S3 EP. 01 - Why are authentic communities essential at work & building unstoppable networks for growth?
In this episode, Elena Aylott shares her unique journey from executive assistant to Vice President of Global Communications and Employee Experience at Oriflame Cosmetics to founding her own company, The Aylott Group.
She emphasizes the importance of trust, adaptability, and community-building within organizations. Key takeaways include the impact of personal and corporate trust, the role of HR as a mega facilitator, and leveraging employee communities for organizational success. Elena also highlights the power of authentic personal branding and the crucial role of human experiences in fostering strong, interconnected networks.
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https://www.linkedin.com/in/elenaaylott/
Introduction
Elena Aylott is an experienced executive specializing in People and Communications. As the former Vice President of Global Communications and Employee Experience at Oriflame Cosmetics, she transformed the global employee experience by fostering people-centric workplaces across more than 60 countries, positively impacting thousands of employees.
Currently, Elena runs her own communications and people experience agency, Aylott Group, and is the CEO and co-owner of the Swedish nail salon chain Nail Democracy.
S3 EP. 01 Transcription
[00:00:00] Steve: Welcome to the experience designers podcast.
[00:00:04] Elena: Thank you.
[00:00:05] Steve: I'm so pleased you're here. And I thought we'd just dive in.
[00:00:10] Elena: Let's do it. Let's
[00:00:11] Steve: Let's do it. So hindsight is a wonderful thing. And you've had, I would say quite a unique journey, certainly from a Non-traditional kind of journey into the role that you had at ORI Flame.
So I just want to anchor in there for a minute. Let's anchor back and reflect for a moment what's been your journey, what's some of the takeaways that you've had?
[00:00:36] Elena: How much time do you have?
[00:00:38] Steve: Just gimme the top line. Where'd you start?
[00:00:41] Elena: Yes. I'm now I'm a founder of my own company that is called a Aylott group, and I've decided to focus my career on helping people building communities in the broad spectrum, but also helping top leaders and top experts to build their personal brand.
And we can speak more about it, but I can tell you what brought me here. And this is exactly how I would answer your question. So my latest role that actually. Shaped me quite a lot. Was the being responsible for all HR, all non product communication. So corporate communication, you can call it and all sales incentive events for more than 2 million people around the world at Oriflame cosmetics, and that was for people who were selling Oriflame individual entrepreneurs.
So I was VP of global employee experience, global communications and all global events. And the journey there took me 16 years. And I cannot say that it was planned. It's very interesting how you listen to all those podcasts and you listen to different I don't know, interviews with people who say that they plan their career very carefully.
I hope that I won't disappoint anyone here saying that I actually have never planned my career. I always, Followed my heart and I am also a problem solver. I get adrenaline kicks out of solving problems. And every time I saw something either not working or I saw another way to do it that would actually benefit more people, I would jump straight into that.
So that's how I started at Oriflame. As an executive assistant to the CEO. And that was a very interesting. role. I was immigrant in Sweden, and then I have a degree in communication. And you might wonder, why do you want to become an executive assistant? First of all, I didn't really have a lot of choices.
Let's be honest. When you come here, you have a degree in communication and some work experience. It's not easy to compare yourself and to compete on the labor market with the people who speak Swedish or any other language as the native language. So for me, of course, it was a barrier.
[00:03:04] Steve: Can I just how many years ago was that?
[00:03:07] Elena: That was nearly 17 years ago.
[00:03:09] Steve: Very different stockholm and sweden 17 years ago compared to today.
[00:03:13] Elena: Absolutely. And remember that it was not my first year in Sweden. So before that, I actually had four years of experience in the Northern Sweden, in Umeå, where I went through basically a lot of things to get a job. I started as an interpreter, a municipal interpreter, and I worked in prisons and in hospitals quite a lot.
And then after this, I got a job. in the county administration. And then suddenly from prisons and hospitals, I went into governor's office and I was, doing quite a lot of jobs with ministerial meetings and high level, sort of Ministry of Foreign Affairs do those. And then after this, suddenly, A mother of a young child in Stockholm, no contacts, what do you do?
And they came to this job at Oriflame and I knew the brand and I love beauty and cosmetics, and I thought, you know what, I always wanted to really learn business because my background is in communication and humanities. So wouldn't it be like the best to work with the CEO of a mega global corporation and to learn it all.
What a disappointed it was when the first two weeks on the job I was clamped into the printing room and I was just printing and I got the induction and how to print in color and black and white and how to staple the documents, and that's where I thought that, Oh my God, what have I done with my career?
But actually, that's how it all started and I really appreciate it. And again, back to, to my journey and that I didn't plan it. It's not the job that defines you. You define the job. So what I started doing and I was always curious in how organizations function because for me, the dynamics of the organization is like a real life organism because organization itself, the modeling on the paper, it's dead.
It's nothing. It's all about people and people's relationships and interactions right within the organization. And then people are put into processes and procedures. So I really wanted to understand with my humanities mind, how is it so that people in one shape in real life, and then they are in a different shape and playing different roles in the organizations.
And should we play those roles or can you be direct in yourself and still achieve, you know what you want? And then also multiply it by me not having a social network in Stockholm, not having any friends. So for me, Oriflame became like a testing ground, but also my social circle because the majority of my friends.
Where are my colleagues and what I started doing, I was actually reading all the board papers I was printing. I was actually asking my CEO, who is an amazing person and actually was always answering my questions. I asked a lot of questions and during the years we formed this relationship when I became.
the sort of his like a fire woman. Taking projects that were difficult to solve, that were confidential and helping him. And by doing this, I was exposed to different departments. I was exposed to different corners of organizations, a lot of crises. I actually led the crisis committees quite a lot of times.
So it was on me and through this, by doing. You basically learn, and you learn a lot, and you don't only learn processes, but you learn how people function. And I've also learned that when you are on a winning journey, Yeah. It's very easy to talk to you people because everybody's cheerful and happy.
But when you start losing and the market is hard, then when you need to become strategical and that's how my journey in founding the communication department started. And after this, We saw the bigger impact of going into HR and combining the communication flow with the content itself. So it's not only the talk about the talk, but actually that you have the matter in your hands and you make it better for people for the experience.
And then you talk about it. It, so you don't only talk, on order, but you actually do something and then you disseminate it as the content. And that was the whole thing of me projecting in my career to the level where I combined the experiences for employees. I combined it with the communication because we were using employees as the basic ground for you can say brand communication.
And then we were also leveraging. All these, all the initiatives we did for employees, for our brand partners as well.
[00:07:48] Steve: but I think one thing that really struck me and I just really want to anchor into this for a moment. I still remember this is crazy how experiences and memories are so interconnected and it's the small stuff and I remember when we met. We went for, we had breakfast on the roof terrace and it was a lovely morning and there was a wasp driving us mad, right?
And that, but I remember the craziest, stupidest things and you brought, but I thought what was really lovely is you brought this kind of array of breakfast I don't know what you want, but here you go. And I think, that, that ability to host that, a stranger coming into an organization.
But I think what was really interesting in just that small experience, and I'm a person who is always assessing experiences. I'm very conscious and aware of it, particularly when I walk into a new environment is Auriflame had this it had this thing about it. It had a feeling, an experiential center, a heart to the business.
Unlike many I've ever actually. Encountered, and I think our good friend Elaine has also mirrored something like that as well. But why is that? What was some of that DNA that was created through, as you highlighted those interconnectivities between the hr, the communication, and obviously the broader field.
What was it that was some of that DNA that really enabled that?
[00:09:02] Elena: enabled that? We can speak a lot about this and thank you for remembering this wasp. I'm actually allergic to wasps, so that's why I actually tried to, I tried to get it out and also not to lose the face in front of you because in the real life I would actually scream loudly.
Yeah, so
[00:09:17] Steve: handled it
[00:09:17] Elena: that was good, thank you. You know what? I think the answer to this question is much simpler than you think, and I'm not going to go through employee experience modelings now because if I'm truly honest, it all doesn't matter. It all comes back to trust. And I think that's actually the basic thing that we could deliver over the years that we built relationships in Oriflame.
That started a long time ago from the founding family. So where the leadership team and the employees trusted each other so much and you can say that we were in there for the same purpose and the purpose was pretty humanitarian. It's to help people, especially women in different parts of the world, especially in the parts of the world where they were not privileged to have their income. And without having to do big investments in their own business, and also not to be dependent on an employer. Who might fire them at any moment. And this is the Oriflames modeling. You know how the social selling works. And I think that by having an example, how you as a person create an impact every day on somebody's life and you basically see the lives transform.
We had a lot of Cinderella stories, like when the person I don't know, didn't a mother of children, I don't know, it can be India or Nigeria who hardly had money to buy pure drinking water. for her kids. Suddenly, who could do that? And we here in Sweden sitting thinking, just think that people don't have drinking water and suddenly you have resources to get it.
You just get shivers. I get shivers now, when I think about it. So I think that the first one is this, the impact that you as individual feel about what the company is all about. And you can say that, okay, is it important to formulate it in a nice way? No, we have so many different names for it, and we could say that we help people to fulfill dreams or we empower entrepreneurs around the world.
It doesn't matter what it's called. What matters is that it goes into the heart of the person through the cases. that you see how you actually impact. So that's the first thing. But the second thing that I told you from the beginning is trust and trust comes from this. So when you impact something and you trust that your work matters and everybody wants that their work matter.
But then also that you see the leadership
[00:11:56] Steve: team,
[00:11:57] Elena: you see the colleagues next to you and you feel that you've got their back. You feel that there is no corporate bullshitting going on. You know that if there is no answer, there is no answer. If there is a problem, there is a problem. At the same time, you're not taking people into the ditch with you, but you're actually trying to create the positive atmosphere and saying, come on, we can do it.
Okay, let's do it together. What ideas do you have? And I think that we went through pretty many years. with this atmosphere. And I think that's the only thing that matters. Then you can say that, yes, we have, we had, I still have, we, even if I don't work in Oriflame anymore, but you can see how how deeply it sees and how I relate to this, you can have different value words and of course it's all very important as symbolics, but the main thing is the feelings and memories and experiences that you create for people when it becomes theirs.
And I can say that when you have, I don't know, the CEO or a member of the leadership team that you treat as a friend and who treats you as a friend, of course there are hierarchies, but I mean that you trust this person probably more than you trust the TV and the news reporting, especially through COVID times or through the geopolitical disturbance.
That's when the magic happens, and that's when the cultures are built. And that's why I know for sure, and that's why I actually now decided to devote my time in my company to community building, that this is the essence of building communities. And I think that the companies nowadays, they really have so much power.
in their hands because we spend so much time at work and think if you create this sort of, trustworthy culture inside the organization, it spills. It spills to customers, it spills to partners, and then it spills to the communities. We're speaking cities, we're speaking countries, and I think that it's so many things that could be done there.
And I've seen those things happening. So I don't know that was a lengthy
[00:14:04] Steve: No, it's
[00:14:05] Elena: But the short one is trust. Yeah,
[00:14:07] Steve: in. Okay. So there's two things I will definitely come into community because I think there's I think community I think also is a representation of a new paradigm that I think organizations have to adopt and evolve into it whatever form that would be particularly when we're moving out of systemic and hierarchical siloed.
But I'm really curious I just want to dive a little bit into trust a little bit deeper if I may because I think also your role and the representation around trust between
people officer or a chief experience officer and obviously the CEO and the journey that you went on with Magnus.
And I think there are some other examples where this close tie, obviously Daniel Aiken and Katharina Berg is a classic as well. Very close relationship. Others, as we know, are very much less so from the more traditional sense. And given that you evolved from a non traditional HR people background. I think that also feeds into that I think.
So what does this kind of trust mean? How did you build trust and what did it actually enable perhaps more than the more traditional environments from your perspective?
[00:15:13] Elena: It's a good question. Thank you. I think that probably My journey doesn't have to be everybody's journey because it took me quite some time.
And if I'm truly honest, I would say that the CEO of Magnus Brandstrom, whom I worked with so he became my mentor with time, and that's why we had such relationship because I basically grew as a professional. Thanks to him, because he saw something in me from the beginning, and then he was hopefully something good.
And then he was exposing me to different environments, and he was challenged me, challenging me all the times with tasks. But also, Magnus had this ability that if you see the problem and you have a solution, just go and do it. Don't go complaining about it. Just go and do it. And I think that I got blessed with a CEO like that because you basically have three hands, for trial and error.
And this shapes you as well because back to trust. When somebody trusts you, you don't want to put this person down, and then if this person gives you a mandate, you want to do the best. of what you're capable of, and you don't want it to suck. I'm sorry for the language. And I think that also shaped me because I really understood how much, trouble sometimes Magnus went into by allowing us to probably prioritizing, some of the non non traditional approaches to processes and people products.
But he trusted that we could do it and he trusted that even there is no immediate return on investment long term, it will be good. And this actually helped me and my organization. best and find the solutions Hoover that were economically viable and also out of the box. I would say why this connection matters?
I think that, The, now the environment has changed so much and what do we know about processes and companies? They're all gone and they need to be reshaped because AI is here, the hybrid is here whatever else is the buzzwords you can mention, the woke is here.
And what do you do with all this? Should you go for the one size fit all or should you start adjusting? Should you wait until the other companies do it and you just replicate, the thing is that what we know now is that we don't know anything and we don't have any paradigm of paradigm that we can relate to in the past, which means that we need to build our new paradigm now, but how can we do it?
As HR, and then this paradigm needs to be about people because you don't know anything. So you, your people don't know anything either. So what do you need to do is that you need to have an ability as a leader, as a HR leader or a CEO. And it's exactly the same task to organize the creative and problem solving powers of people around you to get all the expertise.
of things that they don't know and try to solve it together. And how do you do it when you don't have any references? So that means that in order for you as an HR leader to be a facilitator, you need to know all the other parts of the business and who is another person who knows or understands or can organize all the other parts of the business is the CEO.
So basically, I think that this alliance Between the CEO and CPO is very important because the CEO still has, so much a part of that, though now it becomes on the CEO table, all this organization of people and how you streamline your force for good, to the future.
That's the headache now for every CEO. But she also needs to think about profit and loss. So you always need to think about shareholders leverage. They need to think about the public image. They need to think about all of their people on the near underneath. They need to think about supply. They need to think about the cashflow, and so on.
Oh my God. And the crisis management. But people are there. So I think that the. CHRO's possibilities now, or CPO's possibility now, and the ultimate task is to be there with the CEO to understand every single function in the company, from the business perspective and to become this mega facilitator that helps the CEO to get the synergies first out of the organizations and budgets, of course, and the cashflow and everything, but also How do you help to get this force from the people for to create something that is not known
[00:20:13] Steve: I love that mega facilitator. I love That also requires let's build even more on the trust then that requires As a facilitator requires to create a safe space or a space to experiment which requires trust that It's gonna fail and it's okay and those involved it's gonna that's okay
[00:20:31] Elena: it's you know, and that's why it's so important that you understand where all the business parts are coming from, because it's so often, in the leadership group, it becomes a battle of budgets honestly.
And This is not about that,
[00:20:45] Steve: and I think that
[00:20:47] Elena: when you deal from year to year, the same processes, the same budget allocations, it can be yearly, it can be quarterly, whatever you call it, it's still the same. And you allocate money to the same projects, to the same processes that you had.
You basically create this bubble where you try to you try to recreate your own worth, every time. And then the leadership meetings becomes like an informational meeting where you try to convince other people in your own
[00:21:17] Steve: And
[00:21:19] Elena: and the thing is that now is really not possible and I think it's a waste of time.
And for the CHRO to become a mega facilitator, you need to understand these dynamics and you need to understand where your other. Colleagues in the leadership group are coming from. And I'll give just an example, like for example, if you have a chief financial officer and if you as a CHRO understand the major task of chief financial officer to make sure that the organization delivers on operational profit and that there is cash, in the organization.
When you understand that, and then when you understand that. What does that mean? That CFOs are always mindful about administrative costs. It's the cost for the staff. It's the cost for all the things, that, that are not with sales to do. That are you can call it back office, spend.
You totally understand that every time the CFO has questions to you or the reason efficiency program underway This is not about you personally This is their task and then you need to have it in your hand in your head and you need to think Strategically from the beginning. Okay. I know that this is We need for business to survive.
So how can I organize my work, with the all the resources available so that I can Keep it in mind, but I still can do investments and deliver value and experiences to the people working in this organization. And then you start talking with the CFO on a totally different level because you understand where this person comes from.
The same thing, for the marketing thing, like it's the digital marketing is a very big thing now, and Sometimes, you sit in the meeting and you feel that people are so involved in their projects and then they think it's their universe. But in, in the reality, everybody needs to understand, how it works.
Because if you are a CHRO and you want to create the, I don't know, employer brand, in the fashionable words, for the company. You need to understand the basics of digital marketing as well. And then instead of doing it by yourself and spending money in your organization, maybe you team up with the marketing had, and then you do join campaigning there because you see the win immediately.
Again, I'm all into saving resources because I think that so much resources are just burned, by not talking to each other, but also just think synergies. This is just the creativity of people in different departments coming together with different backgrounds. What heights of projects you can achieve there and what value you can create together.
So that's what I mean when this as a super facilitator, you need to go into the heads, like this film going to John Malkovich hub. You need to go into the heads of all your colleagues in the leadership group. You need to understand where they come from. And you need to see how can you power that up and how can you create like triple quadruple, then I don't know the word value, you go further, for the whole organization by teaming up, how often do we do that?
[00:24:27] Steve: No, and I think the word empathy comes into mind. I think the other thing I just, I've got to go
[00:24:32] Elena: but it's also business acumen,
[00:24:34] Steve: It is. But yeah, it is. Really does. I've got to go into trust again for a second cause I think we've talked hierarchically to CEO laterally to the team to the broader leadership group.
I want to go inward. Actually because for the anyone listening we've got to back ourself and trust our self And also call ourself out around how we're thinking about stuff Just any thoughts around that because I think then if we're now thinking about the more human piece
What's your thoughts to that?
[00:25:03] Elena: know, I can even make the picture even more grim.
We now see the tendencies, especially in the U. S., but I see it in Sweden as well, where if you don't become this facilitator, a lot of HR departments are now being shoveled into finance and legal. Actually, because people don't see the value of having it as a separate department, but because it becomes more operational and then all the talent management questions or recruitment, it goes directly, under either chief operational officer or under the CEO.
And we see it happening. So I think that there is a ground for people who work with, people experiences to be a bit nervous and also to think about the future, and what do I want to be? And then I would say from the beginning, so that there is no misunderstanding. I don't think that being in operational HR versus being strategic HR, it's like a question of prestige, or, one thing matters more than another.
I'll I always thought and I still think that without the hygiene factors and without the flow, I usually, me and my team, we call it flow. So without things like, contractual experiences like, I don't know, contracts and salaries and salary adjustment processes, the HR wheel, annual wheel or annual cycle if it doesn't work in the company.
There is no experiences to speak about because, those things is people's safety net, according to the Maslow pyramid of needs. So I don't think that, you need to drop one and do another so that we don't misunderstand each other. And then suddenly becomes, suddenly everybody becomes super facilitators and nobody does, the work and the reality works.
So that sometimes it's only one person. Dealing with all that, and then suddenly you get so swamped into the operational tasks that you just don't have time to raise your head and think about the strategy. And now I think that if you ask me, and I've been there, I've been there in all my jobs, like starting from the assistant job long time ago, and then in combs.
And so I've always started each of my jobs with being hands on. And I actually think that it's a good experience because you need to understand your area from the beginning and you really need to be able to answer any question even if you are not an expert on it, but if I am responsible for people, I need to answer the question about salary review.
If I get that question, even if I have experts on this in my team, because otherwise I don't get credibility. And actually, I've just listened to an amazing podcast from Spotify about it. And they speak exactly about that. They speak about that, now somehow people try to separate these parts, but you can't separate it.
And it's a bit, if you want to create the content and meaningful change, you need to take all the parts in. So that's the first thing, right? And then the other part is that, how do we actually go around it? How do we become this or like, how do we create the human experiences, right? And why does it all matter?
I think that what we see now happening is that, one size fits all doesn't work anymore, right?
[00:28:37] Steve: completely agree.
[00:28:38] Elena: And why doesn't it work? Because we are so used, it's easier for the human brain. to organize it in models. And it's so easy for human brain to do like big, to organize big chunks of information and to have a solution for it.
But we are not like this as individuals, right? And even if you ask me about the culture, how do you build the company culture? It's not an easy question because it's all about. Small microcultures. It's all about teams. It's all about relationships between different individuals, but you can have a joint direction for it.
So coming back to human experiences, I think exactly as you pointed out from the beginning, it's very important how the leaders understand it. And I usually relate to this when my change happened, and when
As as an HR leader, will I deliver on it or not disappeared is that when I understood that I cannot please them all.
And here we come to the core of your question. How do you facilitate yourself? I think that during my, like I've tried to transform the HR to employee experience. And again, it was not all about the name. It was about, I needed to rebrand it to change the attitude because otherwise it wasn't changeable, but it's not about the worthiness of the words itself.
I think. Every time you try hard and you feel that I have the results, I have the data with me, something happens. Either in the world or there is a crisis or the team member got the changed life and they're leaving or they I don't know. So there is some mega thing happening in one country and then everything that you build is like falling apart.
And then everybody is angry with you all the time because we're upset or that they need the help, and you just feel that Christ will I ever have. A job, when there is a project, I started at point A and I come to point B. And my honest answer to all of you who are listening is, you will never have it.
And I think that as soon as you come to terms with this inside of you, and you find excitement in this, and you feel that it's okay, there is another fire today, let's go burn it, even more, we don't need that, or let's go solve it, this house is good, we need to keep that. So then you, you can operate.
And then I think that then how do you deal with this ever changing environment and that you know that you will never actually have the end of your work. You basically need to become super self secure. You need to understand your self worth. Yeah. And once you understand yourself worth. And this is not an easy journey.
It took me many years and many battles many tears, at home in the evenings and many talks, with both my leadership team, but also with my team. But once you understand that you're on the path to good, you appreciate your own experience and you see every interaction and every single turn and crisis as the learning curve instead of.
Somebody is against me. I need to validate myself again. Then it turns around. And then suddenly you become this persuasive leader who actually can take people with you. But it is a process. It is a process
[00:32:01] Steve: I'd like to just double back a little bit because we also, at the beginning of our discussion today, we touched a little bit on community.
And I know this is something which you've absolutely applied as part of your journey at REflame and the importance of community and networks. I have a question though. What is community? Why is it important? And what value can it bring into organizations?
[00:32:24] Elena: Absolutely.
It's a good question. Yes. This is the question I'm actually on fire for, and I can tell you that it comes from social selling as an industry,
Because a lot of people
don't
know a lot about social selling.
And we have heard about MLM models, people for selling something to their friends and so on. But, there is actually a codex. And the code of ethics for the social selling good companies. There are different organizations that are called direct selling associations. And then there is also the world associations of the world Federation of direct selling associations.
And it's only. very reputable ethical companies who are parts of it. And I was fortunate, to work for one of those who actually led the way because Ori Flame and Magnus Brandstrom the chairman, of this organization for quite some time. And what I've learned through. Working in social sales and through seeing how the brand partners and affiliates, of all direct selling companies, social selling companies, how they create their building, their businesses.
I saw it, that it was, All thanks to building networks, to building communities, but also it starts from small micro network and core community that then, gives the ripple effect, it expands. And in the end, when people are united for some purpose that actually usually has nothing to do with sales.
It's something else that people relate. Onto, which is very personal and very deep. And I can see how it never stops there. And we had so many examples, how especially, the easiest example to give to you is during COVID, when for example, if you, Take people I know who are individual sellers, with their businesses, a lot of people were in the countries and they were in the total lockdown.
And then suddenly, they got COVID. So what do you do? So people from their networks and their communities without actually. Talking to each other purely voluntarily from their goodwill. They helped each other, as I say, without asking, without having any, scheme planned, they were delivering food to the houses, of people in their networks, they were offering to babysit children, they were phoning around hospitals.
We had a big wave in India where people were phoning around hospitals, trying to find free beds for, for people and especially the children. Who felt unwell and had COVID. And then I saw this force, and I saw that it is more than business, but of course the business kicked it off because, that's why people got together.
And for me, working in this environment for so many years and seeing how much transformation and force for good it can bring. I'm totally sold on it. And I think that, you can start small and you can create a community or a team, first, in in your area with the closest people, and you will be united by the joint purpose, or you'll just connect as individuals with one goal.
But then, if you really connect, if you really find the value that you Creates together, it can grow so rapidly and till the end, basically you will see what effect you have on other people and people will be drawn to you. And this is how miracles happen. And this is how we transform corporations.
This is how you do business, but this is also how you. Transform societies. This is how you transform cities. This is how you basically create this unstoppable force of creative people together, striving for something better than exists today. But everything is built on trust. Everything is built of not using each other, connecting synergies exactly from heart to heart, basically.
And that is why I want to bring it into the corporate world because, I've seen it, I've done it. I know that it's powerful and I think that it is so under utilized because usually you either work on, you work with internal communication or let's create the culture. Let's, say some words from the stage and that's where it dies.
I meet so many leaders. who cannot, who work for the business unit for the global organization. And we are speaking vice president level. They cannot even remember the core values of their company that comes from global, from the U S for example. And what do they, what do you think they do?
They create their own values in their own business unit, but then this business unit probably has three departments. Then what do you think those three departments are doing? They are creating their values. Is that bad? I don't think it's bad. I think it's amazing. It means that people are drawn to creating, those communities, micro communities, but can the company leverage on that?
Absolutely you can. And of course you can see, like who your people are, what do they react on? And this you can actually use. For your customers, for your partners, and you don't need to have a separate community of employees, a separate community of affiliates, separate community of super loyal customers.
You can create your own community of people who are loyal to the brand, who like what you're doing and that's how you basically, save all your money. But do so much good and actually involve people and elevate their lives because it's so fun, more fun to be together with somebody than by your own.
[00:38:09] Steve: Yeah, I agree.
[00:38:09] Elena: don't know if I answered your question, but
[00:38:11] Steve: No, it is. And I think I think What's so interesting in that as you were sharing that around social selling and that importance of this, the community element, and that can be a small, medium, large, of course, in these networks that have been created through social selling and social media.
Then of course, There's a way of working. There's a infrastructure an approach to creating them. And why can't you then apply that and adopt that into internally within an organization
[00:38:38] Elena: You should. Absolutely. You should. Yeah. And, and it's interesting. No, you
[00:38:43] Steve: Yeah, and here's my greatest thing actually is that and this is just a perspective.
I and probably a soapbox box moment that I stand on many times is Everything you need already exists inside of your business. If you have a thousand people in your business, you have a thousand humans. If you just create a community or a way of leveraging, supporting, guided by the heart, guided by the mission.
Why use that instead? It's there. It's the most captive audience you have even more so than your customers Your employees see you for who you are as a business day in day out. They contribute to it
[00:39:21] Elena: Absolutely.
[00:39:21] Steve: So why not use it? Why not leverage it? Why not enable it? Why not support it guide it feed it nourish it Whatever words we want to use.
So I think community is
breaking down some of these silos, enabling people in a much more networked, decentralized approach. So I love that and I love that it's come from this social selling
[00:39:42] Elena: angle.
It is, and what you say is now triggering me so much because it is so close to my heart. And it's also, about real human experiences because how do you create connections between people, right? So you create connections between people when they go through something together.
Yes. Because that's when the real connection is happening. And there is a study on this actually from Harvard university that is called the power of moments. And there is a book by Heath brothers on that. And this is, yes, I know
[00:40:12] Steve: you've heard of that.
[00:40:13] Elena: I think that every experienced practitioner actually, yes, they should, and probably have seen this book many times.
So I'm sorry for the repetition here, but you know that there are different moments that matter that are universal. That his brothers are describing and it's easy, it's only four of them. Yes, the one is the elevation moment. So why do we love celebrating our birthdays?
Even if oh, I don't know my age, you still like the attention. And why do you like the attention? Because suddenly You're in the center of some fairytale with a lot of presence and, recognition going on towards you. And this doesn't happen during every day. And this, and then the elevation of your life happens and then becomes the moment that you cherish.
And of course, all the people that you're sharing it with. They become a part of your network that you get close to, right? Because they created this moment for you. Another thing is this, recognition moment is when you actually get the praise for something that you put an effort for, and then you got publicly recognized, it's very close.
To the elevation moment, but it's a bit of a different thing because here you actually put your efforts into creating something and that you are publicly recognized for that. Think about Oscar speeches, that become viral. And of course, this is the moment you cherish and the symbolics of the statue that you have.
And again, people who share it with you. You usually share it with the people who are in your network, in your community. You want to be there with people. All those things, they and then there is a connection moment, which is also important. And this is why we love partying or why we love going out, why we love team buildings, that actually like that are used with a purpose because team buildings can be different and then they can be useless as well.
But when, for example, just think about that you have a, I don't know, corporate party and then the party official part ended and then you see that and you just like chattering with somebody, and then usually you go deeper. In your conversations, usually you start talking about private things.
You find interests that you have in common because you are in the relaxed atmosphere and that's where real connections happen. Usually those people become friends in private lives as well. And this again, how you create those little liaisons, in the communities. But Again going back to what really matters, it is actually, and what you're speaking about, it's the moment that is called the inside moment where you learn something together.
Yeah. And this is where the future is going because, What did I say? When you learn something together, when you get the insight, when you get through the challenge, so then you become so tight, when you turn up the how do you say it in English? Roll up the sleeves.
Roll up the sleeves, exactly. This is when you just become unbreakable with people. You go through it together. And that is why I think that the for the future and how you say that leverage on the people that you have inside. Now it's such an amazing moment when everybody needs to learn generative together.
It's nearly it gives me shivers. If you are a corporation and you want to build the culture, you want to create some sort of transformation, organize your forces and organize, this moments when people can get challenging tasks, for example, when it involves AI, when in a friendly atmosphere, they get to Test it, that it's fun.
They do it together and then also let them bring in their learnings, and let them execute on them because that's how you create the strongest bonds in your organization because people will have joint insight moments. And this is, those are the most powerful moments. So again, back to what you said, you do need fresh.
Intakes, of course you do because you can't be inbred in your own bubble, but so much power exists inside. And if you can find synergy of how you can get the inspiration from outside or somebody in your network gets an inspiration from outside, brings it in and then multiply it different times, and then create those inside moments.
And when the magic is happening and now is the time for it, it's just given, just go grab it. Do it.
[00:44:32] Steve: given. Just go grab it and do it. Instead
[00:44:36] Elena: Yeah. Instead of, doing let's do the classroom training. Okay. Let's forget about what we learned tomorrow. Back to your tasks. This doesn't work.
[00:44:45] Steve: task. This doesn't work. Which I think as part of a research of human behavior and exactly this, of this going from a state of being nervous or unsure to then an immediate state as a collective, as a group of people into an immediate state of togetherness and actually adrenaline was many years ago I did the the Guinness Book of Records
height.
It was the height at the time for a bungee jump.
[00:45:10] Elena: Huh.
[00:45:11] Steve: And I never forget it. Clearly a memorable moment, right? But it was also when I looked
[00:45:15] Elena: are you in the Guinness book?
[00:45:16] Steve: no, but it was the Guinness Book of Records highest. It was in South Africa where you do you throw yourself off a bridge. And of course it was my first one.
So why not do the one that's the Guinness Book of Records at the time. Now it's, I think in China. But interestingly, it was like we're going on one side of the fence. There was a bunch of people who were about to do the bungee jump together and they were barely speaking to each other because we're all absolutely Shitting ourself.
And then those that actually have done it and genuinely those that have went through it together afterwards, the camaraderie and the insight and the learning and that bravery that clearly you have to go through to just jump, to jump forward and to dive in. And it was a real for me. I just remember standing there looking at the group behind us and going, Oh, my God, that's really interesting.
I can't stop smiling. We were all, we're hugging people like strangers. Yet on the other side, I was there literally 10 minutes ago, and we weren't even talking to each other. And I just thought it was an interesting observation of, I know it's a scenario, and it's very specific one with throwing yourself off a bridge, but it is about that insight moment of doing stuff together.
And how it can break barriers even between complete strangers, never mind colleagues who see each other every day.
[00:46:25] Elena: But you know what, this is just amazing example, because, it can be a bungee jump. But it also can be, I don't know, doing let's say, I don't know, event together, pulling it together within one week, executing, and then straight budget.
This is like a bungee jump in the corporate world, but it's exactly what happens is that when you struggle together, you find you you share them the moment. This culmination moment when it happens and that you share, I don't know, the feeling, the sort of the height feeling of achieving it, right?
You don't even need to talk to each other after this because you share this sort of feeling of being a part of the unity. Somehow, because you experienced on your emotional level, exactly the same thing. And this brings people so close together. I've actually experienced a couple of moments like you when after very difficult at the whole project, we were a group of people, it felt like after the bungee jump and we were sitting around the table having, this last dinner together and we were so exhausted.
We couldn't even talk. But. Everybody, was looking at each other smiling, and then somebody would mention something, and then another person starts giggling. And we burst into tears sometimes. And people sitting next to us, they couldn't really understand what was going on.
They don't really talk, they have sporadic words, and then they laugh so much that they're crying. But for us, it was exactly the same feeling that you had after the bungee jump that, we shared it so much. We're still friends with all of those people. that we've been together in that.
So I really believe in that. And you don't have to do bungee jump for this. You can, mastering chat GPT would be enough. But if you solve a concrete problem with this without knowing anything from the beginning, and then suddenly coming to an amazing solution that probably can, I don't know, transform the business or something.
It's so much force in it. And I really hope I hope that more companies would use it because everybody speaks about learner ability, like people development and talent management. Come on. It's here. It, it doesn't, you don't need to go along.
[00:48:37] Steve: Yeah, and I think going to your point earlier in our conversation is we don't have any frameworks to draw on. So we're creating them as we go along.
[00:48:45] Elena: and we don't need them.
[00:48:46] Steve: them. No correct. I support you on that one. But it also requires that any new paradigm You have to let go of your existing.
You have to dare to jump into the void. And that requires bravery. It requires trust. All of these things that we've discussed
[00:48:59] Elena: and it requires leadership, and that's why, and that's why the second part of my business, I call it personal branding, because it's understandable for
[00:49:08] Steve: people.
[00:49:10] Elena: A
bit of a click bait.
You can
[00:49:11] Steve: bit
[00:49:12] Elena: I'm a comm, I'm a communication expert. Let me
[00:49:14] Steve: can say.
I'm a communication expert. It's exactly the same approach
[00:49:24] Elena: It's exactly the same approach that I have to community building and using this word instead of just talking about employees or just talking about affiliates.
I am. I'm so tired of this fake personal branding advice, just like you need to find one side of yourself, and then boost it up and then ride all those words, on your LinkedIn profile, go and sell yourself. I don't think it works like this. Honestly, and I think that coming back to the trust question, I think that in order to build your authentic personal brand, you need to understand yourself as a person.
First, you need to unpack the multiple sub personalities. That you have in you and you need to understand that they all are serving you and they all are there to connect to different people. But also in all this multiple personalities that you have a message that you stand for. And usually when you are an expert for an industry or a representative for a company, usually you are in this environment and you are in this context.
And instead of borrowing, These companies, leading words, you can have your own, but they can be in the synergy, which what this company stands for, or your industry stands for. But at the same time, they will be yours. And when you're out of this company, we're out of this industry or you want to go cross industrial, you can still use it, but they are so authentic.
It's really good. And I actually got this revelation when I was working with internal communication first. Because I think that what a lot of people undervalue, it's how important their first impression and their authenticity is when you come as a leader to a new team. It's a new organization, or if they get the promotion, and then they need to bring people with them or when the leadership team is trying to do the transformation.
Because again, people don't care about your corporate. Bullshit formulation of the transformation. Something like, Oh, let's deliver and go to market strategies, whatever, ask any leader, they can't even repeat to what it says in their strategic document. What people relate to is, are you a good person?
What are you telling me to do? How did you help me on my journey? Can I trust you or not? And if all this clicks, I'll go with you. How is that different to the external world? It's not different at all. It's exactly how you become an influencer online. Some people, their message is designer bags and then they have the audience for that, and and then some people they are the force for good, I don't know, in some charity context.
And that's the reason audience for that. What is your message to the world? And I'm not judging. Everybody has the right for their own message. So I want actually to transform this industry a bit. And I want to say that it's not only about fake LinkedIn profiles. It is about your inner understanding of yourself, formulating what you stand for, and then doubling it up and powering it up first internally in your company.
And then externally. in your industry and then going multi channel. So that's what I'm going to do. Because through doing this, you will create followers and those will be your core community. And then you can expand this community together because other people, they will. answer your call and then they will find their own messages and then they it will be the rings on the
[00:53:07] Steve: And also that feeds into the community. It feeds into the networks. That's what
[00:53:11] Elena: So that's why I'm saying, for me it's the, such an obvious connection, but I'm not sure it is, so easy when you go out to the world and pitch it. So I really hope to show to people with cases, how, With working on your leadership and working on your personal brand and not only, like in normal coaching coaching programs, but working on your content really specifically.
But the content should be authentic and you shouldn't burn out doing it because you're creating, a shallow parallel life. So that's how it actually can bring business benefit to you, but also make you so much bigger than your organization and create communities.
[00:53:50] Steve: Yeah, and that requires like a real, as to your point, I think also A moment or as part of that process of this work is stepping back for a moment and really understanding you as a person.
What do I value truly? And then how do I use that passion around that value or my values as a human? And who do I want to serve? How do I want to serve to the greater good as well? So
[00:54:13] Elena: And here we come to the real human experiences, that, and that's why I love what you are doing, Steven, with humanizing experiences because usually when you are not grounded in yourself, yes, we all have this feeling of imposters, and I don't know if you've noticed sometimes, in the meeting when the person says no to you.
That very, I would say 99 percent of the time it's nothing to do with you personally or your proposition. This is about that. You didn't really fulfill some sort of need that the person has internally. And this comes from the egoistic perspective that No, not interesting for me at this particular time because my mind is somewhere else, and then once you understand that and you start being fearful, we are coming back to this conversation, you knew that you need to be self, you need to know your own self worth and your own expertise.
So when you feel that. Then you also plug away your ego when you are hurt, when somebody told you no, and then you curiously go in and asking this person, how can I help you? And this way human experiences come in. So often organizations are building, let's go to employee experiences, or even customer experiences on the model of force helping, people, and I've been there myself, it's so easy.
Okay. Let's unboard this person, let's put everything we can in the person's head, let's deliver this and this. Have you asked the person what the person really wants to, to to deliver on the tasks
[00:55:50] Steve: I support
[00:55:51] Elena: and no and, I've actually, this treating treating employees as the customers.
A lot of people say it. But do they actually do it? It's because people have different expectations on the working place. Of course, they want your salary. And of course, when you get people in, so you need to pay them well, and then you need to offer different sorts of Perks, as we say.
And then, so what do we have? We usually work with development problems, career paths, and so on. But do they actually know if that's what the person wants? Maybe the person wants something else. Maybe the person came from a different country and really want to work in the environment where the social matters the most.
Or maybe the person really loves the products, and is really nerdy and wants to be to the source of this amazing, creation of something that, you I don't know gives this person passion or maybe the person homes to learn from the best and to become better expert because the company can achieve, this sort of together or sponsor the development of the expertise that this person is hoping to get.
We are so different in our expectations. Who is asking? And when we are asking, we again, putting it all together, we are and again, I was doing this because this is the model that exists. But if we go more human and if we work really with our leaders, because this is the person that you're talking to, if instead of performance reviews.
We have heart to heart conversations where we really try to understand, this person of mine, how can I be here for you? Take away my ego and do what I say to actually, how can I support you on your journey? Or giving feedback. Of course, people are different, but this horrible word feedback now, we are not getting there but being there and just asking, how can I help you?
Because I have my experience and you actually here not to be afraid of me. You are here to learn from me. And instead of the confrontation that I need to be the best, I know the best, like you need to follow my advice, you need to follow what I said. Didn't you do it today? Oh, why didn't you deliver it in time?
We shift it, and then we actually see how can I make this person better. You will be surprised. how different people have different motivations and how can you trigger the best in different people. And then also it is so amazing that, again, going back to my social selling background one of my best friends and mentors, it's the, Biggest band partner of Oriflame, and he has I would say 30 percent of people in his network around the world, number one.
And he told me the thing that I remembered, I think that was like the revelation I had for my leadership that changed me. Really changed me. When you have an aha moment and then,
So he
told me once that you were just running around, doing this processes internally.
I never understood your job. And I said, what do you mean? I need to have a framework for performance management. I need to have the framework for onboarding. I need to have the framework for this. He said, yeah, but you and I are in the same business. Is that what you mean? When I try to invite a person to my team, I'm recruiting.
I'm choosing, who is good for me, who will fit the team. I'm looking what a person is capable of. I am actually then trying to motivate the person. I am, of course, following up on the results. But I don't have this hassle as you have and I don't need to fill in all those templates and I definitely don't spend a fortune on the technologies that you are spending a fortune on.
And I'm like, how are you doing that? And he said now I will tell you the secret never told, like the biggest secrets. And he was smiling. And I said, okay, I want to know it. And he's, he told me one thing. You go to the person, That you really believe in and you tell to the person, I believe in you.
You're great, I believe in you.
And next time you see this person. This person will over, over deliver on your expectations because how often do we hear that somebody believes in me? And he said that this is a secret. And that's how he delivered, the biggest sellers in his organization.
And it's so interesting. He even I'm, I get shivers when I like him and I like something, he told me a story. So when now everybody's working remotely and he was talking to this young couple in a totally different country actually to his. And he told them that you're so great.
You're young, you have totally different tools of working that I do, but I can see something in your eyes and you know what? Next time I come. I really want you to take me to this fantastic restaurant in the city where I know you can not now go and afford it. And I don't want you, I don't want it to be a struggle for you.
I really believe that by the time we meet next, it's going to be like an everyday thing for you. And because you're going to be so great, I see this potential in you and you can call me anytime and ask for advice. I'm here for you because I really believe you can do it. He said that they never called during the year.
That's about feedback, and so on. But then he got an invitation to this restaurant. In this other country, and then he came and they were super successful and they told him you were the only one who believed in us. Everybody else said no.
[01:01:30] Steve: believed
[01:01:31] Elena: And and for me, it became like a guiding star in my leadership, but also in the leadership I really believe in.
And I think that a lot of people should embrace. You should really believe in your people. And that's how human experiences are created. Because if you believe in them. You will see them and then you will see what they need and then no HR can help you in that.
But as an HR mega facilitator, you can make it happening.
You can implant it in people's heads. Heart to heart. Super important.
[01:01:59] Steve: I love that. I think that after quite an incredible rollercoaster of topics because I know we can keep going. I thought that's the thing. Yeah.
Thank you so much for joining. I think we've shared enough goodness, enough humanity, some amazing tips and insights for people. And I love the simplicity of so much of this stuff as well.
We did the, it, it doesn't, it's the small
[01:02:23] Elena: It
[01:02:24] Steve: It really is.
[01:02:25] Elena: and that's the beauty of it. It doesn't have to be deep theories. If you believe in something, then you just go and do it. Yes. And that's my religion.
[01:02:33] Steve: Thank you so much. Lots of yeah, lots of
[01:02:35] Elena: I enjoyed it. Thank you. It's always lovely talking to you.
[01:02:39] Steve: Thank you.