0:35

All right. So we are here. We're back

0:37

at transform. I am so

0:39

happy. We're in the tandem booth. Shout

0:41

out to Mel and company for inviting

0:43

us out here. We're in a tandem booth

0:45

and we're talking about feedback in a remote setting.

0:48

Of course. So let's talk a little

0:50

bit about our guests today. Okay. So

0:53

our guest is from Malmo, Sweden. They

0:56

currently reside in the Bay area,

0:58

right? All right. They have

1:00

their bachelor's in HR

1:03

management. Something most

1:05

people do not know about our guests. I'm going

1:07

to talk a little bit about this is that she

1:09

has a twin. Yep. Identical

1:12

twin. Okay. Don't

1:14

let us forget about that part because that's going to be the fun

1:16

part. All right. Let's see. Oh,

1:19

she's been an HR professional for 12

1:21

years and got her start

1:24

at just a little consulting

1:26

company. Just a tiny one KPMG.

1:29

Okay. Then went on to work

1:31

at, A few other small companies

1:33

you might not have heard of no big deal.

1:35

You got Walmart, you got

1:38

Volvo, you got Kohler,

1:40

just all over the place. That's really

1:43

great. I'm psyched. I'm psyched. What else

1:45

do we have about our guests today? They are currently

1:48

the founder of don't tell HR love

1:51

the name by the way, don't

1:53

tell. What

1:56

She's also the current director of

1:58

HR for Mojave Energy

2:00

Systems, which is an HVAC manufacturer

2:03

focused around green tech

2:05

space. Green tech?

2:08

HVAC? Interesting, we gotta talk

2:10

about that. Listeners and

2:12

viewers, please give a warm welcome to

2:16

Susan!

2:18

Clever!

2:22

Bam! We got

2:23

it, baby. We got it. That was good. I'm,

2:26

wow. Yes. I try to give

2:28

you a good intro. I try to give you a good intro.

2:31

So, can you say it's great

2:33

to be here and I want to hear

2:35

your name in Swedish. So why don't you give us a quick

2:38

little sentence with your name in

2:40

Swedish. So what do we got? Ok,

2:41

so Mitt namn är

2:43

Susann Cleverjós. Super tacksam på

2:46

att vara här idag på

2:48

Transform conference. And

2:50

that was the worst Swedish English ever.

2:54

That's awesome. And if you would have people from

2:56

Stockholm, they'd be like

2:58

But you know what, it's okay, because I'm going to go

3:00

visit there someday. I'm going to go visit there. Again,

3:03

we're here in the, in the Tandem booth. So the first

3:05

question we're asking everybody here at Transform

3:07

is, what are some of the challenges?

3:10

Or maybe even some of the advantages

3:13

of giving continuous or

3:15

critical feedback in a

3:17

remote work or hybrid

3:19

setting. What are some of the advantages or challenges?

3:21

To split that up in two,

3:23

to talk more about the

3:26

challenges first of all, it's actually

3:28

to get managers to be comfortable

3:30

of doing that. A lot of times we

3:33

give them the tools and the system But

3:37

how are we giving them the support when they're

3:39

in the conversations with the main like with their

3:41

team? They need to start doing this. This is

3:43

not something that should happen twice

3:46

a year, three times a year. Like in

3:48

every conversation, you should be like,

3:50

Hey, what do you think you did really well there?

3:52

What could you do better? How do we get them to have it naturally?

3:57

But also can't like naturally feel like they can keep

3:59

track of what was being said so they can come

4:01

back to it as well. It's a two way

4:03

street. It's on employees and it's on the managers

4:05

to keep track of things. The positive

4:08

things about that is again, you

4:10

should never be surprised when you walk into a performance

4:12

review. Right, right. You should know

4:15

90%, 99 percent

4:17

where you're at. Because

4:18

you're supposed to be having conversations. You all hear that?

4:20

Yeah. No one should be walking in surprised. Have

4:23

conversations. And I can

4:25

say that, I say, for instance, I,

4:28

if I look at myself, I

4:30

am not a meats person. I don't like being at

4:32

meats. I want to be exceptional or exceeds

4:34

all of that. Okay. Okay. I hold myself at high

4:36

standards. Okay. I then want my manager

4:39

to come to me before I

4:41

end up in a meats bucket. Let's

4:43

divert early. What am I

4:45

doing? That's not Meeting

4:47

the expectations. Mm.

4:49

Did you say the meets bucket? Yeah.

4:51

I love that. I thought you were like a bowl of meat.

4:54

No, it's just no meats bucket. She's talking about

4:56

meeting expectations. Isn't that right?

4:58

I love that. I'm gonna use meats bucket from

5:01

now on. That's really

5:01

cool. I like that. And I have to say it's absolute to

5:04

be in meats. That's not a bad

5:06

thing at all. Right? You want to improve. This is my ego. Mm-Hmm. My

5:09

big ego. I want to be really, really good at

5:11

what I do. Um, but

5:14

meets. It's good. I'm not just going to clarify

5:16

that very

5:16

well. Okay. Okay. So basically what

5:19

I hear is like, okay, well, you

5:21

have to have continuous feedback and

5:23

you have to be able to track it. Oh,

5:26

what, what, what, what, what tandem, what tandem? Oh,

5:28

that wasn't even on purpose. That wasn't even on purpose.

5:31

So that's really interesting and it makes sense

5:33

because when you're in a remote work setting. You're

5:35

not necessarily seeing

5:38

everyone every day. You might not have that

5:40

real tight rapport that you may have and

5:42

may not be able to see kind of that human interaction.

5:44

So the more frequent you have it, it totally

5:46

makes sense. It totally makes sense. Tell us a little

5:48

bit about, don't tell HR, love

5:51

the name. Kudos to you. What

5:54

is that about? And how did you start it?

5:55

It's a consulting advisory firm I've been doing for

5:58

a long time. 12 years now in and out a

6:00

little bit. Don't tell HR comes

6:02

from the fact that I've had managers being

6:05

like, I don't want people to come to you.

6:07

And if they come to you, you need to tell me immediately. We're

6:10

not the police. We're

6:11

not the police. We're not,

6:14

we're not the bad people.

6:15

Police. We're not here to spy on people.

6:18

I am here to help you. I'm here

6:20

to help the business.

6:22

Don't tell HR. I love the

6:24

name. That is great. That

6:26

is great. So, you're also

6:28

the director of HR, at

6:30

Mojave Energy Systems.

6:32

Tell me a little bit about the

6:34

challenge that Mojave is doing.

6:37

Like, what are you trying to solve? Green tech

6:39

space? Tell me what you all do.

6:40

Trying to save the world. Save

6:44

the world. The team has an amazing

6:47

product that actually was launched

6:49

beginning of this year. It's an HVAC, HVAC

6:52

units, two different sizes right

6:54

now. So

6:55

for offices,

6:55

for commercial space? It's for commercial space. We're

6:58

in the commercial space right now. It

7:01

lowers carbon emission with 70%.

7:03

It actually uses less energy.

7:05

If I get the technology right now, my CEO

7:08

might be really mad at me. But normal

7:10

HVACs, they tend to, when you want it

7:12

colder in a room, say you want 65,

7:15

it might drop down to 60, and then

7:17

it slowly heats up the room. Our

7:20

product can, like, actually meet

7:22

65 faster. We won't do

7:24

that, the big dip, and then go back up again. And

7:27

we can also control humidity. So we

7:29

can control both humidity and the temperature.

7:32

And I see. Phil, if I said this wrong, I'm so sorry.

7:35

I'm going to need to do another training.

7:37

You're doing a good job in my opinion, Phil. Okay.

7:40

All right. But it takes less energy because

7:42

we don't dip. It actually uses less energy.

7:45

Yes. And then you save money with

7:47

that. Okay. Very

7:49

fascinating. So just, you're just saving the planet.

7:52

We're doing our best. So what

7:54

is Mojave's work model? Are you hybrid?

7:56

Are you remote? Are you on site?

7:58

How would you categorize? It's

8:00

very mixed. Given that we're manufacturing

8:02

site, we have an onsite in

8:04

South Carolina. Okay. Okay. We

8:06

also have, our headquarters are in Sunnyvale

8:09

where we have, uh, engineers,

8:11

researchers, they're working the chem labs

8:14

out in the workshops,

8:16

working on products as well. And

8:18

then we have some that are remote and some that

8:20

are hybrid. So it's a very big mix.

8:22

Wow. That's a big mix. How many employees roughly?

8:25

Currently it's 31 right now,

8:27

growing to be about 60

8:29

end of this year or so. Lots of work.

8:31

Lots of work as a director of HR coming. So

8:35

in your opinion, what are some of the advantages

8:38

of being a remote or hybrid company?

8:40

Yeah. What are some of the

8:40

advantages? Cause you can meet people where

8:43

they're at and meet and connect the way that

8:45

you like to communicate. You

8:47

might not like to have very

8:49

much in person. Sit

8:52

next to me. Let's talk about your feedback

8:54

and your performance. You might actually

8:56

prefer to have a bit of a screen that

8:59

you can like, it's gives that little

9:01

protection in between sometimes. And

9:03

I think it's so important for managers to

9:06

take a minute, have the conversations

9:08

with the team. How would you prefer

9:10

to get feedback? Does

9:12

it feel threatening to have it in a room when it's

9:14

just us two? Do you want to have

9:16

a little bit of a space between so

9:18

you can like, collect yourself,

9:21

calm yourself down if there's something that's being difficult,

9:23

things like

9:24

that. Are the remote people only

9:26

in the Northern California area? You're hiring

9:28

people?

9:29

The remote folks we have right now are in

9:31

a few different states. We have sales people that are

9:33

remote as well. And yes, we are hiring.

9:35

Oh, yeah.

9:38

It's an interesting space to hire in, for

9:40

sure. Pretty cool. Pretty cool. So

9:42

moving on to this fun stuff. Actually, right,

9:44

right before the fun stuff. How do you

9:47

envision this

9:49

workplace flexibility thing heading in

9:51

the future? I mean, you've been in a lot of different

9:53

roles at a lot of major brands. You've

9:56

seen how it was prior to 2020.

9:58

Were you kind of seeing this heading now?

10:02

I hate to say this.

10:04

I think lot of conversations, of course,

10:06

is returned to the office. Yes. You

10:08

have to understand too, that. And someone

10:11

said it really well in a session earlier today

10:14

is that the people that sits in this room and make the decisions

10:16

they built the career in the office,

10:19

they don't necessarily understand or see that you

10:22

can build a career outside the office.

10:24

I think for, if I look at Mojave

10:27

we have positions that needs to be in office.

10:29

We also need to have

10:31

the flexibility for those positions that are not

10:33

office necessities in

10:35

that sense. But even for those that are in office,

10:38

what if they have a really bad day

10:40

or need like a little bit of a break? How

10:42

can we support that then?

10:43

Yeah. Yeah. We need flexibility. It's

10:46

about support, isn't it? Support and flexibility.

10:48

I feel like we have as a society.

10:51

I mean, obviously, 2020

10:53

and post 2020 was horrific globally,

10:56

but I do feel like we got a

10:58

little bit more human and you were able

11:00

to see the human side. You've seen CEOs with the

11:02

cat jumping in the screen. You're seeing, you

11:04

know, the home office. of a CEO

11:07

that you may have never seen. So yeah, I do believe

11:09

we are a little bit more considerate of the human.

11:11

So focus on the person, the human

11:14

experience. We're going to be okay.

11:15

That's where you get the productivity. Yeah. Human.

11:19

So you are a twin.

11:22

Yes. We're at the fun part

11:24

where you are identical twin. Yes.

11:28

What is up when identical twins

11:30

go on dates? What is going on? I mean,

11:33

have you ever, first off, have you ever been

11:35

on a date with another

11:37

set of identical twins?

11:40

Together? No. Have I dated another

11:42

identical twin? Yes, that was weird.

11:45

Let me tell you that.

11:47

That

11:50

is great. That

11:50

was pretty much the only common denominator

11:52

we had in those two dates. And then I was like, I'm out.

11:56

And what was the statistic that you told me earlier?

11:59

I've never seen so many twin couples

12:02

that I've had in Sweden. There must be

12:04

something in the water in the water must be something in the

12:06

water. I think in school we had it was me

12:08

and my sister and at least two other twin couples

12:10

as well. Oh, that is hilarious. Awesome.

12:13

Well, thank you. Suzanne. I'm

12:16

trying. I'm, Hey, I'm coming to Sweden. So

12:18

I got to learn how to, you know, speak some Swedish,

12:21

but thank you so much for coming. I

12:23

appreciate it. Come back anytime and,

12:25

uh, we'll talk to you soon. Love it. Thank you so much.