Strategic Agility in the Face of Disruption with Dohnia Dorman

Hello, and welcome, fellow Asomologists, to Awsomology. I’m Sue.

And I’m Ben. And in this episode, we’re joined by Dohnia Dorman, founder and CEO of Omnia Exec LLC. Welcome back, Dania.

Hi, Ben. Hi, Sue. So nice to be back.

Always good to have you here. Thank you, for being with us now as our first three peat guest. That is exciting.

The there’s a little plaque we’ve made for you. It’s in the mail. It’s on its way.

Okay. Very good.

I I thought you were gonna do, like smoking jacket.

Hey. That’s right.

A championship ring, a crown. I’ll take it all.

Yeah. Perfect.

Yeah. Hey. Speaking of championship championship rings, spoiler alert here because we’re, this won’t get released immediately, but, this will date this episode. Last night was the men’s NCAA basketball championship. Florida won. Yes. Dania, you are you still in Tampa?

Yes. I live in Tampa. I am not a Gator, but congratulations to the Gators. That was quite the game.

Yeah. So that was my question as if you’re I know you’re not a Gator, but are you a Gator fan, or who’s your who’s your Florida team?

You know, I tried to stay Florida agnostic. I went to the University of New Mexico. Go Lobos. Oh, okay. Get past the first round. That’s okay.

But, you know, any Florida team that’s succeeding is great for Florida, so I’m all in.

Awesome. Cool.

There you go.

There you go.

So before we dive in, tell us a bit about OmniExec, what you’re up to, what you’re doing, and, maybe an update since the last time we chatted.

Yeah. Absolutely. Well, again, thank you for having me both. I love your podcast, and the the community is fantastic.

So these days, I, am the founder and CEO, like you said, of Omnia exec. And Omnia exec is a boutique firm, and we help organizations streamline processes, strengthen cross team collaboration, and help them stay aligned no matter what the market throws at you. We are passionate about building change resilient teams, helping improve processes, and ultimately fortifying cross functional collaboration so that we can drive better outcomes that are really aligned with business objectives.

Oh my gosh. I love all of that. And you are so good at articulating it, which I’m I’m not surprised. I mean, as long as I’ve known you, Dania, you’ve been, clearly really passionate about purpose and helping people and doing it and communicating it in a way that’s really effective so that people understand, like, the value of what you provide and your organization provides. So yeah.

Thanks, Lynn. Yeah. Yeah. I love, you know, bringing people together and doing the right work at the right time, you know, being on purpose, like you said, and really having impact.

Yeah. Yeah. So when you reached out to see if we could have you back on the podcast, which was an easy yes, by the way. Maybe easiest yes to ever. No offense to any of our other, guests.

But you proposed a topic that’s been top of mind for credit union leaders, which you kinda teased a little bit there, boosting strategic agility in the face of nonstop disruption.

You may not be surprised by this, but the world’s been a little unpredictable lately.

Just a little bit.

We all know something about disruption and, instability. Right? But what are some of the top disruptors credit unions are facing today?

Yeah. You know, it’s really interesting. We have had conversations with different credit union CEOs and other executives, and we’re hearing somewhat of a revolving door of disruptors and disruption, you know, setting aside economic uncertainty that you just spoke about. You know, credit unions continue to to face disruption with technology and fintechs. Right? What does that relationship look like? How can we partner together and be friends, not foes?

Similarly, there’s digital driven changes and disruptions that are coming from member expectations. Right? Members want to have their financial experience be personalized like Netflix, but also convenient like Instacart. So what does that mean from a technology and data digital transformation perspective and that as disruption?

And then another disruption that credit unions continue to face is around talent. Believe it or not, returning to work and other impacts on culture, DEI, this climate, those can be disruptions. But, really, no matter the flavor of the month disruption, what’s becoming clearer is this need for cross functional alignment and agility. Because unless your teams are really fully aligned and agile, solving and responding to those big issues that I just mentioned will just become increasingly more difficult and costly.

Yeah. I think Sorry?

Hold on. Hold on, Sue. Hold on.

Okay. Sorry. I blew up.

I have to, I have to digress just a little bit. Because you mentioned digital transformation and, you know, the world that we’re living in, which, you know, digital services, digital experiences were all amplified and made real faster than any of us maybe wanted them to happen during the pandemic and things like that. So and it’s been a while. Right? I mean, as much as that feels like yesterday, it’s been five years, since it all started. I suppose, of course, we’re still feeling some of the effects of it and everything.

Right.

My question is, for credit unions and really, I mean, any organization, any business, that is on that spectrum of digital transformation. Like, what what’s taking people so long? Or what’s the barrier that, people maybe can’t get past to say, alright. Like, we I mean, first off, there probably is no end.

Right? We’re continually transforming for sure. So maybe I’m answering my own question here. But what’s the barrier for people to say, like, I’m at a healthy spot in our digital transformation journey?

Have you seen anything? Is there anything you’re noticing?

Well, I think it all relates to feedback and getting that member feedback. So everything is that continuous improvement continuum that you just talked about, Ben, and credit unions that recognize they have their core capabilities in place to provide sort of the digital transformation expectations of their members. That’s great, but that’s just today. Because tomorrow, there’s going to be they’re they’re going to want more because technology continues to evolve and all these other influences from their other digital experiences, whether it’s, like I mentioned, Instacart or, you name it app on your phone, they want that similar experience at the credit union. So it’s important that credit unions recognize what really are our core capabilities, where are we willing to either build internally or buy, you know, partner with the fintech or partner with another organization that has that we can leverage their technology and make sure that what we’re delivering is what our members want.

Yeah. Maybe the, last thing you said there is the most important. Like, are we actually giving something that our members want and need? And I think it’s easy to it’s easy to forget about what you’ve done so far on your journey.

Right? Like, you know, maybe it’s old news now that you offer a remote check deposit or something, but also, like, maybe that’s something that your members want and absolutely need right now. And so you should still continue to talk about it even though you implemented that ten years ago or whenever. Right?

You know? So I think it’s easy to forget about the progress we’ve made too.

Yeah. I would agree. And I would think of an example from Amazon. You know, when they first came out with Amazon Prime, it was important that people got sort of next day delivery.

Well, after a while, Amazon and their members recognize it’s not so much that next day delivery is most convenient for me. It’s being able to choose the day or choose the time for the delivery. So what started off as, a nice value add with next day turned into now you can choose and maybe even delay your delivery, pair your other packages to be delivered at the same day. So I share that as a model for credit unions to identify what you just said.

So, remote check deposit was a thing, still is a thing. Maybe we need to revisit some of those nuances to refine it to meet, you know, again, changing member expectations as of today.

Yeah. Awesome.

Yeah.

Thanks for entertaining me. Thanks for my digression. Sorry to interrupt you, Sue.

It’s okay. It’s okay. We’re still friends.

So you Dania, you mentioned this this concept of making sure that we’re responding to disruption in a cross functional way. And I think I think everyone has experienced organizations that are highly siloed. And maybe, you know, as long as we’re invoking the specter of the pandemic, you know, that that sort of off-site asynchronous work has contributed to those silos and made those, made those a little those silo walls a little stronger.

Mhmm. Hundred percent.

Yeah. So what what really is that worst case scenario if different departments are not able to align on these things? What what’s what’s the what’s the endgame there?

Yeah. I’m I really appreciate this question. So when I think about worst case scenario, a term that comes to mind is actually collaboration drag. Have either of you heard of that term familiar?

Oh. Okay. So collaboration drag is a term that Gartner has coined recently, and it’s when productivity, execution, and efficiency decrease because team members are involved in too many meetings. There’s too much feedback coming from all the stakeholders.

There’s unclear decision making, and so you can just imagine just the overwhelm, right, of collaborating.

No. Not at all, Donya.

Yeah. What is that? So I bring that up because you specifically called out marketing. So see get this. Senior marketing executives spend seventeen percent more time collaborating than their peers, and marketing team members spend forty seven percent, that’s nearly half of their time, collaborating either internally with their team or with other stakeholders.

So anyone that’s experiencing this collaboration drag, they’re fifteen times more likely to feel burned out and then nine times more likely to leave your organization in the next twelve months.

So I share that not only because I love marketing professionals being a former one, and my love for executives and team members who are experiencing collaboration drag, they probably aren’t as proficient at or they may be failing to be able to pivot and respond to changing priorities, and that’s why they’re also feeling this overwhelm. And it’s not, you know, a fault of their own. It may be systematic with the organization, how the organization is set up to really tackle these unexpected activities. You know, teams need to be able to respond and adjust appropriately.

But if the organization doesn’t have the right framework, then we can’t respond to change so quickly. So when you ask, Sue, about worst case scenario, here here’s what that looks like. So let’s play this out. Collaboration drag means burnout leads to walkouts, which leads to costly and time consuming recruitments.

We’ve all experienced that in trying to train up our our new hire. Meanwhile, less staff and more work means decreased productivity, sometimes poor quality outcomes and deliverables for our marketing teams, and sometimes late project launches for our frontline team members. So, you know, that credit card that we were talking about with our members, the the deposit team is not able to meet their targets, lending isn’t meeting their targets. Members are having bad experiences, so our reputation takes a hit.

We’re no longer the credit union, the best credit union in town, or the best place to worse to work. An absolute worst case is the credit union closes, community suffer, and they have to then go to the next best or sometimes next worst alternative for their financial well-being. So while that is a doomsday, worst case scenario and a fringe case, you know, I think most executives live somewhere between, it’s somewhere in the middle. Right?

Suffering in silence where this has just become the norm and we’re okay with it or those that have reached a critical breaking point, and it’s no longer tolerable. So a major initiative that got delayed, we missed the market opportunity.

CEOs, CFOs, and board chairs really don’t favor that.

And, or maybe failure to prioritize, you know, that latest change effort really led calls to the call center to increase and team members calling out sick. So there’s a lot of steps fortunately to get us not to worst case scenario where we can put some interventions and best practices in place.

So speaking of best practices, let’s flip the script a little bit. So Okay. Broadly speaking, what are those best practices? How do people stay nimble, stay responsive, get get on the right track before that terrible worst case scenario or even, like, just not so awesome scenario. Right?

Right. Exactly. It’s it’s somewhat iterative. Right? We don’t wanna get to that end road credit union is closed.

So there’s some interventions along the way or best practices. So, you know, being nimble and responsive, it really requires being intentional. And one solution can be that teams look internally.

They make commitments to themselves to modify the way that they’re working to possibly minimize burnout. They may even identify, you know, a decision matrix for when, they can say or should be saying no to a project request.

But unless that decision matrix and sort of that sort of that project prioritization is shared and also supported across the organization, marketing teams don’t really have a choice when it comes to work and then having to be responsive and nimble to, well, we were working on this one thing, but now we have this new request. So when we work with clients, we try to encourage sort of this three p approach to stay nimble and responsive. So we focus on aligning people, processes, and priorities Because, ultimately, it requires, you know, an agile mindset and an agile way of working where the most impactful initiatives are the ones that are constantly getting reprioritized, and you have workflows and tools that help you deliver work that’s more visible across the organization and and with your team.

There’s better collaboration. There’s more knowledge sharing. We heard Sue mention this earlier about silos, so we wanna dismantle silos and also promote operational efficiency that, you know, our financial teams really appreciate.

You are you know, you’re really you’re really speaking deeply to our hearts right now, Tanya, because this is this is a question I think that we have wrestled with for years. And, it really it’s that that moment of when when, how where do we say no?

When, you know, how how do we do that without risking our reputation?

Right. How you know? And I think, semi importantly, how do we do that without contributing another meeting where we, you know, we are just we have to now explain why we had to say no, and that is only creating, you know, less space to actually get the work done.

Yeah. And And more tension.

Yeah. Yeah. And so it’s and it’s not I don’t think something I hate to pull back the curtain and air our dirty laundry, but I I don’t think it’s something that we’ve nailed. That idea of being able to just say, oh, no.

Well, you actually you asked for this is the thing that I say to the team and act like it’s easy to say. You asked for this other thing. Now you’re changing your mind. Now let’s talk about you making a decision about which one we are going to do.

Right. Sounds great here. I I don’t know if we’ve really successfully done that.

I understand. And I think a lot of people share that same experience. So let me share, an example of something that’s worked with another with one of our clients and then sort of break down some internal questions that you can ask around people process and and priorities. So we worked with a national nonprofit. They probably have upwards of five hundred team members, and their marketing function has about twenty people, including some, contractors.

And so you can imagine over time, their project requests from the different departments, continue to ratchet up. And so now they take in about fifteen hundred project requests for deliverables in one year. And so what they found was, you know, that same collaboration drag and overwhelm, and their solution was zeroing in on their process. So their process of intaking work, being able to have a visual tool as a central source for requesting work, but also for the stakeholders to see work in progress.

So they could actually see, alright. This request that I’m asking of you, let’s now renegotiate and prioritize. Is it still as urgent as what we’re currently working on, or, you know, does it can it fall later in this in this step stack of, you know, work in progress? And so that visibility allowed them to pull the curtain back and have more effective conversations, less workarounds, and really negotiate work.

Yeah. And I would say yeah. Go ahead, Ben.

I was just gonna say, I think the the word that’s, like, coming to my my mind as you’re talking is just it’s transparency.

And the most cliche way I can say it too, which is, you know, transparency on your team, you know, letting each other know what you’re working on, what your priorities are, and then certainly sharing with the people that are requesting work of you too. Because I I do think at the end of the day, most organize I I shouldn’t say most organize it. There are plenty of organizations that have a really healthy, collaborative, agile structure that there’s a ton of built in respect for, everybody, and, you know, we appreciate what each other does and the specialties we bring and our talents and all of that.

But sometimes we just don’t know, like, what you all have going on. So, of course, our only option is to say, well, I need this thing, and I need it by then with no other information. You know? And so I do think that, like, just that that pulling back of the curtain that we’ve said a few times today Mhmm.

Is a it’s a vulnerable thing to do. It’s super uncomfortable for sure. But showing people what you’re working on and where things are at and stuff can also be an incredibly useful tool to open up negotiations, to even, like, build a culture of empathy. Like, oh my gosh.

I understand, like, you know, what what you have going on and the challenges that you’re facing. Because every time I request something, it feels like I’m stacking on top of the pile that you already have. So let’s work on this together. You know?

Yeah. Exactly. And I agree with you, Ben. I think more often than not, people, especially in our credit union world, we want to deliver great work. We wanna be great team members. But and how many times have we heard we have to have the right team members and they have to be on the right bus and we have to be going in the right direction?

Well, I would challenge us to consider, not only do we need the right team members, but we need the right team members with the right mindset. Because sometimes our team members, while they are well intentioned, they may have a fixed mindset and are stuck with doing work the way that they’ve always done it, maybe because it’s more comfortable or it’s more safe for them. But if we train and develop an an agile and a growth mindset, that enables team members to be able to change course or drop a project when something else is higher importance.

And part of that, you know, agile mindset is really letting go of perfection and being good enough or being good with good enough. Right? As long as it meets the objective. Right? And there’s no catastrophic failure.

Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Done is better than perfect is the thing we’ve said more than once.

Yes. A hundred percent. Yeah. So dropping the the processes and the ways of doing things. How many times have we also recognized in credit unions that we have legacy systems, and we also have legacy systems and legacy thinking? So, you know, what are these processes that we continue to do? Are they adding value, and are they aligned with the priorities of the organization?

Mhmm. Yeah. I do think that there’s a, like, a challenge that we’ve got with this mindset of, like, getting things done. Done is better than perfect. However you wanna say it because, of course, the the main thing that we’re concerned about with that mindset is a lack of excellence or a lack quality, you know, and and valid one hundred percent valid that we always wanna do our best work and put out something that feels perfect to us or maybe even is darn near perfect. You know?

But the expense there is backlog and Yep.

Burnout and all these other things that we’ve been talking about.

Yeah. A hundred percent. So to answer your question, so to stay nimble, you have to not be bogged down with collaboration drag. Right? Having that right mindset, these efficient workflows, collaboration, dismantling that whole perfection, and really embracing iteration and failure to a certain extent. Mhmm.

Yeah. Yeah. I I think it’s what is interesting, and this is what’s going through my mind as we’re talking about this, there there is such a difference between, certain certain verticals of the credit union space really, really deal in such a black and white world.

Mhmm.

Like, so like, absolutely, objectively correct answers to things. And if you get the objectively correct answer, then you’re done and you can move on. And then Mhmm. Some of us also live in this liminal space of subjectivity.

So there isn’t an absolutely correct the absolutely correct answer in marketing is the thing that gets the results. And we Exactly. Know that till we’ve done it.

Yes.

So, that I imagine that that is one of the differences that contributes to collaboration drag because A hundred go ahead. Because we we know that you have to do the thing, you have to put out the thing, test it, and see what happens and iterate from there.

And I think we there are so many folks who are living in this objective world where they say, well, yes. But, you know, I have a spreadsheet that calculates this thing. And if I I either get a right answer or a wrong answer.

So if I look at the thing that you’re trying to make, I should be able to objectively tell you if it’s right or wrong.

Yeah. And it doesn’t always work that way. Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So it’s our opportunity.

I would challenge as marketing people to invite those that think in ones and zeros or spreadsheets in black and white to, embrace or be first start with awareness of this experimental, approach to getting things done and how feedback plays a Feedback is just as important to us as marketing members as, you know, hitting enter on your formula in Excel. Like, they are both data points that inform that we’re either on track or off track and need to make a change. So So sometimes it starts with awareness. This is the way that we operate.

This is why. This is the value of having this experimental, flexible, way of working. And we invite you to participate so that, together, we can deliver the quality work that the organization requires because that’s what our members need.

Yeah. Love it. Love that mindset. Love inviting that idea of inviting them into that mindset.

Yeah.

So what are some other things, credit unions or really any other business could be doing now to make sure they’re ready to respond to disruption and move forward quickly without burning people out?

That’s key. Right? No burnout. No burnout allowed.

You know, I would say the best thing for credit unions and organizations alike is really to prioritize creating change resilient teams and, functioning cross functional collaboration and shoring up those workflows and technology and, you know, the legacy systems and legacy thinking that we talked about so that everything can be enabled.

Often, I think organizations fail to really recognize the true cost, whether that’s time, resources, or budget it takes to really equip your team to respond to disruption and be flexible.

The last time we ran some numbers, we I I personally can get a little nerdy with research.

And so, for an example, a five member marketing team, if we did our math right, they lost about six hundred and twenty eight thousand dollars annually to lost efficiency and impact. So their their inability to effectively respond to change and, disruption led to more time in meetings, more time reworking, work in progress, delayed approvals, and, of course, opportunity costs. So that’s really expensive. And, again, no CFO or CEO wants to spend, you know, six hundred and twenty eight thousand dollars lost on team members that aren’t able to adjust and adapt for the organization. So this whole concept of wait and see doesn’t work. So we can’t wait and see if our teams are resilient when change happens. We can’t wait and see if they’re going to get along these departments just because they operate at the same organization.

We have to really be intentional about building resilience and teamwork into the organization’s DNA.

And what that looks like what that could look like is ongoing development. While we love a workshop, I’m not sure if you have heard of this term, the forgetting curve, but, and I may pronounce the researcher’s name incorrectly. But according to Evanhouse, after you participate in a training or a learning, your retention of that information drops by fifty percent after day one and then drops learners forget about ninety percent of what they learned after a month. So when I talk about incorporating this into your DNA, it’s not one and done. It’s, continuous improvement, continuous development of our team members, and continuously, analyzing our framework and our our processes to see are are they optimal? Are they the best that they can be for our team and ultimately for our members?

Yeah. That that is I I believe I have heard that about the learning curve, but that every time that’s one of those things that it just blows your mind.

It it hurts hurts hard to hurt.

Yeah. Because because think about the investment, time, resources into training. And, you know, during a training, there’s great information shared. There’s great experiences.

But until we get to having behavioral changes Right.

We’re not gonna see the value and the impact of that training just by doing a one and done. And, again, we offer workshops, and we do programs. But what is best is when it can be a program and it can be, opportunities for people to practice these new behaviors and shed the old ways of doing things.

Yeah. I had the really awesome opportunity to do a a little, workshop at the America’s Credit Union’s marketing PR and development conference, last month.

Nice.

And I’m just so sad that we’re, we’re approaching a month from that, and they’ve forgotten so much of it already according to the, forgetting According to the research.

Yeah. It’s not even According to the research. Right? It’s not you.

Yeah. It’s not me. No. It’s just what the research. Research.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It’s them.

Yeah. But you know who I bet would love to hear this is our friends in training.

When Right.

Somebody they onboard an employee, and within two months, they say, oh, I don’t think they mentioned that in training. And immediately, the supervisor is going back to training with that, you know, ready to take ready to fight.

Exactly.

It’s inevitable. They’re gonna forget something until we create those habits, create those Right. Right. You know?

Yeah. The behavior that we need.

Yeah. Mhmm.

Dania, I wanna rewind to one thing because you mentioned, a decision matrix. And we we’ve used the tool, that was inspired by a book that we kind of book clubbed and read together, that’s helped us kind of assign, decisions to our whole team. And, you know, really one of the end goals and the outcomes of that is to kind of push decisions down as far as they can go. Right?

Like, Ben doesn’t need to make this decision, so Sue has everything she needs to do it. Or if it’s not Sue, it’s somebody on her team. You know? So, and that’s been it’s been helpful for us, and it’s something that, you know, of we could probably do better.

Sure. But, the one challenge that comes with that is continually revisiting it and making sure that it’s updated, and we’re talking about what new decisions are being made or what shifts on the team have happened so that it’s something that, is actually a helpful tool and not just a spreadsheet that lives somewhere.

Yours that you mentioned sounds as though it’s one of the outcomes is, whether or not the work even gets done or maybe how it gets prioritized. Because I think, our decision matrix is really geared towards the the work that we already have on our plate, who can help make the decisions to move that work along as efficiently and productively as possible. So we’ve already committed to the work. I I I’m I’m sure our team and many teams, particularly marketing teams, could benefit from that first decision of do we even do the work or not, or when do we do it? So can you just, like, I don’t know, elaborate a little bit more on what that is, what that looks like, how you get to the to making the decisions of building that decision matrix?

Yeah. Exactly. So I first of all, I commend you, Ben, for pushing decisions down to those closest to doing the work because they’re the most informed, and, you know, we are a fan of, executive team members describing and telling the what. Like, what is the outcome we’re trying to achieve?

Letting the how be determined by the people closest to the work, but also having responsibility as an executive team member to give sort of boundary conditions and consideration. So here are things that we know aren’t going to work. You can try it, but this is what happened last time, or this is where we certainly can’t end up because it could be a catastrophic failure. So here here are sort of your boundaries for, moving forward.

But when you’ve already that’s when you’ve already committed to the work. So prior to, it’s really about relative prioritization.

So something unexpected pops up. You’re already working on your list of initiatives that may have stemmed from the annual strategic plan that, in my opinion, should always be continuously refined, not set it and forget it. But, anyway, I digress.

When something new comes in that the organization or the department should entertain working on, it’s important to recognize what is the existing work in progress and the other things that are queued up in your backlog. And there are a couple of different matrices that you can use to identify, you know, the importance, the criticality of it, the effort involved, or maybe the cost. And by stack ranking those different categories for each of your initiatives, you actually, for our quantitative folks, can come up with a score, and that can help you stack rank, okay, based on these somewhat empirical data points. This should be the next thing that we work on, which may have been that new interruption or something that was already on the plate. But, yeah, they’re definitely and the simplest matrix would be sort of an effort versus reward or effort versus value.

Just a two by two matrix to identify what’s high value, and low effort. That would be ideal.

Yeah. So lots of ways to approach it, but making sure that, ultimately, the team, whether that’s the department or the entire organization, is really working on that most impactful work and not just working on something because it’s on a a checklist of projects to get done.

Yeah. I love that, and I love the idea of a tool like a a foursquare or two by two chart, you know, that exactly as as you described it was what I was picturing in my head as you were talking. And, you know, that maybe removes a little bit of the emotion and, subjectivity out of it too. Right? Like, let’s just really, like, rate this thing as to what it is, and it might not be the end all be all in making that decision as to whether or not you do the work, but I can definitely envision it being a really helpful tool.

Exactly. And, you know, we talk about people processes and priorities. We can’t forget the people side. So sometimes, we know that we come to project prioritization conversations with maybe a bias, and perhaps the loudest voice in the room is the one that gets the project at the top. Or, you know, we’ve all had different experiences. So there needs to be a little bit of humility and humanity when you’re having those, prioritization conversations and really think about what is the ultimate objective for our members or for the organization, not just necessarily my department or my own personal goals when possible.

Yeah.

Maybe easier said than done, but some of the key design for sure.

Yeah. We can aspire for it.

Right. Absolutely. Yeah.

Yeah.

Alright. Well, before we get ready to wrap up, what’s the one piece of advice you’d like our listeners to take from the conversation today?

I would say don’t wait to invest in your team.

So ROI is important. It’s something we always are trying to prove in in marketing.

And there is an ROI to having change resilient team members who can collaborate effectively and efficiently and align to the strategic business outcomes. You know, I referenced that number before, six hundred and twenty eight thousand dollars in lost efficiency and productivity and impact.

Research also shows that investing in investing in marketing teams can actually, reduce collaboration drag by twenty three percent. So using that number before, that’s nearly a hundred and fifty thousand dollars improvement back to the organization. And so what CFO or CEO wouldn’t want that? Right. So truly be in intentional. Don’t wait to invest in your team.

Love it. Yeah.

Love all of it.

Thank you.

Okay. Well, we need to transition to our closing segment where we share something awesome.

This is this has already been awesome enough, but here we go.

So I I’m gonna have a really quick share today.

Smartless is one of my favorite most favoritest ever, podcast to listen to.

And, actually, it’s kinda funny. Like, yesterday, the latest episode, I just had enough, like, driving around town that I was able to get the whole episode in in one day, which usually it takes me, like, a few, like, ten minute sections throughout the week to get to it. But, anyway, a couple of weeks ago, their guests were Brandy Carlisle and Elton John, which, like, both incredible musicians and, like, still, like, making albums and touring and stuff, which for Elton John, it kinda blows my mind just how how old he is, but also just a cool collaboration between those two. But the reason I’m, mentioning their episode on, podcast and not just their, tour and new album and all that stuff is because it’s something I learned.

And listening to that episode was that they’ve been, like, friends since, Brandy Carlisle was, like, super young, like a teenager or something and, like, summering with them in London or, you know, over in the UK and stuff. And it’s just you wouldn’t know by, like, the difference in the styles of their music and, you know, obviously, just where they’re from geographically and all those things. Just one of those cool relationships that, like, two celebrities have that, like, without something like a podcast like that to get into the heart of their relationship and stuff and learn all these cool things about them, none of us would know about, which, you know, I suppose is our gift and maybe their curse that we get to find out about this long, you know, relationship that they’ve had or whatever.

But I’ve listened to a little bit of their stuff. They were on SNL this last week and everything, and it’s just I think anytime that you mash up to creative people like that, especially two that maybe come from different worlds and have totally different styles, like, good things can happen, and they’re definitely a a good thing. And you can tell that, like, their friendship and love for each other is at, like, the core of of their music and stuff. So it’s just a a cool story, cool, episode.

And, I mean, who doesn’t like Elton John? Right?

I mean Right.

Yeah. That is cool. The unexpected That’s a good from that relationship.

Yeah.

That’s cool.

Did you bring something, Dania? Do you have something awesome to share with us today?

I do. I do. So my something awesome was witnessing the two astronauts that were stuck in space for nine months.

Nine months, people.

I watched it. I watched the broadcast, the the streaming on either NASA or SpaceX. First of all, I love all things space. And so, the nerd in me really loved that it was a logistical masterpiece because at every milestone during this twelve no.

It was actually seventeen the seventeen hour trek. You heard different callouts and updates. First, it was in, like, this technical speak, but then the two communication coordinators, they would actually repeat it back into regular speak for the rest of us. And so I really loved you you know, you would see the team members in, Houston and probably Florida and all their other command centrals, but every team member just masterfully owned their responsibility and their part of this process, including, you know, when the capsule did a splashdown in the gulf.

One of the team members literally jumped in the water and climbed on top of the capsule and wrapped this rope. Probably, it’s has a different name, but, essentially, a rope around the capsule so that it could be tugged and docked onto this ship.

And so, you know, thinking about that in collaboration and teamwork, but also the ultimate pivot. Right? These astronauts, they Butch Wilmore is one of the astronauts, and he said the plan went way off for what we had planned. But because we’re in human space flight, we prepare for any number of contingencies.

And so the fact that they prepared for long even though they planned for short, that was so transferable for cross functional teams and projects. We’re not all astronauts. But at the same time, we can work together, and we can pivot, and we can plan and prepare for disruption as if we were astronauts and just have a a beautiful return to Earth.

Yeah.

Love that. And good example, nice callback to what we were talking. Like, done is better than perfect. Yeah.

That whole mission did not go perfectly, but, wound up getting done in a really amazing way that created a cool story. And, I mean, I’m sure they’d rather have been home earlier or whatever, but, you know, still, those contingencies and those plans made it all possible. That’s that’s awesome. And Yeah. From a fellow, space geek and nerd, Dania, how do I not know this about you? We need to, like, catch up and talk about, all the space.

Yes. Yes.

All the apps, like my Constellation app, all of them on my phone Yeah.

Watching rocket launches. Yeah. Let’s talk then.

Cool.

And the good news for you too is the space is big. Yeah. Really big. So you have a lot to talk about.

Yeah. It it’s funny. Like, you know, I mean yes.

And, like, how mind boggling it all is that, you know, how big space is and how long they were up in orbit and all those things. And still, it’s somebody’s job to tie the rope around the thing. Like, it’s so funny, like, the different complexities of the technology that makes it all possible. You know what I mean? Like, at the end of the day, it was still they come home in this thing that we gotta tie a rope around and winch into the ship. You know what I mean?

Like Right.

Yeah.

Yeah. A hundred percent.

Yeah. Yeah. And I I really loved that you tied that back to that idea of collaboration. I don’t think I think when you think about something like a space program, everyone there understands how it’s mission critical to collaborate Mhmm. And why we don’t apply that to our everyday jobs.

Yeah.

You know? I I don’t know. I don’t know the answer to that.

Yeah.

I don’t think we should continue to work on it and Exactly.

Yeah. Our our purpose in our credit unions and our respective areas is just as equally important because it has an impact on someone’s life. And the the beauty about our credit union movement is its financial well-being and, creating, you know, productive and, prosperous communities and just seeing people grow and be able to have access to things. So, yeah, we’re not astronauts. We’re you know, it doesn’t the work that we do doesn’t require that level of engineering savviness, but it should be as important, and have the same level of intention and support, that we see in in NASA and SpaceX.

Yeah. Yeah. Love it. Love it.

Well, I’m gonna take a hard a hard left turn for my recommendation because I started I started watching a new show that we really like. My, we we have started to get more into this sort of comedy mystery sort of, only murders in the building kind of things. My husband likes detective shows, and we started watching The Residence on Netflix.

And it is have you started watching it yet, Tanya?

No. It’s it’s in my queue though.

K. Good. You’re gonna love it. Uzo Adubo, who was on Orange is the New Black, played Crazy Eyes.

And chef’s kiss.

You her character in this, we haven’t gotten very far.

Okay.

So I can’t even spoil it, but incredibly well done, very fast paced, super fun to watch.

And, yeah. So that is my that’s my new obsession is the residence on Netflix.

Excellent. You had me at only martyrs in the building. Mhmm. Mhmm. Mhmm. Yeah. Big fan.

Yeah. Love that. I didn’t watch oranges.

Sorry.

That’s okay. I didn’t watch orange is the new black, but my wife did. And every now and then, I’d be passing through or whatever, and she’d have it on and crazy eyes sucked me in every time. And she like, one of those characters that, like, it’s almost tough to imagine them playing another character. So just to maybe see that has me interested enough in checking that one out for sure.

That’s awesome.

Cool.

That was, like, the quickest episode ever, Dania. You are such a I I have to just say, Dania and I met when we did the I three program and the first event that we did that, the I I three program through the Filene Research Institute.

And the first event that we got to see each other at was big bright minds. And, Dania, you’re just such, like, a big bright mind, and I’m so happy to know you. Aw.

And I always every time that I think about you or get the chance to talk to to you, I just have this feeling that there’s gonna be a day well, shoot. Today could be the day, but there’s gonna be a day that’s more publicly visible where I get to say, like, I knew Dania when we were at Big Bright Minds together or whatever. You know? Because you’re just you’re just crushing it. You’re doing such important work, and you bring so much talent, to what you’re doing. So thanks for who you are and for being back with us again. I’m so happy to know you.

Oh, gosh, Ben.

Thank you.

I was not prepared for that.

Yeah. It is it’s a blessing to to know you and be in this community, be in this credit union movement together.

Yeah. There’s just so much opportunity for us to do such good work, and it takes all of us. And so I’m so appreciative to you, Ben, and and Sue.

You know, being a three peat, I’ll come back anytime.

Alright. Yep.

Yes.

We a couple more times, and we’ll we’ll think of what our five timers club gift is. Maybe it maybe it’s a smoking jacket. Maybe it’s Yeah. I don’t know. We’ll we’ll we got some time to think about it.

Yeah. Okay. Alright.

And another, Filene I three reunion, it should be in the box.

Great. Yes.

Shout out to our Filene I threers.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, then I will I’ll tag on. I am incredibly lucky to have met you through Ben, Diane, and I am always so glad to have you on the podcast to see you. You’re such a bright light and on, in TA on top of being such a analytical and deep thinker, so intelligent, it’s your you know, unfortunately, we only do this for audio, so people cannot see, what an absolute ray of sunshine you are. But Yeah. Someday they’ll get to meet you in person, and then they will know.

They will know.

Secrets that we know. So thank you so much for being with us today and being our three Peter.

My pleasure. Thank you so much. This has been awesome.

And thank you to everybody for listening.

We really appreciate every time you join us. You can always catch up on your favorite podcast app or by finding our podcast on our blog at exclamation QSO dot com slash blog.

Thanks, friends, for tuning in. Be awesome, and see you next time.