Enjoying Moments on The Journey
Finding moments to celebrate the wins, and my takeaways from my Gen Z panel
Hello, and welcome to this week’s newsletter. Thank you to our new subscribers. If you’re new, drop me a line and tell me what you are working on these days
This past week, I spent 5 days in Atlanta for the 2023 ASAE Annual Meeting. While my session was on one of the days, I decided to stay the whole time to be able to connect with friends and colleagues. I have a special connection with the association world because in many ways, I grew up in it.
My Father ran a consulting firm specializing in advising association leaders and boards on issues related to strategy & technology, and I grew up going to industry and association conferences.
While this is technically my 3rd ASAE, my first one was back when I was 9, and my Dad took the family to the conference which was in Denver back in the 1990s. One of the funny moments was there was a concert last night at Red Rocks Amphitheater and the band was none other than Earth Wind and Fire.
At the time, I was 9 years old, and had no idea who that was, and basically pouted the entire time that I was there. Little did I know how amazing they were, and how much I would enjoy their music almost 2-3 decades later.
The conference was four days of learning, connecting, ideating and being around leaders in the association industry who are thinking about tough issues facing their organization and their industry. Many professions and industries are in a state of flux, and are wondering how to lead, be relevant and push their organization forward during uncertain times.
Many of these same leaders are the ones who are thinking about creating a better world of work, and trying to find new ways to do things in order to create better industries, companies and workplaces.
My session What Gen Z Wants, According to Gen Z was packed, and a very thoughtful and insightful conversation about how Gen Z is thinking about their workplace, their career and the association profession. During the session, we had a speaker from Edelman who shared their research from the Gen Z Lab as well as their research on Trust, and we had two Gen Z Association leaders share their perspective.
It was a great way to blend numbers and narrative, and try to help the audience get a more nuanced perspective that blends research with lived reality on this next generation. I had a couple people come up to me afterward to tell me that our panel was a hit, and that it was way more insightful than any of the other generational talks they’ve seen in the past.
One of the parts of being an entrepreneur which I’ve enjoyed so much is that I’ve had so many moments when I think to myself that I’m grateful that I get to do the work I do each day.
This was a particularly rewarding moment for me, because I grew up in the association world. My Dad ran his own conference for 20+ years, and I started going when I was just a teenager. Back then, I would go and help him out, running errands, doing registration, escorting speakers around, handing out printouts (yes, we used to do that!) and it was there when I met the likes of Jim Collins, Jimmy Wales, Rita McGrath, Tim Sanders, Mitch Joel, Chris Anderson, Keith Ferrazzi, Amber Mac, and so many other leadership and management thinkers who have made an impact on society.
I always wondered what it would take to be the one to go up on stage and share my own thoughts and ideas with hundreds of people in the audience. Fast forward two decades later and I get to do some of this in my day to day work. While I certainly have a long way to go, I’m going to make sure I cherish the moments along the way and to remain humble.
This really hit home for me, when I ran into someone who I met as a teenager at one of the conferences that my Dad put on. He went for almost a decade of those years, but he and I have stayed in touch over the years and he’s followed my work. During our chat, one of the things he said to me was that it was inspiring to watch me do what I do, knowing the history of my background. He said to me, “All those years going to those conferences, watching those leaders and experts, and now you’re the one trying to encourage people to build good companies good cultures and better leaders. Your story is inspiring…keep it up..”
I try to have a healthy ego about the work I do each day. It’s something I’m hyper aware of, because I’ve met people in this work who are much more successful than me who were not always like this. (We’re not delivering babies, we’re not doing open heart surgery…) But I have to say, hearing that message hit me right in the gut, and in a good way.
Sometimes it's easy to get locked in on a goal and not to focus until you hit it, and I’m a big believer that it’s important to have intrinsic measures of success. But when someone you respect and trust acknowledges and notices and sees you and what you’re doing and tells you what they see and that they admire you, it can’t help but make you feel good. It also was a reminder that being able to “see” and make people feel seen is such a powerful force.
I posted this image a few weeks ago on LinkedIn, but I think in many ways it mirrors a motto in life I’ve tried to live by - in a big world you’re a small person, but as a small person you’re capable of something big. I believe this for myself, but I believe it for others as well, and it’s why I try to do what I can to encourage and support others in their journey so that they believe they can make a positive impact outside of themselves, and want to use their voice, be a leader, or lead any kind of change that makes things better for others.
I teased it out earlier, but my keynote session What Gen Z Wants According to Gen Z was a fantastic discussion about this generation and the implications for association leaders. Drawing on some of the work that Edelman has done around study Gen Z attitudes and consumer behavior and coupled with lived experiences with 2 Gen Z association professionals, we covered a lot of ground and nuance on this generation. A few of my favorite takeaways:
Starting a career or a profession during COVID-19 was far different than most of us who started in our first jobs and our careers, and it has been challenging. While not everyone prior to COVID-19 had a great onboarding or new hire experience, those in this generation who started during the pandemic have had a unique set of circumstances and experiences
Connection and association matters. This is not just about being in an office (although when done right, that can help) but given how much of their professional experience (and latter stages of college) was online, being able to find ways to help people develop meaningful connection and relationships, to an organization, cause, purpose etc is super important
What’s different today is that when it comes to communication, we are all on the same “dance floor”. Because of technology, (ex: social media) dialogue is now multidimensional, versus being one way. That is one reason why Gen Z can, and does speak out, whether it’s to leaders of an organization, or a brand. Your youngest workers know this, so finding ways to listen and integrate that voice into what you do or how you serve your employees, customers, members etc, is critical.
The youngest generations have always helped us move the needle forward. Finding ways to intergrate their voices, ideas and concerns doesn’t just help us serve them, but it helps us envision and create a better world of work.
New Updates
Podcast: Leadership in a Complex World of Work
This week, I had the chance to interview Muriel Wilkins, an entrepreneur, executive coach, and the host of the Coaching Real Leaders podcast. I have long been a listener of Muriel’s podcast, and knew she’d be a great guest to talk about leadership and leading in a complex world. If you aren’t familiar with complexity theory, this will be a great listen. (Link here)
Article: Tough Times and Investing in People Are Not Mutually Exclusive
Here’s my interview in Forbes with Kevin Kruse on why middle managers are in the spotlight, and what we need to do to support and empower them to drive better results. Kevin is a serial entrepreneur and the founder of LeadX a leadership development platform. I met Kevin at ATD back in May and we had a long conversation about the joys and challenges of entrepreneurship as well as our philosophies on leadership. It was fun to chat with him about these topics, but also, to find another fellow entrepreneur in the leadership space who is both humble, smart, and generous. Big thanks to Kevin!
Podcast: The Manager’s Role in Career Development of Their Employees
One of my favorite topics to teach inside organizations is to help people managers understand how they can facilitate employee career development. I had the chance to go on Eric Girard’s Management Development Unlocked podcast to talk about why I’m so passionate about this topic, and tactically, how people managers can do this. If you’re a people manager, this is a must listen.
Shoutouts
This section went well last week so we’re going to try it again. Enjoy seeing some of my friends win, so here are a few shoutouts:
Chris Miller (VP, Product, Hubspot) recently appeared on Lenny’s Podcast to talk about Product Led Growth
Lindsey Pollak just launched her latest LinkedIn Learning Course, “Driving Internal Mobility as a People Manager)
Minda Harts signed her 4th(!) deal for an upcoming book
The CoRise Team re-branded to Uplift, and launched a Generative AI Education Assistant.
April Rinne is going to be keynoting at the Talent Connect Conference in October
Finally, If you’re still reading this, I recently went on a podcast to tell my personal journey with learning how to speak up and share my voice, and how it fueled my own career success. If you listen I’d love to know what you think, as I’d like to start keynoting on this topic.
Have a great week!
Al