[00:00:00] How do you help employees understand your brand promise and align their performance and engagement to it? Sometimes organizational silos can make alignment difficult. In this episode, we get a peek behind the curtains and an organization that chose to align three essential and typically distinct functions together, HR and employee experience, client experience and mark.
[00:02:22] My guest is Sherry Evans, who is the senior vice president of people and client experience at a visa wealth in her role for two years, following a merger of three companies into one Sherry and her team are working hard to ensure it's clear for everyone how employee experience is clearly. To customer experience.
[00:02:41] This was a really intriguing conversation with Sherry. She's a very accomplished and business-minded talent leader with a unique perspective. I know you'll appreciate, enjoy. Hello, and welcome back to talent management truths. I'm your host, Lisa Mitchell. And today I'm joined by my guest, Sherry Evans. Sherry is the senior vice president and head of people and client experience for advisor wealth, Sherry, welcome to the show.
[00:03:09] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: Thank you very much for having.
[00:03:11] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: So perhaps you could start by sharing with our listeners a little bit around your background and what you are currently doing in your.
[00:03:20] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: For sure. happy to. So I am by trade a and by background at HR professional started my career in my late twenties. It took me a long time to figure out what it was that I wanted to do. Finally figured out that HR seemed to be the right fit after a bunch of kind of failed attempts at other. But I got there in the end. And, and so I grew my career as a, as an HR professional as a generalist. but I had an opportunity to work for smaller organizations right out of the gate. So I got to learn and see every element of HR, which was a huge benefit for me. So by the time I got to a larger organization, I kind of had all those tools in my toolkit and could navigate relatively well.
[00:03:59] But I was always told I was a little different from other HR folks. I never really knew what that meant. And I think it's because I was very business minded, very business focused, which I think made me really good HR business partner. But then that started to translate into something broader about seven or eight years ago, I finally went and did a, an MBA, which was something that I had been wanting to do.
[00:04:21] And, and procrastinating ranks. I never loved. I love learning, but never loved school. and so I went and did an MBA and that actually opened up my world considerably and started then in my job leading corporate strategy in addition to HR and also a responsibility for the creation of a PMO.
[00:04:40] So I had strategy and execution and people, which was, which was kind of a really cool job. In more recent years the company that I was with at that time merged with two other organizations. And created a new organization called a visa wealth. And my role had then been carved back to just doing the HR stuff, but it was a much bigger HR job than, than I'd had previously, because what we were doing was merging three companies in three very unique cultures.
[00:05:06] And that was a challenge. And you know, something that. Really excited to be part of. And then recently the last two years my role expanded to include and you mentioned my title with client experience. So I have client experience. I have HR and I have marketing. So I've all of those functions together.
[00:05:24] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg:
[00:05:25] Really really interesting. So I'd love to explore this a little bit. So congratulations on the MBA. And I think that, you know, you make a good point about being very business minded, how that is helpful when it comes to being an excellent business partner within HR, because. If from a credibility perspective, earning that trust, being able to speak the language of our, of our internal clients is absolutely imperative.
[00:05:47] So it's so interesting. So you've had a couple of experiences where there was, what you kind of colored outside the lines of people or HR. So the first one with corporate strategy and PMO, and now with client experience in marketing. So I'm curious, I want to hear a bit more about how those three, three functions intersect in your current reality.
[00:06:06] What do you think it is about your skills or about how people see you that, enabled this to happen in two, two different contexts where you had this, this blend of functions that people might not otherwise put together?
[00:06:19] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: It's a good question. You know, think because of. in the first instance I was so incredibly engaged in the organization was excited about where, where we were headed and strategy had kind of bounced around from person to person.
[00:06:32] And I had an opinion and I wanted to help lead the, the process in an effective way. And my boss had said, fine take it. I think you should, you know, why don't you go ahead and, and lead it. And then that sort of became a more permanent situation then also the recognition that we weren't executing as effectively as we could given, all of the great things we were, you know, kind of conjuring around the strategy.
[00:06:52] And so again I caught that one and, and, and it was just sort of a nice fit because it had also become a bit of a cultural piece too. So how do we create a culture that, that supports the ability to effectively access. And we'll kind of align our people to where it was that we were headed from a strategy perspective.
[00:07:08] So it all kind of the stars aligned on that. I think it made sense. It was kind of organic how it grew. And when you know, the merger happened and I, I was asked if, if HR would be enough, I said, of course, of course it would because it's, you know, we're merging three companies. Of course it's incredibly interesting.
[00:07:22] But then we had hired an external consultant to come in and help us kind of reinvent. The, the, the structure could look like beyond the first two years, you know, once we'd kind of gone through the heavy lifting of, of integration of, of these companies, you know, what does that, what does that structure now look like?
[00:07:39] What could it look like? And, and so, I wasn't expecting something to change for me. I knew that we had some. In terms of capabilities in the organization. And so we, we solved, we solve for that, but the wreck, one of the recommendations was, you know, we see an opportunity here because it's sort of a leading practice to bring HR and, and the experience, the client experience together.
[00:08:03] and you've got someone in your HR leader who has the capability to, you know, and has done something, you know, beyond the HR function before here's a recommendation. What do you think and would this work, and I'm lucky enough to have CEO of boss who has, a decent view of talent and, we'd had an opportunity to build a relationship.
[00:08:22] And I know he knew that I was interested in, in more than, than HR alone. So, so yeah, it worked out well, you know, given the recommendation and I think given how I'd showed up to date from that, from that point, so.
[00:08:34] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: Well, and there is such a strong connection between employee experience and client experience. We talked about that earlier, before we hit record. I that's something that's been a huge part of my work, my writing, my teaching How, if we really equip employees and really consider their experience from start to finish from the way we even attract them into an organization than they're going to.
[00:08:57] Be able to take care of that client experience as well. Right. It's going to benefit immediately. So tell us about the marketing connections. So that, that piece coming into play, you called marketing the group that typically has held the pen when it came to client experience and voice of the customer,
[00:09:14] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: Yeah. And, you know, I had an opportunity to educate myself out of the gate and I will say there's one thing that the pandemic offered up. It was the ability to, to go to a bunch of conferences and, and on a virtual basis without having to take the time off work to go do those things. So I was, I was voraciously consuming information about CX and what I found.
[00:09:34] Through the, the various outlets that I was engaging in is a lot of marketing folks. we're responsible for CX or former CMOs. now heads of CX and they're fantastically talented at this. And they've of course, understand client, understand client behavior how to engage.
[00:09:50] And of course there's the creation of brand and the brand promise. And all of those things are incredibly important from an experience perspective. But what was missing from their perspective was the ability to influence the broader organization from a culture perspective in bringing that, the employee experience and how employees function to align with that brand promise.
[00:10:10] So that was sort of that disconnect. And, and what I was hearing from them was that they were challenged with trying to build the right relationship with the head of HR to try and make sure that that those connection points were happening in the. Where they could the creation of culture to support the, the brand promise that was being created.
[00:10:27] So I think the vision to bring, you know, HR and marketing together is a good one because it allows for us to leverage each other's strengths. So they have this, this capability of, creating that brand and understanding clients at a, at a very intimate level. But then you create a CX function in between that sits between marketing and HR.
[00:10:45] And you have the culture, you have the experience and you have that, that brand work and you bring it all together and you have something kind of magical. So, we're still, we're two years into this journey. It's working well, we've we we've had some such heavy lifting to do. Creating brands for the organization.
[00:11:01] Cause we were, we were new four years ago, so we're still kind of just finishing some of that work, but inclusive in that is it an employee brand and a visa brand. So, how do we help employees understand what it is that they do and how the, how, what they do impacts the experience that our clients have of us.
[00:11:18] But before we can even, you know, really expect them to, to show up in a certain way, we also need to make sure that their experience is positive. So, so it's really. It's really, you know, bringing all those, those elements together so that the edX, you know, mirrors positive CX. So you can't have one without the other, in my opinion.
[00:11:36] So, you know, I know we're aligned on that. It it's, I think more and more becoming common for, for organizations to understand that you really need to have your employees on that.
[00:11:46] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: So I'm curious about how you have gone about trying to communicate internally to the phrase I always uses to embed in thread the importance of alignment between CX and E. What does that look like at a visa?
[00:12:02] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: Well, it's, it's it's I mean, and the beauty is I have the communications team as part of my team too, so we can start to just change how we you know, focus some of our internal communications, but for us we created, like I said, that internal. That was an embedded in that was, was a manifesto that really talked about client and their role in, in client and our values and bringing all those elements together.
[00:12:26] And then just making sure that we stay consistent on, on that embedding these expectations into how we rate performance. We've changed up our bonus program as well to include a larger component of the, of the client experience. So. those are some things that I think influenced the behavior, but most of all, it's helping them understand how their individual roles impact the organization, success and client success.
[00:12:50] And that's still a journey that we're on. You know, it's, we've, we've just created CX framework or CX vision, which we're about to operationalize. So that will become a really key component for us too. And included, included in that as obviously, Messaging around our brand promise. So who are we?
[00:13:05] What, what do we want to do? But it's, it's a bit of a journey around kind of, what is it that we'd like to see? Behaviourally how are we going to respond to, how do we show up? And it's going to become a mantra for us to, how do we, how do we embed that in, in the way that everyone is showing up and doing their jobs on a day to day, because it's so important.
[00:13:24] And so we're, you know, recently We launched a video series internally, each executive spoke to the key elements of our strategy. And we're also talking about, we launched a, an employee video really defining our purpose, really getting clear on what it is that we're here to do. but then having divisional and departmental meetings with every employee across the business, that they can really clearly articulate what it is that they're here to do and how that connects to the end goal of, of, of the experience.
[00:13:50] So, it's not something that you, that you, I think very simply put in play it's it's it takes awhile. I think a culture shift takes what it's a couple of years, at least before you kind of get you know, really good at the behavior. But, yeah, so we we've been doing a lot of work to kind of setting up the, you know, the elements of what it is that we need to do.
[00:14:10] And now we're in, the process of, of finally executing on those things. so
[00:14:14] so yeah,
[00:14:14] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: it sounds like, uh, you know, a really multifaceted approach and it's an approach you're choosing to take over time to let, let it kind of let the ideas and the, the the vision settle,
[00:14:24] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: Yeah, Yeah, exactly. You have to, you have to drift for a little while and make sure that everyone's really clear right before, before it becomes kind of the standard.
[00:14:32] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: Yeah. Well, it comes down to absorption rate right there. People are trying to get the job done.
[00:14:37] So, any kind of movement towards that future vision has to. be brought in kind of gradually around the edges, right? Because people only have so much capacity to take it in and, and make sense of it. Make meaning of it all. You know, something you'd mentioned to me earlier as well, when we were chatting was around the work you're doing with career paths and why you took that on.
[00:14:57] But also I would imagine that in career paths, which is a hot topic, let me tell you with, the participants in my talent trust group, How God, I think it's three, maybe even four of them are working on it. And several other clients that I partner with. So it's a, it's a hot topic. And I would think that this whole vision, the CX vision, that connection of CX CX is probably has a place in those career paths and how you get at it.
[00:15:21] Could you tell us a bit about that?
[00:15:22] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: Yeah. When I worked at, a large Canadian retailer we had created a career paths and end, and they were just a thing of beauty. I'm a bit of a geek when it comes to this stuff. It's just a
[00:15:33] thing
[00:15:34] of beauty. I love the idea of no matter where you're standing in an organization, no matter your position.
[00:15:40] If you can, you know, if you have career aspirations, if you kinda, you know, think I'd like to go be the head of marketing, but I'm sitting over here in the call center, how do I get there? Those career paths can really help you, you know, map out what are the steps and the experiences I need to go and obtain B before I could get to that place.
[00:15:57] And I think. That's one of those really great things for employees to envision, especially, you know, as we are faced with, with, you know, great resignation and higher levels of, of turnover. And you know, I was telling you that we've been surveying and, have for a while, and everyone does exit surveys, which are, you know, kind of a lagging indicator.
[00:16:15] But for us, it was really, getting clear on what are the common themes, what are the top three themes? And for us. Better opportunity. Career opportunity was, was the number one reason that people were leaving and, and the second was work-life balance. And so, for us, it was how do we give employees the opportunity?
[00:16:31] And I should also note it was our relatively new employees. So less than three years that were leaving more so than, than longer longer-term folks. So, how do we give those newer employees a really clear understanding of what the opportunities are for. In this organization and because we're still new, I mean, we're still scrambling to try to get everything in place, but I've got someone fantastic on my talent team who has started across the organization and there's just a buzz about it now.
[00:16:56] And we post them on our intranet so that you can start to see that matrix happening. And how do you, if you can vision it envision it. We can help you get there. And of course, then we've got other plans that, assist in the development of talent. Once we identify those folks and we know where people want to go.
[00:17:11] So it's really just giving people a picture of what's possible. And that's the piece I think is, is, is key.
[00:17:18] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: Absolutely. And how, how are people able to, to access these paths? Like w like you said, they can see it on your intranet. what does it look like? Is it, is it just a page and it's path, like, tell, tell us a bit about that, because people actually want to know about the mechanics of this kind of thing.
[00:17:34] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: And I wish I could show you. I know you Lisa know what it looks like, and I'm sure many of your, your, your folks that are listening to this probably engage in these things, but. But yeah, for us, we've just, we've just created it and carved out a space on our intranet where from a talent perspective, we have the space to start to post these, and they're not insignificant in size, depending on how big and how many roles are in a particular division.
[00:17:55] We started with our asset management group who were working away across the business. And when we get into our shared services groups, as all of. We have more roles in shared services than we do in our business lines to support the business. and so I'm excited to see when that's finished, but it's like a matrix.
[00:18:09] You can, you literally see each, each role and the experiences that are required. you can put yourself in any one of those in, you know, move yourself along the path. And so ours is digitized. You can kind of plot yourself along any, any point and understand kind of what are the experiences that you need to be in this role.
[00:18:26] And, and they've been able to able to summarize that I think relatively effectively, but, but yeah, I, you know, it's. I think it really gives people an opportunity to, understand more about the roles in the organization, which is great. and then also what's required once you get, or how do you get, how do you get there?
[00:18:41] Do I need to go do a degree in a particular area? Do I need certain designations? What's important. know, in terms of what are the key pieces of, of experience that you need to, to be successful to get to that place? So, for us, it's, you know, it looks kind of like a matrix at this stage and when we're done.
[00:18:57] So the retailer I was with by the way, was Hudson's bay. It was huge. That organization was huge. And this thing was just enormous. The matrix that had been created for Hudson's bay was enormous. We're not that big. but we have certainly plenty of unique roles. And so, by the time this is done, It'll be big at this stage.
[00:19:12] We're just placing them in on the internet by division. So they're not all connected. We're, we're just showing it, you know, division by division to start with it's. I think we want to get people comfortable with what it is and how to navigate through it so they can take a look. But but yeah, so, we're
[00:19:26] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: is going to be maintenance,
[00:19:28] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: yeah, exactly.
[00:19:29] Updating it as the
[00:19:30] roles change as the business evolves. Yeah, for sure.
[00:19:32] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: Yeah. That's always been tough in my experience. Right. Isn't it's making sure that we keep them relevant and current so that people keep availing themselves of these as resources. So, yeah. So, so you talked about, you know, what the exit surveys and that you have, you know, I know you have been impacted as many have by the great resignation to varying degrees in different locations.
[00:19:51] And as you're trying to stem the tide, so you're looking at the data you're seeing, you know, it's for other opportunities. So it's market competitiveness, right. Especially with the pandemic. You, you told me earlier, you just, you know, like the work just went. Out of the stratosphere and, and you had to hire, and so work-life balance was, tricky because there was so much volume in the system.
[00:20:09] And then you've done, you've done something about pay as well. Tell us a little bit about how you're working on work-life balance on that particular one.
[00:20:17] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: Well, it's a tricky one. And, you know, as you mentioned, as we talked about earlier, when the pandemic hit, our volumes became just, we had, we saw unprecedented growth, which we were very fortunate for because I know other organizations and other industries weren't as fortunate. And so we were certainly counting our blessings, but the challenge was we couldn't hire people fast enough to keep up with the volume of the demand.
[00:20:38] And that was problematic because we were hiring a lot of, people in our operations and service center. So not our highest pay bands. and we were really burning people out because the volumes were great and there was a ton of overtime. And it was really difficult to keep up. And as I mentioned, we were still a relatively new organization and had come through the integration and we were about to pivot, to think about the next stage in our evolution, which included digitization and the pandemic hit right around that time.
[00:21:06] So, that really gave us Motivation. and the ability to start to focus, we brought in a third-party partner to help us from an implementation perspective, but we've started now on this digital transformation journey. And the first area that we started to do that with is our operations and service center groups, because that's where we have biggest pain points.
[00:21:24] And that's where our clients are experiencing the biggest pain points as well. So, yeah, we've started to digitize our processes, you know, really tightening things up and giving employees better tools. So that includes giving them agile training, giving them, you know, training on, on new ways of doing things making their jobs easier to do.
[00:21:42] Part of that experience is it should be easy to work here. If it's not easy to work here, it's probably not even easy to do business with us. So, so it's really understanding kind of that. It starts with our employees, giving them the tools they need and, and really, taking three companies worth of processes and really starting to really, truly refine them, but digitize them and create scalable technology and processes.
[00:22:03] So that in the event that we do have ups and downs and we always will, these things are cyclical. we're ready for it. And so we're, we're actually. I think five or six months into this journey now we started to see you know, an uptake in how we're able to deliver. We had a great RSP season which was not the case.
[00:22:20] The last.
[00:22:21] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: Okay.
[00:22:21] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: And so, from a service perspective. And so we're starting to get good feedback and from the employees as well, who were saying that they're enjoying the work more, they're getting an opportunity to do different things and to see opportunity in a different way in the organization. So I think that's important.
[00:22:34] That's the first part of the journey. And so you asked about work-life balance. this should enable us to, to allow people to take vacation. Fully
[00:22:41] you know, right. And, and, and, and we've really carved back over time. We're asking that we don't, you know, unless we really, really need to have it.
[00:22:48] Let's not have overtime be a regular thing. It shouldn't be that someone has to work late every day. That's the sign of a problem. So, so how are we managing that? That's something that's a key focus for us because we need to not burn people out. People are a valuable resource, especially in a very tight labor market where you can't just go get more people and that you don't want to be known for that.
[00:23:08] That's not who, you know, as a Canadian financial services organization who we want to be.
[00:23:13] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: Well, and I think there's a greater consciousness now of, the problem that is burnout. It's a spread problem. And I think people are acknowledging it, speaking out more about their own experiences with it. So there's a greater understanding that. This isn't shouldn't be normal.
[00:23:28] So it's interesting that you're taking steps to try to to help people help themselves a little bit. It sounds like. Yeah, cause it's, it's all too easy to get swept up and never take a break and then everything suffers, right. That sense of productivity, belonging engagement at all slips.
[00:23:45] So being proactive is the way.
[00:23:47] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: Yeah. And at working from home just adds an extra element of complication around that for people be. Let's face it in the beginning, there was nothing else to do. So we might as well work. You know, they couldn't go out and do anything. So, but that it's not sustainable. It just isn't. And to your point, we've hired newer people.
[00:24:03] They've never met their coworkers in person we've learned to onboard people effectively. By way of a virtual, but is it truly as impactful as it is? It could or should be. And we've decided to go with a flexible work environment. So we're not pushing people back. We're letting people decide what works for them.
[00:24:18] with the caveat that there may be times that we say, Hey, listen, we're going to have a brainstorm session. And we're going to, you know, ask folks to come in and do something in the office. But that's not going to be our, our regular way forward. It's going to be really an employee's choice.
[00:24:31] They've proven they can be productive, but how do we give them better tools and the ability to, to disconnect? And of course, we've got the right to disconnect legislation. That's about to go live in Ontario, right?
[00:24:40] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. I was talking about that with a group. I was facilitating some training a couple of weeks ago, it's interesting, right? It just, it just underscores how widespread the problem has become, right. That, that the government's actually legislating something
[00:24:52] like that. So the flexible return to work or policy is in your organization, which is that kind of considered hybrid where, Some people will be completely at home all the time or everybody's coming in part of the time. How have you managed that?
[00:25:07] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: So initially we were going to do hybrid and we'd gone through, we rated all the positions across the business in terms of flexibility, how flexible is one role versus another, or, by level as well. And. We created team agreements across every division so that every, every division had sort of come up with a plan around, you know, are we going to go in the office Tuesdays and Wednesdays?
[00:25:30] Or like, you know, just Tuesdays or Tuesday, every other Tuesday, what does that look like? And, through the conversations we were having, it became clear that as much as employees were willing to do it that there just was a level of discussing. For two perspectives, one health and safety.
[00:25:47] Sure. Not everyone is at the same level of readiness to return. And to what's the reason I'm in the office. What am I doing? What is that purpose? And that's, I think the most important question, which is. Why are you going to, you know, push people back into an office environment? Of course, seeing people in person, you know, there's, there's that element of, you know, collaboration.
[00:26:06] But we've learned how to collaborate. Online does that intangible when you, when you meet people in person and get that sense of them and those, informal conversations that happen when you're walking by somebody, which is, I think something that most of us miss, but what is the true purpose for having people in the office and.
[00:26:22] You know, I don't think we have a good answer to that in, in the way that we need to at the stage on a consistent basis. And we want to listen to our employees. So what we decided to do was shift away from hybrid and create a flexible environment where, like I said, It's up to the employee to choose with the, like I said, the caveat that there may be times when a leader says, Hey, listen, we're going to do something in person.
[00:26:42] So we'd like you to be there. but for us, we're going to try it out. And that's what we're, that's just the place we're in, which is, we don't know the full answer. Let's see how it works. We're going to revisit in the fall. And we'll take some feedback throughout what's working. What's not kind of do that.
[00:26:57] Keep, stop, start, then just iterate as we learn things and take it from there.
[00:27:01] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: Well, I appreciate that answer because I think, you know, there. Things can shift. Right. We've seen that they can shift on a dime and so go as far as you can see, and then go further. Right. You know, right now this seems like the right move you've listened to your people. It sounds like they really been heard.
[00:27:17] And your Korean. You know, the, the framework based on that. And then you can shift and adjust if, if things change right down the road and you've got a plan. Yeah. Excellent. Well, so we're coming near the end of our time together. It just flew of course, always. So I was wanting to ask you one last question, which is around you know, you've had a really interesting career and I'm wondering, what would you say has been the biggest kind of life lesson from that career that you've had.
[00:27:45] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: Wow. That's a big question. for me, I'm working with people and the unpredictability of people and the unpredictability of business and, and sort of, you know, how those things intersect. For me, it's about learning to be patient learning, to be someone who listens and Takes a moment before reacting.
[00:28:06] I was so, you know, action focused for so long in my career. I wanted to make sure that I was stayed on top of things, but what I've, I think learned in at least the last kind of, you know, five to 10 is to take a moment and process and. And not react right away and, you know, gather as much information as possible before, you know, really moving forward with, with a plan.
[00:28:27] So for me, it's, and I'm not a patient person, but it's about, just taking the time to, cause I want to get things right. And I want things to be, to be perfect, but they can't be. And so you have to judge. Do what you can when you can with, with all the information that you have and do the best that you can.
[00:28:45] So for me, it's, there's a bunch of things in there I think, to unpack, but patients and listening skills and, and, you know, not, not having to be perfect or right. All the time.
[00:28:55] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: Well, and what a relief, to, to, to realize that and, and to, to kind of live into it, which it sounds like what you're doing. Right. And, you know, instead of fighting the unpredictability of people in business it's to, to accept that, to, to expect it and behave accordingly, right. Yeah. Excellent.
[00:29:15] Excellent. That's really helpful, great insights and nuggets of wisdom there. So thank you for that. Well, thank you once again for coming on the show, Sherry, it's been such a pleasure to spend time with you.
[00:29:25] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--guest243796--sherri-evans: Well, thank you, Lisa. I've enjoyed this very much. The time really did fly. You promised it would, but it really did.
[00:29:31] sherri-evans_recording-1_2022-05-25--t07-02-14pm--61157a395affa4006d0cfc64--lollyg: Thanks again.
