Employee Engagement and Finding a Job in a New Country
In this episode of my YouTube Channel interview series, I had the privilege to interview Jeff Smith, CEO of SupportingLines Institute. I asked him questions about his morning routine, the difficulties of immigrants finding their first job in Canada, and the importance of employee engagement.
Jeff is a seasoned executive and founder of the SupportingLines Institute. His mission is to inspire leaders and help teams perform so that millions of people become engaged in their work. Jeff has over 20 years of experience in sales, finance, people & culture with operations across multiple industries.
Jeff is a Certified Executive Coach, and Certified Dharma Yoga Instructor. His approach to relationships has generated $8 billion in the new revenue and supported the integration of $10 billion in mergers & acquisitions. He believes that great leaders see supporting lines, not reporting lines. He joined the SupportingLines framework over several years while helping many teams improve performance and increase engagement.
Below are some of the questions I asked Jeff Smith at the end of May 2019 which you can find at my YouTube Channel
Tell us more about yourself and why you ended up creating the SupportingLines Institute?
Jeff Smith: I started this company in January 2018, and at that point, we were a number of coaches. We had a simple purpose in mind, trying to engage millions of people in the work.
I’m at a stage in my career where I’ve been, C suite executive. I’ve been a global sales VP and a billion-dollar company. I’m a certified executive coach and certified yoga instructor. There is a whole bunch of things that came together, that have really helped me understand, how I can be a better leader. This also helped me to identify how I can help other people be better leaders.
When I was at Mobify, I found that there was a big focus on how I could help other people be better leaders. Some of the things we did there were, we created different tools people could use. We created different processes, things people can use, and it was really working. Engagement went up, we were getting better at achieving goals. All the programs are putting in, they were helpful for people, that was the feedback I was getting.
I loved working at Mobify and I’ve loved working at the other companies it just felt like it was time at this point in my career, I had something to share with many people. I want to help coaches expand their practicing, by giving them something that is a clear offering. Collectively, then leaders, coaches, companies who work with, we are trying to do is help lift engagement for millions of people because 85% of the world’s population is not engaged in their work.
I think the biggest struggle in creating the institute was, it’s kind of the ongoing one. I needed to balance my time between content creation, for the program, and to be focused on business development. At the same time, paying the bills through delivering, coaching, workshops, training, that sort of stuff. Trying to find the right balance between those three is hard because I enjoy all of them. It is just how do I move the ball forward each week. Keeping in mind not over-invest in any one of these areas, at the expense of others.
Do you have any morning rituals that you adhere to? If yes, can you tell us about that?
Jeff Smith: I wake up super early at five o’clock, which gives me about a two-hour window there where I can get a lot of stuff done. Once a day begins, it doesn’t matter whether you’re a C suite executive or hold a frontline job, time flys very fast. I find if I do not get a good base to the day, I am not as effective all day.
My ideal morning starts at 5 AM, where I get some things done. It could be personal administration, things that could be stuck for the business. I also have got a good window to have my coffee, get some stuff out the door. Then, I like to practice yoga, I did get in about 40 minutes. I find for me that it is about the right amount of time. After that, I tend to go into my day more grounded. Everyone around me benefits from that, I just get myself more settled.
Why I do yoga? It’s a combination of recharging, as well as just kind of really smoothing things out. I’m a very high energy intense person. For me, it just slows me down a little more to make me more effective. I started yoga, mainly for physical practice. I’ve traveled a lot due to my role as a global sales up, five out of nine weeks, I was all over the world everywhere from Norway, Australia, Brazil,…etc. I just got to the point where I was getting a little bit broken physically.
I started doing yoga as part of trying to really like to open my shoulders. This had the added benefit of getting back to some good physical health. Over time, what I realized is, yoga has more of a spiritual element to it and my practice got deeper.
There are a lot of immigrants coming to Canada, and a lot of them are searching for a job. We all know that finding a job is a full-time role, and sometimes you get frustrated. In your experience, what tips do you have for people to stay motivated, why searching for a job?
Jeff Smith: I think the first thing I would say is that – and this is for anybody looking for work – is that it’s going to take time. You don’t find a job in a week or two, it’s a multi-month process.
For recruiters, getting and screen resumes are important, but it is one of many other things. If someone is looking for work, especially if they are not working, it’s like their most important thing. I think the biggest thing I found useful for me was just remembering that the reason someone may not be getting back to me for a week is that they might have been traveling or maybe had something else going on. Just understanding, people may be on a different time frame or have a different level of urgency.
The other one is, I did at different points I was looking at roles outside of Vancouver and other places. The challenge is that I did not have a network out there. The big thing is that there are extra obstacles if you’re new to the country, one thing you can do is go to networking events. I would say to everyone, just pick what sector you’d like to be in, pick the type of companies reach out to companies, go for coffee, go to events where you think that the right type of company is going to be at and just go meet some people.
A lot of times, you are going to find a better, more appropriate role for yourself, if you go find it yourself. You can also use recruiting firms if you are new to a city that can be challenging as well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErDIFk05cL0&t=6s
The other thing that led to work for me was a contract job. I spent six years at Crystal Decisions, then Business Objects, after that SAP, and one company kept buying the other ones. I started on a five-week contract and then that turned into a six-year career. It comes down to trying to find ways to get out and meet people try to find ways to just get doing something.
Finally, do not make your job search consuming all your time. I got into a rhythm where in the morning, I do all my career-related stuff. Then, I look at what new things were posted, then followed up with people that already talked to or reply to emails. After that, I took the afternoon off, I made sure that I am using that time for me because it’s not often that we have periods of time where we’re not working.
I believe that the SupportingLines Institute is all about employee engagement. What can companies do to increase employee engagement? Why is that so important in today’s workplace?
Jeff Smith: The first thing I always do is to get people to say what they think engagement is. In my opinion, you are engaged in your work, you love your work, and you’re able to reach those targets. The majority of our times we are in our workplace, and it’s kind of a second home for us. We need to be able to have those deep, honest, and authentic relationships with coworkers, supervisors so that it is not just that I’m here just for work. I’m here my whole self for the work.
You have to like your job, that’s definitely part of it, at least the work you’re doing needs to somehow motivated to you and that could be the work itself now, or it could be that it’s taking you somewhere, but so there’s engagement in your work.
The other thing that the research shows is that its people will be growing. There is some sort of professional and personal development, people need to feel like they are thriving, they’re growing or in a fertile environment.
The final one is, we need to be achieving meaningful goals. If all three of those are in place, you’re going to have high engagement, if any one of them increases, you’ll have an increase in engagement, even if it goes from low engagement to just a little bit higher. For example, if you’re in a toxic environment, but the company starts hitting amazing goals, that’s going to lift engagement, there’s still going to be lots to do. It will not be like high engagement, but you will see it move forward. The key is to try to move all three of those things forward.