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This post is a continuation of my original post. If you missed it you can find it here.

As mentioned in my previous post diversity in the workplace is powerful and has its advantages if done well. Diversity can help organizations get different viewpoints and provide different and more diverse solutions to problems to reduce groupthink. I also think comments from people that represent organizations or companies are starting to be managed more due to the effects they can have on their brand. So to continue on there have been a lot in the aftermath of Don Cherry’s comments including an apology by Ron Maclean, a controversial comment by Jess Allen from the talk show The Social.

Starting with Ron Maclean he was probably in a difficult position after not catching Cherry on what many consider intolerant and other racist comments. Then he was in a position if he went against a friend in Cherry and apologized he would be seen as a backstabber or traitor to some. If he did not he would be seen as condoning the comments Cherry made and realistically from some put in the same boat as Cherry and probably terminated from his position at Sportsnet and seen as a bigot by some as Cherry has. Not the most enviable position- even when Maclean denounced Cherry’s comments Maclean was not really given forgiveness by many instead I read many comments on Maclean only apologizing to keep his job and people on both sides of the fence now not supporting Maclean and he has been on damage control. I do not know Maclean or Cherry personally but they are being judged in public opinion since they are public figures but in reality, Maclean was put in a difficult position by who he considers a friend and the friend (Cherry) did not do him any favours in regards to protecting his brand. Unfortunately Maclean is directly linked to Cherry but often is seen as the voice of reason and in reality, the network and certain people saw him playing the role of a babysitter to make sure Cherry did not make a comment like he did and many blame Maclean for not controlling the situation. As objective as I am trying to be, I definitely do not think it is fair to put Maclean in a situation where he was supposed to control a full-grown adult with pretty polarized opinions. I ask people to objectively look at the comments and the reaction of everybody, Maclean, Cherry and the network (Sportsnet) and look at all three have tried to make this right in a way even Cherry who clearly has said he should not have used “you people”. My one opinion here is the education of Cherry and him visiting some recent immigrants to understand how much many of these people love and appreciate Canada would really have been a great outcome. The network did what they needed to do to limit damage to their brand and reputation. This is truly what all this comes down to after the comments were made as there was a scramble to protect peoples and the network’s brand and reputation.

Jess Allen from The Social then stirred the pot a bit with some of her comments and stereotyping hockey players as she clarified after it was her personal opinion as the kids that played hockey were rich, affluent, “white boys”. Again Jess Allen did apologize on her comments but I do not think they were far off from Cherry’s in regards to offending people and being unacceptable. I, I started playing ice-hockey at 5 years old and the game has been growing in ethnic communities for a while. We see South-Asian commentators often on TSN often in Farhan Lalji, and somebody like Nabil Karim who is now on ESPN. We now have Hockey Night in Canada commentated in Punjabi and local oilers analysts like Tony Brar. Jess Allen and Cherry both made comments that some have agreed with and others seen as discriminatory. The Social and Jess Allen’s apology did not go far to apologize to the people she stereotyped as the specific people she referred to she refused to extend an apology to. High school was a long time ago and it is surprising to see people hold onto hate of certain people for this long. I know I have done things in my life I regret and hope people would grow enough to forgive me over time. The audience for The Social is a pretty different target audience than Sportsnet broadcasts some may be the same but if analyzing personas you would find some large differences and again the brand and reputation were protected as CTV also apologized for the comments. It is difficult for some people to accept this apology from Allen as there was a “but” in it and on her social media originally she also responded to comments often without much tact and stood by her comments originally.

If we truly look at the fallout of comments from Cherry there was a domino effect. Our national identity is highly often linked to hockey and also multi-culturalism but they are rarely often linked. With changes in the demographics of hockey as second and third-generation immigrants enter and get interested in hockey branding and growth of the game is changing. Strategies in regards to brand need to be analyzed and targeted now to a more diverse group. I remember playing hockey as the only ethnic person on the team at times and remember one year we had as many as five South-Asian kids on the team. I never truly felt out of place on a hockey team and feel this is a great part of Canada and hockey is that it is so inclusive. You can also bet that Sportsnet and CTV both did their analysis (cost vs. profit CPA) to figure out the hit to their brand and social responsibility. In all of this what we can all hope that there are lessons learned and no matter what side of the fence you’re on the hope is we can come together and understand each person’s opinion. I did not wear a poppy this year the first year I can remember since my daughter was young and the same issue of safety when carrying a toddler. When we look at people and question what they are doing we should also question our assumptions as my belief still is people are fundamentally good.

I think of myself as a lifelong learner and I have noticed over the years how I learn and what I learn has changed very rapidly. All of a sudden I am considered an adult learner and have realized that I need to adapt how I learn. In working in post-secondary the institutions are starting to realize that they need to adapt and offer a more blended learning approach as everybody does learn differently. I am a strong self-starter and tend to learn well self-learning out of modules and books and can apply what I learn. I do not do as well when somebody stands up and tries to teach via lecture. I also noticed in my first degree many of my professors taught very traditionally (13 years ago) believe it or not I had to go to the library to photocopy handwritten slides for many of my economics courses. I’m pretty sure there would be a revolt if a professor was to do that currently. Teachers and instructors now need to be technology savvy and understand how individual learners digest information. For me, on a personal level, I have started to evaluate how I learned best and have tailored my learning to this. I just had lunch with somebody that I know is incredibly smart and he is a self-learner less concerned about certifications but it is incredibly bright and learns very rapidly. I have found that I have a lot of formal education but I have started questioning the return on investment if I was just going into post-secondary right now. We have been socialized to finish high school go to university or college and then a job and then get married. The question now many Millenials are asking is this the best route. Many of the largest companies currently including Google, Amazon, and Apple do not require a degree for employers and individuals that have taught themselves and are more than competent with a mix of learning, experience, and appropriate skillset are becoming more common.

In the current society, we often spend more time at our jobs than anywhere else. It is often difficult to count in overtime and work functions and forget that workplaces are exactly that and it is often important to separate work and other life events. In my last role, I had a large change and learned a lot- moving out of my comfort zone is something I am not afraid to do and embrace change. My last role was a large change (new industry- post-secondary and public instead of private) my wife told me I would struggle as it was slow-moving- I knew I would need to shift my mindset a bit and adapt.  Part of my role was to help the department I was working with to be more reactive to change and move quicker. We adopted agile methodologies but the only way we could really change the speed at which the department and organization worked as a culture shift that had been ingrained for years. I came from many organizations where accountability and deliverable-based cultures were prioritized. I had to adapt for and understand or as it was put to me “fit into the culture” I will get back to culture fit in my next post so I will not delve more into this here. In my first year as a public servant, I was still very deliverable focused and found that I might have been on the outside of the culture a bit but I tried to do what I could to adapt. Still, I took work home most nights and felt a sense of responsibility to move things forward. I noticed my supervisor often did the same and without realizing it she was fostering a culture of getting things done. Still, she would verbalize to me not to be taking work home after work hours and things could wait- I often heard this through the department. The institution I worked at itself had a great culture for people and they pushed “work-life” balance which I will get to later in this post. I have always truly cared about my work and taken a passion for what I do, my goal has always been to provide value to my clients or company I work for. When I have found my value being delivered was slipping I always tried to work differently optimizing my value or find areas where I could provide value. I mention this as again as often corporate culture can help in giving freedom to individuals to be agile in their roles really get sh** done or remind their employees to know their place and stay in their lane; empowering employees provides value and instills accountability but that does not destroy work-life balance as some people believe. Instilling a culture of action while giving flexibility to employees will help work-life balance which I will clarify further later.

I wanted to delve deeper into my experiences with work-life balance, job demands and the overall culture of an organization. Over the last 10 years, I have been involved in some way in changing cultures or accelerating the adoption of new business practices. I have felt accountable in my role always even taking my phone and company laptop on my 3-week honeymoon, I am not endorsing to not take a break or even taking work on a honeymoon but I am saying there needs to be balanced in work-life to not take away accountability. I would not call my endeavour into the public sector a failure but it was challenging as I had been accustomed to an environment where management worked in a heavy deliverable-based culture even if other employees were unionized. I will not say work-life balance and productivity are even related but it is important to understand the items that can compete in corporate culture. I remember in one of my roles being told I care too much and I would get used to letting deliverable dates go as well that it was just the way it was. There was a complacency built into the culture at times where you could always get things done the next day unless it was a pressing need from a higher executive. Unfortunately the work being done was not prioritized by ROI and the staff were often not empowered to prioritize work across the department until after some time. Improvements were made but many issues still festered and the excuse of work-life balance was often used. At times I grew frustrated as it was important for the institution to instill a work life balance- there were stretches where many of the leaders and staff were away on vacation at times where strategic planning was essential. There were also leaders on flexible schedules such as Friday’s off or every second Friday for some of the leaders and staff but processes were weak and support was not defined for individuals who were on break so many items stalled or were slow to develop. I also realized that working outside of work-hours was frowned upon so I tried to optimize my time and closely tracked my time (with AI based time software) (Timecamp- timecamp.com) to make sure I was on task and could track my own time and cost and productivity analysis (CPA).  I wanted to make sure that I was focused on providing value as I realized that it was difficult with vacation, professional development and other breaks at an 85% factor of productivity I realized I was worked about 7 months. I always asked working at this employer if they pushing work-life balance at a corporate level but not helping enforce and foster a culture of responsibility and accountability affected productivity. I often found if I saw a call from somebody I responded very promptly when I was able to or if there was a voicemail I followed up. I am a large believer of the client, co-worker and customer experiences often being a key in building a culture where accountability and agility and productivity can thrive.  Cultural values in organizations need to be balanced as when they are not and you try to change or transform cultures without clarity there can be confusing. Clear communication of cultural values within a company is important but also living and acting those values is even more important in instilling the beliefs and environment of the organization. Leaders that are not accountable themselves truly set a tone where

I worked at a company also that did not hide that work and deliverables were the priority. I was told when I started that this would be the case and that if I worked 70 hours one week and 20 the next that was just how it was. Still somehow with everything I felt a passion for doing work there, they expected accountability and realistically to answer emails and calls promptly. This was clear from the environment and the culture- still working long hours at the company but they provided flexibility and I got to work at home when appropriate as well it was deliverable focused and I had no worry in regards to punching a clock. I also had healthy anxiety of making sure I was responsive and productive. It was easy to fit into the culture there was no confusion in regards to the direction that Executives were going there expectations were clear and if you met or exceeded them you were usually rewarded. I had very little need to track my time at this position as providing value to the company was priority number one. I really felt work-life integration but in a healthy way- even though I worked 30-40% more at this organization. I question some of the practices when companies expect employees to work excessive hours and I understand it is easy to say to move on. I also understand that many people are working just to put food on their family’s table and am not ignoring this as they feel forced staying at a job but I am not focusing on this scope I am focused on knowledge workers who are doing well enough and skilled enough to be mobile in their choice of employers. There can be a culture change in regards to work-life balance but it should be remembered often when you change X it will affect Y and there are levers and trade-offs I have seen this very commonly in my experience with acquisitions as company’s I worked for often purchased other company’s and the culture of the acquisition company changed significantly, this was often forced upon the organization being purchased as the cultures often could be quite different (for example four day work-weeks). The acquiring organization had quite extensive integration plans and this often meant introducing processes and changing how people fundamentally worked. This change often pushed people out of there comfort zone quickly and often they left on their own if they were unable to adapt. If an individual was deemed essential to operations there was definitely flexibility afforded to that individual.

Work-life balance has tradeoffs if not managed. Corporate cultures that do not instill accountability will ultimately have difficulties in implementing flexibility without negative trade-offs in the environment. Changing work-life balance done correctly can often instill more loyalty to the employer and allow the employee flexibility to provide value even more. Many of the so-called best employers hide behind a guise of work-life balance but instilling passion in their employees for the work they perform would be more beneficial. Work-life balance should not mean just giving more days off, balance can be gained by affecting many factors personalized to the individual. Stress and work pressure are parts of work-life balance and can be managed. The overall environment of the organization needs to be managed as employees also need the tools to do their jobs and to increase the engagement of employees. It is important to manage employees and culture this will have more impact than any other initiatives and benefits. Employees put a value on each work-life balance initiative and each employee does not place the same weight on each factor so managing this with some personalization will help employers make sure employees are more engaged in their roles.

For further reading on these topics checkout:

https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/302042

https://www.inc.com/justin-kulla/the-truth-work-life-balance-is-a-lie.html

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jessicalutz/2018/01/11/its-time-to-kill-the-fantasy-that-is-work-life-balance/#5d9f5abf70a1

https://www.forbes.com/sites/briannegarrett/2019/12/08/move-over-work-life-balance-hello-work-life-integration/#1382b0173ce2

I wrote in the past on the value of post-secondary education and its need to adapt here. I also wrote on traditional examinations within the context of the CPA exam failures recently on testing there programs and usability. I was asked by somebody than where do I see things going in regards to education and that in my opinion is a difficult question but my take is below.

I really believe there is a large role for Universities and formal education institutions if they are able to adapt to learning. I remember on my first degree that I had one professor who still made students go to the library to photocopy slides and used an overhead projector and simply refused change and it was normal for at least 10 years prior to present with Powerpoint and have notes online. Now there is even more engaging technology for slides like Beautiful.ai, Prezi and keynote as examples. The refusal of one professor to modernize is a common issue I have seen with post-secondary institutions where one individual not adapting can change a student’s experience as tenured professors priority is often research and teaching is something that helps fund their priority. Organizational agility and change management is something government-funded, risk-averse organizations like post-secondaries might naturally struggle with as rocking the boat is often not rewarded and most often taking risks is not encouraged in this traditional environment. This has led to opportunities for entrants into training and education and more certification agencies. I am of the opinion that many vocational schools and privately owned certification bodies are gaining steam as employers often are looking for specific certifications and skillsets suited to their industry. Digital marketers for example now are probably very well served to have google analytics certifications and other credentials on top or sometimes instead of a traditional business degree. Some of the best digital marketers have no degree and many of the top respected experts in their field now are not academics like Gary Vaynerchuk or Neil Patel. Sometimes a degree is needed but a great thought piece on this can be read here.

So here we go, I understand there will always be a role for post-secondaries we are not going to go to a Bootcamp or self-learn being a doctor, lawyer or nursing. Many careers might be unable to shift for years to more agile learning but I will talk about this more below still on the opportunities of AR (augmented reality). My learning has shifted greatly over time to look at ROI and skillset I have realized with technology and trends moving so quickly being a lifelong learner is necessary to be effective for clients/ customers and employers. Often a 4-year degree has items you have no interest or would never use but is part of the requirements of a traditional University education – my first degree was an arts degree where I completed an Economics degree with a Sociology minor but  I had many statistics and math courses mixed in which I thought might have a use but I was forced to take fine arts classes and second languages to get my degree. I had no interest in them and they provided little value and I hear the argument of being a more rounded individual as for one of my fine arts classes in drama I went to go see plays and wrote papers that were enjoyable. But these courses really reduce the ROI on my degree- I also did a business degree later online where I felt the ROI was a little higher as I did very little that would not benefit me. Still, I will say my highest ROI was from certifications like PMP, Lean-Six Sigma, and Prosci Certifications mainly as these were specialized and provided knowledge that was applicable and helped me in my career as actionable knowledge. You cannot master or learn a whole subject area in 3 days as mentioned in the article here and I think the article makes great points but often these boot camps and certifications expect application and knowledge to be gained and give you the base to start. Upskilling is becoming essential to keeping up with trends as mentioned before and being in the workplace for a bit it is clear that often there can be a gaps in skillsets when organizations do not invest in their employees for growth and in working with many different organizations and industries I find gaps can be large when this investment is ignored. Recently PWC committed to spending about $3 billion on upskilling its employees which can be seen here. Just my opinion but this is forward-thinking even with technology and AI people are at the center of growth and success of most organizations.

One of the best posts I might have ever read in regards to the change traditional schools need to make is here. One thing that sticks out for me for traditional universities or Colleges to keep up is understanding the market and adapting with speed with technology but also designing their own curriculum for it to be relevant to their career goals. I am very interested in understanding what will occur in the future as have two young kids and with online degrees and certifications is it worth investing in an RESP. How greatly will education change with AR and being able to learn hands-on items from home? Currently, I am learning to code and it is incredible the free resources available and released by private organizations. Will knowledge be more free-flowing in this way and what will be the role of formal education. I am in the middle of my MBA and really question the ROI and value currently but want to finish as understand this is an indicator of certain high-level knowledge to employers. I also feel like at times things are changing rapidly and wonder if I will have to ask my kids how to program some random item like my holographic personal assistant. Either way, learning is different for everybody and is changing rapidly in ten years I wonder which tenured professor will still be using traditional PowerPoint. Or maybe Microsoft will adapt PowerPoint rapidly to how learning is changing.