The show’s guest in this episode is Mckenna Sweazey. She is an author, speaker and marketer. She is based in Silicon Valley and is obsessed with helping people harness Digital Empathy at work.

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Helping People Harness Digital Empathy at Work with Mckenna Sweazey

Hey, everybody, it’s so exciting to be here live with you today. I, I love I have to say, we started doing the podcast live in September. And I’ve just loved doing it live, it creates a little excitement in my life, sometimes a little thrill when things don’t go perfectly, and I just loved being here live with you. And I’ve been thinking I had somebody booked some time with me, and just to talk a little bit about leadership trying to figure it out. And they were trying to figure out, like, how do you learn how to lead people? How do you how do you do that. And I ended up sort of sharing some things with them that I thought I might share with you. One of the things is that, when you find yourself trying to find tasks to do for someone that you’ve hired, is, maybe you’re not passing them big enough buckets is what I always say, like, make sure you’re passing them a big enough bucket. And then once you pass in that big bucket, you may think, well, they don’t know how to do that big bucket. And then you become the best member of their team. And you show up maybe daily, I, when I hire somebody new, I meet with them daily, maybe for just five minutes to make sure they don’t have any bottlenecks or need any decisions or need feedback, just so they have really good feedback loops when they start so that they can really scale up quickly and be on brand, they get a lot of information, if they meet with me. If they’re reporting to me, if they’re not reporting to me, then they should meet with whoever they’re reporting with daily, just to check in so that they steer the ship in the right direction in the early days.

And I also want to talk for just a second about our Leadership Essentials Program. I believe you can find that on my website, MelanieParish.com. There’s a Leadership Essentials tab. And I would love for you to look at that if you want to learn how to lead better. It’s a time of year that people sort of take a breath, they might have summer. And that program is really all about helping people learn how to lead. I’ve had people who are in accounting, who are like, Man, I went to undergrad to learn accounting. And then I got, you know, became a CPA and I spent all these years getting a master’s degree. And I did that for about three years. And then now I’m a leader, and nobody ever taught me how to do that. So the Leadership Essentials Program is all about helping people learn to lead a team. And I love the program. And I just think it’s so hard to learn how to lead and how to think about leading. And it’s really hard to feel good about leadership in the early days when people are first starting to do that. And life is really different when you can feel good about what you do.

And I am so excited about our guest today. Her name is Mckenna Sweazey, and she’s a speaker marketer. And she’s based in Silicon Valley. And she is obsessed with helping people harness digital empathy at work. And she has a book out called How to Win Friends and manage remotely. I am so excited to get to talk to McKenna today.

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Welcome to the show.

Hi, Melanie, I am delighted to be here.

Yeah, it’s great to have you here. And I know that you’ve done leadership in your life, how did you learn how to lead?

By trial and error? I think that, for better or worse. And this is how I got to this moment in time about talking about digital empathy is that I am very concerned with other people’s feelings. And that is a good thing and a bad thing as a leader. And that I think helped me to watch even before I was a manager and think, okay, is that how I would have done it? And I was always taking notes and always trying to think, you know, when I’m in that position, who needs to know what what would I have done differently. And I think the best managers I’ve seen and heard people talk about, you know, mate, you know, to be an A plus plus is probably a combination of all things but you can be pretty good as a manager if you’re just trying to think about being transparent and acknowledging your team’s feelings and not always trying to babysit them and make them happy, but acknowledge the feelings and and, you know, people’s feelings are relevant and they’re real, and they should be taken into account even though it’s not your job to make people happy as a manager.

Well, and I think it’s so funny, I’ve noticed this you know, I noticed myself when I became the boss See, and and I’ve seen it in others to where they think because of the boss, they have to be in charge. And they forget that they think that being the boss means telling people what to do or getting mad at people if they’re not performing or you know, and, and I always think of that sort of profile the person who’s mad if it’s not going their way as somebody who doesn’t know what else to do in leadership. So I love the idea of just, you know, fall back on empathy. If you don’t know what else to do fall back on empathy, that’s a better strategy. Go much better, you know, can’t go much better than that.

Exactly.

A modern approach based on classic management styles for working and managing people remotely.

I really love that. Yeah, and and tell us more about your book, I’m excited with this idea of how to win friends and manage remotely.

So the whole book is kind of it’s very practical and pragmatic. And it’s really divided into three parts. The first part is, you know, what do you need to do to be able to be empathetic? And I think in remote work, there are some very practical things, some of which are obvious, some of which are not about your calendar, your circadian rhythm. When do you get things done? When do you not? How transparent do you need to be? When you’re in a bad mood, you should tell people because you know, they’re only getting a tiny pinprick of information in that one zoom call. But it is very clear that you’re in a bad mood, and they don’t know why. So how to put your best self out there, which is both for managers and managers and everyone.

Can you give an example like, what would you say like, I’m in a bad mood today? Or?

Yeah, so I think, you know, we’ve forgotten that in an office. It’s extremely intimate sitting next to someone is so intimate. And if someone comes in and they’re over one or half, and they slam their bags down, and they put their coffee and they spill it. And you know, the very clear example is they have giant spill of coffee down your shirt, you know exactly why they’re in a bad mood. Without that spill, maybe you don’t have as many clues. But then you hear them on the phone and their mother in law’s doing XYZ, and you’re painting this picture of why this person’s in this grumpy mood. And then when they are a little Curt with you, you can say, You know what, they were pretty rude. They were pretty grumpy earlier, maybe I’m just gonna let that slide. But if it’s only the Zoom call, that’s 20 minutes, and they’re a little Curt. And you think Well, is it me? Do they not like what I did? Is it something I should know about? Are we all being fired? I don’t know. Obviously, you can tell that I’m very worried about these things. And so I think being absolutely transparent about that, you know, it depends on how intimate a workplace you’re in your sort of natural proclivity, some people are going to tell you the whole spiel, oh, I was just on the phone, my mother in law and blah, blah, blah. And those people are probably, in many ways easy at find it easy to forge remote work bonds, because they’re willing to put themselves out there so much. Some people find that a lot harder. But even saying I’ve had a kind of a crummy morning. Pardon, if I’m a little Curt, you know, if you use Slack, it can easily go in Slack. Hey, guys, having a rough morning. Apologies if my slack seem delayed, or you’re getting any weird vibes from me, you don’t need to over explain it. It’s really up to you. But it is true. And studies have proven that humans definitely pick up on emotional cues, even from small text messages and small, you know, text only communication like email. So if you’re not careful to give context, which we’ve lost from being in remote work, then you risk the risk putting emotions out there that you didn’t intend to or portraying things. Sorry, I don’t know if you can hear the child that’s losing it out there. But anyways, okay, just revealed something about my day.

Thanks for the competency and letting us know what’s going on. Any cultural competency, like, you know, different cultures have different comfort levels or different, you know, is there anything we need to apply or be aware of here around that?

I think that’s absolutely true. And I’ve worked in a lot of global roles and with different people in different regions, and I’ve run into this a million times. And some of it fits neatly into stereotypes. And of course, some of it is you are just you and it doesn’t matter that you are Canadian, or from Wichita, Kansas, if you are the kind of person you are. So I think getting teams together. And my big thing is sort of walking through the cultural etiquette in your organization of the communication tools you use, and giving examples and having people feel free to anonymously or publicly say things that they’ve seen that they’ve loved or haven’t loved in the way that communication happens. And in a really great functioning, global organization, it would be good to say okay, and how does this apply to like how you think your culture dictates US versus Do you, particularly if you have to sort of offices working a lot together, you know, a French office in in New York office, and you are going to run into that a lot of things, spelling it out. But giving people also room to spell out their own personal preference, because as much as we are affected by our culture, we’re also an individual.

I love that. I think that’s really interesting. And at what else do you see? Like, how is how is remote work changing? You know, we’re a couple of years in now to pandemic or we post, like, I see changes happening, we’re more like, hybrid. Now in some environments, what do you see?

I think for better or worse, wrote the book on the assumption that we were going to be hybrid again. And I do think for a lot of organizations, that is going to be true to some degree, whether or not that’s remote 90% of the time with, you know, an off site every month or every quarter, or it’s going to be three days a week or more in the office. And while there are differences between those, you know, making sure that you are remote first is a good base level, and that the technology is aligned to remote first, because you’re always gonna have people who are remote at that point, people whose family.

I don’t know what remote first means.

Well, that you design everything on the idea that were remote. So that even if you’re in the office, the the so as an example, depending different companies have different conference software in the conference rooms, and sometimes it’s much better than others. And in a place where there is not a great multiple set of microphones. So you know that if you’re on a conference room, the people sitting on either edge are not going to really make it into the audio, and you still have five people who are on video, then you should be taking that from your desk, each person dialed in from a laptop. Because if they can’t be equitable for the people that are in different locations, then you shouldn’t do it at all like that. Because then there’s no point in having remote workers, they’re going to be so left out, you know, 20% of the words that are said in that conference room. So really making sure that you do things with the idea that the remote work is like the baseline and in person is bonus?

And what about if people are choosing to stay remote? For whatever reason? Yeah, yes. Like, should you be ultra accommodating them? At the expense of in person work? Or? I’m just curious.

And it’s a really tough question. My feeling is that this will shake out with time, and that there will be companies that are extremely accommodating of remote first remote only, and that there will be companies who are saying, you know, actually, our preference really is in office. And of course, we’ll accommodate you, but we are not going to do everything possible to make it work for you. I think it also really depends on the role. And that’s a little bit self selecting, if you are a terrific graphic designer, and your aspiration is just to create beautiful things. And it can it’s very project based, it might be easier to do that remote only, it’s much harder to be a remote manager, when a lot of the team is in the office, I mean, borderline impossible. If everyone’s in the office to really be better than something you can’t be a good manager, but are you better than the person who is in the office. So I think, you know, with time, we’ll find that that might be better, if you want to do that you should be doing it at a remote organization. And that some people will find that preference, and that’ll be great for everyone. Because, yes, for their huge number of people who have very deep preferences on either side of the spectrum, and we should let them work together. I’ll be the first one back in the office, I really don’t like working remotely. And I think it’s because a lot of hand gestures in their last outside screen, trying to tell a story with my whole body. So I belong in the office, but there are people who don’t gesture as much and maybe don’t want to go to the office. So I think things that’ll shake out with time. And but for now, I think that’s kind of the idea of remote first that we should be kind of bending over backwards. Because people are getting back to the idea we’re getting more comfortable things are sort of not settled yet.

I heard a story recently of a university department, which they’re back in person teaching and they have been for some time, but their meetings, there’s a larger portion of people who don’t want to show up for faculty meetings. And so they’re they’ve taken to ordering really enticing snacks. They can entice people back to the office, which I found sort of clever.

I think we will need incentives in the short term as a reminder of what you can get done and why it’s worth giving up. You know, not commuting, not wearing trousers, whatever.

I love the word trousers.

I lived in England for seven years. So it’s a very important distinction.

That’s a great word. So when you friends, so I imagine there’s play in this word, you know, the wind, friends, and management. But when we think of winning friends, what meaning do you attach to that phrase in your book?

So I think that remote work requires and digital empathy is what enables finding real connection with your colleagues. And that is both provides joy at work for a lot of people. And it makes it a lot easier to get your work done. miscommunications happen, because people don’t have the correct context. There’s been a lot of studies that sort of low grade, social bonds are hugely important for innovation. And I’m sure you’ve seen a lot of that information that, you know, if you, if people are having lunch with different people, ideas passed within an organization more easily. And that allows teams to come together and coalesce and CO create great things, those sort of water cooler moments. And those water cooler moments happen for lack of a better term amongst friends, you know, people that you know, and that you want to share with and Hey, what are you working on. So being able the kind of person who can connect with people remotely, and I’ve sort of joked around about, but you know, it’s easier if you’re willing to go on and share your story of your children vomiting this morning, or whatever an exciting thing has happened. But finding ways to create that connection in a way that feels authentic for you, and it’s something you’re comfortable sharing. Other people are comfortable hearing this, you know, this is really important for getting modern work done.

Yeah, I think that’s really interesting. I’ve, I’ve found, we, I have a tiny team, there’s three of us. And we meet once a week, unless I’m traveling, and I’ve been traveling a ton, so we haven’t met much. And sometimes we’re up to big things. And they’re very gritty, like, let’s go, we got to talk about business kind of meetings. But lately, we’re sort of business as usual. So I’m really busy coaching. They’re really busy doing what they do, but we don’t have a lot of touch points in our meeting. So we’ve really just been chatting about, you know, I found out about elections in the Philippines this week. And that was really interesting. And, and so. And then I Simon like, almost simultaneously while we’re having these meetings, like several meetings that were kind of just a lot of chatting, there was some guy, you know, some cisgendered, white dude on talk, who was talking about how he never takes a meeting unless he knows what the agenda is. And he just rubbed me the wrong way. And so I’ve been thinking about him a lot. And I’ve been thinking about like, how, at first I was like, well, that’s kind of smart. And then I was like, No, that’s not who I am. And, and then I was trying to I’ve been trying to think about why. And it’s, it’s like, because I want to be a human being. I want to have work connections, I want to have people in my life that I like to work with, I want to have conversations, I don’t want it to all be productivity in my life. Because all work and no play makes me a really boring person. And I want to know, the people I work with, I don’t I don’t I work remotely. Number one, the two people I work with, I never see. Yeah, I’ve worked with one of them for two years, and one of them for seven years. And I’ve met one of them in person twice, you know, and so it’s, it’s, um, I want to have those moments of connection. And I’ve been trying to think about why and it’s, it’s really just joy really just comes down to pure joy. It’s not about productivity, maybe we have better ideas together, but also just quality of life for myself. Yeah. And, and so I think it’s really interesting that, you know, it may be we have better ideas together. But we certainly have longevity together. And we certainly enjoy our work more. And, you know, I think also we know how to care for each other and so we know how to care for our clients, which I think is so important.

But I have to ask, well, and I guess I will get away from this guy’s personal tone of delivery, which you know, is important to home deliveries. It’s very, very clearly pointed out matters a lot. I completely agree with both of those statements. So one, I do not like to go to meetings that do not have an agenda to joy and the community element are incredibly important. And I don’t think they’re mutually exclusive. I think having check ins that are just how are you is a perfectly reasonable way to schedule a meeting? I think this a lot, you know, I think there are people who perceive this with networking a lot. And they think, Oh, if there’s no goal to the networking, I don’t want to take the meeting. And, and I, whenever I have networking type calls, I just want to find out how do you think about the thing that we’re thinking about? What What’s your perspective? Who are you talking to? And that is my goal. And it’s just so what are you thinking? And maybe actually, even with a, you know, professional, chit chat calls? So what are you thinking about what we’re thinking about now, which might be the elections in the Philippines, it might be this guy on to Excel or whatever. But, but I think being explicit, even when it’s just just I say, just I should not have said that, even when it’s social first is important. And if it’s not social first, the agenda thing is the most beyond the most critical point of meetings, you know, why are we here? What are we doing? And can we leave when we’re done?

It’s interesting because I certainly wouldn’t want someone to put themselves on my calendar that I didn’t have a relationship with, just to chit chat. So there, there’s there’s a short list of people who could put themselves on my calendar. And go, so how are you doing? Yeah. Want to know what the agenda?

See, you do want to know what the agenda is?

Well, I mean, my first response was, Oh, that’s cool. And then my second response was, oh, maybe not like, I mean, so. So there is I have ambivalence there with you. I agree with you. There’s, it’s like, yes. And I don’t want to just be that person.

Exactly. And, and that’s, we’ve lost so much of that, by chance meetings, you know, talk a lot about feedback, and how to give feedback in a virtual environment. Because if you and I are in a meeting, and you give a presentation, and let’s just say I’m your manager, and 90% is great, but there’s some key things I thought could be better. If we walk out of the meeting together, and I said, that was great. You know, next time, let’s redo slides, 33 and 34. I think we could hit them differently. And then later in our one on one, we sort of come back to like, what we can do better. That is a low. What’s the term I’m looking for? And I’m not getting your fear response up, because it’s quick, it’s intimate, and it doesn’t hold a lot of weight. If I schedule a meeting for you right after the meeting, and I just put agenda discuss presentation from this morning, you’re gonna be like, what, what does that mean? What does that mean? It’s completely without context, what went wrong, our assumption is, in the absence of information or something, is negative information. And so we lack that like, quick, easy freedom. And you can only do it often by a text. And so then when you’re sending a Slack, that’s a whole level of intimacy, less intimacy, you know, not a great way to give feedback often, depending on you know, how sensitive it is. So that on the fly, and that on the fly, chit chat back to the water cooler moments, you just schedule those water cooler moments, we have to water cooler moment for 15 minutes a week, or else we won’t do it.

Yeah, if I miss all those little ad hoc conversations, I went to church this weekend. I’m a Unitarian. So it’s not very serious. It’s it’s, you know, low key church. We don’t even know coffee, our point of church leave and it’s like, Oh, okay. Good coffee hour, or you know, it’s all those moments. And I’m hoping I’m hoping we gather those moments again, soon.

I think one thing I would love to see, and I think they are building one sort of near where I live, is that even someone else’s office even let’s not say we work, but a group office is nice, where you go and you sit in a cubby next to people that you kind of know and even if you’re not working together, you can walk out and get coffee and how are you and how are the kids? How’s the dog? What are you doing for Mother’s Day, whatever. That I hope to see more of that. I do think that work from home work from home for people who live in sort of suburban environments is unnecessary. We you can have places where you can go and work with it might have a quick and easy commute.

I’ve been working at home for 20 years, so…

but some people self select.

I feel like I’ve worked from home, but I’ve never worked from home so much. You know, I used to do I did a lot more like go and work a day with a client. Exactly her and I’ve done so little of that the last two years like I miss that. The team day I’ve done team days, but they’ve been on, you know, virtual and, and so I’ve missed that work that that sort of being being with team being in that environment. Where can people find you McKenna?

if I may add mckennasweazey.com, which is relatively hard to spell, but I’m sure it’ll be in the show notes. Obviously, I have obviously I have a sub stack and, and my book is coming out. It’s actually available for preorder now.

Title of your book one more time, we’re and people can find it like on Amazon?

It’s How to Win Friends and Manage Remotely.

Perfect. Thank you so much for being here. It’s been a joy to get to spend time with you. I hope your children start feeling better soon. Thank you. Yeah, we all have more empathy in our work.

Indeed. All right. Thanks, Melanie.

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Really fun to be here with McKenna Sweazey. And I really love this idea of, if you’re having a bad day, go ahead and let people know it’s a different kind of feedback loop, which I talked about in the experimental leader book. But I love the idea that if we wonder what people think we’re thinking, we just tell them, let people know how we’re feeling what we’re experiencing so that we increase their knowledge of what’s going on, we decrease the chaos a little bit in those interpersonal relationships, especially in an online environment, because the online environment increases chaos increases the not knowing. And it allows us to have empathy for each other. It allows us to have a better sense of reality so that we don’t make things up. The absence of knowledge has people make up what they think is happening, and often, we’re just wrong. So knowing having a story to start with that is, at least based on some kind of facts is really helpful. I really challenge you to think about where you can up your empathy, either at home or work this week, and go experiment.

Important Links: 

• Mckenna Sweazey – website
• Mckenna Sweazey – LinkedIn

Mckenna Sweazey

Mckenna Sweazey is a Digital Empathy and remote work expert and author.

With a career spent working in global organizations, from corporates to start-ups, managing remote teams around the world, she’s refined her communication skills to be as effective in person as from 6,000 miles away.

Her book, How to Win Friends and Manage Remotely, is coming this fall from Career Press.

She’s also currently the VP of Marketing at a data start-up in Silicon Valley.

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