More engaged employees create a sustainable culture that is built for innovation and change. When you show you’re listening, understanding their issue, and working to help, they’ll give you their best work. In this webinar, we’ll dive deep into four key areas to make this happen for your teams.

1. Leaders Answering the Call to
Action in the Workplace
Hosted By
Cory Hartlen
Director-Client Engagement & Solutioning
@CoryHartlen
Cory.Hartlen@procedureflow.com

2. All Co-Authors of,
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3. Meet Our Speakers
Sangeeta Bhatnagar
GTACC Chair
Top-talent Acquisition/
Human Behavioural Facilitator
Co-founder Security Culture Institute
sangeeta@sbglobal.ca
Afshan Kinder
Partner,
SwitchGear Consulting
afshan@switchgear.ca
Penny St Antoine,
SVP, SF Operations
MCAP Service Corporation
penny.stantoine@mcap.com

4. Todays Agenda
Leaders Answering the Call to Action in the Workplace
Creating a Culture of Engagement
• Active Listening
• Control
• Program Creation
• Experiment
• Wrap up, 3 take-aways from each speaker

5. Active Listening
“Listening is an art that requires
attention over talent, spirit over
ego, others over self.”
-Dean Jackson

6. Active Listening
Questions
• Why it is so important for people to feel like
they are being heard?
• How can we build a culture where people feel
like they are heard and valued?
• How does active listening connect with
emotional intelligence?
• How have you seen active listening make a
difference?

7. Active Listening
• How have you seen active listening make a
difference?
“We can do all the right things in terms of when it
is prescriptive but, it’s when it really counts is when
we, as leaders, step up.”
-Afshan Kinder

8. Active Listening
• Why it is so important for people to feel like
they are being heard?
“I think one of the things is when we are listening to people often, we are
trying to figure out how we are going to answer them. Especially if
someone is bringing up some concerns or pain points. Your brain is busily
trying to think of ways to respond. Instead of thinking of what I’m going to
say back to them, I try to think about from where they are coming from.
Instead of being ready to answer, I’m readier to ask questions. To get down
deeper into what it is they are really saying, what it is the issue, really trying
to understand it, before we get to the action piece. It really makes a big
difference about how everyone feels about the conversation as well. We
can’t always solve things for people but, it is more about being appreciated
and being valued.” - Penny St Antoine

9. Active Listening
• How can we build a culture where people feel
like they are heard and valued?
“We had an issue where all the cutlery was going missing in our
kitchen, it had gotten to a point where we said we wouldn’t be
replacing it. Team members suggested a branded spork that
everyone could put in their own drawer for use when they needed
it. It showed that if we just work with people and ask them some of
the challenges they are facing, I think we’d be surprised at what
solutions people come up with.”
-Penny St Antoine

10. Active Listening
• How does active listening connect with emotional
intelligence?
“It is actually extremely and directly connected. Like what Penny and Afshan are saying, people need to be heard.
So, when we truly listen, not passively listen, and stop what we are doing. How many people come to leaders
when there is a crisis and they leaders say, “yeah, yeah, keep talking, I’m listening” and when we stop what we are
doing and truly look at them and listen, we show them esteem, respect, value. That is the only way we can have
empathy for the person and understand the situation. We use these words when we are training Frontline [staff],
“Oh, have empathy, have active listening.” But then, are we in the leadership/coaching role, displaying that? So,
only through truly active listening, can we feel what whoever is coming to talk to us is feeling and then solve
whatever the problem is. When we think from a personal point of view, everyone has a badge on their forehead,
that says Make Me Feel Important because we’re pulled in so many directions and not everyone has been
validated that day, that minute, whatever and by not listening, we’re not actually showing that we can empathize.
So, the first step is to have that self-awareness, which in Emotional Intelligence is Step One. So, how do we, in
every interaction, listen. What do we give of ourselves in every interaction? And then we can move forward
because they feel that you were listening, you were there, and you cared. You were present. You know that old
saying “People don’t care what you know until they know that you care.” The best way to show that you care is to
truly be there, be present and listen.” -Sangeeta Bhatnagar

11. Control
“The control center of your life,
is your attitude”
-Anon

12. Control
Questions
• Does the level of control vary across
personality types?
• What does it look like in an organization to
share the “control” so team members have a
voice and can feel like they are contributing to
the future of the company and their careers?
• What is it about being in control we all want?

13. Control
• What is it about being in control we all want?
• “I think it is interesting because as leaders, we often are successful because we
are in control yet, that’s not really, at the end of the day, how you want to run
your organization. You want people to have a choice to decide their own life. In
varying degrees, it’s important to different people. If you are a parent, you
already know this, because if you tell your child versus giving them options are
we a versus b, are we going for ice cream or are we going to McDonald’s, what is
your choice. They are much more likely to be happy about making a choice than
you tell them what to do. I think it is no different with adults, we like to have
some control over our work, over our day to day and it is different for everyone
whether it’s having control over my work station, how high it is, the colors, the
sound to how I do my work throughout the day. Do I get to make decisions, or
do I have to go to my boss to get approval? I think we all want it to varying
degrees and how we want it is different. People want to have a voice. They want
to have some say in how they are contributing to the organization. They don’t
want to feel like they are just a number.” --Penny St Antoine

14. Control
• What does it look like in an organization to share
the “control” so team members have a voice and
can feel like they are contributing to the future of
the company and their careers?
“It is really about involving the team in solving issues. Instead of trying to solve the issue at the top of the
house, and I would day previously, we did a lot more of that, we can incorporate more people at all levels. Talk
about how we can all do this and participate in the implementation. Giving them that freedom to choose
rather than us telling them how it’s going to happen. That is a little tricky because it does take more time
because now you’re involving more people. Different levels of people so that they can see how it is going to
affect them but at the end of the day, you end up coming to a much better solution and people are more likely
to get on board with it. They are more likely to be engaged feeling like they were part of this, thinking “I know
what’s going to happen here and I had a say in it. It’s going to work for me.” The other thing that we try and do
is look at what we call FIO Culture. Basically, Figure It Out yourself, learn, make a few mistakes along the way
but, encouraging resourcefulness to find a way. I think it is necessary now that organizations are getting much
leaner and much more focused on efficiency to really foster that kind of environment. “ -Penny St Antoine

15. Control
• Does the level of control vary across personality
types?
“Yes, so, there are four main personality types, depending on what model you use. I talk
about the DISK model of human behavior so, typically people who are more task oriented,
whether they be extrovert or introvert doesn’t really matter but, the people more on the
task side, they typically need, and almost demand, control. They function better when
they have it, versus, people who are more people oriented, they could be quiet, an
introvert or extrovert but, they would need control in a different way. They love a lot of
team work and collaboration, versus some people, that are not so concerned over what
everybody wants. They are not really looking for those “Kumbaya Moments.” If we can
understand what someone’s primary needs are then, you can modify how you show that
you are giving control. Once we understand, we can adapt the words that we use so that
person that you are working with feels that, “Yes, I have control. They are not forcing me
to do something.” Sometimes, it’s just the words that we use that can influence how the
recipient takes the same information. Definitely worth understanding the Task Oriented vs
People Oriented side.” -Sangeeta Bhatnagar

16. Control
• Does the level of control vary across personality
types? -continued
“One of the things we have found helpful in my organizations is to have predictable times
to gather that feedback and have a closed loop in terms of what we did with that
feedback. So, it bleeds a bit into program creation but, I think it is important that not only
do we have Town Hall Meetings or Road Shows, and everybody has that but, one of the
things I used to say is that it’s like renovating a house, we can’t do everything all at the
same time. Sometimes, we must fix the leak. The leaky roof or the leaky basement, before
we start redesigning or refreshing a powder room. We would ask “What are the top three
things that are really important to you?” and we’d work on it for a quarter and keep it very
visible in the center. Having those questions and results available on a board in the lunch
room and backed up electronically really made a difference to employees, made them feel
like their voice really went somewhere is another important part of it.” -Afshan Kinder

17. Program Creation
“The best program in the world
is worthless without the will to
execute it properly, consistently,
and with intensity.”
-John Romaniella

18. Program Creation
Questions
• How do we train leaders to think about
agents through program creation?
• What kind of programs did you create
to drive higher employee engagement?
Results?
• What are the basic components of a
program?

19. Program Creation
• What are the basic components of a
program?
“I personally think Employee Engagement should not be, “Oh, we
have this launch. Oh, we have this program.” It should be a way of
life. It should be common sense that if we foster a culture based on
kindness, generosity, respect for your time. When I say generosity, I
mean be generous with what you give to your team and it all
starts with what we started with, the active listening. And when
we give of ourselves, we give compassion. It’s not just pizza
lunches and we suddenly have engagement so, my point that I
wanted to add in is that it should be how we treat people every
day and with the simple behaviors to create that engaged
culture. “ -Sangeeta Bhatnagar

20. Program Creation
• What are the basic components of a
program? -Continued
“It is a cultural thing. Engagement doesn’t happen through a
program thing that has a series of steps. We implement it and
tick it off our list saying, “We did that.” It’s about how we treat
people on a day to day basis.
Also, we should make people feel like they are learning all the
time and growing all the time. One of the things is setting
expectations. Not everyone may have a career in the call center
but, we give them an education, and we can promise that. We
can have programs that help all employees, ones that offer
mindfulness learning or stress management as opposed to ones
that presume that everyone wants to be promoted and have a
career in the center because not everybody does. It’s making sure
that you are listening to different sets of needs within your
organization.” -Afshan Kinder

21. Program Creation
• What are the basic components of a
program? -Continued
“When we’re looking at programs, it’s not just about us. It’s about
things that people care about. We have a social committee that
covers a lot of things, a lot of fun events but, what it’s also
morphed into is community. Community involvement and
community support. So, we’ve done a lot of different programs
throughout the year of coming together as a team and doing
things to help people outside of our company. So, more care for
our community around us. I think the basic component of any
program that we’re going to do is that there is a basic purpose
that people can rally around, that people care about, whether it’s
an employee engagement program, social or community based.
It includes people from all levels, diversity and I think those are
the critical components of a program. We want to be able to
do something that people care about and are interested in and
that includes everyone. Lastly, hopefully, there is some way
afterwards to measure success.” -Penny St Antoine

22. Program Creation
• What kind of programs did you create to drive
higher employee engagement? Results?
“When I was at ING, we were a sales organization, with the only channel that a customer had, other
than the website, to talk to because it was the virtual bank, and so we actually had a Pay for
Performance program. So, what that meant was that a specific score card. 60% of the team members
would get a variable bonus and it was high because their salaries weren’t that great but, it could be up
to 50% of their salary. What would end up happening is that we’d have a lot of happy people and we’d
have some unhappy people. What we typically did was give everybody some points for anything
[metric] that they met so, even if they didn’t get to the cutoff for the bonus, everybody got something.
That still wasn’t great so, what we decided to do was go back to the team and said, “OK, what would
make a difference for you? Besides getting money, what may be other ways that we can help you?”
They came back with a daily incentive. It was motivating for them. We didn’t really have the
bandwidth, as a leadership team, at the time to figure out what that would be and how would that
work. So, we created what we called the Giveaway Gang. They came up with something that would
really make a difference. It wasn’t big prizes or anything, it was really the action and the act of,
whether it was a $5 dollar to the cafeteria or something like. It helped create a lot of fun in our
organization.” -Afshan Kinder
Results?
So, those that were not necessarily bonusing, they were trying harder and we would
start seeing some better results. -Afshan Kinder

23. Program Creation
• How do we train leaders to think about agents
through program creation?
“I firmly believe it all starts with self-awareness before doing anything because,
only through that humility and that awareness can you roll out anything of
service to your team. The more genuine and giving that the leaders are, that it’s
accepted by the team instead of them thinking “yeah, yeah, it’s just another
program.” Sometimes, you are spending all this money to drive engagement,
where all that is needed was more care. The leaders to be more self-aware with
how they communicate and how they roll out a new idea/new program. So,
being kind and generous are the basics I really believe in, that helps extend any
program.” -Sangeeta Bhatnagar

24. Experimentation
“No wise man tries every day
what he has proved wrong the
day before.”
-James Adams

25. Experimentation
Questions
• You can be your own experiment, how
can you push yourself?
• How do you experiment with out
causing issues to your brand/business?
• Tell us about some experiments that
you tried, results?

26. Experimentation
• Tell us about some experiments that
you tried, results?
“Team Games, our center did a Family Feud game, so directors and
managers and everyone, to be closer to team members instead of just in
meeting rooms and in our offices. The other true experimentation that we
did was with the Pay for Performance program. That was a lot of
experimentation to get it right. Was it 60/40 and we would measure it
against our attrition rates because, at the end of the day, if you don’t have
those hygiene factors that pay people well, you know, you don’t have to
pay the highest salary, you have to give them enough money so that they
can live in a city like Toronto where everything is quite expensive. So, as we
fiddled around with the 60/40 and the points, we would run in such a way
that we could forecast would that change would do to every single team
member. We would give them 2 months’ notice to let them know how the
change would play out and impact them.” -Afshan Kinder

27. Experimentation
• Tell us about some experiments that
you tried, results? - Continued
“So, they might end up making less money but, we’re going to show you
how to get back to where you are. When you have incentive programs and
start changing the parameters and it negatively impacts people, you’ve got
to give them a way of making up the difference, having a plan and having
a path. What is really, important is that leadership meets their commitment
and keeps their promises. What we did is up the salary a little bit, worked
on the Pay for Performance program and then that hygiene factor was in
place and helped to curb some of the attrition. We provided coaching, we
provided fun and that really made a big difference overall.”
-Afshan Kinder

28. Experimentation
• How do you experiment with out causing issues
to your brand/business?
“That’s one of the benefits of having a more collaborative environment is that people have
been coming up with more and more ideas of how to do things differently, whether it is
Customer Service or Processing different things. As you look at some of these ideas, you
may think, “Oh, I don’t know, would that work?”
I think in the old world, they’d be like, “No, we’re not going to risk that.” but, when we’re
being more collaborative, we encourage people to try and learn, we’re willing to try a little
experiment. We’ve done a number of experiments that have gone really well, over the last
few years, whether it’s around Fee Collection, or Texting or the way we collect, and they
seem small and what we’ve done to mitigate any risk to our brand and our business, we
start off really small and just do a few or keep it just to a smaller amount. We kind of try it
out, see what happens and then, you work out the kinks and then as you expand it out
and that’s worked well for us. Instead of just trying to go Big Bang, just try it small, do a
few people or a small amount of money, see what happens and that concept works well
for us. The thing we learn is, Test, Tweak and Adjust, Get Some Feedback and go from
there.” - Penny St Antoine

29. Experimentation
• You can be your own experiment, how
can you push yourself?
“This is fun! I do it for myself and I do it for my clients! The best part is creating your
base, write down your strengths as a leader and, at the same time identify
opportunities where you can improve your own engagement. If we look at those area
humbly and say, “Okay, I need to work on this, this and this.” Commit to one, if we take
it back to our first point, the active listening and just make a commitment that at every
point, no matter who comes, we just stop. Be fully present and engage with them.
Increase our own engagement with every interaction we have with them. Watch what
happens, we didn’t spend a dollar [and engagement improves.] When that happens,
employees know that you stopped, your head was out of your work and you totally got
them. You weren’t listening to respond, you were really seeking to understand the
situation and them. If we go humbly and say there is a big difference in listening and
hearing, and we put that upon ourselves, we will be more engaged with each
interaction and that goes onto who we are engaging with. That is your base for
employee engagement, at every level. So, it all comes to how we treat people. Being
100% present only happens through awareness and accepting that it’s an area we must
improve on. So, we push ourselves to get a little uncomfortable and do what doesn’t
come by instinct.” -Sangeeta Bhatnagar

30. Takeaways
1. Ask yourself if you are willing to give up some control
and be more collaborative to have a more engaged
workforce?
2. Employee engagement is a journey that never ends–we
are learning and changing as we go. It’s not a one and
done project.
3. You have to decide if you want to go fast or have a better
culture. The latter requires more time and patience
Penny St Antoine,
SVP, SF Operations
MCAP Service Corporation
penny.stantoine@mcap.com

31. Takeaways
1. Employee engagement is a culture and not a set of
activities or a program. You lead by example first and
your team will follow.
2. Make sure you have the basics down pat such as a
decent salary, clean bathrooms, a microwave or two in
the lunch that works.
3. Put some fun into your culture. As I always say, when
you make it someone else’s idea, they can’t argue or
find fault with it.
Afshan Kinder
Partner,
SwitchGear Consulting
afshan@switchgear.ca

32. Takeaways
1. Everything starts with being humble enough and
self-aware enough to know your own strengths
as a leader
2. Reflect on your communication style – how you
speak and really how you listen. Does the person
you are speaking with feel heard?
3. Understand that your role is to support your team,
the more you work to serve and appreciate – the
more they will serve the customers.
Sangeeta Bhatnagar
GTACC Chair
Top-talent Acquisition/
Human Behavioural Facilitator
Co-founder Security Culture Institute
sangeeta@sbglobal.ca

33. Leaders Answering the Call to
Action in the Workplace
Questions & Answers

34. Leaders Answering the Call to Action in the
Workplace
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