229: (Recorded LIVE) Workplace Culture Alignment with Aaron Doyle

Aoife O’Brien [00:00:04]:

And it’s so weird to be able to see yourself on video. It’s very annoying. We’re gonna switch we’re gonna switch it back to the audio. Don’t you worry. Okay. Here we go. So it’s corded video and audio on there. And I can’t wait for you guys to see the final product, and you’re gonna be able to listen to it.

Aoife O’Brien [00:00:18]:

You’re gonna be able to see it on YouTube as well. So, brilliant. Aaron, you’re so welcome to the Hack at Work podcast. Thank you for

Aaron Doyle [00:00:25]:

having me. I

Aoife O’Brien [00:00:25]:

can’t tell you how much been looking forward to this episode. I know. It’s flown in. I know. It has flown in. We are recording this in front of a live studio audience.

Aaron Doyle [00:00:36]:

Not not reacting at all.

Aoife O’Brien [00:00:37]:

Not never reacting at all. A really nice audience. I think they’re gonna go easy on us. They’re gonna go gentle on us tonight. First question.

Aaron Doyle [00:00:47]:

Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:00:48]:

Do you wanna let people know a little bit about your background? What brought you to where you are today?

Aaron Doyle [00:00:53]:

Yep. So I work for John Savannah. I’m director of people operations, and my role mainly revolves around building people strategy, recruitment, and then kind of nurturing all the team as well. My background before that was I’ve kind of spent a career building out HR functions in tech companies was was the past or in start ups, mainly tech before that. Worked for a company called Sendoso. It was a US multinational coming to Ireland. It’s really great time there. I was first hired in Europe, so built out the teams.

Aaron Doyle [00:01:25]:

Right. Yeah. It was really really good role, really exciting. We grew really, really fast. We were about 90 people within about a year. So it was that was to support the growth that we were seeing, which was huge growth at the time. So it was a really good role, very good culture that we built Yeah. As well.

Aaron Doyle [00:01:43]:

That was the first time that I’d really been involved in the building of culture at that level, and I loved it. Yeah. It was something I was really proud of what we built. And for some reason, we’re listening to this that was there. Don’t know what we were talking about because it was just we did really great work. We really enjoyed being there. We had a lot of fun Mhmm. In the process as well.

Aaron Doyle [00:02:01]:

So I love that. And then all the other Country 360 HR aspects And, yeah, about 2 years ago, I met the guys with Johnson Island. They said that they

Aoife O’Brien [00:02:07]:

were building out HR function, that they needed support growth

Aaron Doyle [00:02:08]:

that they were having. I love what they’re doing

Aoife O’Brien [00:02:18]:

as soon

Aaron Doyle [00:02:18]:

as I heard about it. Yeah. Yeah. I I really and I met the guys, and I really liked them as well. I met the loyal team, really liked them, and, yeah, 2 years later. Yeah. Here we are.

Aoife O’Brien [00:02:27]:

And can I say that doesn’t surprise me at all, you know, having experienced firsthand, I think, the culture that you’ve created here? But maybe can we take a step back and say, what what is culture? Like, how would you define company culture?

Aaron Doyle [00:02:39]:

Yeah. So I look at it as the way we do things around here.

Aoife O’Brien [00:02:43]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:02:43]:

And I think that’s probably the exception. That’s the Definition of what it is. Yeah. And for me, it’s really hard to look at one thing. I think it looks at the behaviors that are deemed the norm within the group. I think that’s the first thing. It’s it’s how we interact with each other. It’s how we speak.

Aaron Doyle [00:02:58]:

It’s how we work with clients, how we work with prospective clients. It’s how we put ourselves forward to the markets, work with our teams, decisions we make as a business, and how we make decisions as well. Mhmm. You know, do we offer flexibility? Do we offer hard time working? Do we offer everything like that? That whole how we do things around here

Aoife O’Brien [00:03:16]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:03:17]:

Is what I view.

Aoife O’Brien [00:03:18]:

You’re totally speaking my language now. Like, for me, that’s it is. It’s how we do things around here. For me, the values and the behaviors within our organization is a key part of that and the decisions, like you’re saying. So what policies do we have? But if we create this culture, how do we make sure that it’s it is what we say it is?

Aaron Doyle [00:03:39]:

Yeah. So, I mean, I think I think looking at your values is really powerful. Mhmm. I think your values should be your value and values for behavior. Yeah. And they shouldn’t be just something that’s on the wall. Mhmm. You know, the leadership team, I scribble down.

Aaron Doyle [00:03:53]:

Yeah. I put a little thought into it. When we when I joined Johnson Ana, we were looking at how do we change our values to reflect the change that the company was going through at the time, so kind of that start up scale.

Aoife O’Brien [00:04:03]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:04:03]:

And what we did was we looked at how we want the company to behave as a team, but we asked the wider team as well. So it wasn’t just the leadership team to tell you what that looked like. We went to the wider team, and we asked them. We had 3 lists. We had personal values and behaviors, professional values and behaviors, and things that they really didn’t want to see.

Aoife O’Brien [00:04:21]:

Yeah. And

Aaron Doyle [00:04:22]:

we had 20 of each, and we asked them to pick their top 7. And then we kind of whittle that down to what’s the most common 5.

Aoife O’Brien [00:04:28]:

So you had the 20 on the list Yeah. And people were asked to. Yeah. Right. Okay.

Aaron Doyle [00:04:33]:

One to 7. What do you deem to be most important, least important? Yeah. And we got some really good stuff back, and that told us how people wanted to behave with their colleagues. Yeah. Everyone wants the business to behave.

Aoife O’Brien [00:04:45]:

Yeah. We want

Aaron Doyle [00:04:45]:

to be perceived in the market. What was non negotiable, things like pointy elbows, you know What

Aoife O’Brien [00:04:50]:

what does that mean?

Aaron Doyle [00:04:51]:

That pointy you know, that kind of

Aoife O’Brien [00:04:52]:

Get out of my way. I’m in a hurry. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:04:56]:

That that kind of

Aoife O’Brien [00:04:57]:

Competitive.

Aaron Doyle [00:04:58]:

Almost aggressive. Yeah. You know, that kind of culture, like, that’s something we didn’t want negativity. That kind of, you know, coming with problems without solutions. Things that we wanted to see were respect, integrity, authenticity

Aoife O’Brien [00:05:09]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:05:09]:

You know, being innovative, disruptive, moving fast. These were the kind of things that kept coming up. So then we took all that information away as a team, and we looked at how how we made these into statements. Yeah. We didn’t wanna just have, you know, integrity written on the wall. We didn’t want to do that. We wanted to build that out in the statements, and these became guiding lines and I said, we want people to behave.

Aoife O’Brien [00:05:30]:

Well, that’s like, before we started recording, we were having a bit of a chat earlier and we were talking about this idea of, like, respect and integrity. Should they just be normal? Like, would you not just expect that from a workplace that you have those things anyway? Do you need to explicitly say, here we treat each other with respect or here we act in integrity?

Aaron Doyle [00:05:51]:

Yeah. I I think I think I I I definitely agree with you that there should be non negotiables. I think there’s no harm in in emphasizing. One of the things that we ask people to do is the idea of being authentic bring your

Aoife O’Brien [00:06:02]:

authentic self

Aaron Doyle [00:06:03]:

to work. And that’s also something that just reaffirms, like, you can be that’s what we wanted to say. Yeah. Specifically say, you’re welcome here. You can be yourself. You don’t have to be pretend something you’re not. We don’t do faves

Aoife O’Brien [00:06:14]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:06:15]:

To be yourself. So that was one that we wanted to be kinda specific on.

Aoife O’Brien [00:06:18]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:06:18]:

And I totally agree. Like, these things should be accepted as to who they are. You should always be

Aoife O’Brien [00:06:24]:

It’s just not a choice

Aaron Doyle [00:06:25]:

of the case. Yeah. Exactly. Do you know? Like, it’s important to have to say that. Like, people should always have integrity. They should operate with respect. Businesses should do the right thing. They should have morals and ethics.

Aoife O’Brien [00:06:35]:

But we

Aaron Doyle [00:06:35]:

wanted to just be very clear about that. Yeah. Looked like as well.

Aoife O’Brien [00:06:38]:

Can I just say, like, from all of the interactions that I’ve had, that really comes through for me? I think that people say to me, you’re so authentic.

Aaron Doyle [00:06:46]:

Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:06:47]:

And I did if anyone’s on my email list, I I sent an email out a few weeks ago about this whole idea of authenticity and for me it’s showing up as you are and as I describe it sometimes, like, keeping it real. Like, this is the reality, this little setup that I have going on here, this is how I do it at home. It’s not different, we’re not in a, like, big professional environment or anything like that. The thing that springs to my mind was that a few years ago I used to do these LinkedIn lives all the time with my podcast guests. So we’d have a podcast guest come or a podcast episode released and then a few days later I’d go live on LinkedIn and have a kind of a follow-up conversation for about 10 minutes with the podcast guest. One time I I think I had a phone call with someone else, had like a Zoom call with someone else prior to that and my plan had been to dry my hair and to, you know, put on a bit of makeup and stuff like that. And I got so engrossed in the conversation that I was having with this other person that I didn’t have time and so I showed up LinkedIn live with wet hair and no makeup. And for me, that’s it’s keeping it real, like this is what life is.

Aoife O’Brien [00:07:55]:

That sometimes you get busy, you get distracted, you get pulled away from things and, yeah, I have wet hair and that’s just how it is. And so that’s, kind of, for me and just to say that that has come across, that has come through so strongly in all of the interactions that I’ve had with anyone from here. So I appreciate that. I

Aaron Doyle [00:08:12]:

appreciate that. That’s, like, that’s what we’re trying to

Aoife O’Brien [00:08:14]:

do. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:08:15]:

To be real. We get told an awful lot that we’re sound, and I know that’s a very Irish thing to say, and that’s why we haven’t put it in as our values. Yeah. And white trans labels.

Aoife O’Brien [00:08:24]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:08:25]:

It’s that nature of just being being ourselves

Aoife O’Brien [00:08:27]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:08:27]:

And being nice.

Aoife O’Brien [00:08:28]:

Being nice, I think. Yeah. It’s a for anyone because I so I know there’s listeners from all over the world. It’s like sound the easiest way to describe it is probably nice. I don’t know. Like, do people agree? Like, it’s just nice. Nice. Not a dickhead, basically.

Aaron Doyle [00:08:41]:

Yeah. Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:08:42]:

There’s no other way that you might describe it. But maybe, like, in building on that, how do you make sure that the people that you bring into the organization are also nice, like, that they’re sound, that they that they have those values as well, and that you’re not hiring in people who are toxic.

Aaron Doyle [00:08:59]:

No. It’s a really good question. And when we’re doing interviews, we try and ask questions around behavior Yeah. As well. And you never, like you get a sense from somebody, first of all. You can tell from the interactions, and sometimes the most powerful interactions might be scheduling with emails or they have the interviews in other kind of Yeah. Yeah. That can be powerful as well as comms.

Aoife O’Brien [00:09:17]:

Everything is a bit of a telltale sign. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:09:20]:

There’s gonna be people listening to this now. Right? Well, I’m emailing them about interviews. It’s gonna be really making sure they’re they’re super sound on their comms. But,

Aoife O’Brien [00:09:29]:

no.

Aaron Doyle [00:09:29]:

So that effect, like, asking me how you feel questions like, tell me about your favorite person you’ve worked with. Why did you like working with them? I think that’s powerful. Tell me about the manager that’s gotten the best out of you.

Aoife O’Brien [00:09:40]:

How do

Aaron Doyle [00:09:40]:

they get the best out of you?

Aoife O’Brien [00:09:41]:

How does

Aaron Doyle [00:09:41]:

a prospective manager get the best out of you? Tell me about, a colleague that you found difficult to work with.

Aoife O’Brien [00:09:46]:

Yeah. What did

Aaron Doyle [00:09:47]:

you find difficult to work with?

Aoife O’Brien [00:09:48]:

That’s not an easy question to answer, I think, in an interview situation, is it?

Aaron Doyle [00:09:52]:

And we try and make that. It’s, you know, we’re having a a very real chat. And, you know, if somebody isn’t honest, it’s a disservice for them.

Aoife O’Brien [00:09:59]:

It’s a

Aaron Doyle [00:09:59]:

shame for us to, like, find a way to

Aoife O’Brien [00:10:00]:

You can hardly show up and say, I got on with everyone or I never have to problem with any of my colleagues because that’s just a lie.

Aaron Doyle [00:10:06]:

Yeah. Exactly.

Aoife O’Brien [00:10:07]:

You’re always gonna have there’s always gonna be someone who kinda rubs you up the wrong way or is that you just don’t gel with or whatever it might be.

Aaron Doyle [00:10:14]:

I’m following the dots sometimes is, you know, tell me about how you worked with them. Like, how did you navigate Yeah. Those differences that you might have had

Aoife O’Brien [00:10:21]:

Or not necessarily. Or not. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:10:23]:

Yeah. But, no, that would be you try and understand and ask them, like, what does culture mean to you as well? What behaviors do you value? Yeah. These kind of things. Get as much information about the person’s behavior as possible.

Aoife O’Brien [00:10:34]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:10:35]:

Is what I’m trying

Aoife O’Brien [00:10:35]:

to do. And hopefully people know that. Like, that’s this is, I suppose, a drum that I’m trying to bang for the last few years is understanding as an individual that you have values as well. Yeah. I didn’t know that. When I worked in corporate, I knew that we had our values on the wall. Yeah. Going back to what you were saying earlier, we had our values at the bottom of the emails.

Aoife O’Brien [00:10:53]:

Yeah. But they were not the the lived experience that I had whatsoever in that organization. I’ll share one of the examples which was, simple. And this was an American company and the most bureaucratic company I ever worked in in my life. Yeah. Again, the example I always think of is if I wanted to send an email to a group of clients using our marketing software, I had to get approval from 1 of only 2 people in the US in order to send out this email to our local clients in Ireland. Like, to me, that’s overly bureaucratic and it’s not showing a something that always kind of springs to my mind, but I never knew that I, as an individual, also have values and that my values should be in alignment with the values of the organization. And it goes a long way, I think, to understand what your own values are so that you know what you stand for, so you know the kind of environment that you’re gonna fit in really well with.

Aoife O’Brien [00:12:00]:

And all of this comes from those negative experiences, let’s say, that I had at work and the whole reason that I set up my business in in the first place. So maybe we can talk a little bit about that, about Sure. Toxic work environments, you know, and any do you have any experience of working in toxic environments?

Aaron Doyle [00:12:18]:

Okay. Yeah. Yeah. They’re not only in dealing with anything like that. So I I can speak for you. Yes. It was gonna be a word when I was in college, and it was a a call center outbound sales role. It was Coco.

Aaron Doyle [00:12:32]:

And it was a really tough role. I shouldn’t have gotten the job. I was terrible at it. I’m not the profile that does that well. I don’t like rejection. So that’s all I was getting all day. Like, I didn’t love that. But all I remember with the place was everything was great.

Aaron Doyle [00:12:46]:

Like, we were doing really unenjoyable for me. I knew it was enjoyable work. Yeah. But everything was great. It was, like, great chairs, great floors, great office, gray everything. I think

Aoife O’Brien [00:12:55]:

the only No pop of color.

Aaron Doyle [00:12:57]:

How to found these. Like, gray everything. And, those really cynical ceiling lights, like, hospital ceiling lights. So was that that was the environment. And then the work was an amazing for me, and the product that we were selling actually wasn’t a very nice product. So we didn’t know that part, but that was kinda complacent for me. You coupled that with the management style was really heavy on inputs, like micromanagement on the inputs. Wow.

Aaron Doyle [00:13:21]:

Okay. Really nasty mentions. Like, one of these boards with call times

Aoife O’Brien [00:13:25]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:13:25]:

On it Yeah. Which, you know, if you’re having a bad day or if you weren’t good at it, which I wasn’t Yeah. You’re kinda named the giant amongst the group, you know, which is very apparent, which I didn’t love. And then the kind of the culture that you can imagine because of that is a slightly aggressive kind of

Aoife O’Brien [00:13:42]:

environment as well. Yeah. Like, highly competitive if you’re Highly competitive. If you’re things. And I suppose, like, before you kinda share more about that, I’m interested to know, do you think that there are some people who would really thrive in that environment? So it wasn’t a good fit for you.

Aaron Doyle [00:13:56]:

And that’s the caveat now.

Aoife O’Brien [00:13:57]:

But, yeah,

Aaron Doyle [00:13:58]:

it wasn’t for me whatsoever. Some people would

Aoife O’Brien [00:14:00]:

But did did some people love it? Did like, where you were, did some people love it? Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:14:04]:

Okay. Because of the product. Because the product just wasn’t a particularly, a good product. Okay. So I think that was the problem with it. But some people were good at that.

Aoife O’Brien [00:14:13]:

Yeah. Do you know what

Aaron Doyle [00:14:14]:

I mean? Some people can handle that, and some people were top of the list, and they were you know, they’d have the swagger that goes with being top of the list. And for me, that just wasn’t something that

Aoife O’Brien [00:14:21]:

I thought.

Aaron Doyle [00:14:21]:

So for me, it was was totally misaligned with them. It probably goes back to I shouldn’t have been hired there.

Aoife O’Brien [00:14:26]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:14:27]:

That was that was just a bad hire. Yeah. And I was the bad hire. There. Yeah. Yeah. It just wasn’t it wasn’t a fierce. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:14:34]:

But, yeah, that was

Aoife O’Brien [00:14:35]:

one that stands out. Think we’ll come back to that idea in a second of it being a bad hire but as the time of this recording I’ve just come back from Cork. I was down in Cork for a few days and it brought back a whole load of memories early career for me where I was hired to do something not dissimilar to that. I was pounding the pavements in Cork going from business to business trying to drum up sales, advertise advertising sales essentially for a magazine that hadn’t been launched yet.

Aaron Doyle [00:15:03]:

Okay.

Aoife O’Brien [00:15:04]:

So this was, if I think about it, the totally wrong kind of job for me. Yeah. I was not too long out of college and had had some involvement with the people who were involved in this magazine, and they thought it would be a great idea to put me in this position. And I just think that is just totally the wrong and all the memories came back when I was back down in Cork. I was like, oh, I remember going into that business or oh, that’s changed completely now and it’s completely, you know, it’s a different one. But also thinking how far have I come in my career and how wrong that was of a fit for what I’m good at and what I’m not good at, which I have awareness of. But maybe coming back to this idea of, I suppose the the toxic and the fact that you think that was a mishire then on their part and how how to maybe avoid doing those kinds of things?

Aaron Doyle [00:16:00]:

Yeah. Absolutely. And, like, that’s that’s expensive for a business.

Aoife O’Brien [00:16:04]:

Yeah. Exactly. You know, like I

Aaron Doyle [00:16:05]:

said, like, I was of no value to that company. I was not performing. It probably cost money. Yeah. I think it’s looking at making sure that’s when you’re interviewing that you’re you’re making sure you’re actually interviewing correctly. Like, that you’re not going with sometimes you see it, especially in start ups, good feel. And and, look, there’s there’s a bit of ways in good feel. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:16:26]:

You know, you have to have that kind of sometimes that’s where you might get that values compatibility piece of your compatibility. But looking at, can this person actually do the job Yeah. From competency standpoint? Yep. Do they have technical knowledge to do the job? They just didn’t. I was in college at the time. I had to

Aoife O’Brien [00:16:40]:

leave left college. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:16:42]:

And I I was totally misheartened there so, like, you know, a competency round

Aoife O’Brien [00:16:46]:

in

Aaron Doyle [00:16:47]:

that process would have would have helped, as opposed to maybe a good field.

Aoife O’Brien [00:16:50]:

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Do you have any experiences either for yourself or other people of that’s that kind of sounds like a general not a great culture but more toxic because of the competency mismatch. But any experiences more from a culture where you’re like, oh, this is just not a great fit for me culturally?

Aaron Doyle [00:17:13]:

Joel, I’ve been really lucky to to not. That was one and the the the the the kind of the cultural mislignment there was potentially there was a really strong demos management, which I really didn’t like. Yeah. And that can be, no. Like, I I touch touch words. And it’s probably, it’s something I’m very good to say that I genuinely haven’t. Yeah. You sometimes come across bad actors in in in companies, you know, that have a a a kind of a a slightly toxic agenda.

Aaron Doyle [00:17:41]:

Maybe somebody’s disengaged and potentially on the

Aoife O’Brien [00:17:44]:

way out. It’s something like that.

Aaron Doyle [00:17:45]:

Yeah. Yeah. You know, you do see that, especially in HR. You become made aware of them.

Aoife O’Brien [00:17:49]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:17:50]:

But now for the most part, you’re very lucky. But when you do even have somebody like that, it’s incredible how quickly they can become disruptive. So Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:17:57]:

Yeah. That process

Aaron Doyle [00:17:58]:

of nature is is contagious.

Aoife O’Brien [00:18:00]:

It’s interesting you say that because I definitely was that person in a couple of different scenarios where I wasn’t enjoying and Yeah. I love your description. You’re, like, the bad actor. I’m, like, yes. I can totally relate to that. I had 2 situations and anyone again who’s listened to the podcast for a while or who knows my personal story, there was one where it was, like, this is just a toxic situation. It was misogynistic. Okay.

Aoife O’Brien [00:18:21]:

I was made a lot of promises. They didn’t deliver on those promises. And they probably thought, golden handcuffs, she’s not gonna leave this role. Yeah. And I did leave because I thought, I’m not taking this. I’m not having it, and I’m gonna leave. And then the second one, it was less of a toxic environment generally, but more just a not good fish culturally for me. I I felt like I came with all of this experience, but I didn’t feel fulfilled.

Aoife O’Brien [00:18:46]:

I didn’t feel like I was reaching my potential in that role. And so, again, after years of staying in a role, I loved it, I hated it, I just left. I was like, I I cannot do this anymore. I don’t want to stay here. But I was that disruptive person probably in both of those situations, you know, making it not so pleasant for other people. Yeah. But but I think it’s it’s important to address those things. I don’t think anyone ever really addressed it with me.

Aoife O’Brien [00:19:14]:

They never challenged me on it or anything. Totally. Yeah. And I think that

Aaron Doyle [00:19:19]:

is often the job of the manager Yeah. To understand, especially in one to ones. Like, one to ones can be incredibly powerful feedback loops. Like, surveys are great, some quarterly surveys, but you don’t understand who the person is behind, especially going on as most surveys are. But if you get that, everybody knows if there’s somebody like that. You can tell what the behavior you know who that person is. And it is it’s worth having a conversation asking, look. Are have here.

Aaron Doyle [00:19:42]:

Is there something wrong? Mhmm. It might use problems for them to make a move, potentially, or it might actually correct the neighbors.

Aoife O’Brien [00:19:48]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:19:49]:

You might actually get the person back. Like, it could be something relatively small. Yeah. There’s something I could be dressed, and you get the person back on-site, and then they start adding value again. Yeah. You’re not looking to relatives. And someone, like you said, in your situation, I can’t blame

Aoife O’Brien [00:20:00]:

you for leaving. Yeah. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:20:01]:

More people should be brave enough to actually leave in those situations because this puts manners on

Aoife O’Brien [00:20:07]:

That’s what that’s what I was yeah. I mean, that’s what I was gonna ask about because oftentimes and I talk to my friends about this all the time. They stay in situations that are not serving them I’m too short. Exactly. Like, for me, life is too short. But why do you think people stay in those kind of toxic situations? I don’t know. Okay. That’s how

Aaron Doyle [00:20:28]:

it sounds. Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:20:29]:

Is it a is it a comfort?

Aaron Doyle [00:20:29]:

Is it a lack of Or a fear? Or fear? Is it something like that?

Aoife O’Brien [00:20:35]:

I’m all put money. I’m not gonna make the same money. And I

Aaron Doyle [00:20:37]:

think it’s only when people actually leave and start looking elsewhere. Sometimes in those situations, like, they do see, oh my god. What was I doing? Yeah. Especially when you’re at that point where if there are there’s something to that effect that there’s no going back from. Yeah. Yeah. It’s it’s it’s a tough one to understand why people do. You know? It is I think it’s a lot of potential confidence, potentially fear.

Aaron Doyle [00:20:59]:

Mhmm. Golden handcuffs. You

Aoife O’Brien [00:21:00]:

know? Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:21:01]:

It’s will I get the same money elsewhere? I mean, if you if you go through a process with companies, you’ll find the grass can be greener sometimes out there. Yeah. Like, if you’re stuck in a job that you really don’t love and you start looking elsewhere, like, you will find opportunities. Yeah. Those things that you might have to fear about, you’re often not fully correct in

Aoife O’Brien [00:21:21]:

it. I I think for me and I’ve talked about this, and I’m not sure if I’ve spoken about it on the podcast, but I was very lucky early careers that I found a few places that I loved. I loved working there. It was an amazing culture. And you can say that kind of spoiled me for anything else because when I got to those other roles, it was like this is not the same. I know there’s something not quite right here. I can’t place my finger on it. It’s with retrospect I look back and I go, that’s what was going on there.

Aoife O’Brien [00:21:51]:

Yes. But at the time, it’s just a feeling that this is not quite right. This is not a good fit for me. I’m not happy here, and I need to get out. But I think sometimes, yeah, like, it could be fear. It could be loads of different reasons. People feeling like they’re stuck or they don’t have a choice in those situations. But, going back to your your earlier point of this is the opportunity for the manager to step in.

Aoife O’Brien [00:22:14]:

Like, what kind of things do you think that managers could and should be doing to maintain that positive culture in an organization?

Aaron Doyle [00:22:21]:

Yeah. Like, I think, first of all, operate with trust. Yeah. I think that’s that has to be. Yeah. You have to trust your people.

Aoife O’Brien [00:22:28]:

So you mean when you’re, you know, measuring people’s keystrokes to see when they’re I can’t understand.

Aaron Doyle [00:22:34]:

You’ve hired a person to do the job. You hire them in good faith, and you hire them because you have reason to hire. Let them do the job that you’re hired them to do. Don’t tell them how to do it. That doesn’t make sense. You should still do it yourself if that’s Yes. You know? Give them autonomy to do the work. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:22:50]:

Don’t necessarily give them the solution. Give them the problem and let them figure out.

Aoife O’Brien [00:22:54]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:22:55]:

Because I know, you know, you’re not getting the best of somebody like that. I think those 2 things together adds to the job satisfaction that somebody has. People want to be challenged.

Aoife O’Brien [00:23:02]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:23:03]:

Don’t wanna be overstretched, but but challenged. Yeah. And that keeps people engaged. I think when people like the work they’re doing, it’s a big plus. You know, you look at a wider range of comp and benefits, that all has to align anyway. But in terms of the psychological self safety is is really important Mhmm. As well. You know, people need to feel safe.

Aaron Doyle [00:23:19]:

Yeah. And, yeah, safety and tolerance and and trust for people like adults. And then other things, like, for that individual, you know, do they need flexibility? Mhmm. Is flexibility something that they really value? Yes. Does this person have? I mean, it’s outside of work that’s a slightly later start or a slightly earlier finish when you guide them with and allow them for that. Mhmm. If you trust your people to do good work and allow them to do good work and give them problems to solve and to deliver, give them a bit of space to do it. You know?

Aoife O’Brien [00:23:46]:

Like, otherwise, I think

Aaron Doyle [00:23:47]:

that’s important. And then look and close and move fast. Potential changes in behavior. Like, is this person that used to be really engaged and really ready to go, are they tired? Like, are they potentially is that something that’s happening? Are we are we in a kind of a burnout situation? Yeah. Potentially, if they’ve been going and going and going. So, yeah, I think I think managers need to keep calls on a lot of those different things Yeah. And can do true one to ones and true honest conversations.

Aoife O’Brien [00:24:12]:

Yeah. I think oftentimes managers are overworked. They’re overloaded. And they may they don’t notice or they don’t know it’s their job. They might think it’s, oh, this is HR’s job to notice these things or to figure things out or to, to anticipate these types of things. But I suppose maybe it’s making clear, as a manager, this is it’s your responsibility to have those conversations, to notice those things on top of the workload that is probably Yeah. Massive. I’m sorry.

Aoife O’Brien [00:24:41]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:24:42]:

And I think, you know, as a head to our function, training managers and supporting managers is is really important. If there’s a time of the year where you have slightly less work, than others, maybe it’s Christmas, maybe it’s summer, can you do some training with managers if needed to help them support their employees? And those ways, can you do the one to one training? You set expectations there? Or if managers, you know, responsible, then they’re not sure how to play, like, you know, I’ve always said, in any company I worked, you never leave yourself stuck. I try this one entirely.

Aoife O’Brien [00:25:10]:

Yeah. But

Aaron Doyle [00:25:11]:

just just if you have something, even good for you, you’ll just go over to this and you can start thinking

Aoife O’Brien [00:25:15]:

about this. I think sometimes, like, sometimes people are worried about that and we’re not kinda gonna go down a total different avenue on this but just to flag the fact that a lot of people are feeling overwhelmed and sometimes it’s really difficult to ask for help because the perception is if I ask for help, people will think I can’t cope with the workloads. They think I can’t do it, and it’s gonna reflect badly on me when actually, normally, the opposite is the case. If you flag something early and say, listen, I need some support with this or I can’t get everything done or I’m feeling this way, then it helps to mitigate the issue rather than it it blows up in a few weeks’ time when when you can’t cope at all.

Aaron Doyle [00:25:55]:

100%. Or sometimes you see people, you know, chipping away with extra hours and stuff like that. It’s kinda like they don’t go underwater. Do you know that kind

Aoife O’Brien [00:26:02]:

of Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:26:03]:

Yeah. Yeah. But the work is getting done. I don’t know if there’s a team of people all doing, say, 10 let’s say, 4 people do 10 hours a

Aoife O’Brien [00:26:10]:

week actually.

Aaron Doyle [00:26:11]:

The manager might be done the wiser because the work is getting done.

Aoife O’Brien [00:26:13]:

Yes. No gap. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:26:14]:

But that’s in itself. That’s a new outcome.

Aoife O’Brien [00:26:17]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:26:17]:

That’s a 40 hour week.

Aoife O’Brien [00:26:18]:

Yeah. To be filled. Exactly. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:26:20]:

Yeah. Fulfilled. And if the work gets done and then we flags it, the manager might be done the wiser Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:26:25]:

Because the

Aaron Doyle [00:26:25]:

work is getting done.

Aoife O’Brien [00:26:26]:

Yeah. It’s okay. I’m so glad you said that because that is so true. And I think there there’s one thing to be said for busy work and this work doesn’t need to be done. But if the work genuinely needs to be done and it’s been split across the team as is Yeah. That is justification for we actually need someone else to do this. You made a point earlier, Aaron, about this idea of the inputs versus the outputs. Can we talk a little bit more about that? Because I think, you know, we tend to get so hung up on the inputs and how much time we’re spending at work and how much energy it takes to do something and all these things when actually we should be focusing on, well, what are the deliverables? What are the objectives? What are the outcomes I’m trying to achieve and the impact that I want to have with the work that I’m doing? Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:27:12]:

And how do we get that? What’s the best place what’s the best way to do that? Mhmm. And I suppose me being me in the most efficient way as well. So any any thoughts on, like, how to make that

Aaron Doyle [00:27:23]:

shift? Yeah. I think, you know, we look at KPIs. We put a lot of weight on KPIs Yeah. Or OKRs, whichever the the model lends itself better to. And we tend to do it the same way. We tend to have kind of 3 key to the goals. Just true. Like, within your role, you’re responsible for 3

Aoife O’Brien [00:27:38]:

things. Okay.

Aaron Doyle [00:27:39]:

You know, a couple of things that feed into that. So we have, like, category and then key results Yeah. That feed into that. Just tangibles to make this big piece happen, and then let people do it. Yeah. Do you know what I’m gonna do? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:27:50]:

We love. Let people do it.

Aoife O’Brien [00:27:52]:

I’m here for support, but that’s your job. That’s your problem to solve. Exactly. Get on with it.

Aaron Doyle [00:27:56]:

Yeah. Tell me if you need any help. Tell me. Yeah. But here’s a problem you solve. I’m gonna solve that kind of thing, and here’s some key results that if you can do these, you have a very high likelihood of being successful. Yeah. That’s the way we’re gonna build it.

Aaron Doyle [00:28:08]:

It’s not to say, we’re gonna measure this, we’re gonna measure this. It’s these are the likelihoods that if you do all these, you’ll achieve this.

Aoife O’Brien [00:28:15]:

Yeah. And I

Aaron Doyle [00:28:16]:

think that’s a really good way of doing it. And why we do this, break that down as the team needs to or sorry. Company needs to deliver x, maybe revenue target.

Aoife O’Brien [00:28:24]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:28:24]:

What does every function need to deliver to feed into that? Yeah. And what does every individual needs to feed into their team, to create a feeling. So it it creates this unity and togetherness.

Aoife O’Brien [00:28:34]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:28:35]:

People understand why they’re doing the work they’re doing, and then managers can give people a little bit Yeah. If you know what that looks like, and you can keep a pulse on what it looks like for

Aoife O’Brien [00:28:44]:

people, you don’t need

Aaron Doyle [00:28:45]:

to micromanage it. But if the outputs are being achieved Yeah. That’s perfect.

Aoife O’Brien [00:28:55]:

Yeah. Yeah. That’s where we need to be. And again and I think this kind of we touched on the idea of flexible working earlier, but it it that lends itself, I think, to more flexible working because when we focus so much on the inputs, it’s the oh, well and I always think of this as an example, that my friend said to me, she said, well, you know, I worked 2 hours extra on Wednesday, therefore, I can knock off 2 hours extra on Friday. And I think that’s the mentality that a lot of people have. We’re so focused so much on the number of hours that we put into the job that we have rather than I’ve achieved this outcome and therefore, I can take the whole of Friday off because I’ve achieved what I set out to achieve on Thursday already, you know. So I think it does take a shift in mentality, but for me, that’s where work is going.

Aaron Doyle [00:29:43]:

I totally agree with you. It’s it’s like Thursday. If something works really well and gets all the work done, like you said, by Thursday Yeah. To give you more work

Aoife O’Brien [00:29:50]:

on Friday.

Aaron Doyle [00:29:50]:

Exactly. You know that

Aoife O’Brien [00:29:51]:

it’s Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:29:52]:

Yeah. Off Thursday. Yeah. Totally. If if people can get their work done the way that works for them, absolutely, take your feedback where you can. And there is like, with us, we’re a client facing delivery focused business. Yeah. There’s times where we have to go all hands on deck.

Aaron Doyle [00:30:06]:

Yeah. The expectation is there’ll there’ll be downtime as well.

Aoife O’Brien [00:30:08]:

Exactly. And

Aaron Doyle [00:30:09]:

it comes in ways. Yeah. I’ll take it when you

Aoife O’Brien [00:30:11]:

Yeah. And I think a lot of businesses are like that. I certainly come from that type of background where it’s it’s all about client and we had a degree of flexibility, but there were certain levels of flexibility that we couldn’t have because we were client facing. Yeah. And then certain times of the year where it was a bit more, like you say, all hands on deck. This needs to be delivered or a particular team needs support. So let’s all help out with this one particular team to make sure that they get that deliverable, which is so meaningful for our business. We had a chat before we started recording with someone in the room about this idea of the, I suppose, the hybrid model and how to maintain culture in that hybrid type of model.

Aoife O’Brien [00:30:57]:

Yeah. And, again, at the time of recording, we’re in the context of Apple have just mandated a 5 day return to office. I will do a solo episode about my thoughts on this and maybe the, you know, the both sides of the story because there are 2 sides to the story and then maybe what the trickle down effect will be for other organizations. Because, you know, I think, one way to describe it is we are we’ve seen behind the curtain, if you’re familiar with The Wizard of Oz, like, we’re seeing what’s going on behind the curtain. We’re very well capable of working from home, of being productive. But at the same time, and I’ve had lots of conversations about this over the last few weeks, about there are certain types of organizations that are required to always be, whether it’s on-site, in a factory, whatever it might be, there are certain types of organizations. And is that fair that some people get to work from home and other people don’t? So there’s loads of different sides for it from that perspective. But I think the particular context that we were talking about was, well, the agreement is this one thing but actually people are not really sticking to that agreement.

Aoife O’Brien [00:32:10]:

And I suppose maybe there’s a few layers to this question. It’s thinking how do we maintain the culture that we’ve set for our organization in that remote slash hybrid type of environment? But also, if people aren’t following the quote unquote rules, how do we make sure that, you know, peep that we address those issues?

Aaron Doyle [00:32:31]:

Yeah. It’s look, it’s a it’s a tough question. And my take on it is visibility doesn’t always equal productivity. Yeah. So when you have people in the office 5 days a week, it doesn’t necessarily mean they’re doing the best work. Yeah. Some people And

Aoife O’Brien [00:32:44]:

we think that, I think. The perception is if you’re in the office that you’re doing that, you could be on Facebook. You could be doing all sorts of things, but you’re happy to be in the office.

Aaron Doyle [00:32:52]:

Chatting. Like, I’m I’m really guilty of this.

Aoife O’Brien [00:32:53]:

Yeah. Sometimes when

Aaron Doyle [00:32:54]:

I’m in the office, I am because I’m I’m having conversations. Yeah. Our model is we come in on Tuesdays, my end days, and we try and get a Thursday, you know, as often as kind of every month or 6 weeks or so and and socialize afterwards. But what we say to people is there’s a purpose for when you come in. We front load meetings, 1 to 1s, coffees, launches on those 2 days.

Aoife O’Brien [00:33:17]:

Yeah. So

Aaron Doyle [00:33:18]:

that gets everybody together. Yeah. And it gives us the chance for information to flow, good meetings to happen, you know, whiteboard sessions. If you look into any of the rooms, all those walls can be written on. There’s whiteboards everywhere.

Aoife O’Brien [00:33:29]:

I did notice that earlier. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:33:31]:

We want we want people to be having, like, good conversations, creative, innovative conversations, and that happens with a whiteboard sometimes. Yeah. I know it’s a little bit old school, but it does. It works. So giving people purpose when they’re coming in. I I I hate the idea of somebody coming in on a day, like, say, you know, lashing around for 2 hours on a bus or something like that to do work they can be doing at home. Yeah. Give them a purpose.

Aaron Doyle [00:33:52]:

And that purpose sometimes can be social

Aoife O’Brien [00:33:54]:

as well.

Aaron Doyle [00:33:54]:

Yeah. But try and there’s work that happens better in the office, and try and get people together on those days. Or even if it’s just getting we’re really together for lunch at 1 o’clock on a Tuesday, something that we really like. And sometimes upstairs, it’s great to see. We have these long tables that holds 6 people aside, and it’s great that everybody can kinda come together there or even if people go out and get lunch, they bring it back. And that’s a really lovely part of the culture that people want to gather on those days. And, you know, it’s it’s giving people facilitate, not togetherness, but not giving people, you know not saying come in and do the same work you could do at home Yeah. From the office.

Aaron Doyle [00:34:30]:

That’s me. It doesn’t really make sense.

Aoife O’Brien [00:34:32]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:34:33]:

I know some companies that just have to work in the office. You know? The or the the work they do has to be hands on, but I think where you can bring people together when there’s a reason, and that reason could be information, catching up on the ones, social, whatever it is. And then let people do the work they can do from home Yeah. From home.

Aoife O’Brien [00:34:51]:

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And to

Aaron Doyle [00:34:53]:

to answer the point of how do you address that? I I I don’t like the idea of blanket mandating, say, 2 days a week or 3 days a week. I’m not picking the 2 days because people might miss each other. Yeah. If I could do 2 days in the office and my manager could do 2 days, and we might never see each other. Yeah. So that purpose purpose on those days brings people together. I I think if people aren’t doing it, you’ve gotta really question that. It’s a bad example that sometimes what we see is people that have been in the business for longer.

Aaron Doyle [00:35:28]:

Don’t throw you in with this.

Aoife O’Brien [00:35:29]:

They wanna

Aaron Doyle [00:35:29]:

take a little bit of liberty on what days they come in or not. Yeah. Did sorry. Not not here, but just as a wider example.

Aoife O’Brien [00:35:35]:

Yeah. I’ve

Aaron Doyle [00:35:36]:

I’ve heard these people longer term. Certain people in businesses might say, oh, look. I might come in today or to that effect, but I think you ought to come down harder on it.

Aoife O’Brien [00:35:45]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:35:46]:

I think you ought to address it because it sets an example for this kind of senior people in the business that have a senior standing, show showing everybody else. Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:35:54]:

They’re the role models. Exactly. They’re the role models. Exactly. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:35:57]:

And that might even be showing what good looks like, which is what these people should

Aoife O’Brien [00:36:00]:

be doing. Yeah. And I I think one of the the big issues is that when and this kind of this is not just for hybrid, generally from a culture perspective that we don’t have those difficult conversations when we need to have them.

Aaron Doyle [00:36:17]:

Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:36:17]:

Like I mentioned earlier, if I was that bad actor, no one had that conversation with me. I knew I was acting up. Yeah. I knew I was and I was getting away with it. So, like, there’s nothing to stop me from being being a little a little brash, as I say, in Ireland. I’m sure they say that in other places as well. But that’s that’s what I was, definitely on more than than one occasion. And, like, maybe let’s talk about how do we have those difficult conversations from a culture perspective, not from a toxic perspective, not from a not from the perspective of we’re talking about hybrid or people are not.

Aoife O’Brien [00:36:54]:

It’s just generally, here’s our values, here’s the behaviors we expect, and here’s one person at least who’s not behaving in the way that we would expect based on our values and what we say we we want people, how we want people to behave in the office. Yeah. And how how do we start having those conversations?

Aaron Doyle [00:37:16]:

Yeah. Like, I really like the radical candor.

Aoife O’Brien [00:37:19]:

Oh, yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:37:19]:

For feedback. Yeah. He was brilliant.

Aoife O’Brien [00:37:21]:

And we’ve we’ve put a link to

Aaron Doyle [00:37:22]:

the book

Aoife O’Brien [00:37:22]:

in the show notes. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:37:23]:

Yeah. Yeah. It’s it’s the idea of being empathetic or being direct. That, you know, it’s like somebody has something stuck in your teeth. Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:37:31]:

It’s an

Aaron Doyle [00:37:31]:

example I always use. You know, you can say, yeah. Yeah. You can be direct

Aoife O’Brien [00:37:35]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:37:35]:

And you can put people out. Yeah. Same.

Aoife O’Brien [00:37:37]:

And then there’s a there’s how many people won’t say anything?

Aaron Doyle [00:37:40]:

Exactly. Exactly. That’s part of that one as well.

Aoife O’Brien [00:37:42]:

Yeah. You

Aaron Doyle [00:37:43]:

can go, you’ve got something stuck in your

Aoife O’Brien [00:37:45]:

skin and your lips. And you don’t want to say it in front of people, and you don’t want to say it in an obnoxious way. You want to just let someone know subtly Yeah. That you’ve got something going on here. You need to fix it. Go to the bathroom. Whatever. Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:37:55]:

Exactly.

Aaron Doyle [00:37:56]:

Yeah. It’s that same effect. It’s just that kind of fly word. And in these situations, when it’s with behavior, I think it’s fair to say, like, come with data, not opinion. Say, like, look, on this occasion, this is what I saw. This is the behavior display and this is the impact.

Aoife O’Brien [00:38:11]:

Yes. Yeah. What we’d

Aaron Doyle [00:38:12]:

love to see.

Aoife O’Brien [00:38:13]:

The impact, isn’t it?

Aaron Doyle [00:38:14]:

It’s the impact. Yeah. It’s not because otherwise

Aoife O’Brien [00:38:16]:

It’s not you as a person. Exactly. It’s not your personality.

Aaron Doyle [00:38:19]:

No. It’s yes. At this on this occasion, you did this. This is what we saw. This was the impact we had and this is what it’s led to.

Aoife O’Brien [00:38:26]:

Yeah. But this is also it’s the perception, isn’t it? Like, this is how you’re coming across. Exactly.

Aaron Doyle [00:38:32]:

Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:38:32]:

And is that the brands that you wanna put out there? Is that how is that how you want to be perceived? Is that what you want to be known for?

Aaron Doyle [00:38:39]:

Yeah. Exactly. That’s a good

Aaron Doyle [00:38:40]:

if you’re doing a personal favor, the same way that you tell them it’s something, they’re they might be non

Aaron Doyle [00:38:43]:

tell them it’s something. They’re they might be none the wiser Yeah. That this is going on. Mhmm. And they might actually want to be behaving in this way. But I think that’s a good place to start the conversation because at least if you follow around with the candor, you can be have direct conversation about it, but it’s framed in the right way. Here’s you and the person’s best intentions of resolving this problem when you enter into the conversation. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:39:05]:

And, you know, you take it from there as to how it goes. But I think that gives a good like you would’ve resolved and successfully.

Aoife O’Brien [00:39:11]:

Yeah. Yeah. I think that’s I mean, that’s a fair approach. But the trouble is recognizing when we need to have those conversations to begin with, I think, and just saying, listen. You know, not putting it off. You don’t wait till you’re quarterly check-in. You don’t wait till your end of your review. You have those conversations, and you have them immediately.

Aoife O’Brien [00:39:27]:

It’s not about the person and their personality. It’s about the impact and how they’re showing up at work and what needs to be addressed. And, I mean, in your experience, does that work in terms I was gonna say standing out. That’s probably the wrong word, but you get what I mean to, like, reinstate. Because as you mentioned earlier, if you have that bad apple, then that’s kind of impacting on all of the people around you and it spreads. Like, oh, well, that person’s acting like that. So I think I can

Aaron Doyle [00:39:57]:

Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:39:57]:

Do that as well. You know, I he’s getting away with that, so why can’t I?

Aaron Doyle [00:40:02]:

Yeah. And I think, you know, people want to be liked when somebody joins a group. Yeah. We inherently want to be liked.

Aoife O’Brien [00:40:09]:

Yeah. The point. Yeah. Around. Yeah. Yeah. We don’t deliberately try and piss other people off. Is that what you’re trying to say? Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:40:15]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:40:15]:

Do you make a bad heart? But if somebody’s just not picking up on that cultural norm or that behavioral norm and they’re kind of, you know, going off in a slightly different direction with their behavior, And it’s potentially or it has the potential to get them disliked by people in the group. You’re doing them a favor

Aoife O’Brien [00:40:31]:

Yeah. That’s a really good point. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:40:33]:

Potentially a way of saying this to them. And, generally, people, if they if they’re told about it and they can fix it, they will. Because it falls into that. Like, I think a really good test for your culture when people are or just in general is to ask somebody in business what gets you liked and what gets you disliked.

Aoife O’Brien [00:40:52]:

Oh. Yeah. That’s a powerful question, I think. Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:40:55]:

You can go before, you know, about culture and say, what how would you describe the culture and then how would the leaders describe the culture? And that’s another And is

Aoife O’Brien [00:41:03]:

it and is it different?

Aaron Doyle [00:41:04]:

Exactly. Yeah. I think if, you know, if I was interviewing any company, I’d ask those kind of questions, what catty light Yeah. What catty dislike, what do ludus say about culture, what do ludus do about culture? I think that gives you a really good picture of what it’s like in a place.

Aoife O’Brien [00:41:16]:

I think that’s brilliant for someone going into an organization to make sure that if you’ve ever been in this toxic situation before that you’re not going in. And I know so many people who’ve gone from one toxic situation into directly into another toxic situation. Yeah. And it like, you you think that you’re you’ve done okay and Yeah. And then it turns out that it’s it’s really not. But those are brilliant questions and I think, yeah, definitely bear those in mind if you’re if you’re trying to get out of a toxic situation and looking for a new job.

Aaron Doyle [00:41:49]:

Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:41:50]:

Are we talked about so so so many different aspects of workplace culture. Is there anything you think that we haven’t really touched on that you want to maybe get across?

Aaron Doyle [00:41:59]:

I think we’ve had a really good conversation. Yeah. There’s a lot in this there’s a lot in this subject.

Aoife O’Brien [00:42:03]:

Yeah. So we

Aaron Doyle [00:42:03]:

could sit here for hours.

Aoife O’Brien [00:42:04]:

Oh, we could. Yeah. I think in the interest of getting people home,

Aaron Doyle [00:42:08]:

rain, jumping at night. Yeah. No. That’s that’s everything.

Aoife O’Brien [00:42:13]:

Yeah. Yeah. And if people want to find out more about Johnson Hannah, about what you do, what’s the best place that can do that?

Aaron Doyle [00:42:20]:

LinkedIn. You can search myself. Yeah. LinkedIn, Aaron Doyle or Johnson Hannah. Yeah. Follow us on our our website or socials, anything like that.

Aoife O’Brien [00:42:29]:

Brilliant. You

Aaron Doyle [00:42:29]:

can contact us on LinkedIn.

Aoife O’Brien [00:42:30]:

And the question I ask everyone who comes on the podcast, what does happy work mean to me? I think getting for

Aaron Doyle [00:42:49]:

like, if the simplest definition is not having fear on a Sunday night. Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:42:50]:

Not being

Aaron Doyle [00:42:54]:

thinking, oh my god. What’s my weekend? I look like Yeah. Not thinking, oh my god. What’s my weekend look like? Yeah. Not dreading going into work.

Aoife O’Brien [00:43:06]:

I think everyone can like, I’ve had that. I think so many people can relate to that.

Aaron Doyle [00:43:10]:

Like, I had a alter at school. I had an alter at school, and I never wanted to feel like that in my career. Yeah. And thankfully, I don’t.

Aoife O’Brien [00:43:17]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:43:17]:

And I want people in their roles to to have the same experience.

Aoife O’Brien [00:43:21]:

Yeah.

Aaron Doyle [00:43:21]:

I’m having the idea of somebody on a Sunday night or 5 o’clock on Sunday. Oh my god. I have to go to work. Yeah. That’s that’s the situation I want to avoid for the company I’m in.

Aoife O’Brien [00:43:30]:

And just now that you’re talking about it, I’m like, I can feel that. I can sense the anxiety of I have to go into it. Yeah. A job that I hate with people that I don’t really like a lot. And Exactly.

Aaron Doyle [00:43:41]:

Or sit in the car park going, I can’t go in here. Yeah. That’s the opposite of that. Mhmm. And in its glory, that’s the opposite of what that

Aoife O’Brien [00:43:49]:

is Yes.

Aaron Doyle [00:43:49]:

Is is what I’m

Aoife O’Brien [00:43:50]:

working for. And that’s well, that’s everything that I stand for, I suppose, and and why I do what I do. So thank you so much.

Aaron Doyle [00:43:56]:

Thank you.

Aoife O’Brien [00:43:56]:

This has been amazing. My first ever live recording of the podcast. It’s been it’s been an absolute pleasure. Thank you so much, Erin.