HRchat Podcast
Listen to the HRchat Podcast by HR Gazette to get insights and tips from HR leaders, influencers and tech experts. Topics covered include HR Tech, HR, AI, Leadership, Talent, Recruitment, Employee Engagement, Recognition, Wellness, DEI, and Company Culture.
Hosted by Bill Banham, Bob Goodwin, Pauline James, and other HR enthusiasts, the HRchat show publishes interviews with influencers, leaders, analysts, and those in the HR trenches 2-4 times each week.
The show is approaching 1000 episodes and past guests are from organizations including ADP, SAP, Ceridian, IBM, UPS, Deloitte Consulting LLP, Simon Sinek Inc, NASA, Gartner, SHRM, Government of Canada, Hacking HR, McLean & Company, UPS, Microsoft, Shopify, DisruptHR, McKinsey and Co, Virgin Pulse, Salesforce, Make-A-Wish Foundation, and Coca-Cola Beverages Company.
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Podcast Music Credit"Funky One"Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
HRchat Podcast
Building an Innovative Culture with Simon Trevarthen
In this HRchat episode, we talk about AI and strategies to develop a company culture based on ideation and creativity. Our returning guest is Simon Trevarthen former Chief Innovation & Open Assets Officer at Fanshawe College and Founder and Chief Inspiration Officer of Elevate Your Greatness.
Simon is a speaker on resilience, inspiration, and innovation. As a presenter, Simon energizes audiences, while delivering personal, professional and business growth insights. He focuses his energy on helping others find and ignite their passion to achieve their greatness.
Simon has facilitated hundreds of sessions and sparked energetic conversations about innovation and business transformation. An international keynote speaker, Simon has addressed over 50,000 people at conferences, training seminars and workshops.
A storyteller, strategist and business coach, Simon has led and consulted on change efforts in the public, not-for-profit and private sectors.
Global in viewpoint but local in impact, he has been an executive, consultant and speaker in Africa, the Middle East, Europe, and North America. Simon has also worked as a journalist and international spokesperson for major humanitarian organizations in conflict zones.
Questions for Simon Include:
- As former Chief Innovation and Open Assets Officer at Fanshawe College, you provided executive leadership that drives their innovation strategy, cultural transformation, and the animation of their flagship Innovation Village. Their vision is to be Canada’s college innovation leader by 2030. Tell me more.
- How do you build a culture of innovation? Top down? Bottom up? Who do you bring in to shake things up? How does a Chief Innovation Officer work with HR to achieve that culture?
- The Elevate Your Greatness framework is focused on understanding the customer's perspective by seeking out trends, signals, and insights. Talk to me about the connection between customer experience and employee experience. Based on your experiences at Fanshawe and other things you've worked on, what's changed in your approach to the employee experience since the last time you appeared on this podcast?
- How is AI changing/assisting the ways you innovate?
We do our best to ensure editorial objectivity. The views and ideas shared by our guests and sponsors are entirely independent of The HR Gazette, HRchat Podcast and Iceni Media Inc.
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Speaker 2:Simon, it's my absolute pleasure to welcome you back after quite some time to the HR Chat. Pod, how are you?
Speaker 3:Hi Bill, how are you. Great to speak to you again.
Speaker 2:It certainly is. It's been too long since we've done one of these together. I have a lot of time for Simon listeners. He's a lovely guy, he knows his stuff and I think you're going to enjoy our conversation today, Simon. For those people who perhaps didn't listen to our previous chit chat on the show, perhaps you can start by taking a couple of minutes and reintroducing yourself. Thank you.
Speaker 3:Bill, yes, so I've been working in the strategy and innovation space for the last 15 years. A lot of my work has been in how to create innovative cultures and bring them into organizations. So a role I just finished was, as a chief innovation officer, building an innovation center, building its strategy around innovation and really turning those ideas into crystal, crystallizing them um into change, into partnerships that matter for the organization okay, thank you very much.
Speaker 2:Very good, let's delve into that a little bit more so as the former chief innovation and open assets officer over at fan short. Then, you provided executive leadership that that drove innovation strategy, cultural transformation, the animation of their flagship innovation village. You mentioned that you were instrumental in finding amazing partners to help with that, and I believe their vision is to be Canada's college innovation leader by 2030. That's a heck of an ambition. That must be pretty exciting, though that must be an amazing project to work on. Can you tell us a bit more?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it was an exciting role. I think many organizations are looking to have chief innovation officers and those kind of roles typically really are. The idea is they're really that catalyst within the organization as a focal point to pull all of their innovation efforts, their transformational projects, into one portfolio of then how you build a capability, a pipeline of innovation that can transform the organization, transform its impact and transform its kind of partnership ecosystem. And so in my role with Fanshawe College as the Chief Innovation and open asset officer, my three key responsibilities was to shepherd the flagship opening of our flagship innovation center called Innovation Village. It was about 100,000 square feet, it was a $60 million build and really that was the epicenter of our innovation efforts as physical bricks and mortar, but more than that, animate that center.
Speaker 3:But how it will interact, because you know the reality is pretty couches don't actually make things happen. So how do you build the culture around that? So a lot of that pieces were around the cultural building and how do you actually interact with partners industry, community, non-for-profit partners in actually building innovation pipelines? The third element of that was really building a strategy, an innovation strategy. What and how do you differentiate yourself in the marketplace, this being a post-secondary institution. But actually then, how do you actually embed yourself in your ecosystem, in your region, in the industry? So the key piece is building the ecosystem, building that kind of focal point, that physical hub, the innovation center. And then three how do you actually build an innovation culture? And so, with many organizations, large and complex organizations, having a chief innovation officer role is really that acting as a catalyst, as a focal point for all of your innovation and transformation efforts. Two, supporting cultural transformation. And three really understanding that innovation ultimately is a people question.
Speaker 4:And as a people question, you'll love our articles on the HR Gazette. Learn more at hrgazettecom. And now back to the show.
Speaker 2:Okay. So my obvious follow-up to that, then, is how? How do you build a culture of innovation, simon? Is that top-down, is that bottom-up? Do you have to bring certain types of personalities with certain experiences in to shake things up? Is it more about the partners that you interact with and it's part of all of that as well, because this is an HR podcast how does the chief innovation officer work with HR to achieve that culture?
Speaker 3:Well, we all know that cultural change can be really complicated and it's multifaceted. I don't think there is one strategy that will actually create an innovation culture. Yes, you need a top-down approach to someone. You need support from the senior leadership team and with a statement that innovation is important to us. Innovation, a culture of innovation, is important to us. You definitely need that, because without that kind of leadership support and how innovation cascades down through the organization, you're just not going to get the traction. But you also, with that strategy of innovation, you need the alignment. How will it actually cascade into plans and changes across the organization, across all your functional areas? In terms of a bottom up, you know, in every department, in every function, there are innovators. Often they work in isolation, often they have a great idea, but it's just not catching on, it's not sticking. So the other piece of that is you need to have and support ways in which people with great ideas and they could be process innovations, to product innovation, to experience transformation, ways in which you actually nurture ideas and creativity. And so one of the things we'd created was an innovation fund that had seed funding for small kind of nuggets, sparks of innovation. So people would apply get a little bit of seed funding to demonstrate that their idea had merits A little bit more developed was we had, like a quote called a search fund, which was larger pockets of money with an idea that's more developed, and how do you actually bring legs to that and broker partnerships to build that and scale those ideas and growth and show it has impact not just within the organization but extended into the partnerships in the community? That is all part of an innovation pathway. Ultimately, what you want is if you're building culture and really embedding this within your culture is a pathway of how you scale, grow ideas, interchange, grow ideas into really capabilities. Ultimately, an innovative culture has strong, distinct capabilities about what we're good at and how we wish to make an impact in our given sector.
Speaker 3:The intersection with HR is really important. As I mentioned before, innovation ultimately is a people game. It is a people question. So it's really a question of, regardless of your title, regardless of your functional area, how do you bring people into that mix. Anybody who's worked in change management knows you have to recruit, enlist that kind of volunteer army, those kind of pinpricks around the organization of people doing cool stuff, amplify their work, showcase their work and showcase the potential and showcase the potential.
Speaker 3:It's really like ink dots joining up the ink dots, and HR has a major role to play and HR leaders have a major role to play in actually thinking how we embrace that change, understanding, like you know, is there opportunities for people to be relieved of, let's say, a day, a week, a month, or kind of a soft secondment to work on innovative projects?
Speaker 3:Is there opportunities for HR to support building a competency set around innovation if it's so important to your business and to your organization or institution, building a competency set and ultimately thinking about incentives and they're not necessarily monetary incentives, but giving people that kind of celebration of their achievements. So innovation awards, projects, all of those can help in terms of building an innovation culture. To my mind, hr is a critical piece in shifting the culture and transforming those efforts in terms of behaviors, norms and the actions people take. So really it is downward. Definitely it is also about embracing your innovators, but it's also about building those capabilities and structures so creative ideas see the light of that day and actually can grow and change and transform the impact of the organization and actually can grow and change and transform the impact of the organization.
Speaker 5:Once in a while, an event series is born that shakes things up, it makes you think differently and it leaves you inspired. That event is Disrupt HR. The format is 14 speakers, 5 minutes each and slides rotate every 15 seconds. If you're an HR professional, a CEO, a technologist or a community leader and you've got something to say about talent, culture or technology, disrupt is the place. It's coming soon to a city near you. Learn more at disrupthrco.
Speaker 2:It's been a while, simon, since you were on on this show, but the last time you were on, we talked about the elevate your greatness framework and how that's focused on understanding the customer's perspective by seeking out trend signals and insights, and we discussed the connection between customer experience and employee experience. I'm I'm interested, based on your experiences at Fanshawe and other things you've been up to in the years since, what's changed in your approach to the employee experience? Yeah, take a minute or two and tell us that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean yeah through my work with Elevate your Greatness, which is my innovation strategy and consulting firm. Really the approach I think is really kind of expanded to think about different stakeholder groups, really thinking more about those partnerships and really thinking about how your organization builds an ecosystem beyond just the staff, beyond just maybe even your customers. But what are some of the partners? They could be suppliers, but also other kind of collaborations in your ecosystem and how you weave that together.
Speaker 3:I'm highly influenced by kind of like work around the idea of a network organization. So it doesn't mean you dispense with the hierarchy because hierarchies are important in terms of reporting, in terms of reporting that hierarchies are important in terms of accountability. But how do you blend that with the idea of building a networked organization so that you foster those horizontal and across the organization collaboration within so you can have a greater impact on customer solutions? Because we all know silos can dampen any attempt at transformation and innovation, particularly around a customer. Experience has to often touch multiple parts of an organization. So shifting away to a team of teams approach and network approach can have exponential impact on your organization's results, growth and scaling.
Speaker 2:You're very good at the triplicates, simon, because you're a wordsmith, I would say, okay, we can't record an episode of the HR Chat Show these days without talking about AI and, of course, a man who's all about innovation, I'm sure that you are a big proponent of AI and how generative technologies are changing the ways that we work. For you personally, simon, I'm interested how is AI changing or how is it being augmenting some of the things that you do to innovate and spread the word?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think artificial intelligence I mean let's strip it back a bit we are at maybe at the toddler stage of artificial intelligence and so when we see the chat, GPTs and what, the functionalities of those kinds of systems and using AI in different areas and different verticals, we are very much at its inception. And so when you throw the stone forward a decade, it will only gather in complexity and I think for any kind of complex solution, gather in complexity and I think for any kind of complex solution, complex business, having an understanding the implications of artificial intelligence and how you deliver and find and scale your impact is absolutely instrumental. I've worked with a lot of projects where they're starting to use AI in different formats. I'll just give you a small example of this where they were essentially using drone technology and flying along road surfaces to map them with a LADAR technology to understand the quality of the road surfaces for municipalities and governments and saying, well, all the potholes were Now using AI they realized as a spinoff from that, they were able to understand the foliage ring of trees captured up and down these scans of the roadway and using that AI, they're able to understand the species of the tree and what it means is it's a spinoff business, a spinoff idea of how they can use that to actually, let's say, particularly with forestry management, you could fly a drone over a forest and tell exactly what species of trees, how dry they were, particularly in North America, when you think of all the forest fires which happens in Europe too.
Speaker 3:But it just shows you that AI is a force multiplier when it comes to your business a force multiplier. And so it's absolutely essential to think about how you can integrate it in all of the verticals into what you're doing, because it will add capabilities, it will potentially have spinooff products and services and ultimately, when you think about the people piece, it will be able to even develop more effective and more kind of intimate customer relation experiences, because, as it improves, the experience will actually improve for the customer. And so I think AI and integrating it across all verticals, not just in products and services, but also the customer and so I think AI and integrating it across all verticals, not just in products and services, but also the customer interactions, is going to be a critical kind of development as we go forward in the next couple of years.
Speaker 2:Excellent. Thank you, and just finally, for this particular conversation today, Simon. How can our folks connect with and learn more about you?
Speaker 3:Thank you very much. So the best way to connect with me is through my consulting work with Elevate your Greatness, where we do strategy and innovation. A lot of our work is focused on supporting organizational cultural change around innovation, coming up with strategies, what is unique about you, your organization and how can we foster that and really make it distinctive. A lot of that work is really helping people facilitate and actually come up with a crystal clear vision of what you're going to do to have the maximize your impact people perspective, what it means in terms of attracting the best talent, the most creative talent, the most inspired talent, and actually showing that to potential employees, but also your current staff and leaders. So really putting yourself on the map and putting yourself distinctly in the innovation space.
Speaker 3:So the best way to contact if you look at Innovate your Greatness, we come up and you can contact with us online. Perfect.
Speaker 2:Well, that just leaves me to say for today. Simon, it's been lovely catching up with you and thank you very much for being my guest on this episode of the HR Chat Show. Thank you, bill, always a pleasure and listeners as always. Until next time. Happy working, as always, until next time, happy working.
Speaker 1:Thanks for listening to the HR Chat Show. If you enjoyed this episode, why not subscribe and listen to some of the hundreds of episodes published by HR Gazette and remember for what's new in the world of work. Subscribe to the show, follow us on social media and visit hrgazettecom.
