The Work Wire
SHRM CEO Johnny C. Taylor, Jr. and Bob Goodwin, President at Career Club, host a lively conversation on how the latest news impacts all things work-related.
The Work Wire
Civil Conversations - The Work Wire
Join us for a thought-provoking episode of The Work Wire, featuring Bob Goodwin, President of Career Club, and Johnny C. Taylor, Jr., President and CEO of SHRM. Dive into a compelling conversation about fostering civility in the workplace amidst increasing social and political tensions. Bob and Johnny explore the challenges of workplace toxicity, highlighting the shift from traditional issues like discrimination to modern concerns such as political discord.
Discover SHRM’s ambitious initiative to promote one million civil conversations, aiming to transform workplace culture and, by extension, broader societal interactions. Learn about practical strategies to encourage respectful discourse and understand the powerful role HR professionals can play in shaping a more civil, understanding workplace environment. Tune in to gain valuable insights into turning conflict into constructive dialogue and why promoting diversity goes beyond surface-level differences.
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Bob Goodwin:Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of the Work Wire. I'm Bob Goodwin, president of Career Club, joined by my good friend, the president and CEO of SHRM, Johnny C Taylor Jr. Johnny, good morning, how are you?
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:I'm doing really well, bob. So good to see you this wonderful spring day. I actually think today is the first now, yesterday was the first day of spring.
Bob Goodwin:There you go happy spring to you as well. Yeah, spring has sprung. I'm in cincinnati and, uh, I can see the trees starting to bud and blossom. I think I gotta cut my grass this weekend, so I think I got to cut my grass this weekend, but anyway, it's great to see you. I hope you've had a great week I have, and you Awesome. So today's topic we talk about workplace issues and all that kind of stuff, but at the end of the day, it's a people-to-people endeavor, right, and it's one-on-one. And SHRM has launched a new initiative around having 1 million civil conversations and I would love to unpack that with you. What is civility? What is uncivility? Why this initiative? Why now? But do you mind just sort of kind of at least introducing the topic to folks?
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:Yeah. So it's really interesting. In 2019, pre-pandemic, which sounds like a hundred years ago, right For those of us who lived through it we started doing some research on workplace toxicity and, for those of you who know, shrm has a big research team and we're one of the themes we get some insights was that people were describing work as toxic and we thought toxic was sexual harassment, race discrimination, ace discrimination. We kind of thought that would be it. But back in 2019, an interesting new insight sort of popped up and that was people were having problems at work around political discourse, in particular, political affiliation, diversity of perspective and they said that was the new area, not of discrimination although what they described as discrimination but incivility when someone did not share your beliefs or your worldview or your perspective, they would become outright uncivil. So we started to pull that thread and follow the research. Well, of course, we want to do it year after year to see if there was some trending, especially as we entered an election year. But the pandemic happened, so a whole bunch of things played out in complicated life. Well, we came back this year and we have been capturing the data, but in 2023, no surprise, the incivility increased, the toxicity in the workplace increased and we were curious about why. So we've done a lot with some data on what we think is going on and the what. What exactly is occurring, but, more importantly, what are we going to do about it?
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:Out of that came this idea that the human resource profession, where we have essentially 161 million people every day who go to work, even if it's working remotely, as a captive audience that's half of the US society.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:So the idea is we can actually influence, perhaps the broader society around civility, respect, the ability to agree, disagree rather, but not be disagreeable that we can do that in the workplace, because it's one of the few places where, aside from the courts, we actually have jurisdiction to penalize you, right, if you don't engage in this kind of behavior, then we have the ability for there to be consequences, whereas you can typically be rude, disrespectful, uncivil to people without consequence, right? So that's where the idea was born and we said just imagine, imagine if we could have. It's the beginning 161 million people in a 335 million person country and a globe of $8 billion, 8 billion people. We know that 1 million may actually seem like a small number. I think it's significant because you're building a new behavior in people and the idea is that be civil toward each other, especially in my mind. When I heard about million civil conversations one I thought the number was small I said why not to 100?
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:million Surprise. John Taylor thought that. But then what I really thought was important was if I could qualify. I'd say, have a million civil conversations with someone you actually know you don't agree with. That's the real driver here is having conversations. We all I can talk with Bob. You forever Love you. I agree with you 99.5% Like. But what if we could have conversations? What if I found someone who I thought was actually very different than me and saw the world differently, and made myself develop the muscle, that muscle that can have a civil conversation?
Bob Goodwin:Yeah, so let's, let's kind of I you said I really like one that's data driven right. And so we and and I really really liked that it was a surprising data point, that it wasn't just confirming kind of what we thought we would find in the data, but something new kind of popped up as we talk about incivility. What does that look like? I mean, I know it's not a test, I've got it written down but, like on your website, there were five different kinds of behaviors that were identified as incivil or uncivil.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:What's the negative of civil I often say I like incivility as a word. I think the word it might be uncivil. We'll go, not civil, Not civil. How about?
Bob Goodwin:that. But what are some of the things? Let's just double click on that for a minute and help people see what's below this term of not civil, uncivil behavior.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:So you're looking at the website, you tell me. I know them all, but yeah, I mean the first is no-transcript physical disagreements at work. That's arguably the most uncivil of all is to actually play that out in fisticuffs. And there are others, I'm sure.
Bob Goodwin:So there was just being disrespectful, interrupting, excessive monitoring and micromanaging, which I think is really interesting, the one that you just said with ignoring, and then the last one. I guess fighting would fall under this, this definition. But unprofessional body language, how about?
Speaker 1:that yeah so?
Bob Goodwin:so you know, as, as we're in a presidential election here, um, I read a statistic yesterday I think this is a Gallup poll but the broad number is like 25% of people would not want to work at a company that does not share their political views, and then, with Gen Z, that was 45%, yes, which to me is sort of like seeking homogeneity. Rather than you know, and I love how you all do this you don't say DEI, you say IED than you know, and I love how y'all do this. You don't say DEI, you say IED. But you know inclusion and like no, I want to be around things and I want to include people who don't necessarily see the world the way that I do, and yet we see that there's a pretty big chunk of people out there like, no, I'm very tribal, I really kind of only want to be around people that see things, and does that drive some of the incivility that we see? Do you think?
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:Well, of course it does, and it's interesting because it's I've challenged people who who sort of respond that way. I respect and understand their point of view, but I explained to them. I thought you were the very person who said you valued diversity. I thought you were the very person who said you value diversity, diversity isn't is, by definition, about difference.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:Right, and so you should. We're valuing people who actually see the world differently. We make that case all the time. It's why we think diversity is so great for business. It's because having people who have different points of view, different ways of seeing the world, will make you have a better product, a better service, be better to your customers, et cetera. So that's the very thing that we all thought was like the thing Right. All of a sudden, you don't want that. But here's a more interesting one, at least from my perspective. When we talk about this, when you say you only want to be at a place that with which you are aligned, with its political values or what have you, or any number of values, you do so because you are seeking belonging and you know where I'm gonna go right.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:In some ways, all of this work about making people feel like they belong is the opposite of diversity. Right, because if you, yeah, I naturally belong or feel like I belong better when I'm with my family members because I know them, we have shared values experiences that's an easy one. Your values experiences that's an easy one. I am not unhappy when I'm outside of my family, but I feel like I belong less, and I think all of us have been on. So the problem is the pursuit of belonging could in some ways run afoul the goals of diversity, and that's what you've described to me is and I got one other fact to it that I find fascinating ABC News did a poll now a year, maybe two years ago, about a year ago where they found that college sophomores said that they I mean more, it was right at about a half half or a little, maybe more than half said I would not want to room with someone who was of a different political viewpoint and affiliation.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:Now just think about that for as many victory laps we take right About how great this new generation is and how they embrace diversity, et cetera. Yeah, in some ways, different dimensions of diversity, they're better on race, they're better on gender, but they're not so good on this other dimension of diversity called viewpoint diversity.
Bob Goodwin:Yeah, but to your point. That's the irony of the whole thing. But it's what I appreciate about kind of unpacking this with you, Johnny, because it's not linear, it's much more complicated than that. And so we say we want diversity, but the kinds of diversity we're already comfortable with.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:That, which is why we're forcing these conversations. We're trying to force people to have civil conversations and, as I said, my modifier this is not Sherm has a million conversations, no matter what civil, civil conversations. I actually am challenging people really push it right. Instead of doing five push-ups, do ten. Right. We want to do push-ups, but do ten, and the ten is when you go have a civil conversation with someone who you are likely to want to be uncivil with, right and that's.
Bob Goodwin:That's a you know we haven't said this word yet, but I think that's very relevant to this, which is empathy and seeking to understand another person's point of view, not just to have a platform for my point of view. Right, and what is the? I think it's Stephen Covey, but you know, if you seek to be understood, seek to understand first. It's like I want to understand where you're coming from first, okay, and then maybe I get new information, a new appreciation, but something that then I've kind of earned the right now to share, maybe where I'm coming from, but this belonging. I am so glad you brought this up because you know, as I said earlier, we tend to be tribal. I mean, just look at human history.
Bob Goodwin:We, we are a tribal species, right, and so we generally are yeah, fair enough right birds of a feather and all that, but but in the workplace you have got, you know, a heterogeneous group of people together and it's interesting. It's sort of the intolerance of tolerance used to be an expression, but I like it when you're different, except when I don't like it when you're different. And I think that what you're saying is this viewpoint issue is really important. So let's activate this a little bit. How would that conversation so I know that my colleague is for the. Let's just talk about the presidential election, because that's easy is for the other candidate. Whoever I'm for, they're for the other person, right? And how do I engage in a quote, civil conversation when I feel like I'm actually just lighting a fuse for a bomb that's going to go off?
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:Context matters and literally place matters right. So one of the things that I've encouraged at SHRM, a couple of things even in my own workplace, I've said I will actually buy you lunch, the company will buy you lunch if you'll go to lunch with someone you don't know. So it's just something as small as that. See, the temptation is, if I said we'll pay for your lunch today, we go to lunch with someone we know, and we generally go with groups of people we know, and so thus the belonging thing, yeah, you've come back from lunch feeling better, but we haven't advanced the organization's goals of inclusion, which is making us, this diverse workforce, work together so that everyone feels like they're included. So just a tactical thing I've done is encouraged employees. If you go to lunch with someone who is different than you and you know, on viewpoint, on gender, on race, name it I'll actually pick up the tab. People managers can do that. I've done that. It's not a sherm white thing.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:I've encouraged it. We do it in our departments. We'll go to, and so something as simple as that going to dinner, going to lunch with someone who is different than you and you're going to learn frankly about those differences. The other thing that we strongly encourage people to do and I think is to actually, if you know where someone stands, go grab a cup of coffee, walk around, go see. I just want to understand I start with, make me understand how you feel about X. You're going to vote for trump, I'm voting for biden, or vice versa? Let's talk about it. Why the question? Why is so powerful? That little three letter word is so powerful? And listen to understand, not to respond right to really please repeat that, johnny.
Bob Goodwin:That is the whole thing.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:Hey, you can all of it. Unless you can't hear it, you're going to hear it. So the question is so tell me, why are you going to support Biden and not with judgment, not with anything and not with interruption, but hear the person out. There may be a very logical reason that that person's voting for candidate A, but that you won't because you don't have the same value systems in that regard.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:This doesn't matter to you, it matters to that person. Got it, check, but hear them out so that you can actually understand. That's the root of this empathy thing that I've been talking about for a long time. The empathy gap, the empathy deficit, is that we don't do it.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:We're ready to tell you and we always want to respond right, like yeah, but no, hear them out and then, to be fair, explain why You're not trying to win them over. Just explain why you select a different candidate and go a different path, and that goes a long way. Now you've got to have guardrails and rules, and that's some of what you'll see on the website, on that microsite, where we tell you you have to have rules of engagement, including listen, to learn and understand, but also, no matter what someone says, as appalling as you might find it, you cannot take this personally or it defeats the whole game. And I'm going to I can't just tell you a very personal. I didn't plan to tell you this, but I would tell you.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:So I had an, an employee who once I I learned that he had some really negative comments about African-Americans on his time, you know. So it wasn't at work, it wasn't the subject of an EEOC complaint or whatever, but I learned that this is who this person was and or at least what they said online. And I called them and I said you know, I really understand what prompted you to say that online about black people. I thought you and I were good, right, what's going on here? And it wasn't the conversation, wasn't. You're horrible for saying that. I can't believe you did that. I felt that when I first read it. Actually, what I felt when I first read it was disbelief. I thought maybe this is a deep fake scam.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:There's no way you said that, but I took it for what it was and I approached him and I said, not from a place of judgment or power as your CEO. I'm not threatening your job. I want to understand where that comes from. And, without giving you all of the gory details, I walked away, not justifying how this person felt, but understanding, after having been beaten up several times, as in you know, growing up, by people who looked like me One or two particular bullies, and, by the way, they could have looked like you, they could have looked like my sister, but that framed his worldview. And we began to talk and have conversations and I said got, got it.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:Those two were bad guys, happened to be that they were black, but they could have been anything else. I'm a good guy. You've experienced me for four to five years and I've been nothing but good and you've been good to me. So what can we do together to get past? I mean, we are all products of all of our experiences, right? So I'm not going to pretend like that didn't occur in your life and that you don't have some deeply, deeply rooted issues and anger issues with people who look like me. No judgment here. What can I help you do, if I'm just kind to you. And I got to tell you.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:This person said that was such a defining moment for them. That was such a defining moment for them. I don't know how this all worked out, but I know for that moment we were more civil and that very conversation could have gone quite sideways. I could have received the data. I'm not on social media, so someone told me about it. We don't hire people like that. Instead, I took a very different approach. It was about civility. Again, for those who are out there, oh Johnny, you're just rational. No, I'm not rationalizing anything. I'm saying I have my own issues and we all have our issues. All of us have biases and, frankly, some prejudices and we have to work through those. And grace and mercy says if I have some things I need to work on, then clearly I need to be willing to let other people work on things right yes, so.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:So I'm sorry that I went off, but it was that was.
Bob Goodwin:That was amazing, because it's real and and it was exactly what we're talking about. It was was a very polemic kind of a thing in the workplace environment that you could have attacked him. Yep, it might have just been purely emotional, righteous and didn't. And so back to your word. Why? Because I think so much of this hinges on that. This is seeking to understand. It's assuming good intent. Yes, Right.
Bob Goodwin:Like you're not a bad person, right, and I think that understanding like help me understand, but it's like being a two-year-old. It's asking that like two and three layers deep. Yep, that is really interesting, john. You know where did that come from? Tell me more about that.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:And be ready to hear where it came from.
Bob Goodwin:What you don't understand is my mother, when she first came to this country, experienced X, oh Right. But we live in an MSNBC, fox News era kind of a world where it's not a conversation if it's not a debate, right, and it's not, you know, interesting unless you're at some extreme of it. And yet what we're talking about is no, I want to understand you like, and we will likely walk away from this conversation not agreeing on that issue. But at least I now understand better. There's a book, this guy's Roger Fisher. He wrote the book Getting to yes. You're the Lawyer on the Call, you know, are you familiar with this book? Getting to yes? Right, and I think they were originally kind of coining win-win and all that stuff. But what I took away from that a long time ago is that, rather than be focused on the person's position, understand their principles.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:Oh, I like, I like.
Bob Goodwin:Like this is what I want. Okay, can you help me understand why that's what you want? Well, you know, I've got this pressure, that pressure, this other thing's happening. I did this before I got burned, so this is why I'm demanding what I'm demanding. But when you can unpack it and kind of get past the surface and really back to why, tell me why you feel this way, tell me why this is what you want, you find that there's maybe a creative solution. And again, in a civil, civil conversation we're not trying to persuade anyone of anything that's the talking over waiting for you to be quiet so I can say what I want to say, because I'm actually ignoring you, um, but but this getting it, that just helped me understand, because I genuinely want to understand. I think it's huge.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:I think that's really kind of what revolves around well, and that's at the crux, I mean at the root of this entire you cannot have a civil conversation. I'm going to say something that I I'm thinking through as I say it. So, guys, you all are seeing me live ID. You can't have a civil conversation, I've. You can't have a civil conversation if it isn't rooted in the why, because otherwise I'm just here to win the debate. Exactly, that's what I'm saying, exactly Louder than you. I'm going to be ruder than you.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:I'm going to be more dehumanizing, like that's how you take someone down in a fairly brutal battle, and our society has really devolved into that on almost every issue. See, it's not just politics. In fact, everything has become politics. I mean, race is politics, religion is politics, this is politics. Everything has become political, that we know how you think, because you're right or because you're left, and so everything has become political. And in that context, the gloves can come off and let's face itacterizing, intentionally something that occurred and both sides have done it right, both sides.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:I remembered, you know, former President Trump's name calling everyone Childish, puerile, totally out of order. I also remember Vice President Harris taking the context of now President Biden, then candidate Biden's supporting busing at the time, and turning that into like you can totally, totally take any situation and flip it and both sides have done it and all that does is lead to more incivility. So we really have to step back and say, first of all, incivility. So we really have to step back and say, first of all, reasonable minds can disagree. In fact, reasonable minds oftentimes do disagree. It's all in the house. So we went from the why to the how.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:If we solve for those two things, how do we speak to each other as human beings, we're not animals. I love watching television. I'm a big Nat Geo guy and you see the two rams that disagree and they lock heads and they fight until or a bear and one walks away, all sliced up. We're better than that. We're at the top of that chain, right? Human beings should not have to walk away with you showing scars from a disagreement. But we've gotten there and we've gotten there've gotten there and we've gotten there because of media. We've gotten there because of culture in organizations where we allow, as CEOs, that behavior to occur. We have to do better than that period.
Bob Goodwin:So let's and I want to be mindful of the time, but let's just sort of imagine I walk into the coffee room at Sherm and two other people are making coffee and they make some very derogatory comment about Trump's a criminal. Biden is out of his mind, like whatever the issue is, and I'm like, yeah, man, like anybody that would vote for them is a feeling, your favorite curse word is an idiot. How would in one million civil conversations, could we diffuse that or redirect that kind of a conversation to be more civil?
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:Yeah, and I've actually been in that situation when I've heard someone going off on Biden's age and I walked up and I said do you have grandparents going off on you know, biden's age? And I walked up and I said do you have grandparents? You know, at some point they are a little bit more forgetful. It might be 70 for some, 90 for others, whatever. Yeah, I started, I appealed to empathy to say how would you like if someone were attacking your grandpa or your grandma who's doing their best? And again, this is this isn't about vote for whom. Whatever you want to vote, that's on you, vote on the issues.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:But to make generalized statements about older Americans and to mock them for getting old something all of us hope we get to write the alternatives not particularly attractive and it was really interesting because you just and it wasn't judgment filled. I could have said I'm gonna report you to HR for that. It wasn't. It was like dude, I really thought about that. Is that the right way for us to talk about and treat other people? And you get these aha moments from people they're like, I guess so. So that's what I do is I confront it.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:And I found that in confronting, it's not about judging the person. They're going to judge themselves, believe me, whether they do it openly to me or back home that night, but it's making them see the other side of it, see the other human being on the other side of it. And it may be your colleague who's standing there, who's got a grandparent, for example, who's experiencing dementia or Alzheimer's, and so you don't even know that, in the process of you attacking what you think is just a political figure, you're now really creating angst and anxiety for your colleague. And so, when you put it that way, it's amazing how you diffuse it. So it's not significant.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:It's not a power play of the CEO telling me oh, he must be a Trumper if he's sitting or he must be supportive of Biden if he comes in and defends an attack. Like no, no, no, it's none of that. It's about the humanity in us and whether that and one day, just keep waking up. My grandmother would always say keep waking up. My grandmother would always say keep waking up All of the things that you're. One day, you will find yourself having to live up front with all of that.
Speaker 1:I was in.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:Birmingham, alabama.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:I tell you real quickly, yesterday and we were it was a big discussion on it was actually Wednesday, the days of blurring together about the formerly incarcerated real easy in this environment where the headlines remind us every day that crime is out of control in various cities around the country, to get really, really tough on crime and not see people who've made mistakes as people and to forever want to resentence them, including not giving them opportunities to find new jobs.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:It was amazing just sitting there listening to the conversations and I said you know, maybe I should think a little differently about it. I'm a law and order guy and I told the audience that when I was there I said to me if you commit the crime, you serve the time. I'm real simple. But as I listened to these people and understood from there and I had to truly listen because it was literally, it was against everything that I fundamentally kind of believe in, the law and order mentality that I left there changed and I was able to allow them to express themselves and I expressed myself, but always civilly. This is possible, but you've got to commit to doing it.
Bob Goodwin:One other word that pops into my head, and we'll wrap up in just a second, is humility.
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:Maybe they don't know everything.
Bob Goodwin:Oh, fancy that, maybe there is another point of view here that's worth taking into consideration, and I do feel strongly about X issue, whatever it is, but I'm open to learning something different, and humility seems to be a quality that is actually viewed as weakness. Right, and unless I'm, just like you know, loud and proud on whatever my issue is, well, you're not a true believer and whatever it's like no, I may not have all the information to be honest, or maybe there's a different way of seeing this, but you know, humility and empathy, I think, go really hand in hand.
Bob Goodwin:yeah and so, um, if people want to learn more about how to drive 1 million civil conversations, what can they do?
Johnny C. Taylor Jr.:well, you same site. You're looking at shermorg. We have a great, and I'll just get to shermorg. I could give you the 1 million. So just shermorgorg, click on it. And this is available to anyone, not just members or HR professionals, but anyone too. And we have, as you pointed out, we have resources, so we have data that tells you what we know is happening in your workplace. We have research to tell you what you can do about it and then tools that you can actually use to implement. We have the 1 million civil card, the conversation cards, mugs where you actually sit down and have tea or coffee or whatever you want. But, yeah, just tons of resources to unpack it. I would just say and thank you, bob, for giving us the opportunity to talk about this. It feels like a big Sherm commercial, but it's not. It's about our society, it's about humanity and that word that you mentioned at the end humility is everything, it's everything, yeah.
Bob Goodwin:So again, I appreciate. I mean, it's so easy to provide the platform for this because it's such an important thing. We spend so much time at work and we want to enjoy our time at work. We want to enjoy the people that we work with. Work, we want to enjoy the people that we work with and at a time when you know there's artificial or augmented intelligence and all that, this is the real human intelligence piece that you guys advocate to get to roi, and so I appreciate everything, all the resources and the prestige that sherm brings to the workplace, getting behind something that makes it just more civil, and that's a high order good that you guys are seeking. So, thank you, absolutely Good to see you. Good to see you, johnny.
Bob Goodwin:Thanks everybody for checking in, Not the you Come on now. We got to be the W.
Bob Goodwin:Thanks everybody for taking a few minutes out of your day and we hope that our conversation today motivates you to maybe just ask a couple more questions, give a couple less answers, seek to understand and be the model, the leader at your company, wherever your workplace is, to have more civil conversations when you see something, to defuse a potentially volatile situation and just model the kind of behavior that is a society that we would all want to live in. So again, johnny, thank you so much for your leadership in this. Thank you everybody for listening and we appreciate your time. We'll see you on the next episode of the World Wire.
Speaker 1:See you then. Check out careerclub for personalized help with your job search. Visit shrmorg to become part of the largest human resources organization worldwide.
