04 November 2024
DEIB, Diversity & Inclusion, Company Culture
"ERGs are fully empowered. There are things happening around the world through our ERGs that I, as the chief inclusion officer, did not dictate, and did not play a part in."
Alveda Williams, chief inclusion officer at Dow, talked about the enormous difference Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) have on policies, practices innovation, and overall business success at Dow. With 600 chapters globally, these groups have influenced policies and contributed to product innovations, such as the Pride collection sneaker with Under Armour.
She also shared why influencers and non-people managers are part of leadership, and how that fosters a culture of collaboration and inclusion. Her insights remind us that inclusion is not just a policy, but a practice requiring intentional effort and leadership at all levels.
On the benefits of employee resource groups:
So often we get stuck on the first letter. Is the focus on the” E”? My tendency is to say we're focusing on the wrong thing. We really should be focusing on that “R,” because these groups are a resource for the employees and they're a resource for companies.
It's why we've spent so much energy around them. Over the last seven years, we have quadrupled participation in our ERGs. In 2017, 15% of our employees were engaged in one of our ERGs, to today, 60% of our employees are engaged in one of the 10 ERGs. We believe in the power of ERGs to move the needle for our people and for our company.
On how ERGs influence business decisions:
In terms of business outcomes, I tend to think of that really broadly. I think about policy changes, changes in our practices, and of course changes in innovation and in terms of our overall results.
We recently expanded our global parental leave policy, and we went from six weeks of parental leave to now 16 weeks of parental leave, time off for all birthing and non-birthing parents, regardless of gender. And that policy came out of our women's inclusion network.
I think about the work that we've done around expanding benefit coverage for same-sex couples, born out of our GLAD ERG.
And then there are examples around innovation. One of our key customers is Under Armour. Every June, Under Armor puts out a Pride collection sneaker and in the mid-sole of that sneaker is Dow technology. And so you take the innovation that we bring in terms of delivering the technology into the shoe, partner that up with our global GLAD LGBTQ+ ERG, and you've got a powerful product that is on display, and the proceeds of that go to an organization called Athlete Ally in support of LGBTQ athletes.
ERGs are fully empowered. There are things happening around the world through our ERGs that I, as the chief inclusion officer, did not dictate, and did not play a part in.
When they speak, we absolutely listen. When they bring the ideas, we absolutely vet them. The highest level of leadership in our company serves as the executive sponsors for these ERGs, and it speaks to the level of importance that we place on them. They are not just there waiting to be called up. They are fully empowered and activated to bring their best ideas forward.
On how ERG goals are connected to the company’s goals:
We've said ERGs have long been a place of connection and community in our company, but what are the things that we can do to help them better serve the company's direct needs?
Three years ago, we developed this concept that we call an ERG agenda each year, and it speaks to the things that are critically important for the company. ERGs are going to do the work of providing a place of connection and courage and community for their group and the allies that support them. But if you want to be a resource for the company, here are the things that we are asking you to focus on.
We don't dictate the programming, but we will say that in 2024, for example, well-being is important. And we watch what they do with that, and it can be powerful. What well-being or mental health means to somebody in the Veteran's group may look very different than what it means in the women's group.
We give them five or six sort of anchors, if you will, every year. And then we just let them go and have fun with it, and it's great to see what they can come back with.
When they speak, we absolutely listen. When they bring the ideas, we absolutely vet them. The highest level of leadership in our company serves as the executive sponsors for these ERGs, and it speaks to the level of importance that we place on them. They are not just there waiting to be called up. They are fully empowered and activated to bring their best ideas forward.
On the impact of ERGs on the employee experience:
Seven years ago, when we had 15% of our people in ERGs, we looked behind the curtains of our employee survey and what we saw is that people who were participating in our ERGs were having a significantly different and positive experience relative to those who are not.
We could see it in the data. We were literally proving out the business case around ERGs ourselves, and I mean significant — 11, 12 basis points. This year, it's about 14 basis points. That was with 15% of the people in our ERGs. We knew that if that were true, what we were seeing is higher overall employee satisfaction. That satisfaction translates to engagement, engagement translates to productivity, and productivity translates to bottom-line value.
On how Dow defines leaders:
We have a community that we call Lead, and includes everyone who is a leader of people, in addition to those leaders who are a certain career grade in our organization who do not have people. At Dow, we believe that leadership is a privilege, not a right, and so we want to make sure that we're setting up our leaders to be able to serve the community of employees that we have.
At the center of the employee experience, the data that you at Great Place To Work has shared with us, and the data that so many of our partners have shared with us, is that leaders make the difference. The data will show you that more than 70% of an employee's experience is based on their experience with leaders. And so we are tapping into that unapologetically and making sure that we start at the heart of the house, which is our leadership community, 3,000 or so of our 36,000 employees.
Show Transcript
Roula Amire:
Welcome to Better, by Great Place to Work, the global authority on workplace culture. I'm your host, Rula Amiri, content director at Great Place to Work. Alveda Williams:, Chief Inclusion Officer at Dow is my guest today. And boy, if you're looking for examples of how to make the business case for culture work, this is the episode. It's packed with lots of examples. We talked about inclusion and employee resource groups and how they influence business decisions. They have quadrupled participation in ERGs in the past seven years, going from 15 to 60%. They're an enormous resource for the company and tied directly to business performance. We also talked about why non-people managers are part of its leader community, and Alveda shared some wisdom I think we can all benefit from, and that is to bloom where you're planted. It's good to keep in mind wherever you find yourself in life. I'm excited for you to listen to this one.
Alveda, welcome to the podcast. You are a PhD scientist turned HR pro, so I'm sure there's a story there, and maybe we'll have time to get to it, maybe we won't, but I'm going to be hopeful.
Alveda Williams:
The short story is don't try that at home.
Roula Amire:
You are the chief inclusion officer, and I'd like to ask you a question you might think is very basic, but that is not everyone understands what inclusion means, and what an inclusive culture looks like. And I thought maybe you could explain it by sharing an example of inclusion at Dow. Can you walk me through maybe something that's happened recently or that has stuck out to you in your time at Dow around inclusion?
Alveda Williams:
We run really large production facilities, and of course in the manufacturing side, what we call operations, as you can imagine, there are many challenges that come with the kind of work that is done and being able to attract the right talent. And one of the biggest challenges we have is really moving the needle around gender representation in that particular function. And I think back several years ago, we had one of our leaders go down to Latin America and do an expat, and she was leading all of operations in Latin America. And one of the things she noticed at several of the sites, but particularly at this one site down in Brazil, is that there were no women that worked there.
Roula Amire:
No women?
Alveda Williams:
No women that worked in the manufacturing facility, in the operations, specifically. So you have to overcome this first challenge of the very nature of the work and is it attractive to women to begin with? And then secondly is if you can attract women, do you have an environment that is welcoming of them? And so one of the very simple things, and I'm almost embarrassed to share this, is that what we realized is that, and this is no more than seven years ago, so bear with me, no more than seven years ago, we realized that we had a facility down in Brazil that did not have women's restrooms. And so even if you could hire a woman...
Roula Amire:
Where are they going to go?
Alveda Williams:
Where are they literally going to go? And so it was very interesting to hear that story, to see this leader who's just the epitome of inclusive leadership spring into action. And so I remember hearing about this, and we were like, "Okay, this is kind of ridiculous." And no short of a year later, without even warning, they were just behind the scenes working. No short of a year later, I received an email where I had a picture of the ribbon cutting of these new facilities that of course included women's bathrooms and not only women's bathrooms, but women's changing rooms in the production facility.
And then fascinating development is within a year past that, I got another email that showed me the picture. It was a collage of all of the women that now worked in the facility. And so just a really intentional effort around yes, going out and doing the work to attract talent, to make sure people knew that the jobs that we had to offer were really good jobs where they could provide not just a living but a life for their families, but that once we got women there, that they would have an environment that they were comfortable in and where they could go, but also thrive.
Roula Amire:
And I think another takeaway is that was discovered because there was a leader on the scene to not just stay in your, if you're a leader, in your office, but actually go where your people are, walk around, talk, look, because that's how this even happened.
Alveda Williams:
No question. Leadership matters. And I mean we're skipping a lot of parts of the story. I know that there was a lot of work to make sure that beyond just the physical assets and the physical infrastructure, that these women were walking into an environment that they could be effective in their jobs, but feel fully welcomed and thriving in the work.
Roula Amire:
Speaking of inclusion and belonging and listening, I want to make sure that I ask you about ERGs, employee resource groups. You have around 600 of them at Dow, is that correct?
Alveda Williams:
We have 600 chapters. We have 10 ERGs.
Roula Amire:
600 chapters. Define a chapter for me.
Alveda Williams:
Right. So we have 10 ERGs, we operate across 30-plus countries around the world, 120-plus sites. And so if you think about the magnitude of sites and the presence of different ERGs at every site, that would be what defines a chapter. So I may have a chapter of the global African Affinity Network in Midland, Michigan, which is where we're headquartered. Over in the Netherlands, we can have chapters of the same-
Roula Amire:
I see.
Alveda Williams:
... ERG at the different sites where we operate.
Roula Amire:
Understood. You've described them as resources for employees, but also resources for the company.
Alveda Williams:
Yes.
Roula Amire:
And I think that's what many executives don't fully understand, which is how and why they can be used to make business decisions, develop future leaders, and be sources of innovation. Is there a recent example you can share of how their involvement led to a better business decision, influenced a business decision, changed course on a business decision?
Alveda Williams:
Yeah, of course. So let me just start with the top of your comments there. I think so often, I was just having this conversation with somebody, so often we get stuck on the first letter. Is it an E? They call them team member resource groups. So it's the focus on the E? should it be on the TM? Should they be called BRGs? And to your point, my tendency is to say we're focusing on the wrong thing. We really should be focusing on that R, because these groups are a resource for the employees, they're a resource for the companies. It's why we've spent so much energy around them. We have, over the last seven years quadrupled participation in our ERGs. So going from in 2017, 15% of our employees were engaged in one of our ERGs, to today, 60.8% of our employees are engaged in one of the 10 ERGs.
And the reason for it is exactly what you described. We just believe in the power of ERGs to really move the needle for our people and for our company. And so to your question on... recent example of where they have made a difference for us, and again, for me, resource for the employees or resource for the company. And in terms of business outcomes, I tend to think of that really broadly. So I think about policy changes, changes in our practices, of course changes in innovation and in terms of our overall results. And so there are a few examples that come to mind. I think about recently, we expanded our global parental leave policy, and we went from, I think it was six weeks of parental leave to now 16 weeks of parental leave, time off for all parents birthing and non-birthing, adoptive, et cetera, regardless of gender.
And the basis of that was our women's inclusion network was a resource for our company. And so that policy came out of our women's inclusion network. I think about the work that we've done around expanding benefit coverage for same-sex couples, born out of our GLAD ERG. On the talent side, and I'm going to be talking about this later today with our veterans' group, military degree equivalency program where we acknowledge the unique skills that veterans bring into the workplace, and those folks that come with a ranking of E-6 or so are actually treated as equivalent to a bachelor's degree. It's long before the skills journey was really a thing. We were acknowledging the skills of our veterans and really tapping into that.
And then there are examples around innovation. I mean, one of the things that we do, one of our key customers is Under Armor. And I don't know if you've ever seen them, Rula, but every June, Under Armour puts out a pride collection sneaker. And in the mid-sole of that sneaker is Dow technology. And so you take the innovation that we bring in terms of delivering the technology into the shoe partner, that up with our global GLAD LGBTQ+ ERG, and you've got a powerful product that is on display, and the proceeds of that go to an organization called Athlete Ally in support of LGBTQ athletes. So those are just a few examples. One is an innovation business example, others on the policy side that show the power of our ERGs at work every single day.
Roula Amire:
So someone listening might be saying, "How did that happen?" So when you said they're born out of the ERGs, can you walk us through how that happened? So that means you have to have ERGs,
Alveda Williams:
For sure.
Roula Amire:
... A. B, you have to listen to them.
Alveda Williams:
Yes.
Roula Amire:
And then I'm assuming C is act on that feedback or take that feedback to executives who can make or change decision-making. So it's not just having them. It's seeing that through to the end where they can potentially affect business decisions.
Alveda Williams:
No question. I think you sort of answered the question yourself. The thing I would add is we have had ERGs in Dow for a long time. Our oldest ERG dates back more than 30 years, which is our women's inclusion network. Our global African affinity network for black talent and their allies is celebrating 25 years this year. We've got newer ERGs that are seven years old or so with our RISE ERG for new employees, our Prime ERGs for those that are in the prime of their career. And so our ERGs have been around for a long time. The reason I bring that up is we've had this sort of long history around inclusion and diversity work, but it was actually in 2017 where we decided to reignite the work, refocus, if you will, more intentionally on the work of inclusion, diversity, and equity, to the point that we created the Office of Inclusion that I now lead in the Chief Inclusion Officer role.
I tell that story in that way, Rula, because the ERGs precede me, they precede the role in Dow, and so they are fully, fully activated. And so for us, because they've been around so long, because they have been clearly placed at the center of our strategic work around inclusion, diversity, and equity, we have no choice but to listen to them. They are fully empowered. I like to tell the story of I sit in my office and look at my email as it comes through, and every single day there are things happening around the world through our ERGs that me as the chief inclusion officer, I did not dictate, I did not play a part in. They are fully empowered and activated.
And so when they speak, we absolutely listen. When they bring the ideas, we actually absolutely vet them. The highest level of leadership in our company serves as the executive sponsors for these ERGs, and it really provides a testament and speaks to the level of importance that we place on them. So they are not just there waiting to be called up. They were there before we decided to move forward more intentionally in this work. And they very much feel fully empowered to bring their best ideas, best thinking forward.
The other thing that we do is... What we've tried to do is because they're so activated is to sort give them a bit of a North Star. And so we've said ERGs have long been a place of connection and community in our company, but what are the things that we can do to help them better serve the company's direct needs? And so I think three years ago, we developed this concept, very simple concept that we call an ERG agenda each year. And it just speaks to the things that are critically important for the company. And so ERGs, you are going to do the work of providing a place of connection and courage and community for your group and the allies that support you. But if you want to be a resource for the company, here are the things that we are asking you to focus on. And we don't dictate the programming, but we will say that in 2024, for example, wellbeing is important. And we watch what they do with that, and it can be powerful. Right? Because-
Roula Amire:
That's only directive. That's the only thing you share.
Alveda Williams:
That's the only thing that we share, and we give them a little context to that. But what wellbeing means, wellbeing or mental health means to somebody in the veteran's group may look very differently than what it means in the women's group. These are areas that are also really nice and ripe for cross collaboration. But we say wellbeing is something we want you to focus on. We have a strategy in our company around decarbonization and growth. And so ERGs be a platform for building awareness and learning around decarbonization and growth and sustainability. Supplier diversity is huge for us. Help us identify diverse suppliers that we can give an opportunity to do business with us. So we give them five or six sort of anchors, if you will, every year. And then we just let them go and have fun with it, and it's really great to see what they can come back with.
Roula Amire:
How long have you been setting the agenda?
Alveda Williams:
I want to say we're probably in about year three.
Roula Amire:
Okay.
Alveda Williams:
We're probably in about year three. I think I recall it starting sort of right near the ends of the pandemic. And so the good news is that I feel like we're getting it right because we haven't had to tweak it that much. And so elements of wellbeing have shifted over the last few years. Some level of play around talent is always there. Sometimes it's about talent attraction. Depending on the environment we're in, it's about retention, helping us retain talent. This year it's about something that we see in our surveys, which is around equal opportunity from a talent perspective, making sure that people have a fair shot regardless of background or difference. Our strategic business objectives around decarbonization and growth, that's an anchor point. And so yeah, it's been there for about three years and we've just had to literally tweak it a little bit and it's just been amazing to see the ERGs at play there.
Roula Amire:
What's been the impact of having a North Star? So different companies might have an agenda, might not, but I think your point of having a North Star that's led by business needs and goals, you've had ERGs before, the agenda is fairly new in the last few years. Have you seen an impact and in what way?
Alveda Williams:
Yeah, I would say two things. I would say selfishly as a leader of the company is just alignment. That is for us, the key, getting the ERGs aligned to the focus and purpose, objectives strategically of the company. And then the second thing I would say is somebody who leads this work is, again, we... Maybe I'll take a step back and say seven years ago when we looked behind the curtains of our employee survey, when we had 15% of our people in ERGs, we looked behind the curtains and what we saw, Rula, is that those people who were participating in our ERGs were having a significantly different and positive experience relative to those who are not. And I mean we could see it in the data. We were literally proving out the business case around ERGs ourselves, and I mean significant. 11, 12 basis points, this year it's about 14 basis points. That was with 15% of the people in our ERGs.
And so we knew that if that were true, what we were seeing is higher overall employee satisfaction. We believe that satisfaction translates to engagement, engagement translates to productivity, and productivity translates to bottom-line value, right? And so if that were true, then the goal for us was how do we get more people engaged? And it was very clear to me that people will come to the ERGs for different reasons. There are some who will come for legacy reasons of, "I just need a safe place. I just need a place where I'm around my people." Or an ally who says, "I just need to be able to show my support." There's some people who are going to come to the ERGs for that. There's some people who are passionate about attraction of talent, and making sure that they have good people surrounding them every single day, and they will come to the ERGs for that.
There are some in our case, given the work that we do every day, they're passionate about sustainability. And so if you leverage the ERGs for that, guess what? You can get people into the ERGs. And so we leverage this platform of the agenda to say, "Here are the things that are important to the company and we want to drive that alignment." But oh, by the way, the benefit of us doing that is we are realizing that people will come to the ERGs or come to this place for different reasons and we're going to be able to attract more people to them, and I believe fundamentally that that's one of the reasons that we've been able to grow in the last six, seven years, quadruple participation to nearly 60%.
Roula Amire:
Let's stick with this theme of collaborating with employees and including them in creating their workplace experience, which just sounds like what you're doing at Dow. You've expanded who you include in your lead community, meaning managers aren't the only people who are considered leaders, people of influence are now part of leadership even if they're not a people manager. Tell me a bit about this. How do you choose and decide who's an influencer, how are they involved, and why is this important?
Alveda Williams:
Yeah, so to your point, we have a community that we call Lead. And so it includes everyone that is a leader of people in our organization in addition to those leaders that are a certain grade, what we call career grade 8 in our organization, a certain grade and higher that do not have people. So everybody that is both a people leader and career grade 8 and higher without people are included in our Lead community. And so we engage them in different ways. At Dow, we believe that leadership is a privilege, not a right, and so we want to make sure that we're setting up our leaders to be able to serve the community of employees that we have.
And so we do that in a number of ways. At the beginning of each year, in about February, we kick off what we call our lead conference. We brought it back for the first time post-COVID in person this year where we had 250 leaders in person. The balance of those leaders, that makes up to a close to 3000, 3000 leaders in total, get to engage in the conference virtually. And it's really an opportunity for us to kick off the year, hear directly from the heart of the house, our chief executive officer, our entire leadership team, special guests this year of we had none other than Michael C. Bush in the building, so that was great, and really just rally around the priorities of the company. And so giving our leaders that out of the gate at the top of the year so that they can then take the messages and activate the rest of our employees around the priorities for the company are what Lead is all about.
But it's not just a one-time convening. We also have the lead community that is operationalized throughout the entire year. And so on a, I would say maybe a monthly basis, we are convening that community around topics of importance, again, rallying around the priorities that they heard at the beginning of the year. And that could be anything from things like supplier diversity is a big thing that's important to us right now, so we've had some sessions around that, psychological safety, et cetera.
So there are those convenings. And then the other thing we do with the lead community more directly is quarterly earnings debriefs. And so once we post our earnings each quarter, our CEO has a meeting with the Lead community, almost what I would call an ask-me-anything-type session. So we talk about the earnings, talk about how we're doing, what we're expecting, what the go forward priorities are, and indeed allow most of the time for anybody in the Lead community to ask a question that can be answered directly by the CEO or anybody of any member of the executive leadership team.
Roula Amire:
What percentage of the lead community are non-people managers but influencers?
Alveda Williams:
I would say my best guess at the number is probably about 10%. So of the 3000, I would say about 300 are influencers and 2,700 or so are direct leaders of people.
Roula Amire:
And how do you define-
Alveda Williams:
Did that math math? I think the math mathed.
Roula Amire:
I hope so. I can't do it in my head. How do you decide who's an influencer? Because really anyone in a company could be an... They influence their colleagues, they influence their department, the people they know. So for other people who might want to do something similar, how should they go about thinking of who to choose for those Lead meetings?
Alveda Williams:
Yeah, so it's interesting, right? You have to kind of draw the line somewhere. So in our case, we do define it at a certain career grade of people who just do not have people, but they're at a level where they have to be leading in some capacity. We do believe that there's leadership at all levels, but for the sake of the Lead community, it's direct leaders of people, and those that are a certain career grade, what we call the associate director level and higher that may not have people. Those are the influential leaders.
Roula Amire:
And why is it important? Why is this something that you are doing at Dow, including the influencers in addition with the traditional people leaders?
Alveda Williams:
I think we are focused on delivering the best experience for our people because we believe if we deliver the best experience for our people, we can deliver the best experience for our customers, and that adds to the bottom line. And at the center of that employee experience, the data that you all have shared with us, the data that so many of our partners have shared with us is that leaders make the difference. The data will show you that more than 70% of an employee's experience is based on their experience with leaders. And so we are tapping into that unapologetically and making sure that we start at again the heart of the house, which is our leadership community, 3000 or so of our 36,000 employees.
Roula Amire:
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What advice would you go back and give your younger self? It can be your scientist self.
Alveda Williams:
I was going to say,
Roula Amire:
So your younger, younger self.
Alveda Williams:
... I don't know how old do I have to be? Younger.
Roula Amire:
You can go as back...
Alveda Williams:
No, listen,
Roula Amire:
... as you want.
Alveda Williams:
... it's interesting. So in September of last year, I celebrated 21 years with Dow.
Roula Amire:
Congratulations.
Alveda Williams:
And I thought to myself like, "I'm 21. I'm like a whole adult." And so I wrote this post on LinkedIn where I thought about 21 things that I would say to a younger version of myself. And so there are a couple of things that come to mind, and they're a little bit, pardon me, they're just a little bit, I don't know, glorious. One is, and this is something that I tell younger people all the time now, is to bloom where you're planted. I think we spend a lot of time, people spend a lot of time trying to think about what is next and how do I get there and what can I do to make it?
And my answer is always bloom where you're planted. And sometimes we don't get to choose where we're planted, but blooming where your planted makes all the difference. When you deliver where you are, contribute where you are and make an impact where you are, those are the things that set you up for what's next. So that's the first thing that I'm pretty passionate about, and people get to listen to my mini talks on that all the time.
And then the second thing I would say is just to run your race. Comparison kills.
Roula Amire:
It does.
Alveda Williams:
The sun and the moon can both shine in their own time, and there's a place for all of us. So I've just believed that I've navigated my career in that way, which is why there's so many weird twists and turns in it. Those are two pieces of advice that I would give to myself and the same pieces of advice that I give to people that I get the benefit of coaching and mentoring every day.
Roula Amire:
That's great advice, for anyone at any point in their career, or just in their life.
Alveda Williams:
Yeah.
Roula Amire:
Right? Those are great reminders.
Alveda Williams:
No question.
Roula Amire:
Has there been a challenge you faced in the last year, either personally or professionally, and what did you learn about yourself that you'd be willing to share?
Alveda Williams:
Maybe professionally, what I would say is, if you think about the nature of the work that I do every day now, full-time, seven years in the game of inclusion, diversity, and equity as a full-time role, I think the biggest challenge is the environment that we find ourselves in this work. So that in itself has been difficult. The headwinds are real and great. I say that respectfully, it matters where you do this work and it matters who you do this work with. And so the lesson for me has been that as hard as it is, when you get into the middle of a battle, you don't abandon mission, right? As a company at Dow, we have that ambition around being the most innovative, customer-centric, inclusive and sustainable materials science company in the world. So right there in the very ambition of our company is the focus on inclusion. And so even though it's tough right now, we're not pulling back, we're not backing down, we're doubling down. And so for me, the lesson has simply been that this is weary work, but it is worthy work.
Roula Amire:
Well said. It's definitely not for the faint of heart.
Alveda Williams:
Don't want to get biblical here, but you cannot get weary in doing well. This is good work to be done and we have to stay the course and not reverse course.
Roula Amire:
So that's a lot of responsibility that you carry. How do you create a sense of well-being for yourself so you can...
Alveda Williams:
Is that a thing?
Roula Amire:
Yeah, that's a thing.
Alveda Williams:
I just learned in the session, I need to go create one of those 60-second moments. I was just so inspired by that. I'm working on it.
Roula Amire:
Okay, yeah.
Alveda Williams:
If I'm being really honest, I would say that for me, the concept of balance is not really a thing in the work that I have to do, but I have sort of gotten good at what I call work-life integration.
Roula Amire:
Okay. Tell me about that.
Alveda Williams:
Yeah, it's pretty fascinating. I literally just integrate my personal life into my work life. And so my executive admin who works with me, she sees the concerts because my sixteen-year-old is a classical vocalist. She sees the track meets because my daughter is a collegiate division one track-and-field student. And she sees the football games because my husband is a high school football coach. And so she knows...
Roula Amire:
What are you making in that house? What are you drinking? Geez.
Alveda Williams:
She knows that I might be in New Orleans today, but by Friday I've got to be in San Antonio for conference championships, and by Saturday I've got to be back in Houston for a choir concert, and then on Sunday I'm going to be back on the plane to go to the next trip. And so this idea of authentically bringing a version of yourself to work, and that includes all the personal obligations and responsibilities, being clear about what the... a mentor of mine calls them the crystal balls are, right? What are the crystal balls? The things that if you drop them, they shatter, versus the rubber balls. Like I can drop that one because it's going to bounce back.
Roula Amire:
I love that.
Alveda Williams:
And making sure that the people who work with me understand that. So that's one thing. And then the other thing, very interesting that I just developed this over the last few years, one of the things, Rula, that I would do is I would never take time off or take time away or go on a vacation because I didn't have enough time to do it. Literally, it takes you a week to go do this and you don't have time, so you don't do anything. In the last few years I've developed this concept alongside of some really good friends of ours that we call the turn and burn trips.
And so you take whatever time you have and you just go do it, and you make the most out of it. And so I have taken my husband who had never been to New York City until last year, 36 hours in New York City, and we tore the city up. Get anything New York that you can think of, we experienced in 36 hours, and that includes both a Broadway show and sitting at a Yankees game, and all the other things in between, 36 hours. Or 72 hours in Belize. Island hop, three different islands, three different hotels,
Roula Amire:
Oh goodness.
Alveda Williams:
... and we got it in. And so it's very interesting concept.
Roula Amire:
It is.
Alveda Williams:
But it's something that has worked for us to sort of get away and make sure that we get rid of the excuses.
Roula Amire:
So then the takeaway for me is, or for anyone listening, you're saying it doesn't have to be a week-long-
Alveda Williams:
Yeah.
Roula Amire:
... trip or something you have to plan months and months in ahead.
Alveda Williams:
Yes.
Roula Amire:
A short little getaway, a day or two or three,
Alveda Williams:
Yes.
Roula Amire:
... somewhere, can recharge.
Alveda Williams:
I believe in staycations too, as a real... That's a real thing.
Roula Amire:
Oh, I love a good staycation.
Alveda Williams:
Literally take time off and just woosah.
Roula Amire:
Do you do that?
Alveda Williams:
I do. I do, when I can. And sometimes it's not even full days. Sometimes I just got back at 2:00 in the morning. This first three quarters of the next day is a woosah for me. I'll be back at it. I promise I'm coming back.
Roula Amire:
Is there a book or podcast you'd recommend to your peers?
Alveda Williams:
I would like to highly recommend the Better podcast by Great Place to Work.
Roula Amire:
Thank you, Alveda. I did not...
Alveda Williams:
She did not-
Roula Amire:
... pay Alveda.
Alveda Williams:
... pay me to say that. I had a gentleman come talk to my team, and so we've been reading his book, gentleman, his name is Charles Vogl. He wrote a book sometime ago actually called The Art of Community, just really simple principles around creating Communities of belonging. And so that's something that I'm reading right now and sort of actioning upon with my own team. The Art of Community by Charles Vogl.
Roula Amire:
Excellent. Everyone should check that out. Thank you, Alveda, for the conversation. I enjoyed it tremendously.
Alveda Williams:
Thank you as well. Thanks for having me.
Roula Amire:
Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed today's podcast, please leave a five-star rating, write a review, and subscribe so you don't miss an episode. You can stream this in previous episodes wherever podcasts are available.
Welcome to Better, by Great Place to Work, the global authority on workplace culture. I'm your host, Rula Amiri, content director at Great Place to Work. Alveda Williams:, Chief Inclusion Officer at Dow is my guest today. And boy, if you're looking for examples of how to make the business case for culture work, this is the episode. It's packed with lots of examples. We talked about inclusion and employee resource groups and how they influence business decisions. They have quadrupled participation in ERGs in the past seven years, going from 15 to 60%. They're an enormous resource for the company and tied directly to business performance. We also talked about why non-people managers are part of its leader community, and Alveda shared some wisdom I think we can all benefit from, and that is to bloom where you're planted. It's good to keep in mind wherever you find yourself in life. I'm excited for you to listen to this one.
Alveda, welcome to the podcast. You are a PhD scientist turned HR pro, so I'm sure there's a story there, and maybe we'll have time to get to it, maybe we won't, but I'm going to be hopeful.
Alveda Williams:
The short story is don't try that at home.
Roula Amire:
You are the chief inclusion officer, and I'd like to ask you a question you might think is very basic, but that is not everyone understands what inclusion means, and what an inclusive culture looks like. And I thought maybe you could explain it by sharing an example of inclusion at Dow. Can you walk me through maybe something that's happened recently or that has stuck out to you in your time at Dow around inclusion?
Alveda Williams:
We run really large production facilities, and of course in the manufacturing side, what we call operations, as you can imagine, there are many challenges that come with the kind of work that is done and being able to attract the right talent. And one of the biggest challenges we have is really moving the needle around gender representation in that particular function. And I think back several years ago, we had one of our leaders go down to Latin America and do an expat, and she was leading all of operations in Latin America. And one of the things she noticed at several of the sites, but particularly at this one site down in Brazil, is that there were no women that worked there.
Roula Amire:
No women?
Alveda Williams:
No women that worked in the manufacturing facility, in the operations, specifically. So you have to overcome this first challenge of the very nature of the work and is it attractive to women to begin with? And then secondly is if you can attract women, do you have an environment that is welcoming of them? And so one of the very simple things, and I'm almost embarrassed to share this, is that what we realized is that, and this is no more than seven years ago, so bear with me, no more than seven years ago, we realized that we had a facility down in Brazil that did not have women's restrooms. And so even if you could hire a woman...
Roula Amire:
Where are they going to go?
Alveda Williams:
Where are they literally going to go? And so it was very interesting to hear that story, to see this leader who's just the epitome of inclusive leadership spring into action. And so I remember hearing about this, and we were like, "Okay, this is kind of ridiculous." And no short of a year later, without even warning, they were just behind the scenes working. No short of a year later, I received an email where I had a picture of the ribbon cutting of these new facilities that of course included women's bathrooms and not only women's bathrooms, but women's changing rooms in the production facility.
And then fascinating development is within a year past that, I got another email that showed me the picture. It was a collage of all of the women that now worked in the facility. And so just a really intentional effort around yes, going out and doing the work to attract talent, to make sure people knew that the jobs that we had to offer were really good jobs where they could provide not just a living but a life for their families, but that once we got women there, that they would have an environment that they were comfortable in and where they could go, but also thrive.
Roula Amire:
And I think another takeaway is that was discovered because there was a leader on the scene to not just stay in your, if you're a leader, in your office, but actually go where your people are, walk around, talk, look, because that's how this even happened.
Alveda Williams:
No question. Leadership matters. And I mean we're skipping a lot of parts of the story. I know that there was a lot of work to make sure that beyond just the physical assets and the physical infrastructure, that these women were walking into an environment that they could be effective in their jobs, but feel fully welcomed and thriving in the work.
Roula Amire:
Speaking of inclusion and belonging and listening, I want to make sure that I ask you about ERGs, employee resource groups. You have around 600 of them at Dow, is that correct?
Alveda Williams:
We have 600 chapters. We have 10 ERGs.
Roula Amire:
600 chapters. Define a chapter for me.
Alveda Williams:
Right. So we have 10 ERGs, we operate across 30-plus countries around the world, 120-plus sites. And so if you think about the magnitude of sites and the presence of different ERGs at every site, that would be what defines a chapter. So I may have a chapter of the global African Affinity Network in Midland, Michigan, which is where we're headquartered. Over in the Netherlands, we can have chapters of the same-
Roula Amire:
I see.
Alveda Williams:
... ERG at the different sites where we operate.
Roula Amire:
Understood. You've described them as resources for employees, but also resources for the company.
Alveda Williams:
Yes.
Roula Amire:
And I think that's what many executives don't fully understand, which is how and why they can be used to make business decisions, develop future leaders, and be sources of innovation. Is there a recent example you can share of how their involvement led to a better business decision, influenced a business decision, changed course on a business decision?
Alveda Williams:
Yeah, of course. So let me just start with the top of your comments there. I think so often, I was just having this conversation with somebody, so often we get stuck on the first letter. Is it an E? They call them team member resource groups. So it's the focus on the E? should it be on the TM? Should they be called BRGs? And to your point, my tendency is to say we're focusing on the wrong thing. We really should be focusing on that R, because these groups are a resource for the employees, they're a resource for the companies. It's why we've spent so much energy around them. We have, over the last seven years quadrupled participation in our ERGs. So going from in 2017, 15% of our employees were engaged in one of our ERGs, to today, 60.8% of our employees are engaged in one of the 10 ERGs.
And the reason for it is exactly what you described. We just believe in the power of ERGs to really move the needle for our people and for our company. And so to your question on... recent example of where they have made a difference for us, and again, for me, resource for the employees or resource for the company. And in terms of business outcomes, I tend to think of that really broadly. So I think about policy changes, changes in our practices, of course changes in innovation and in terms of our overall results. And so there are a few examples that come to mind. I think about recently, we expanded our global parental leave policy, and we went from, I think it was six weeks of parental leave to now 16 weeks of parental leave, time off for all parents birthing and non-birthing, adoptive, et cetera, regardless of gender.
And the basis of that was our women's inclusion network was a resource for our company. And so that policy came out of our women's inclusion network. I think about the work that we've done around expanding benefit coverage for same-sex couples, born out of our GLAD ERG. On the talent side, and I'm going to be talking about this later today with our veterans' group, military degree equivalency program where we acknowledge the unique skills that veterans bring into the workplace, and those folks that come with a ranking of E-6 or so are actually treated as equivalent to a bachelor's degree. It's long before the skills journey was really a thing. We were acknowledging the skills of our veterans and really tapping into that.
And then there are examples around innovation. I mean, one of the things that we do, one of our key customers is Under Armor. And I don't know if you've ever seen them, Rula, but every June, Under Armour puts out a pride collection sneaker. And in the mid-sole of that sneaker is Dow technology. And so you take the innovation that we bring in terms of delivering the technology into the shoe partner, that up with our global GLAD LGBTQ+ ERG, and you've got a powerful product that is on display, and the proceeds of that go to an organization called Athlete Ally in support of LGBTQ athletes. So those are just a few examples. One is an innovation business example, others on the policy side that show the power of our ERGs at work every single day.
Roula Amire:
So someone listening might be saying, "How did that happen?" So when you said they're born out of the ERGs, can you walk us through how that happened? So that means you have to have ERGs,
Alveda Williams:
For sure.
Roula Amire:
... A. B, you have to listen to them.
Alveda Williams:
Yes.
Roula Amire:
And then I'm assuming C is act on that feedback or take that feedback to executives who can make or change decision-making. So it's not just having them. It's seeing that through to the end where they can potentially affect business decisions.
Alveda Williams:
No question. I think you sort of answered the question yourself. The thing I would add is we have had ERGs in Dow for a long time. Our oldest ERG dates back more than 30 years, which is our women's inclusion network. Our global African affinity network for black talent and their allies is celebrating 25 years this year. We've got newer ERGs that are seven years old or so with our RISE ERG for new employees, our Prime ERGs for those that are in the prime of their career. And so our ERGs have been around for a long time. The reason I bring that up is we've had this sort of long history around inclusion and diversity work, but it was actually in 2017 where we decided to reignite the work, refocus, if you will, more intentionally on the work of inclusion, diversity, and equity, to the point that we created the Office of Inclusion that I now lead in the Chief Inclusion Officer role.
I tell that story in that way, Rula, because the ERGs precede me, they precede the role in Dow, and so they are fully, fully activated. And so for us, because they've been around so long, because they have been clearly placed at the center of our strategic work around inclusion, diversity, and equity, we have no choice but to listen to them. They are fully empowered. I like to tell the story of I sit in my office and look at my email as it comes through, and every single day there are things happening around the world through our ERGs that me as the chief inclusion officer, I did not dictate, I did not play a part in. They are fully empowered and activated.
And so when they speak, we absolutely listen. When they bring the ideas, we actually absolutely vet them. The highest level of leadership in our company serves as the executive sponsors for these ERGs, and it really provides a testament and speaks to the level of importance that we place on them. So they are not just there waiting to be called up. They were there before we decided to move forward more intentionally in this work. And they very much feel fully empowered to bring their best ideas, best thinking forward.
The other thing that we do is... What we've tried to do is because they're so activated is to sort give them a bit of a North Star. And so we've said ERGs have long been a place of connection and community in our company, but what are the things that we can do to help them better serve the company's direct needs? And so I think three years ago, we developed this concept, very simple concept that we call an ERG agenda each year. And it just speaks to the things that are critically important for the company. And so ERGs, you are going to do the work of providing a place of connection and courage and community for your group and the allies that support you. But if you want to be a resource for the company, here are the things that we are asking you to focus on. And we don't dictate the programming, but we will say that in 2024, for example, wellbeing is important. And we watch what they do with that, and it can be powerful. Right? Because-
Roula Amire:
That's only directive. That's the only thing you share.
Alveda Williams:
That's the only thing that we share, and we give them a little context to that. But what wellbeing means, wellbeing or mental health means to somebody in the veteran's group may look very differently than what it means in the women's group. These are areas that are also really nice and ripe for cross collaboration. But we say wellbeing is something we want you to focus on. We have a strategy in our company around decarbonization and growth. And so ERGs be a platform for building awareness and learning around decarbonization and growth and sustainability. Supplier diversity is huge for us. Help us identify diverse suppliers that we can give an opportunity to do business with us. So we give them five or six sort of anchors, if you will, every year. And then we just let them go and have fun with it, and it's really great to see what they can come back with.
Roula Amire:
How long have you been setting the agenda?
Alveda Williams:
I want to say we're probably in about year three.
Roula Amire:
Okay.
Alveda Williams:
We're probably in about year three. I think I recall it starting sort of right near the ends of the pandemic. And so the good news is that I feel like we're getting it right because we haven't had to tweak it that much. And so elements of wellbeing have shifted over the last few years. Some level of play around talent is always there. Sometimes it's about talent attraction. Depending on the environment we're in, it's about retention, helping us retain talent. This year it's about something that we see in our surveys, which is around equal opportunity from a talent perspective, making sure that people have a fair shot regardless of background or difference. Our strategic business objectives around decarbonization and growth, that's an anchor point. And so yeah, it's been there for about three years and we've just had to literally tweak it a little bit and it's just been amazing to see the ERGs at play there.
Roula Amire:
What's been the impact of having a North Star? So different companies might have an agenda, might not, but I think your point of having a North Star that's led by business needs and goals, you've had ERGs before, the agenda is fairly new in the last few years. Have you seen an impact and in what way?
Alveda Williams:
Yeah, I would say two things. I would say selfishly as a leader of the company is just alignment. That is for us, the key, getting the ERGs aligned to the focus and purpose, objectives strategically of the company. And then the second thing I would say is somebody who leads this work is, again, we... Maybe I'll take a step back and say seven years ago when we looked behind the curtains of our employee survey, when we had 15% of our people in ERGs, we looked behind the curtains and what we saw, Rula, is that those people who were participating in our ERGs were having a significantly different and positive experience relative to those who are not. And I mean we could see it in the data. We were literally proving out the business case around ERGs ourselves, and I mean significant. 11, 12 basis points, this year it's about 14 basis points. That was with 15% of the people in our ERGs.
And so we knew that if that were true, what we were seeing is higher overall employee satisfaction. We believe that satisfaction translates to engagement, engagement translates to productivity, and productivity translates to bottom-line value, right? And so if that were true, then the goal for us was how do we get more people engaged? And it was very clear to me that people will come to the ERGs for different reasons. There are some who will come for legacy reasons of, "I just need a safe place. I just need a place where I'm around my people." Or an ally who says, "I just need to be able to show my support." There's some people who are going to come to the ERGs for that. There's some people who are passionate about attraction of talent, and making sure that they have good people surrounding them every single day, and they will come to the ERGs for that.
There are some in our case, given the work that we do every day, they're passionate about sustainability. And so if you leverage the ERGs for that, guess what? You can get people into the ERGs. And so we leverage this platform of the agenda to say, "Here are the things that are important to the company and we want to drive that alignment." But oh, by the way, the benefit of us doing that is we are realizing that people will come to the ERGs or come to this place for different reasons and we're going to be able to attract more people to them, and I believe fundamentally that that's one of the reasons that we've been able to grow in the last six, seven years, quadruple participation to nearly 60%.
Roula Amire:
Let's stick with this theme of collaborating with employees and including them in creating their workplace experience, which just sounds like what you're doing at Dow. You've expanded who you include in your lead community, meaning managers aren't the only people who are considered leaders, people of influence are now part of leadership even if they're not a people manager. Tell me a bit about this. How do you choose and decide who's an influencer, how are they involved, and why is this important?
Alveda Williams:
Yeah, so to your point, we have a community that we call Lead. And so it includes everyone that is a leader of people in our organization in addition to those leaders that are a certain grade, what we call career grade 8 in our organization, a certain grade and higher that do not have people. So everybody that is both a people leader and career grade 8 and higher without people are included in our Lead community. And so we engage them in different ways. At Dow, we believe that leadership is a privilege, not a right, and so we want to make sure that we're setting up our leaders to be able to serve the community of employees that we have.
And so we do that in a number of ways. At the beginning of each year, in about February, we kick off what we call our lead conference. We brought it back for the first time post-COVID in person this year where we had 250 leaders in person. The balance of those leaders, that makes up to a close to 3000, 3000 leaders in total, get to engage in the conference virtually. And it's really an opportunity for us to kick off the year, hear directly from the heart of the house, our chief executive officer, our entire leadership team, special guests this year of we had none other than Michael C. Bush in the building, so that was great, and really just rally around the priorities of the company. And so giving our leaders that out of the gate at the top of the year so that they can then take the messages and activate the rest of our employees around the priorities for the company are what Lead is all about.
But it's not just a one-time convening. We also have the lead community that is operationalized throughout the entire year. And so on a, I would say maybe a monthly basis, we are convening that community around topics of importance, again, rallying around the priorities that they heard at the beginning of the year. And that could be anything from things like supplier diversity is a big thing that's important to us right now, so we've had some sessions around that, psychological safety, et cetera.
So there are those convenings. And then the other thing we do with the lead community more directly is quarterly earnings debriefs. And so once we post our earnings each quarter, our CEO has a meeting with the Lead community, almost what I would call an ask-me-anything-type session. So we talk about the earnings, talk about how we're doing, what we're expecting, what the go forward priorities are, and indeed allow most of the time for anybody in the Lead community to ask a question that can be answered directly by the CEO or anybody of any member of the executive leadership team.
Roula Amire:
What percentage of the lead community are non-people managers but influencers?
Alveda Williams:
I would say my best guess at the number is probably about 10%. So of the 3000, I would say about 300 are influencers and 2,700 or so are direct leaders of people.
Roula Amire:
And how do you define-
Alveda Williams:
Did that math math? I think the math mathed.
Roula Amire:
I hope so. I can't do it in my head. How do you decide who's an influencer? Because really anyone in a company could be an... They influence their colleagues, they influence their department, the people they know. So for other people who might want to do something similar, how should they go about thinking of who to choose for those Lead meetings?
Alveda Williams:
Yeah, so it's interesting, right? You have to kind of draw the line somewhere. So in our case, we do define it at a certain career grade of people who just do not have people, but they're at a level where they have to be leading in some capacity. We do believe that there's leadership at all levels, but for the sake of the Lead community, it's direct leaders of people, and those that are a certain career grade, what we call the associate director level and higher that may not have people. Those are the influential leaders.
Roula Amire:
And why is it important? Why is this something that you are doing at Dow, including the influencers in addition with the traditional people leaders?
Alveda Williams:
I think we are focused on delivering the best experience for our people because we believe if we deliver the best experience for our people, we can deliver the best experience for our customers, and that adds to the bottom line. And at the center of that employee experience, the data that you all have shared with us, the data that so many of our partners have shared with us is that leaders make the difference. The data will show you that more than 70% of an employee's experience is based on their experience with leaders. And so we are tapping into that unapologetically and making sure that we start at again the heart of the house, which is our leadership community, 3000 or so of our 36,000 employees.
Roula Amire:
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What advice would you go back and give your younger self? It can be your scientist self.
Alveda Williams:
I was going to say,
Roula Amire:
So your younger, younger self.
Alveda Williams:
... I don't know how old do I have to be? Younger.
Roula Amire:
You can go as back...
Alveda Williams:
No, listen,
Roula Amire:
... as you want.
Alveda Williams:
... it's interesting. So in September of last year, I celebrated 21 years with Dow.
Roula Amire:
Congratulations.
Alveda Williams:
And I thought to myself like, "I'm 21. I'm like a whole adult." And so I wrote this post on LinkedIn where I thought about 21 things that I would say to a younger version of myself. And so there are a couple of things that come to mind, and they're a little bit, pardon me, they're just a little bit, I don't know, glorious. One is, and this is something that I tell younger people all the time now, is to bloom where you're planted. I think we spend a lot of time, people spend a lot of time trying to think about what is next and how do I get there and what can I do to make it?
And my answer is always bloom where you're planted. And sometimes we don't get to choose where we're planted, but blooming where your planted makes all the difference. When you deliver where you are, contribute where you are and make an impact where you are, those are the things that set you up for what's next. So that's the first thing that I'm pretty passionate about, and people get to listen to my mini talks on that all the time.
And then the second thing I would say is just to run your race. Comparison kills.
Roula Amire:
It does.
Alveda Williams:
The sun and the moon can both shine in their own time, and there's a place for all of us. So I've just believed that I've navigated my career in that way, which is why there's so many weird twists and turns in it. Those are two pieces of advice that I would give to myself and the same pieces of advice that I give to people that I get the benefit of coaching and mentoring every day.
Roula Amire:
That's great advice, for anyone at any point in their career, or just in their life.
Alveda Williams:
Yeah.
Roula Amire:
Right? Those are great reminders.
Alveda Williams:
No question.
Roula Amire:
Has there been a challenge you faced in the last year, either personally or professionally, and what did you learn about yourself that you'd be willing to share?
Alveda Williams:
Maybe professionally, what I would say is, if you think about the nature of the work that I do every day now, full-time, seven years in the game of inclusion, diversity, and equity as a full-time role, I think the biggest challenge is the environment that we find ourselves in this work. So that in itself has been difficult. The headwinds are real and great. I say that respectfully, it matters where you do this work and it matters who you do this work with. And so the lesson for me has been that as hard as it is, when you get into the middle of a battle, you don't abandon mission, right? As a company at Dow, we have that ambition around being the most innovative, customer-centric, inclusive and sustainable materials science company in the world. So right there in the very ambition of our company is the focus on inclusion. And so even though it's tough right now, we're not pulling back, we're not backing down, we're doubling down. And so for me, the lesson has simply been that this is weary work, but it is worthy work.
Roula Amire:
Well said. It's definitely not for the faint of heart.
Alveda Williams:
Don't want to get biblical here, but you cannot get weary in doing well. This is good work to be done and we have to stay the course and not reverse course.
Roula Amire:
So that's a lot of responsibility that you carry. How do you create a sense of well-being for yourself so you can...
Alveda Williams:
Is that a thing?
Roula Amire:
Yeah, that's a thing.
Alveda Williams:
I just learned in the session, I need to go create one of those 60-second moments. I was just so inspired by that. I'm working on it.
Roula Amire:
Okay, yeah.
Alveda Williams:
If I'm being really honest, I would say that for me, the concept of balance is not really a thing in the work that I have to do, but I have sort of gotten good at what I call work-life integration.
Roula Amire:
Okay. Tell me about that.
Alveda Williams:
Yeah, it's pretty fascinating. I literally just integrate my personal life into my work life. And so my executive admin who works with me, she sees the concerts because my sixteen-year-old is a classical vocalist. She sees the track meets because my daughter is a collegiate division one track-and-field student. And she sees the football games because my husband is a high school football coach. And so she knows...
Roula Amire:
What are you making in that house? What are you drinking? Geez.
Alveda Williams:
She knows that I might be in New Orleans today, but by Friday I've got to be in San Antonio for conference championships, and by Saturday I've got to be back in Houston for a choir concert, and then on Sunday I'm going to be back on the plane to go to the next trip. And so this idea of authentically bringing a version of yourself to work, and that includes all the personal obligations and responsibilities, being clear about what the... a mentor of mine calls them the crystal balls are, right? What are the crystal balls? The things that if you drop them, they shatter, versus the rubber balls. Like I can drop that one because it's going to bounce back.
Roula Amire:
I love that.
Alveda Williams:
And making sure that the people who work with me understand that. So that's one thing. And then the other thing, very interesting that I just developed this over the last few years, one of the things, Rula, that I would do is I would never take time off or take time away or go on a vacation because I didn't have enough time to do it. Literally, it takes you a week to go do this and you don't have time, so you don't do anything. In the last few years I've developed this concept alongside of some really good friends of ours that we call the turn and burn trips.
And so you take whatever time you have and you just go do it, and you make the most out of it. And so I have taken my husband who had never been to New York City until last year, 36 hours in New York City, and we tore the city up. Get anything New York that you can think of, we experienced in 36 hours, and that includes both a Broadway show and sitting at a Yankees game, and all the other things in between, 36 hours. Or 72 hours in Belize. Island hop, three different islands, three different hotels,
Roula Amire:
Oh goodness.
Alveda Williams:
... and we got it in. And so it's very interesting concept.
Roula Amire:
It is.
Alveda Williams:
But it's something that has worked for us to sort of get away and make sure that we get rid of the excuses.
Roula Amire:
So then the takeaway for me is, or for anyone listening, you're saying it doesn't have to be a week-long-
Alveda Williams:
Yeah.
Roula Amire:
... trip or something you have to plan months and months in ahead.
Alveda Williams:
Yes.
Roula Amire:
A short little getaway, a day or two or three,
Alveda Williams:
Yes.
Roula Amire:
... somewhere, can recharge.
Alveda Williams:
I believe in staycations too, as a real... That's a real thing.
Roula Amire:
Oh, I love a good staycation.
Alveda Williams:
Literally take time off and just woosah.
Roula Amire:
Do you do that?
Alveda Williams:
I do. I do, when I can. And sometimes it's not even full days. Sometimes I just got back at 2:00 in the morning. This first three quarters of the next day is a woosah for me. I'll be back at it. I promise I'm coming back.
Roula Amire:
Is there a book or podcast you'd recommend to your peers?
Alveda Williams:
I would like to highly recommend the Better podcast by Great Place to Work.
Roula Amire:
Thank you, Alveda. I did not...
Alveda Williams:
She did not-
Roula Amire:
... pay Alveda.
Alveda Williams:
... pay me to say that. I had a gentleman come talk to my team, and so we've been reading his book, gentleman, his name is Charles Vogl. He wrote a book sometime ago actually called The Art of Community, just really simple principles around creating Communities of belonging. And so that's something that I'm reading right now and sort of actioning upon with my own team. The Art of Community by Charles Vogl.
Roula Amire:
Excellent. Everyone should check that out. Thank you, Alveda, for the conversation. I enjoyed it tremendously.
Alveda Williams:
Thank you as well. Thanks for having me.
Roula Amire:
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