Transparency is a cornerstone of empathetic culture. And when it comes to the labor market, pay scales, and required skills, the more information you can get, the more confident you feel in making decisions- whether you’re a hiring manager or a job seeker.
What do workers today want? What kind of benefits are the most appealing in competitive markets? How are others at this level getting compensated? Where is the best talent for our organization and what skills do they need?
Turns out data-based decision-making can actually be a very empathetic approach to being a more human-centered organization.
My guest is Cary Sparrow and we discuss what the data show workers today want (and it’s not all about pay!), the barriers to connecting the right talent with career opportunities, and the mindset getting in the way of organizations competing effectively for top talent. Cary shares his own empathetic leadership model in how he set up his team to support employees with broader life needs and how that resulted in finding great talent, keeping them, and making the company successful. Cary also offers practical next steps to help leaders navigate change and embrace what the data show they need to do to succeed in today’s labor market.
To access the episode transcript, please scroll down below.
Key Takeaways:
- What employees want has shifted significantly over the last few years, largely stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Transparency around pay is now an expectation from job seekers, even if your state does not require it.
- You have to have data on the workers in your market. What workers need in NYC or LA, is likely going to be different than those in much smaller towns.
- People in untapped talent markets were able to participate in the workforce more during the pandemic when things were fully remote than ever before.
“Employees are much more interested in understanding what is available to them for benefits and working conditions, more than they have been in the past, compared to salaries.” — Cary Sparrow
Episode References:
- The Empathy Edge Podcast Episodes:
- Rhonda George-Denniston: Why Betting on Your People Leads to Market Domination
- Jessica Swank: How Box Navigates the New World of Work
- Anna Litotta: Understanding Generational CODES
From Our Partner:
SparkEffect partners with organizations to unlock the full potential of their greatest asset: their people. Through their tailored assessments and expert coaching at every level, SparkEffect helps organizations manage change, sustain growth, and chart a path to a brighter future.
Go to sparkeffect.com/edge now and download your complimentary Professional and Organizational Alignment Review today.
About Cary Sparrow, Founder & CEO, Wagescape
Cary Sparrow helps HR professionals and consulting firms to predict the future of pay. He is also a former US Navy officer who served on several nuclear submarines. 35+ years (combined) of engineering, military, consulting, technology, and operations leadership in achieving organizational growth makes him a guest of value to HR leaders and other decision-makers wanting to navigate the labor market, in today’s rapidly growing access to remote work and digital promptness. Here’s his one-sheet: https://legendarypodcasts.com/cary-sparrow/
Connect with Cary:
WageScape: wagescape.com
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/carysparrow
Connect with Maria:
Get the podcast and book: TheEmpathyEdge.com
Learn more about Maria and her work: Red-Slice.com
Hire Maria to speak at your next event: Red-Slice.com/Speaker-Maria-Ross
Take my LinkedIn Learning Course! Leading with Empathy
LinkedIn: Maria Ross
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FULL TRANSCRIPT:
Welcome to the empathy edge podcast, the show that proves why cash flow, creativity and compassion are not mutually exclusive. I’m your host, Maria Ross, I’m a speaker, author, mom, facilitator and empathy advocate. And here you’ll meet trailblazing leaders and executives, authors and experts who embrace empathy to achieve radical success. We discuss all facets of empathy, from trends and research to the future of work to how to heal societal divisions and collaborate more effectively. Our goal is to redefine success and prove that empathy isn’t just good for society, it’s great for business. Transparency is a cornerstone of empathetic culture, and when it comes to the labor market, pay scales and required skills, the more information you can get, the more confident you feel in making decisions, whether you’re a hiring manager or a job seeker. So what do workers today want? What kind of benefits are the most appealing and competitive markets? How are others at this level getting compensated? Where is the best talent for our organization and what skills do they need? Turns out, data based decision making can actually be a very empathetic approach to being a more human centered organization. My guest is Cary Sparrow, founder and CEO of wagescape. Wagescape provides labor market intelligence, helping HR professionals and consulting firms better understand the labor market to predict the future of pay. He’s also a former US Navy officer who served on several nuclear submarines his 35 plus years combined of engineering, military consulting, technology and operations leadership in achieving organizational growth makes him a valuable advisor to HR leaders and other decision makers wanting to navigate the labor market in today’s rapidly growing access to remote work and digital promptness. Today, we discuss what the data show workers today want, and it’s not all about pay, the barriers to connecting the right talent with career opportunities and the mindset getting in the way of organizations competing effectively for top talent. Cary shares his own empathetic leadership model in how he set up his team to support employees with broader life needs, and how that resulted in finding great talent, keeping them and making the company successful. Cary also offers practical next steps to help leaders navigate change and embrace what the data show they need to be doing to be successful in today’s labor market full of gems today, take a listen. Welcome Cary Sparrow to the empathy edge podcast. So glad to have you here today.
Cary Sparrow 02:50
Thanks a lot, Maria. It’s a pleasure to be here.
Maria Ross 02:53
So we were just jibber jabbering before we started recording about like mutual ties with Minneapolis and the work that you’re doing around you know that you’re doing with wages scape, and how you’re supporting companies and consultants that are interested in trends in the labor market. And I want to talk a little bit, I want to take a step back and ask you how you got into this work, because you founded this company, so what was sort of the empathetic need that you discovered in the market that led to the creation of wagescape. So
Cary Sparrow 03:22
I founded wagescape Back in 2015 after coming out of several careers. So I started in the military as a submarine officer. I then went into management consulting. I then went into corporate America and was responsible for building out global HR infrastructure in a really large company, and along the way, always had a kind of natural disposition for finding new opportunities, for creating businesses and bringing new solutions to audiences that needed them. And I also had a really deep passion for unlocking the potential of talent anywhere. And coupled with that passion was kind of a pretty profound disdain for a lot of the ways that companies unfortunately stifle talent, and along the way, saw that one of the biggest barriers to connecting talent with career opportunities, connecting businesses with talent that could really help drive their own competitiveness was data, was data about what’s going on in the marketplace. I can, we could spend a whole other episode on why market data is so bad and the problems that presents. But basically, you know, if you’ve got a huge market and it’s really inefficient because there’s really poor information, you’re doing two, you’re doing lots of things wrong, but there’s a couple of facts of that in particular. One is a huge amount of inefficiency, which means that it takes more money and more people to do things that should be able to be done, you know, in a much more streamline way. But even more important than that is you’re stifling innovation. You are really preventing. Seeing the ability for folks to connect dots in ways that have never been connected before, and to create new ways to serve, you know, their customers, serve their audiences, serve their communities, and that’s what I saw with the waiver market, and we saw a better way to do it. And so I founded wagescape to pursue that with the idea that we would help companies, communities, individuals, you know, find ways to be much more innovative in terms of the jobs and careers that they can pursue, the ability to, you know, find and then grow the skills that companies need and so forth. And that’s basically been our guiding star ever since we started, right
Maria Ross 05:33
well, and it’s so apparent that transparency is a part of compassion. I’ve talked about that in my books and in other podcast episodes, this idea of sharing information because that not knowing is so disorienting for people, whether you’re the hiring manager or the talent, it’s not empathetic to keep people in the dark about where they’re going and leaving them stumbling around. And so I’m really struck by this idea of leveraging technology as a compassionate practice to give people the information they need so that they can find a mutually beneficial solution, right? So the hiring manager can find the right person and the talent can find the right opportunity. Yep,
Cary Sparrow 06:17
exactly right. And it goes even beyond that, and looking at kind of what are the systems, you know, and for example, the labor market touches every aspect of our life. It touches every individual, every family, every community, every government, every organization, every country, in very profound ways, every minute of every day. And so giving communities the ability to see, where are we attracting businesses, or where do we have, you know, capabilities within our population that could be, you know, given better opportunities from a career standpoint, helping governments make policies, helping universities figure out how to best serve, you know, their constituents, and educate and bring up the skills of their students. All of these are things that depend on a perspective of what’s happening in the labor market. And as I mentioned to start this off, the information that people are using to make those decisions is really very, very poor by any objective standard,
Maria Ross 07:08
and it runs the gamut. It’s not just transparency around pay. It’s transparency around what skills are in demand right now, right? It’s transparency around what are workers looking for. Yep. And so I’m curious your take what the data shows. I mean, I know what I’m out talking about in terms of what employees want, but what does the data show employees want in their culture and in their leaders and in their jobs? Well, there’s
Cary Sparrow 07:32
the what employees want has really shifted in the last few years, and a catalyst for that, obviously, was the pandemic. So, you know, we can start with the ones that are most obvious, in terms of work flexibility. Companies recognize, because they had to, that they could structure remote you know, remote organizations, employees, meanwhile, realize that they could contribute and be productive and valued in ways that didn’t depend on them having to commute two hours plus a day in cities, having them, you know, not spend as much money on their wardrobes, having them not spend as much money on, you know, extra home care arrangements with their families and so forth, and build in a lot more flexibility. And so that’s kind of an expectation, I think now, I think that companies are struggling with that, but employees definitely understand what the benefit to their lives are. I think transparency around pay is an expectation that is now a reality. It’s pretty clear, as we talk with our own clients who are recruiting firms that not having pay in your pay ranges in your job ads, whether your state requires it or not, really limits the number of job seekers that will even pay attention, will even bother to open your ad. If they don’t see a pay range right in the, you know, in the headline of the ad, they just skip right over it. And then, like I said, that’s not something that was driven by law, although lots of laws are moving in that direction now, but it’s driven by employee preferences, and they recognize that there are lots of jobs out there and lots of employers. I think that there’s a bit of back and forth and a bit of maturity that is developing around how individuals expect to be able to contribute in organizations, and the support that they have around those. And I think there’s pretty high expectations there. Or, you know, being able to learn and have a an ability to contribute. I think in some cases, to be honest with you, those expectations go beyond the experience, you know, that the folks have actually earned. And so there’s a little bit of sorting out that’s going on there. But employees are our employers are absolutely changing their approach to sort that out employee. I mean, we can just keep going on this list. For example. You know, employees are much more interested in understanding what is available to them for benefits and working conditions, more than they have been in the past, compared to salaries. So salary is important, but folks are very concerned about how. Are you going to be supporting, you know, my life well? And
Maria Ross 10:02
there’s multiple studies that are out now, including the 2024, business solver, state of workplace empathy report that shows, when we talk about what employees consider empathetic benefits, pay is like, 13th on the list in terms of, like, I mean, obviously we all want to get paid, but in terms of, you know, bonuses, things like that, what’s at the top of the list, like you said, is flexibility, and towards the top of the list is professional development. Are you going to invest in me, even if you know I might not be here in five years or 10 years? And we spoke to, I’ll put a link in the show notes. We spoke to Rhonda George Denniston, who is the chief learning officer at TBWA globally. And one of the things that she talked about was that they have a philosophy of, we already know you’re not going to we already know we only have you for about five years, but while we have you, we want you to be doing your best work for us. So we’re going to invest in training, we’re going to invest in development, we’re going to invest in professional growth, and we’re going to invest in benefits that support you as a whole person. And I just think that’s such a, you know, that seems so taboo to think of it that way, like, why would I invest in these people if they’re going to leave me in a few years? But the idea is to get the best out of them while they’re there so that your company can succeed. Yes,
Cary Sparrow 11:15
that’s right. Now, one thing I would say about pay and where that stands is, you know, prior to the pandemic, and prior to this period where we had not just wage inflation, but actual inflation. That was, you know, that we’ve all been living through. That goes back before even I mean, the last time we had those levels of inflation was when I was in high school, so, which is way too long ago. The conventional wisdom has always been that nobody ever left the company because of pay, they always left because of poor leadership and poor culture. That’s not true. Starting in 2021 that stopped being the case where wage inflation from 2021 through 2023 went up at 20% a year in terms of advertised wages. And in an environment like that, when you’ve also got you know the cost of your food, the cost of your, you know, the ability to heat your cost of transportation, the cost to take, you know, a vacation,
Maria Ross 12:06
if you it’s gotten a lot more expensive to live now, right,
Cary Sparrow 12:09
exactly, and so employees, absolutely will, you know, switch jobs for what in the past was not considered a meaningful pay difference, but now the pay differences can be, in fact, very meaningful. And I think that a lot of companies have really struggled with that reality. They’re used to, you know, they know how to lean into the things that are not related to pay, but especially if you have very wage sensitive, uh, employees, it’s, I think
Maria Ross 12:34
it probably depends on their sensitivity to your point. Because there are, there is some research that shows that people will stay in jobs even for lower pay and more hours, if they’ve got a supportive, empathetic culture. So but I think it’s depending on who you’re asking, right? If you’re asking someone who has five kids at home, well maybe, you know, and they’re living in San Francisco, or they’re living in New York, maybe not. But so that’s really interesting, that you really have to have an eye on the data in your market for your particular group that you’re hiring for, because we can’t always make the blanket statement
Cary Sparrow 13:08
that’s exactly right, and that’s you just listed a couple of the major deficiencies with market data that’s been available, and the deficiencies that the platform that we set up were specifically designed to correct. But for example, our clients that are in retail, for example, or in hotels and hospitality or, I mean, we’ve got one client that is a huge provider of the staffing for big, huge events like, you know, kiosks that sell T shirts and that sell hot dogs and sodas and beers and everything else, those employees will go down the street for an extra $50.50 an hour, they have no compunction whatsoever of doing that. You’ve got the higher paid employees that you see will be a little bit less sensitive. But to be honest with you, at the inflation rates that we’ve seen over the last couple of years, seeing an offer for a 20% raise is a meaningful difference almost to anyone. And that’s not, yeah, not uncommon, but especially for the folks that are really kind of scraping by to maintain a standard of living, yeah? I
Maria Ross 14:06
mean, it’s Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, right? Like, exactly, but
Cary Sparrow 14:10
that’s where, like, you were you said, so a couple things that are really important. You have to know what’s going on locally, like, literally, who is within half a mile of of your location that’s offering something different. And, I mean, we’ve got one client, a huge retailer that has built, with our data, a huge alert system so on any given they can see who’s now advertising higher rates than us within a certain distance around every one of their stores in the country. And those go on to an alert list. I mean, it’s really very sophisticated, as opposed to the way that a lot of companies manage pay decisions, which is once a year, they go in and they look at how much they can afford to pay their employees, and they set their policies based on that which is completely out of touch with, kind of the power dynamics in the market, right, right?
Maria Ross 14:52
And, you know, I was just talking about this to someone in the context of education, in the context of the school system in America, right? Yeah. Where you know you’re gonna get what you pay for, like, yeah, maybe it’ll cut costs for you in the short term. But what are you giving up in terms of talent, in terms of innovation, in terms of engagement, in terms of all these other things we have to weigh that it’s not just a numbers decision. It’s gotta be about what is the long term strategy of the organization, and what are we actually trying to accomplish here? What is our purpose? So I love how this is bringing into impact. We talked about this before we started recording this idea that data, cold, analytical data, can be used as a mechanism, as a catalyst for making really compassionate, human, centered decisions. Yes. So can you talk a little bit about that, sure well,
Cary Sparrow 15:42
so I’ll just use my own company as an example. So when I founded wagescape, I came out of an environment where I had figured out how to work with global teams without necessarily even meeting individuals. And I also, just like I said, I had a growing disdain for a number of the unnecessary kind of management practices that a lot of organizations have as it relates to the way that they lead and develop and even attract talent and give them opportunities. And so made the decision that, first of all, we were going to be remote right from the beginning. So even before long, before remote was a thing, I could go out and find people that were interested in what we’re doing, and we’re available with the right skills that were needed regardless of where they were. So I have a global I have a very small company where we got about 15 people that work with us on a basis, that are spread all over the world, right? And we occasionally meet each other at like events and things, but we know how to work with each other in a way, and that’s super flexible. The other thing that we do and why that flexibility is it reinforces kind of other parts of the value proposition that that we offer is we look for people that you know are kind of outside, that may have opted out of a traditional career path. So we’re talking about like professional moms, for example. Or it’s not just moms, it’s dads now too that they’re the primary, you know, they’ve got primary responsibility for raising the kids, and they’ve got hugely, you know, highly qualified from a professional standpoint, like my, my head of it, my head of marketing, my head of product development, all are in this category, and my proposition to them was, I will give you really interesting work. You will make a huge difference. You’ll be a part of my leadership team, and I will give you all the flexibility you need in order to manage the other things in your life. Work is one thing in your life, and as a result of that, so many companies don’t realize how much talent is out there that have these realities in their lives, right? Would love to be able to contribute in a way where they keep they don’t take a step back, right? So if you I mean, what a horrible choice to say you can either be a parent in the way that you want to be a parent, or you can grow your career, but you can’t do both. Yeah, that’s a horrible choice to give people well.
Maria Ross 17:57
And I’ve talked to several guests on this show around this untapped talent that’s in the market that we overlook because they’re not fitting into this mold that we think is the way the workplace has to run. And the research that came out of the pandemic is that people got more involved in the workforce than they had been previously. Neurodiverse people from underrepresented communities, they were able to contribute in a way that they were not able to before, and the whole just blanket mandate from some companies to return to Office is actually shooting themselves in the foot, because you’re giving up that talent that can be there when you know not all innovation has to happen within four walls, and that’s where we need to change our leadership paradigms. Of you know, is it that they can’t innovate, or is it that you don’t know how to lead if they’re not remote? You’ve obviously led remote teams for a long time. You’ve honed that skill. But there’s a lot of leaders, and I have empathy for them. They’re scared. They’re like, I don’t know how to do this, and I don’t know how to do this well, I just will do better if I can see everybody
Cary Sparrow 19:00
Well, I think a lot of organizations had that. That fear was manifested in, like, conventional wisdom of how they had to set up the organization, and the pandemic smashed that conventional wisdom, yeah, because we had to, and a number of organizations embraced it. They weren’t comfortable with it, necessarily. They didn’t like the transition. But once they started to get through it, they realized, hey, we can give our employees a better deal, and by the way, that means we can tap into more talent. Yeah, there’s an upside, yeah, before, right when, regardless of where they are and regardless of what they look like, and you know what limitations they have, there are people that can contribute that we’ve never tapped into before. And there was a whole segment of companies that embraced that. And then there’s a segment of folks that are like, God, I can’t wait to get this over with, and I want everybody back in the office, yeah, and I think, you know, my own opinion is, so let me get this straight. You’ve got a whole universe of companies out there that have figured out that they can tap into talent that’s much better suited to what they need, engage them in a way that they’ve never been as engaged. In the work before and really optimize how much you pay them compared to what the value is that they give. So it’s a better match for employees productivity and your overall costs and your ability to compete. You’re going to say that you’re going to compete against those companies by bringing everybody back into the office and take away all the advantages that those companies have figured out that they can take. I, you know, good luck with that. Yeah, exactly, exactly how that goes. So
Maria Ross 20:30
I want to go, you know, you alluded to this. And you know, you talked about how you set up wagescape to support your employees broader needs, and specifically, how did that help you find great talent? Was it that folks found out about you and found out about the way that you were running the organization? Was it that’s what you were advertising in your job postings? Like, how did that actually happen, that they that you were able to tap in? Because I think one of the big barriers that people cite to even diversity in the workforce, right is, well, I don’t know where to find those people. And I’m like, You’re not looking in the right places. So how did you actually end up attracting, how did you end up, you know, for folks listening that are like, How can I do that? How can I find those untapped resources?
Cary Sparrow 21:18
Well, in terms of creating kind of a, you know, a concept around, you know, the jobs in the company that was more flexible and more inclusive. I put it right in the ads, right? So we’re not big enough, and we’re very young, so it’s not like we had this huge employment brand. We had no employment brand, right, right? We were just another very, very small company, right? And so I put it right in the ads. I went to places that tended to cater to folks that wanted a more flexible approach. There’s a couple of you can go online and find you know, groups that you know are specifically catered to working parents, working moms. But I just put it right in the ads, and that attracted you know, the folks that I ended up hiring, that was one of the main things that attracted them. And so there was a bit of a, you know, that enabled some self selection,
Maria Ross 22:08
right? Well, and because you’re actually, you know, it’s not just about, I want to hire all these diverse people and then bring them into an environment where they won’t flourish. You are actually advertising the environment, right? So that when you get them, you hold on to them and they stay.
Cary Sparrow 22:22
That’s the other thing is. So we keep people because our work fits with their life, but very importantly, because we offer amazingly interesting work. It’s challenging, but it’s rewarding. It’s, you know, every one of my team, I think, would line up and could go through instance by instance, of all the things that they’ve learned in these jobs. Yeah, that’s just, and that’s important, yes, and, and also attracting people where that is, right? I was really clear on that is, you’re going to learn a lot, and the job is, you know, a month from now, is not going to be the same, and that’s either going to energize you, it’s going to turn you off, but you should make a decision on that based on what’s going to work for you,
Maria Ross 22:59
exactly. And I think that’s a lot of the flack that you know, Gen Z and younger millennials get, but they crave that kind of variety. They crave that kind of like, I want to be challenged, I want to learn more. And it comes off as entitlement in many instances, but it’s really just about how that generation is wired, their generational code, as we’ve talked about on this show before. I’ll actually put a link to Anna lay out as episode about unlocking generational codes, and what is the operating system of each of these generations. Because once you understand that all the quote, unquote demands and entitlements make sense, and if you leverage them to your organization’s advantage, you actually can get phenomenal work and phenomenal loyalty out of those people, but it’s about understanding what people want, like, back to where we started here, what people want in the workforce today and what they want in a culture, and it’s changed. Like, we just need to accept that it’s changed.
Cary Sparrow 23:56
Yeah, we have. Most of my employees are not full time employees, again, part of the flexibility piece. But I’ve had other CEOs that look at me and said, Well, you know, you’re only getting, you know, 16 or 24 hours a week out of these folks. How can you run a business like that? I’m like, I’m getting the best 16 or 24 hours, exactly. I mean, do you honestly think that somebody working 40 hours a week. They’re
Maria Ross 24:20
not working 40 full hours. Yeah, exactly chooses
Cary Sparrow 24:23
to work 16 or 24 it’s not right. So I would say that, you know, our productivity level compared to the kind of the number of hours that are worked is very, very high, and our engagement level is very, very high. So I love
Maria Ross 24:35
that. So as we kind of wrap up, because you’ve given us so many great nuggets here, and things to think about. Is there one or two things you would advise companies that are hiring right now, like, Are there one or two actions you can give them based on the work you do at wagescape, the data that you see that you think could be something relatively accessible for them to do to start? Attracting and retaining that top talent.
Cary Sparrow 25:02
Oh, there’s so many things there, and so many companies now have really been down the path of trying, you know, lots and lots of things. And I would say, recognize that things are not static, and they’re not going back to the way that they used to be. So the more that you can make decisions that are about creating more flexibility in terms of how you make decision coming forward. A lot of organizations are set up to drive risk out, which means more standardization, more predictability. And I would say, embrace more opportunities. Find more ways to see, how can you do more, right? As opposed to how can you get conformancy? And that’s every leader’s opportunity every single day, multiple times a
Maria Ross 25:41
day. Well, what you’re describing sounds like really a design thinking mindset around how you, you know, try some things. I spoke to the CHRO of Box A while back, and what I loved was her vulnerability and saying, Nobody knows, nobody’s figured this out. Yet right like nobody knows what the right thing to do is, and the right thing is different for every company. So we’re doing a lot of experimentation. We’re doing a lot of listening. We’re doing a lot of let’s try this and see how it works. Oh, that was a spectacular failure. People hated that. Let’s try something else, and to not be afraid to do that while you’re running the business, while you’re generating revenue, while you’re trying to grow. I think that’s so important. And that’s that’s a big ask of some people who are reticent to embrace risk, as you said, yeah,
Cary Sparrow 26:28
it is a very different risk profile. It’s so good to hear that, you know, played back from kind of a design thinking standpoint, yeah, I will say though, that there’s a lot of people that really, really, really don’t like change that. Really want, you know, things to be very predictable. They want to be good at what they do. Yeah? They want it to be interesting within the bounds, very tight bounds of kind of, yeah, evolution and so you can’t ignore those people, no.
Maria Ross 26:56
So I’m saying I have empathy for them. Like, you know, they’re like, Wait, I’ve been working this way for 30 or 40 years, and now you’re telling me, I have to, like, ask my employees about their own personal lives, like, what?
Cary Sparrow 27:08
Yeah, exactly. And I mean, my risk profile is pretty much off the charts compared to a lot of others, right?
Maria Ross 27:15
It’s still not, well, you’ve been in the military, so it’s not nearly
Cary Sparrow 27:19
like what fighter pilots have and things like that. So, but it’s still pretty high, and there’s a lot of folks that, I mean, for folks that are energized by change as opportunities, you’ve got to remember kind of who’s around you, and to, you know, Learn, Build muscle to manage change in a way that brings, you know, everyone that you need along. I love
Maria Ross 27:39
this little tangent we’ve gone on, because it’s also about how you support people through change, because if you can help them feel comfortable and feel safe and let them know we may fail, and that’s okay, yeah, you know, they still might be a little hesitant because of their risk profile, but that goes a long way to bring some of those people along with you. Do you have a psychologically safe and a supportive environment that says, hey, we’re all in this experiment together, and we need to hear from you. We need to know, and we’re not going to get it right, and you’re not always going to get it right, but we have your back. Yeah, yeah, I love it. Okay. Well, this has been such a great conversation. Cary, thank you so much. We’re going to have all your links in the show notes for folks to connect with you. But for folks on the go, where can they learn more about you? Or wagescape.
Cary Sparrow 28:30
Go to wagescape.com or look me up on LinkedIn. Great. Cary
Maria Ross 28:33
Sparrow, and if you connect with him on LinkedIn, make sure you personalize a note. I always do this. PSA, and say You heard him here on the empathy edge podcast. Cary, thank you so much for your time today. It was a pleasure. Thanks very much for having me, and thank you everyone for listening to another episode of the empathy edge podcast. If you like what you heard, you know what to do, rate, review, share with a friend, and don’t forget to follow us and subscribe until next time, please remember that cash flow, creativity and compassion are not mutually exclusive. Take care and be kind. For more on how to achieve radical success through empathy. Visit the empathy edge.com there you can listen to past episodes, access show notes and free resources. Book me for a Keynote or workshop and sign up for our email list to get new episodes, insights, news and events. Please follow me on Instagram at Red slice Maria, never forget, empathy is your superpower. Use it to make your work and the world a better place.
