Welcome to the fourth episode of Superpowers at Work, produced by Siero Media, where host Sissy Siero sits down with S.E. Puett to discuss how messaging, policy, and people interact to create real change in the workplace. S.E. Puett spent over two decades in public service before pivoting to consulting, working at the intersection on tech and diversity. S.E. shares their wisdom and experience creating workplaces where colleagues are celebrated, supported, and included - and why that is essential for us all. 

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Learn more about Siero Media at sieromedia.com and subscribe on your favorite podcast app!

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Learn more about S.E. Puett.

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Transcript:

‍SISSY VO: There's just no cookie cutter way, there’s no easy path to making a lasting social impact - if only there were.  But there are steps we can take to inspire change at work.

SE: My name is S.E. Puett. I pivoted from a 20-year career in public service before joining a big four firm and consulting.

SISSY VO: S.E. works as a consultant with huge organizations, helping them create an environment of belonging in the tech space.

Sissy: You know, you're a person of love and respect, and you, you put it into practice. And now, a lot of people don't do that. Or perhaps with the same awareness, you know, and the same intention.

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SE: I love the way that you mentioned the, the intention behind it because I think at its core, each of us has to answer the question, what's in it for me? And there are people that aren't comfortable answering that question because it's, it's self first, or, or it's publicly self first. You know, I came from a time and a generation where you weren't allowed to celebrate your wins. You weren't allowed to really sound overly boastful or, or joyous about the accomplishments that you have. I'm personally enjoying living in a time where we can flip that on its head and celebrate one another's wins and prop one another up, and, and know that it's okay to do that. It's okay to support one another. It doesn't have to be a constant teardown on a social media thread, you know? [Laughing]

Sissy: Right. Either or, and that very lack, it's that lack of consciousness. You know, can you speak more about what’s the inspiration for you to go into this a little bit more about your, like your background?

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SE: The goal was, go pick one thing, get really good at it, go get a degree in it, and then go get a career that will make you a stable tax-paying American citizen. And I think that just it, like I followed it, I did what I was told, but it obviously wasn't a long-term fix for me. I've gotten the opportunity to work in a variety of segments in public service, and I think that's helped translate a lot of skill sets into not only a private sector space, but a more technical space - well dedicated to a technical nature of work. And it's created opportunities for me to sit down and have this conversation with you, you know? Um, good, bad, or indifferent, I don't apologize for any of it. It all fell into my higher purpose and I've just learned to trust that more so now.

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Sissy: Yeah. How is it that, or I should say, when do you really feel seen?  When do you notice that you feel really seen in who you are and what you do?

SE: Yeah, I love this question because this is something I used to take an interest in.  And I have had team members that will say, you know,” please don't call on me. Don't call me to the front. Don't, I don't need an award. I don't, I don't, I don't wanna be out there like that.” You know? And then I've had team members that really enjoy the accolades. They enjoy celebrating wins in the, in the chat, in the thread, whatever that looks like for each of us.

I've always found myself getting the most joy out of feeling like I created an opportunity somewhere. It made me feel resourceful. One of my famous phrases is, you know, if I don't know the answer nine times outta ten, I know somebody. I'm happy to put you in touch with them. You know, that really brings me joy to do that because I remember every single person that put me on, I remember every single person that gave me an opportunity. And so that's become something that I, I experience a lot of joy saying I get to do that now it's my turn and, and perpetuate that. 

Sissy: It sounds to me like you, you feel seen when you see other people. Am I right about that?

SE: Yeah, I really, I feel like my superpower is that I can usually see other people's superpower. I have to spend some time with them, right? But you know, that's why we have those conversations to say, this particular person responds really well to this, this, and this, versus this person over here. Like, listen, give them an Amazon card. They're gonna be fine. You know, they're gonna be just fine. They're gonna appreciate that. In fact, they're gonna be the most competitive person every single time you have this employee engagement activity where there's an Amazon card coming. They're gonna win it. Watch, you know? It’s just finding ways to, speak to the values of your team. 

SISSY VO: I just want to say here, that everyone has different needs, especially at work. SE was so generous to share with us about their diagnosis on the spectrum and the hard lessons they've learned about presenting as a neurodivergent woman in corporate America.

SE: First and foremost, I wanna say this was a very tough lesson for me to learn because I've always been a very straightforward speaker and I've had to learn in certain environments - there is a consultant speak, there is learning who your customer is in that room, and how they need to receive the information from you. And I will just be a little bit vulnerable in saying, you know, being diagnosed on the spectrum for me means I have to constantly monitor that, and I still don't have it figured out a hundred percent. There are times when I'll catch myself, when my face is flat and I don't have that expression. There's times when my tone gets really flat and I see somebody shift, that's my cue, like, did I sound too aggressive? Because I'm always, I'm always dealing with the bias of my appearance and that people have a certain expectation as to what my tone of voice should look like based off of how I am presenting. You have diverse perceptions in one conversation, and you need to decide in that moment, how do you want them to receive that? How did they need to receive that in a way that gets the best outcome possible? 

So for somebody like me, that means I have to work extra, extra hard on my communication. I have to work on my attonation. I've gotta work on my articulation. There's, I'm working for a place now where my twang will slip out when I get super excited about something. I have to watch that.  

Sissy: You know, that's interesting you should say that.  I'm curious about how does it translate up, how do we reach the people in the C-suite? How do you get these messages of belonging and the need for these basic human acknowledgements, if you will? How do we get those messages up? 

SE: You know, when you start, labeling things, these, these blanketed buzzword, hashtags, acronyms, and, and otherwise you, you have to own the consequences of how your audience is going to receive that. It's a disservice to your intention to say, this is how I wanna get buy-in from my leadership, from my stakeholder, for whoever that is. It's a disservice to your work and your time and your effort to throw something in front of those people and not prepare yourself in such a way that lets you know how this person or how these people need to receive that information. 

I think we cannot have a conversation until we seek to understand all perspectives outside of our own, whether we've lived them ourselves, whether we have studied them ourselves or not. 

The word agile is a bad word on some teams because it's been bastardized and misused so many times. In fact, I know several executives that would chuckle at that because they don't like to hear it anymore, you know? 

So, at its premise,I think you need to understand who the customer is in every conversation. 

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How do I need to curate my message in a way that that person needs to receive it, internalize it, digest it, like really, really synthesize this information and then apply it in the world around them. So look at that from a workforce perspective. How are you going to do that with your own teams? If you can't tell me there's a standardized approach for it, why should it be a standardized approach for your executive team? They're, they're humans too. They need to receive information a certain way. 

So we need to start by understanding our customer in that conversation. You just have to be mindful of that social corporate responsibility that says, what is the message that we wanna leave? 

Sissy: I love that point because that to me is what we’re all trying to do.  We want to understand the messaging, what’s important, and how do we help to them get to that.

SE:  That's a question that we all have to ask in those strategic sessions. Let's have those conversations and make sure that we are getting the buy-in, not only from the top to carry this out, but we're getting buy-in from the very people that we are expecting to carry it out so that they can put some meaning behind it, they can put their passion behind it, their unique skill set that brought them to that organization. And then let them also celebrate the win when they execute. Let them be a part of that metrics dashboard that lets 'em know how we're doing. And again, there's your opportunity. Make it an engagement. Call some people out, celebrate your wins in whatever way that your organization, you know, has adopted. But talk through that life cycle. 

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I worked with a director of training years and years and years ago, who helped me to understand it is so much easier to change the policy than it is to change the people. Cause I didn't, I didn't wanna believe that. I thought, no, the policy's there to create the framework or the structure for us to fall in line to. So how do you explain all these infractions then? You know, it's not just about calling people out or canceling them or whatever. It is to get to the root cause of those perceived problems or the things that are negatively impacting your metrics or your goals to understand what do we need to do to innovate, to evolve, um, with the user experience in mind? If we stay true to that and always have that baseline to check against, to say, are we still on track with what we all agreed on? You know, use that to be your measurement and then go find ways to port that across the organization. Go talk about what you're doing well and where we could really improve. What are some initiatives you're building to improve? How are you getting your people behind that? Maybe doing some temperature checks to make sure that they're in a place to carry that additional bandwidth or, or to context switch. 

It's not a one and done. It's not a blanket that we just throw over it. You have to have conversations and you have to have some intention behind those conversations.

You know, you've got people who still don't have a good grasp on what the work is. And unfortunately, some of the byproducts of that misunderstanding is misusing terminology, is likening it incorrectly to things like affirmative action and critical race theory.

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At its core, it's a misunderstanding of what each of these things are. And again, turning it into a blanketed negative campaign. 

I think if we can focus on the language and we can focus on the behaviors that we want to implement into these policies and implement into these programs, we can bypass a lot of the static and noise to say, “Hey, we're here to be good humans. How can we learn to be more innovative humans by being good to one another?” We still can't agree on whether or not we all should wear a mask during COVID or not. I mean, we can't even get that far.

So talking about what equality looks like versus equity is something that's gonna take a very long time for humans to hash out amongst themselves. That's where the work starts. It starts with those conversations, acknowledging those differences and what that means to that person.  You know, people are, they're burned out. They are fatigued. They are, you know, too much of the same thing or not enough people helping with the same thing. And that's a part of being a human being as well. But to be able to live and breathe and work in a place where I can speak openly about how I feel about how I'm being treated, that in itself is an evolution from the workforce that I joined 20 something years ago. 

Being able to show up as your authentic self, however you choose to identify your authentic self. And what I mean by that is, as far as you wanting to be on camera or not for a Teams meeting or a Zoom call.  How you want to present yourself on camera, knowing that you're probably working remotely or at home. Somebody that goes into the office, how did they feel comfortable presenting themselves at work with their coworkers versus how they would do it off the clock? Those are the things that make a difference in creating psychological safety, in creating innovative environments, and creating profitable teams because they are not consumed with all of the thoughts surrounding “Am I good enough?”, “Do I feel like I belong?”, “Am I being heard when I, when I offer my thoughts and my perspective and my skill sets to these conversations?”

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People have those conversations in their head every single day. We need to be asking our organizations and our organizations’ leaders, are we also willing to entertain those conversations even when it's inconvenient, even when it's uncomfortable? You can't expect to have, you know, to be around for a hundred years as a business or as an entity and not have to go through some drastic changes to survive. 

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SE: It takes being comfortable with being uncomfortable sometimes, but it definitely builds a team that is more resilient and really, really leans into thriving when they get to celebrate their wins because they learned how to work bigger, better, faster, stronger.

SISSY VO: Getting your message across relies on knowing your listener. Even with the biggest organizations in the world, change starts with sitting down and just listening to each other.

Thanks so much to S.E. Puett for sitting down with us today. And a special thanks to the Siero Media Superpowers team: Creative Director, Kristi Alexander, Associate Producer, Felicia Dominguez, Sound mixer, Samantha Gattsek, Producer and Sound Designer, Rae Kantrowitz, Communications Coordinator Ilana Nevins, and our Program Manager, Catherine Stark.

For a full transcript of this episode visit our website, sieromedia.com/podcast. And if you haven't clicked like or subscribe yet, you're really missing out! We've got a great slew of Superpowers at Work episodes waiting there just for you, wherever you get your podcasts! I'm Sissy Siero. Be well.

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