At Work with The Ready - 24. Ask Us Anything No. 3

24. Ask Us Anything No. 3

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11/25/24 • 47 min

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At Work with The Ready

It’s mailbag time! And while we know we said this last time, we really mean it that this was probably the hardest group of questions we’ve dealt with on the show yet! Rodney and Sam get out their thinking caps and answer some questions from listeners like you about non-traditional organizational leadership, workplace dynamics around project capacity planning, and more.

Questions tackled:

Are great teams and strategies impossible without traditional leadership?
Can project capacity planning be done in a people-positive, complexity conscious way?
Why do traditional orgs bias towards convergent thinking, especially around annual planning?
How do you prioritize cross-functional initiatives between leadership and teams that avoids zombie projects and mutual disappointment?

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Interested in learning more about Depthfinding and the ocean framework? Head here.

Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox? Sign up here.

Follow us on your favorite platforms for more org design nerdery:

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Mentioned references:

the LinkedIn post asked about
Rube Goldberg machine
"MBT" (mission-based team): FoHR Miniseries Ep. 1
"DAO": BNW Ep. 96 with Chase Chapman
"product mindset episode": AWWTR Ep. 23

Questions tackled:

Are great teams and strategies impossible without traditional leadership?
Can project capacity planning be done in a people-positive, complexity conscious way?
Why do traditional orgs bias towards convergent thinking, especially around annual planning?
How do you prioritize cross-functional initiatives between leadership and teams that avoids zombie projects and mutual disappointment?

--------------------------------

Interested in learning more about Depthfinding and the ocean framework? Head here.

Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox? Sign up here.

Follow us on your favorite platforms for more org design nerdery:

--------------------------------

Mentioned references:

the LinkedIn post asked about
Rube Goldberg machine
"MBT" (mission-based team): FoHR Miniseries Ep. 1
"DAO": BNW Ep. 96 with Chase Chapman
"product mindset episode": AWWTR Ep. 23

Previous Episode

23. Adopting a Product Mindset in Organizations

1 Recommendations

There are plenty of organizations that say they want to be “customer-focused”—but in practice? It’s easy to fall back on leader-driven opinions and assumptions about what customers really want. That’s especially true in big companies with entrenched processes and hierarchies that prioritize internal agendas. In those environments, staying aligned with customer needs can be an uphill battle—and organizations instead get stuck building solutions based on what leaders think customers should want, rather than what they need, leaving exciting opportunities on the cutting room floor.

In this episode, Rodney and Sam dig into what it actually takes to adopt a product mindset. From navigating a “hammer looking for nails” ethos to designing flexible solutions that adapt to actual user behavior, they unpack how to bring customer-centricity into daily practice—and what to do when you start to veer off course.

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Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox? Sign up here.

Follow us on your favorite platforms for more org design nerdery:

--------------------------------

Mentioned references:

Depthfinding
psych safety ep: AWWTR Ep. 20
experimentation ep: BNW Ep. 62
founder mode ep: AWWTR Ep. 22
Josh Bersin ep: The Future of HR Ep. 12 with Josh Bersin
revealed preference

Next Episode

The Future of HR: Giving HRBPs the Future-of-Work Makeover They Deserve [Rebroadcast]

Rebroadcast note: We're hard at work recording a brand new miniseries for January, so this week we're resharing one this episode from our Future of HR miniseries. As we've worked with companies over the last year to reimagine their HR departments, we've seen this episode's ideas and lessons about evolving the HRBP even more important in practice. So take a listen with some fresh ears, and we'll see in two weeks with a brand new episode.

The role of HR Business Partner is often a tale of two experiences. On the one hand, HRBPs are some of the most empathetic and passionate people you’ll ever meet. On the other hand, they’re stuck on the hamster wheel of busywork, bouncing from crisis to crisis without the authority to prioritize their energy—and without the respect from leadership to make a real difference. Look up “burnout” in the dictionary and odds are you’ll find a picture of an HRBP.

In this miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can become more resilient, efficient, and equitable.

Today on episode 5, they explore how this critical role took a hard left turn from it’s intended purpose, what its future-of-work glow-up (hello, HR Business Coach) could look like, and how HR Business Coaches + Mission-Based Teaming = unlimited potential.

References mentioned: