This week's episode is a real treat for me. My friend and colleague, Celeste Herron, interviewed me on my podcast! We discussed neurodiversity and the ways that the workplaces of today can better nourish all the ways that we are human.
Fundamentally, cultivating the inclusive workspace is about knowing about and removing the barriers to full contribution for all team members. Because, let's face it, if your team members are performing in spite of the barriers, you are wasting money. Cultivating this workspace where human thriving isn't an exception starts with being curious about this question: What aspects of your work culture, workflow, systems, processes .. block team members people from showing up and contributing fully? More often than not, the most significant answers to this question dial down to difficulty tolerating differences. In our conversation, Celeste and I discuss this struggle using neurodistinctiveness as an example. We look at how our history contributed to this issue and how the workplace needs to chance to reduce and remove these barriers. As you listen, think of any aspect of difference that seems relevant to your workplace or team. Whether it's related to gender, ethnicity, personality, stage in life or anything else, the same principle applies. Get curious about the barriers to contribution.
There's so much written about building an inclusive cultur ein your organization, yet very few organizations are doing this effectively. Instead of trying to force yourself to expertly know it all, do a team audit instead. Based on what you share with me, you will get 2-3 customized solutions that you can easily implement, so you can see tangible changes immediately. Visit FaithClarke.com or click here to schedule your quick audit.
About Celeste: Celeste Herron, Brand Experience Designer, Strategist, and Mentor to visionary women, who build businesses and brands that change lives and are using their wealth to change the world.
She is the creator of the Embodied Brand Method, a framework and a new way of thinking about branding and business development, where the personhood of the leader, the humanity of the company are paired with a brand experience that is exquisitely curated to create a feeling of trust, bravery, and wonder that deeply supports your buyers and clients. This is a transformational rite of passage for the woman who is ready to move beyond being just a business owner and become the leader of a highly profitable, high-impact brand.
Book a consultation with Celeste to talk about your transformational brand or visit celesteherron.com to learn more.
Mia and I pulled back the curtains and looked at the innards of her team onboarding and staff supports practices. Since Mia is in a beautiful growth phase in her business, she's been expanding her team and is actively thinking through the most effective ways to connect her team members to Copy-Haus' unique approach to copywriting, while energizing their connection to the company and to each other. In a fast growing business, this has not been easy. You will hear us talk about figuring out what new staff need, your unique way of offering that and about integrating community connection rituals into the workflow to build a strong sense of TEAM.
Onboarding is really about cultivating connection and shared responsibility for the work and for each other, to maximize productivity while everyone thrives. In other words, feel good and like you belong WHILE getting the job done. If you think you'll be hiring a new team member in the next 2 - 3 months, this might be the time to audit your onboarding processes. I'm doing a few quick audits over the next few weeks. Go to https://calendly.com/faithclarke/teamaudit to schedule one and I'll share the 2 - 3 simple things that your process needs so that it can be more effective for your new hire and less overwhelming for you!
About Mia: Words are Mia Francis-Poulin's jam. A conversion copywriter, native New Orleanian, and Parks and Rec enthusiast, Mia helps impact-driven creators to find the right words to market their products authentically and confidently. She's the owner of The Copy Haus -- a boutique copywriting agency for course creators, consultants, and online business owners offering done-for-you and done-with-you sales page, email sequence, and website copywriting. Check out www.thecopyhaus.com/manifesto to see how The Copy Haus is doing copy differently.
Connect with Mia:
Marissa and I had a blast talking about the unique ways that our differences show up in the work place and on teams. From rocking and hand flapping to introversion and hating cold calls, we explore the various ways leaders can support ALL members of the team and help find the middle ground, where we understand each other and work together synergistically. We also talked about the upcoming Spring: Changing the Face of Business conference, an online event committed to true connection, collaboration and community with a uniquely diverse collection of business owners. I've hardly ever seen such a diverse speaker line-up as Marissa has put together!
About Marissa: Marissa Loewen is a Transformational Business Coach, Community Catalyst and Creative Entrepreneur. Marissa works with business owners, political leaders and radical changemakers to create the rules in order to create thriving, resilient, prosperous businesses that fuel the business owner. In addition to a signature system for creating profit and ease in businesses, personal coaching and an online digital profit planner, Marissa also is launching her first podcast called The Little Podcast of Big Questions.
Find more about her at createtherules.com
and on Instagram: Http://www.createtherules.com Http://www.instagram.com/createtherules
Get tickets to Spring: Changing the Face of Business at https://spring.createtherules.com/
Cultivating inclusivity on your team will positively affect every aspect of your team's life and effectiveness. Inclusion alone will massively increase your team's engagement, and this will have a ripple effect within the team, the organization and outward to the wider community. Yet, this state within a team may not be easy easy to create and sustain. This episode explains what inclusion is and discusses the negative impact of not including YOUR OWN differences. We cannot include differences in others that we reject in ourselves.
Communication is the life blood of every team. The tasks don't fit together to meet your team's goals without it. This quick episode shares 3 isses that may be slowing the communication flow in your team. Which one resonates the most for you?
Get a detailed checklist to help you figure out exactly what you need to do to help your team become even more effective, engaged and efficient at PeakPerformingTeam.com
Beautiful time connecting primarily as humans.Céline and I talked about the wide range of business and community structures that we clearly not built for humans. Céline is a leadership and culture design maverick that truly helps businesses unearth THEIR way, that works for them. Céline is relentlessly authentic and leads a diverse team of people who have the freedom to show up in their own way, and who approach things with curiosity. But her team wasn’t always this way. We reflected on the idea that we are often leading people through growth that we are also doing, and the importance of having self-coaching tools that help us notice, become more curious and challenge our assumptions. We talk about what a team is and the primary way we can differentiate team members from other people who support us. We thought about our businesses as a playground, and our need to define boundaries as well as creating a space where humans can thrive. Communication is the life blood of this playground, and Celine closes with her key advice for all business leaders who want healthy team communication that include all the humans on the team.
About Céline: Céline Williams (ACC, CCUG) is an international speaker and the founder of reVisionary, an award winning boutique consulting firm providing executive coaching, leadership development, and culture services to people-focused businesses around the world. Céline has almost 20 years’ experience working with growing organizations to help them navigate change and build leadership capacity, and is the trusted advisor to leaders and executives in a variety of industries. She is sought after for her expertise in accelerating team performance, designing culture, navigating change, and facilitating effective communication.
Connect with Céline!
I call it the 3 C's. Craft.Communication. Capacity. They help me focus on the fastest way for a team to get relief from some of the tiny fumbles, squabbles and exhaustion that results. If you know that things on your team are just a little off, the first step is to know where the problem is. Is it the team's craft, communication or capacity? Of course, they all affect each other, but picking a starting point that will cascade improvement and relief into the other areas is key!