I don't.
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My purpose of being here is not to write you up. I don't want to write you up. I
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want you to go home to your family. So is
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there another way that we can have this conversation? And then I just stop
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talking and like stare at them and wait for them to talk. That's
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Yes. What's one leadership trait that
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you have seen in the trades that needs to die because it's
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Um, one of them is the yelling and
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that it's my way or the highway. Like, those are two that
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Do you think that comes from these professions in
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general, not having the same sort of emotional intelligence
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I think there's some of that, but I also think
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there is, you've got, You've
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got the old guard that typically the
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quality of their work is phenomenal, yet it is truly,
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you do it this way, I'm going to bark at you if you don't do these things. And
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it's causing this huge riff with this new generation coming
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in who's like, no, I'm I'm not doing that right like I'm not
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like that's not happening. Here's what I typically find most
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of these, they're mostly guys or some gals, the big
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teddy bears once you can kind of get through what is
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there and some of that as you said earlier, is this. we
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have to be really hard, this is what we have to do kind of mentality. And
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so when we can understand what folks actually need
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and repeat it back to them, when we both want
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the same things, we have a want match, you know, got
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to figure out what do we both want, then how do we get there? So when we have a
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want match, we can 100% get there. Are there times where
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we have to 100% draw the line and say, we're setting a
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very firm boundary here that this behavior is no longer acceptable in
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this organization and here's the limit and the boundary of what happens
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if this continues? Absolutely. And that has to happen. And
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typically it only takes one to start to shift the culture because
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it's like, oh, we're not doing this anymore. Okay, you're right.
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So there is that, but I don't ever wanna kind
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of throw the whole thing out because there's a work ethic that
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is significant that we typically see
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with the older workforce that's there. And
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there's this craftsmanship that is typically beautiful
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because they truly see what they're doing as an art
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craft. And they figured out the flow of it, where that's
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taken them 30, 40, 50 years to do. And so
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it's this finesse almost of a dance of, Getting
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that transferred into our
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younger workers coming in while also integrating the technology, while
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also integrating sometimes a softer way kind
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of a being in those situations. So it's definitely an
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and both. There's not a one size fits all to this. But
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what is imperative is trust and building
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the relationships with the folks that are out there. All
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One last question. It's kind of a big one. You know, there
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has been a decline in attraction to
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these roles, to the trades, to the military, to public
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safety, public service, those types of roles. What are you
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recommending for HR professionals who are sitting in this space going,
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I just can't keep people in the door? How
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should we be advertising trade jobs differently now
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You know, I truly believe it's experiential. You
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know, if we think about kind of what's happening within
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our middle schools and our high schools, what is specifically happening
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of, I think about in my hometown, we've got, it's kind
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of like a touch the truck day, right? We've got something in our community called
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Hendricks CareerTech, which truly brings trades
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in every career, really into the middle schools and the high
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schools. It is giving them those experiences, having
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them go out in the field with folks, having them have that hand on
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experiential training to it with saying, hey, Here's
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a guy that's making $170,000 a year in a non-union environment.
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Here's a guy making the same in a union environment. Here's the distinctions between
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union and non-union. Here's the distinctions specifically between
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a heavy equipment operator and a framer.
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Here's what those are, and here's some ways that you can do some hands-on to
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see what you actually like, right? So like the Crafts Know
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a Character program that is going across the country is beautiful for
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this. What's happening with our youth apprenticeship programs is
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phenomenal. So it really is those hands-on. So what
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I'd say to our HR folks is really get involved in
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these programs in your communities. and really tap
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into the experiential piece, figure out how do
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we get our organizations involved to be in front of these young people.
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I don't just mean the job fair at the high school. I mean, how do you
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create opportunities for a 10-week internship over
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the summer to get the interest in
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I love that. And if you're listening and you're like, hey, my town doesn't
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have anything like that, go ahead and create it. I give you permission. It's
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one of the greatest things to be able to walk into a
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school or another business and say, hey, I'm working on this. I think it
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can elevate us both. Would you like to explore it with me?
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So I've had so much fun doing that in my career. So please feel free
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as listeners to take that on, because I think it's really good
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for you as a practitioner, but also for your organization. Tracy,
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as always, amazing conversation. You always bring such great
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insight and advice for those listening. So
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I hope you
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enjoyed today's episode. You can find show notes and
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links at thehrmixtape.com Come back often
