Ep 48 - Onboarding in 2025: Real Talk About Remote Work Challenges

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Ep 48 - Onboarding in 2025 Real Talk About Remote Work Challenges Podcast and Video Transcript

[Disclaimer: This transcription was written by AI using a tool called Descript, and has not been edited for content.]

Dave Dougherty: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to episode 48 of Enterprising Minds. We are quickly approaching the 50 mark, guys. I'm not sure if you're aware of that, but how does that feel? Crazy.

Ruthi Corcoran: Pretty darn good. Nice work team.

Addressing Workplace Concerns

Dave Dougherty: So with that, actually, we are going to address a concern that a couple of us have had in the workplace, you know, under the format of coffee talk style advice.

So Ruthie, you have the question formulated. So why don't you introduce the topic and we'll, we'll get everything rolling.

Ruthi Corcoran: All right, let's get started.

Remote Work and Onboarding Challenges

Ruthi Corcoran: So since 2020 I [00:01:00] think it's fair to say most of us have encountered this. If you're working in the, the corporate marketing world, a lot more of our work is remote, whether it's hybrid, full time remote the shift is definitely away from being in office with your team every single day and more towards being on calls using more chat based functionality to communicate and collaborate with your team.

So the thing I've been thinking about a lot more is as a new team member, or indeed as an established team member, how can we improve the way that we onboard and engage entry level employees so that they feel more part of the team? And importantly, can get that sort of learning by osmosis that happens so easily when you're side by side.

Ruthi Corcoran: And I think about this from two angles, from the one, one side, what advice might we give to an entry level applicant, or maybe somebody who falls in that one to three years of experience. You're joining a new company with its own [00:02:00] culture, with its own team. How do you embrace or jump into it? In such a way that you get exposure to lots of people, lots of ways of doing things and can really start learning the things that you don't even know to ask about, or you don't even know that you need training on,

Creating a Welcoming Culture

Ruthi Corcoran: And then the other dimension is as either an established team member who has, who has new team members they're working with, or as a manager of a team, how do we think about creating the space for those new entry level employees coming in and making them certainly feel welcome. So there's sort of a cultural aspect to it.

But then also giving them the push or the opportunities or the suggestions they need to really get a head start in working with a new team in a new, in a new way. And I, I'll just add one more piece on this, which is I'm thinking particularly that entry level employee and the folks coming out of [00:03:00] college or out of high school in particular.

And the reason I think about that is because their entire history has been very much one of an educational setting, which as we all know is quite distinct from a corporate setting or a business setting. Oftentimes you don't have a syllabus that says here's the steps you need to take. Sometimes you're given a project and you have to ad lib it.

Sometimes you get very specific onboarding that sort of steps you through. One by one, sometimes you don't get that level of handholding. And so what can you do to set yourself up for success? And what can team members and managers do to better set those teams up for success?

Real-World Examples and Solutions

Dave Dougherty: Is, is there a specific situation that you're talking about? Like people are returning to work and now have to be shoulder to shoulder or. Just sort of general advice for for new [00:04:00]

Ruthi Corcoran: you've got a new team member who's maybe had a couple of internships or Maybe not even that they're joining your team They don't know what they don't know.

They've never worked in a corporate setting before Maybe they've had minimal experience. How do you ensure those guys get the type of learning you get even just by the water cooler chat? From the other more experienced team members. They're not only learning this skills of the trade, the job trade, but they're also learning how do you be a good corporate employee?

How do you work with other people effectively within that setting? There's so much that you get by just simply being or you used to get by simply being in person in an office. That's a gap now. And some of the things that come to mind is, okay, well, one way you could solve this would be to encourage your teams to just go in office more often to have more side by side time because you get those sort of side chats or you get the sort of, oh, I'm watching them do stuff.

[00:05:00] Another thought could be, oh, okay, well. Maybe we do sort of an apprentice model where you have them follow other team members and you set the expectation that, hey, you're going to follow this team member. You're going to go to meetings with them. You're going to be on emails. You're going to see how they communicate and how they, how they work with other parts of the organization.

Those are just a couple of thoughts off the top of my head. To give the type of exposure to some of the non tangible items that wouldn't be part of an onboarding checklist, or maybe there's a way you, you structure your onboarding checklist to enable that kind of thing.

Dave Dougherty: Alex, I'm going to put you on the spot because you have like, what I would consider one of the more traditional backgrounds of the three of us in terms of like school to corporate.

Yeah, I got a whole

Alex Pokorny: laundry list of stuff.

Dave Dougherty: Yeah, so let's start with you and then we can go to me, which is totally I don't know how I ended up here kind of story.[00:06:00]

Alex Pokorny: I've also had this experience a few times, worked for the few very remote companies. Also had direct reports who were kind of pretty new in the industry, but also remote and trying to shift or shift into a very different style of work. Had some people who came from like the online gambling world and then shifted into a very, you know, conservative corporate.

world. Like there's culture shifts like that as well for whatever experiences they may have had might be run very, very differently. And the abilities that they had there might be very different than what they have here. Case in point, I had a direct report here. It's like, man, we really need, if we want to make this blog, you know, get more attention.

We need to put a link right here on the homepage and giant multinational corporation. Do you know what it takes to put a button on the homepage? Like months. Of work, like you got to get some UX studies that are going to prove that's going to be a value. I [00:07:00] mean, it's like there's a mountain of work and he was used to having full control of the site and literally just being able to think of an idea, throw it on the site, you know, it's done by launch.

So it's setting expectations. They're kind of like level setting with that and kind of moving up. With that particular example, actually, this is a good one for this conversation. I let him run with it. Knowing that we're not going to be able to make this happen, but this is a small task, run with this, let's learn about what it's going to take to actually do this, let's meet with people, we'll talk to them, we'll run through this entire thing, like it's, you know, we're 100 percent behind it, and we'll learn through it basically, like who has to be involved, what are the discussions and all the rest, and I gave him basically real world experience on something he was excited about, and I was alongside with him, feeding alongside saying like, look, it's, It's extremely difficult to do, but this is how we would do it.

So let's start this. It's going to be a, you know, 10 percent project. It's not going to be your main job, but I want to, you know, pull you through [00:08:00] this process too. And I explained that to him right at the beginning, like not trying to like think that this is some kind of, you know, confidence scheme or something like that, where you, you know, goes through something for no point, but no, I explained that to him.

So That he had that ability and start seeing that perspective from the inside of like, you know, this is the difference in what happens. Quite a few other things from a remote side as well, especially speaking to anybody younger generations. What is said and how it's said in chat is not how people are in person.

Chat is not people. I say this many times because I've had It's very interesting managers who like would do the ellipses, the three little dots at the end of like random statements and it would make people so nervous because it was like. Yeah, we should get that done dot, dot, dot. And then you're like, well, what am I supposed to take from that?

Or is this something we're supposed to do? Is this not something I mean, it's like, what? And then like use of emojis. [00:09:00] Oh my gosh, there are generational differences on the definitions of emojis and they are highly confused. So whenever someone is speaking via chat, I always try to take it with the very smallest grain of salt and basically try to just imagine that what they're saying in person will be considerably different than how they are in chat.

So to that point. Be the person who's always on camera as much as possible. If you have a quick discussion with someone and it's getting a little confusing, book some time with them or saying, Hey, do you have, are you free the next like 10, 15 minutes? Can we just talk this out? The moment you can get on camera and start to talk with people, they understand you and where you're coming from.

They have additional empathy you on the other side as well. And then you can start to. There's so much more communication that happens with facial structure, facial motions and hands and all the rest of that, that you're missing.

Dave Dougherty: I think,

Building Relationships and Networking

Dave Dougherty: along those lines, if I can jump in, one of the most, one of the things that has allowed me to be [00:10:00] successful I had a manager when I took a new job within a company.

Who on day one gave me a spreadsheet and said, here are all the people that you need to know in order to do your job well. And that was super helpful because then he called it the hit list. He's like, I expect you to have coffee with every single one of these people within your first month. And know what they're working on figure out who you vibe with and, you know, go from there.

And so at all of our one on ones was, hey, how's that hit list coming? And that was really good because then I could remember. Who was working on what project? And then whenever I was in a random conversation, somebody was like, Oh, I'm thinking of doing this. I'm like, Oh, so and so is already doing that.

Well, let me put you in touch, you know, and then being able to facilitate those connections has allowed me to be much more successful than if I was only trying to do it by myself. And [00:11:00] that actually came up today. I was talking to a colleague in Europe and he's like, how. How do you have access to all these different tools that, you know, you might not even supposed to be allowed to have access to cause you're not on that team anymore.

I was like. It's because I have relationships, people want me to have the tool because they know I know how to use it properly, you know and I'm willing to help. So it's easier for me to, you know, if they ask me a question, it's easier for me to jump in and use that tool and, and give the data and my perspective on, on what should happen or a way to approach something.

Then, you know, if they have to share their screen and I say, okay, click here, no, move down to that, do that, you know. So, you know, the relationship piece is extremely important, and that's the one thing, you know, in all of our other discussions that we've had, that's the one thing I can't do, you know, it can write your emails for you, but creating an actual connection that's [00:12:00] that's on you.

to do.

Ruthi Corcoran: I'm going to add a couple of those too. And then I'll pass it back to Alex. Cause some of the ones you've added so far, I always have been super helpful. And I've been taking notes on the side because some of these are like, Oh yeah, that's a good idea. Or that's a good reminder. I, the, the coffee chat one in particular, man, it's cause you don't know who you don't know.

And I, what that does, Dave is it gives the person permission to just reach out. Oh, my boss said I had to go have a coffee chat. Like all of a sudden it takes a hurdle away that says, yeah, I can reach out to this person even though they might be a different level or they're on a different team. The two other thoughts that came to mind.

One is I remember a job I started and somebody, one of the team members had created a. A shareable bookmark list of here's all the tools and random links from the company that you need to have access to for just random corporate life. Not even just to do your job, but just, Hey, here's how [00:13:00] you find workday.

Here's how you find your benefits information. Here's that annoying company SharePoint link that no one can ever find. It's all of those little things that you don't even know. And then a lot of the resources that you need to ask for. You don't know that they exist because they're sort of part of the suite of company resources.

And then related, you know, I have done this for, for team members in the past, too, is giving them here's the list of tools you're going to need. Go start asking or make sure you have access or I'll help you along as you go which is huge. The other thought that came to mind as you were talking about that sort of personal relationship thing I think.

One of the, one of the most valuable thing you can do as a, as a new person, especially as you're entering the job part, job market for the first time, play that new card, say, hey, I'm new. I don't know what I don't know. You said something interesting in this meeting. I would love to learn more about that.

You've got a grace [00:14:00] period of at least. a year, especially when you're a new entry, right? Six months for sure. But at least a year to say, Hey, we've never met before, but I'd love to learn more about this informational interviews. If you start out with saying, Hey, I just joined. I'd love to learn more about this in your area.

People love to talk about what they do. They love to, and they like to help. And so Play that new card and set up as many informational interviews as you can, along with the coffee chats of, of, Hey, let's just get to know each other.

Dave Dougherty: So a funny story along those lines. That new card when I, when I first joined you know, the, the really large fortune 100, I, I leveraged that, that new card and there was a senior vice president who was like way up the chain who presented on careers.

And blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Right. It was like a little 10 minute spiel. So I went ahead and emailed him and said, Hey, I saw that you know, you saw your presentation on this [00:15:00] would love to pick your brain on what you've experienced through your thing and how I can apply that as a new hire to this organization.

I fully expected a no. Cause right. It's like, here's the new guy batting for, you know the all star or whatever. And. To my surprise, he's like, you can have 15 minutes at 730 in the morning on this day. It was like, you know, in his commute to the airplane or something. And it was great. He was really nice.

He told me, yeah, I've got 20 years experience. This is how it works. This is how you want to do it. And you know, but things change a lot, but, you know, go for it and welcome to the company. I was like, that's pretty sweet. Like, don't be afraid to swing for the fences because most people are willing to help.

And that's been something that's taken me too long in my career to figure out, you know, you know, most people are people typically, [00:16:00] yeah, so Alex, you're going to say something before I jumped in with the story.

Alex Pokorny: Oh, I was just saying from the manager perspective, so there's kind of, we're playing both sides of this the other piece about the intro and the copies.

That can make a lot of people really nervous to just you brand new to a company, you know, nothing Your imposter syndrome is like a hundred ten percent. It's tough As a manager or even as a colleague to someone When the I think the nicest things to do is to pull them along into an intro meeting to other people cameras on if you can and Softball out a couple of personal questions to everybody You know, pets, friends, what do people like to do, that kind of stuff.

If it's intro slides and that's the kind of thing that you guys do, fine. The whole other team presents first, though. Then you talk to the person who's the newbie. The more personal connections and basically breakdown of being, this is a title and this is me. [00:17:00] Instead it's, this is a person and I'm a person.

The closer you can get to that person to person piece, the more comfortable people are. And I've noticed that at the last couple of companies that I've joined, I was freaking awkward until there was finally like a breakdown meeting like might have been the first week Where everybody was relaxed and chill on a Friday and we were just talking and then suddenly my nervousness and all the rest just plummeted and I was able to more easily to reach out to people and talk to them one on ones with random people when they're everybody's a stranger is tough one on ones once you know some people and you realize hey you know this group seems okay is a lot easier and as a manager you can facilitate that as a colleague you can facilitate that as well for someone who's new.

Dave Dougherty: Okay, so this might be a personality change or difference. Personally, I prefer the one on one coffee talks [00:18:00] because it's more real. I find people will automatically put on their mask and be a little more performative if it's a group setting. So, yeah, you put on the slides, but like, you know, of course people are going to talk about their dog and I love my kids and oh, isn't this great.

We took this vacation. Like I'm a well balanced person. It's like, no, you're not. You're sending emails at 1130 at night, you know, so like, yeah, I mean, they're great. They're part of the performing aspect of of work.

Alex Pokorny: Yeah, fair point. I mean, it depends on the group a lot. I mean, if you have this laid back kind of happy hour ish group that works well, but you're right.

If it's some formalized BS. That's going to fall flat, like that doesn't know the layer that Alex tossed in

Ruthi Corcoran: there [00:19:00] too is, Hey, remember that people are people and some people Dave and myself definitely fall in this camp as you might've picked up or like, yeah, just give me the list. I'll reach out to everybody.

It'll be great. Like, let's just go get coffee and I'll just, I'll just be the new person. And Alex, to your point, like. That's not the case for other people. And in particular, like our focus here is let's talk about the group of people who are absolutely new to this completely. They don't have previous experience or it's very minimal.

What does that look like? And you might not even know what to ask out of a coffee chat. Like what do you ask? How

Alex Pokorny: do you get that off? How do you start that? Pro tip, like who are you and what's your

Ruthi Corcoran: background? Tell me how you got to wherever you are. Like, that's a good starter. Sorry, Alex, go.

Alex Pokorny: Exactly. Have them talk about themselves, like you were saying.

People can easily fill time with that and they can kick things off that

Dave Dougherty: way. One of my favorite things, like if it's going well, you know, and you can tell that you guys are vibing or on a similar wavelength I like [00:20:00] to ask them like, all right, so I know this is your job now, but what do you actually like to do?

Cause sometimes they're not the same thing. You know, and then you really find out some stuff and that's awesome. Like you know, they really like their role two roles ago, but this one, nah, it pays the bills.

Alex Pokorny: Yeah, another one I always use is culture questions. Like, what do you think this company's culture is like? Like, how would you describe it? Or like, you know, how, how do things get done around here? Like, tell me those kind of things. And it's interesting because The more open ended I think some of these kind of questions go and more personalized If people start to finally open up and they're not just reading off a resume They're kind of just talking about like look this part sucks.

This part's good. This part sucks, too It's like yeah, there's kind of more real conversations at that point.

Dave Dougherty: Well, and the other thing too is[00:21:00]

My advice for that if you set up a coffee talk and you're doing it in person don't show up with your computer Yeah, you know like Or, you know, if you're working on your iPad or something, because then all of a sudden it becomes like an interview, right? It's, it's no longer, hey, I want to speak to you, you know, one on one.

It's oh, help me, help me get information that will help me. And that's just completely disingenuous, and that's not the message you want to send.

Ruthi Corcoran: You mean like, don't take notes during your coffee chat? Is that what you're saying? No, you should take

Dave Dougherty: notes, but like, there is, there's a certain Distance that's created when it's on, you know, on a computer.

It changes the vibe. Are you interested in the person? If so, do you really need to do that? Or can you take some quick notes afterwards? You know, this is sort of a different approach. I know for me, like if I'm, [00:22:00] I describe myself as New school values with old school lines in the sand. Right, which can be a weird mix.

So like, if I'm presenting, and half the room is on their laptops, you're wasting my time. Don't bother showing up to this meeting. Because clearly, you're not prioritizing what I have to say. And I didn't spend the last week putting together this deck to waste your time. So shut your laptop, and pay attention.

Right.

Ruthi Corcoran: Do you know a little thing that as you're describing that scenario and some of the the different dynamics there? So one is yeah, if you're meeting in person for coffee, don't bring your laptop like that's that's I feel like that goes without saying, but let's just say it.

Dave Dougherty: Sometimes it doesn't. I've experienced it.

Sometimes it doesn't.

Ruthi Corcoran: The other thing that I was thinking about is when I have copy chats with folks remotely, which I do a lot because I think that they are a [00:23:00] valuable way of connecting. I literally have coffee in my hand in part because it sets the tone of this is informal. I'm not, I'm not leaning over.

I'm not taking notes unless I say it. Specifically, I said, Oh, I'm just going to write that down quick. That was really cool. But otherwise I have coffee in my hand because it helps create that sort of atmosphere. And I would hope that it helps sort of take down the formalness of the, the environment for the person I'm with.

Dave Dougherty: Yeah. The thing that I I have noticed that is concerning is the amount of people who believe there is a correct answer for a lot of things. And I guess I, I don't live in that world. There, there are multiple answers. There are multiple ways to get to the same destination. You just have to figure out your way of doing it.

You know

Ruthi Corcoran: You know, Dave, that's a really cool segue to another item that I did just jot in my notes over here [00:24:00] of to your point, there's not always a correct answer. There might be multiple answers. But there are answers that exist and you can access them. So the note I wrote down is Google stuff. It's amazing how often I get asked questions by, by different team members who are somewhat new, who.

For whatever reason are not in the habit of first either Googling or asking chat JPT or pick your favorite Pick your favorite source of information, but that's such a it's good It's really good to ask questions especially the open ended ones set to Alex's points you can get other people's perspectives and they can introduce you to Ways of thinking or ideas you hadn't thought of yourself, but for some of the more tactical stuff, man Just Google it.

You'll become more proficient very quickly than a lot of your peers by simply looking it up yourself.

Dave Dougherty: And I think one of the big questions that I ask, [00:25:00] especially in any new role is, I mean, you can do this in the interview. You can do this after you get the job. You know, tell me what the successful people in this role are doing. And then, if they don't have an answer for that, oh. If they do have an answer, then you go talk to that person.

Who that they, who they cite. Because there's something about that person. The way they handle their job. The way they communicate with other people. That is something that you should probably borrow. And when I did that, when I took my, my latest role I immediately realized that there were a number of things that I just wasn't going to do it that way.

And so, and I said as much to set the expectations with my boss. It's like, look, you wanted me into this role, happy to do this role, but I'm not doing it this way. I'm going to do it my way. And [00:26:00] if that becomes an issue, we can talk about it. Otherwise let me do this. Right. But that also comes after years of experience of managing expectations and doing the projects.

And, you know, it's really liberating once you can get to that spot. Like I was in a training. The other week, actually, and my boss was on the same training, and he said to me in my one on one, like, Oh, man, Dave's gonna hate that. Because it was very specific instructions on how to do a very particular thing on a project that hadn't even started yet.

So it was like, this is a waste of 20 minutes because I'm not gonna remember it. Anything that you say to me because I haven't done it yet. And I won't know if this makes sense until I do it. In which case you're going to say, but I already told you the process. It's like, yeah, but you came up with the process without doing the work.

So I'm not going to [00:27:00] commit to, to that. So that brings up some interesting dynamics, but maybe that's a Dave problem. I don't know. Could be. I'm open to that.

Final Thoughts and Recommendations

Ruthi Corcoran: I've got one more, but I think Alex also has a couple more, so I'll just interject my little short one here, which there's probably some tie in with with Dave's experiences here as well, which is broad bucket over communicate. Be present, be, your only way of being in front of people is through your communications in a remote environment via email, via chat, via on video in a meeting, etc.

That's the only way people see you because they don't see you in the hall. You're not, you're not present to them unless you are quite literally in front of at the top of their inbox or in their chat related to that. CC your manager on communications. Especially if you're entry level and you're [00:28:00] new and you're, you're doing stuff, just CC them.

It's not a, it's not a micromanaging thing. It's not a, It's not your boss is looking over your shoulder. It's, hey, they can help you throughout your various situations with folks. If there's a question that comes up that you don't know the answer to, you don't have to sort of awkwardly ask. You can say, hey, did you see that message?

I don't know how to respond to this. Can you help me out? It's, it helps your manager help you in their day to day and it helps you give the, helps. Your manager guide you through some of the day to day situations that you might not even realize are things you got to watch out for Makes

Alex Pokorny: a lot of sense. I mean that's also building trust because you're Just adding the amount of communication that you're doing with other people now You're doubling it by throwing your manager as well. So now you've got more communication with them as well. So that's good I was thinking a couple things that can help especially a messy [00:29:00] entry one is Bottom up and top down.

So what I mean by that is commonly when someone has started the manager or hiring people are thinking of specific tasks that they would like that person to eventually take on or to take on quickly. I think that's a tough way to start because They're going to tell them how they have done it and how their perspective.

But one of the better questions out of that, and either as that new employee or as that manager be thinking about this or asking this of this is what I hope to get out of this. So instead of saying this is a prescriptive mentality, like Dave being given a list, a process, that's not that helpful. It's a lot more helpful to say, this is the task that I need done.

This is what I hope to get out of it. I'm hoping to have you show me this or something like that at the end of it because they're probably gonna do it differently and that's [00:30:00] also just, that's okay. And then from the top down perspective, The more kind of grounding might just be a me thing, but the more I can understand the market, the environment, the larger company, the direction of things, it is really nice to be able to tie in what I'm doing, what I'm hearing with that and say, okay, I feel like I have my feet underneath of me.

I kind of get what people are talking about and kind of the why they're talking about things this way. Or maybe I'm meeting a lot of really grumpy people. Well, that's because actually numbers have been really bad and that means there's been a lot of pressure on a lot of people. It's not me and my interaction.

Instead, it's what they're feeling from those outside influences as well or something like that. You know, whatever those kind of main. Things are from a marketing standpoint. I always ask people, you know, why, like, why would a customer care about this? What triggers them? What pressures them? Is it competitors?

Is it a situation? Is it regulation? Like, you know, what's going on that causes this thing to happen? But [00:31:00] that also is true across why is this company here? What are we doing? Why do we sell this way? Why do we do things like that and having those kind of nice open questions? allows you to bridge a lot of that gap to have like, Oh, history wise, this is what happened.

And now you're here.

Dave Dougherty: I think there's some, there's some quick wins to be had to like, if you reach out to teams that, that are always begging to be reached out to, you know, legal, you know, lawyers are friends, not enemies, even though their job is to say no to ideas, you know reach out to legal, establish a relationship before, before you need something from them.

And then I had an interaction the other day, actually, where I reached out to a team that I had never talked to before. But I had a prioritization question and the guy came back and was just like, Oh my God, thanks for including us in the prioritization process. Like, [00:32:00] it's fantastic. You reached out.

It was just like so excited that I reached out before submitting anything, you know, it's like, thank you for including us. I'm like, sure. Yeah. Cool. I'm, I'm glad you're so happy, . You know, it's a really simple act, but now it's like, all right, cool. That then I know that I can, that kind of response lets me know that I can reach out more and, and establish something more there.

'cause clearly there's a desire, but people aren't taking advantage of that yet.

Ruthi Corcoran: I think

that context laying that Alex, you talked about enables what you just talked about, Dave, which is, if. If the people that we work with and especially our new hires have a good grounding in Here's why the company does what it does, here's what we do in support of [00:33:00] that why, and here's specifically how we do it, and so you can sort of ladder it all up and understand the context of here's what our team does and how we do it, and here's how that relates to what other teams and how they do it, then to your comments, Dave, you you can make those connections because you have the underlining sort of here's why we're doing it and here's what we're doing so you can say okay in order for us to be successful we should engage these other guys too which then helps folks who are totally new to the culture the community the the networks start to piece together where there should be connections because oftentimes those are invisible you don't even realize hey there's a legal team and here's who they What they might be responsible for, how they play in, or even like, I remember coming to an organization, I didn't understand at all what the purpose of an HR rep for our organization was, like what, what their role was and how they could help me or support me.

And even I'm, I'm just reminded of a time where we set up a call with them to say, Hey, tell us more about [00:34:00] what your role is and how we should think about engaging with you. And even simple things like that can be a. Cool way of doing an introduction, a coffee type thing because especially those teams that you talk about, Dave, like legal and HR compliance, regulatory, they, they want to be part of the picture.

And so they're going to be all the more eager and they might paint a picture that you would have never been able to piece together.

Dave Dougherty: Yeah. And it's funny, like, you know, we talk about the, I think that's a really good summary for, for people to go back to and like what, you know, what's possible for that or what they should be going and doing.

But the other thing with the personality is in the kind of go after it, get after it kind of thing. Like that has put me in some interesting situations previously. Like when we met, I for that organization, I took part of the new employee. Organization, right? They have that would be the other thing.

Look for those sorts of. Internal organizations [00:35:00] for resource organizations, you know, for new employees, you know, working mothers, African American network, or, you know, whatever else exists, those can be great resources to, to find out, you know, across the organization how things work. Even in areas that aren't yours, but provide that bigger context.

And I remember going to the new employee, it was sort of a, have some dinner with execs and they did this kind of like speed dating talk with executives. And I called out. The senior vice president of HR around like, Hey, what you're doing with digital marketing doesn't make any sense and I'm brand new.

And if you actually want to get digital marketing talent, these are the organizational changes that have to be done and I can get you You know, group of 10 people who will, you know, back up my claims here. [00:36:00] And then that was the thing that, you know, they're like, all right, great. Put it together. And I'm like, oh crap.

Okay. So, so I got eight to 10 people that, you know, they paid for lunch. We, we gave them feedback, but I had to go to my boss and be like, Hey. There's a number of us on your team that's going to speak to HR today, but it has nothing to do with you.

And that was an interesting conversation. That was an interesting conversation, but it worked out. It worked well. You know, but that's the kind of stuff where like, I have found those sorts of uncomfortable things. Like if you find yourself really nervous after being telling that story, that might not be your approach, but I have found That by accidentally talking myself into situations where my back is against the wall forces me to break through that barrier of what I'm might be uncomfortable with, [00:37:00] and it usually leads to good things because I'm not naturally extroverted, but I will.

I'm good for an opinion.

Ruthi Corcoran: You know, Dave, this brings up probably one of the most important things you can, you can do as a new employee and something for managers and team members to look out for for opportunities, which is find a buddy, find somebody else who is in your shoes as a new employee. It's okay if they're sort of established, but there's something about.

Finding somebody or a group of people who are all in the same circumstance together because it puts you in a case where you can say, Hey, did you know about this? And they can say, no, but I learned this other thing. And that sort of joint learning and the ability to have sort of camaraderie and learn from each other is one of the most valuable assets you can have, because you might find a Dave who then ends, you end up sitting in.

You know, executive leadership lunchroom, having lunch with HR, because Dave took a very different approach than, than you, you might have in that [00:38:00] circumstance. And that's huge.

Dave Dougherty: Yeah. And I, I, the other thing is carve out time on your calendar. To do the coffee talks, not just the new higher hit list kind of things, but like, if you go to a presentation and somebody says something interesting, follow up after that and say, hey, I'd love to learn more about this and people want to talk about what they're working on.

And so I set aside Fridays to. network with people, talk to people that I haven't talked to in a long time and I just want to catch up with or, you know, yeah, just try to keep that, keep that network going both inside the company and outside the company. Cause it's so easy to get caught up in the to do list that you forget about the things that are actually important.

Like I was talking with a friend of mine who works for a different huge company about that particular topic about how to do lists or traps. [00:39:00] And they're great. You feel great accomplishing certain things, but don't lose sight of the other things. You know, and where you're going. So, yeah, anyway, I think that was a great a great discussion.

Dave Dougherty:

I think I'm going to have to go back through and pick out all of the the recommendations we had for that and maybe put a summary on that. Cause it's a good reminder, even for, even for me. So yeah, anyway, thanks for making it this far in hope you've enjoyed it. Please like, comment, subscribe, share if you know, any, you know, new graduate or new hire that might benefit from this, share this episode with them.

Dave Dougherty: And with that, we will see you in the next episode of Enterprise and Minds two weeks from now, take [00:40:00] care.