Episode 77 The Power of a Learning Culture with Gordon Trujillo

Speaker A: Foreign. Hi, and welcome to DaVita Leadership Insights, a podcast for DaVita teammates who want to become a better leader, both personally and professionally. I'm Grace Berman, a senior director with davita University.

Speaker B: And I'm Doug Miller, a master coach and davita, uh, University faculty member. Today we get to chat with our boss, Gordon. Woo hoo Trujillo. Hey. He is the vice president of enterprise, learning and development, and we're gonna be talking about the topic of the power of learning.

Speaker A: Welcome, Gordon.

Speaker C: Thank you, thank you, thank you for that fantastic intro. And to be honest, I'm probably the one who's in the presence of greatness. So as a token of my appreciation, I wrote you a short rap, uh, to get us started.

Speaker A: Oh, yeah. If you're open to that. Oh, here we go.

Speaker C: Now, this is a story all about how our podcast started. Let's break it down now. With three great teammates and a whole lot of flair, we're bringing you energy. Let's take you there. Ready to go? Let's go.

Speaker A: Oh, my goodness. Yes. Awesome that you go down in history as the coolest boss ever. Now, Gordon, you do realize that, right?

Speaker C: I'm ready for it all. Thanks, Grace.

Speaker B: The first rapper on our podcast. I don't know.

Speaker A: I'm really proud.

Speaker B: So, Gordon, we're really excited to have the opportunity to talk to you about this topic that, as learning professionals, all three of us are super invested in. Right. From our career perspective. But we also are just bringing so much passion to this topic, uh, as people and as people committed to our own growth and development. And so what's so cool about this topic is that at DeVita, we see our leaders as responsible for developing our teammates. And that development is a deliberate part of our culture. It's really. It's part of what has me stay at davita and call it my dream job. So I'd love to start, uh, the exploration of this topic by asking you to define learning.

Speaker C: It's a great question. Um, and there's so many different ways to think about it. The way that I think about learning, it's really simply the ongoing process of acquiring knowledge and skills. That is as simple as I would put it. You know, the idea is when you acquire more knowledge and more skills, you have an increased capacity to perform. So then the question becomes, what do you do with that increased capacity? And that is performance, which is essentially the evidence that the capacity existed in the first place. That's the way I think about learning.

Speaker A: Yeah, thanks for sharing that. And I'd love to hear why you Believe in the power of learning. Uh, with that definition, what experience or experiences have you had in your life that have led you to this belief?

Speaker C: Yeah, it's a great question. When you start to get questions like these start to reflect where you've been, um, and how far you've come. And in fact they're the same experiences that led me into the learning profession in the first place. It really, it started all the way back in college, many, many moons ago. My kids would say, back in the 1900s when I was, uh, oh my gosh, when I was a resident assistant,

Speaker A: you just made me feel so, you

Speaker C: know, it happens to me every day. So I just roll with it at this point. But yeah, but you know, back in college I was a resident assistant. In the dormitory, essentially, you know, in the dorms, you're caring for individuals who are making a transition in life and it's a difficult one. Many times these kids, uh, they come from first generation families. They're the first ones to go to school. They've never been out of state, um, so there's a lot that they could be going through. And as I reflected on graduating with, uh, my degree, I really thought about what else could I be doing that could impact the world at large. I spent a lot of years doing internships in the engineering field. The work pays well, but you're left feeling unfulfilled, maybe not even satisfied. Um, and so I really focused on cultivating coaching relationships, really focusing on helping young adults transition from being teenagers to adults. This is the first time that I really realized that you could connect myself and my skills to other possibilities that might not be what my undergraduate degree was in. Um, and it's not like, you know, that there's a whole L and D field or learning and development field in the first place. Um, where, especially when you start to think about corporate training, you know, things that are beyond what you might get in high school or college. Um, so I got a job in management consulting that led me to what is now a 24 plus year career serving organizations of all sizes essentially to help them connect their learning to their business strategies.

Speaker B: What a great origin story and what a great service. I remember, I don't know if you lived in the dorms, Grace, but I remember stepping off that elevator like it was like, that was intense. Stepping off that elevator onto the floor and, uh, and greeting my RA was a powerful, important part of that journey. So really cool. So that's what got you into this field. How about telling us a little bit about a time when you really leveraged the power of learning and you saw it come to life. Yeah.

Speaker C: Ah, so let's rewind, um, from the 1900s. Now we're just feeling that one today for some reason. Um, 2015, I'm in management consulting, uh, really feeling sort of the heaviness of being at a crossroads, itching to do something new. Um, I didn't know if it was gonna be a startup or change paths completely. And at the same time, as you always do with life and work alignment, you think about your personal life as well. And I was very active still am, um, into exercise, going to a gym, a CrossFit gym at that, and had a membership and had a good friend who is a clinical psychologist. Obviously, these kinds of things. You meet up at 5am, you sit down after the workout's done, and you start to ask yourself, what more could we be doing to contribute to society with what we're learning here, what else could we be doing? Are we just meeting at 5am to do this and then we're gone and that's it? And so we asked ourselves the question, what more could we be doing? Uh, that led us to start a nonprofit, what we call Forging Youth Resilience. It's actually something here that is here in Denver. We started that, um, my friend and I, um, and this is really predicated on backing into confidence and capability through strength fitness. So building confidence through strength training. Um, so we've been working with youth who are held back from building that confidence, um, and they've all been able to see the power of learning come to life. We had a specific kiddo, um, who was going through some pretty tough life transitions, um, going through a foster home situation, not feeling like they had confidence. And really that leads you to make different choices that you might be, Might be taking if you didn't have the confidence to do something different. Um, and so many kids are like that. Many kids are going through juvenile justice systems, many kids are going through foster care situations. And teaching these components of fitness really just opened up an opportunity to build consistency in their lives, release some stress. Um, and doing it through strength training was our way in. We were applying what we had been learning and sort of trying to create greater impact for the society at large in the local community. So three to four times a week after school in your neighborhoods. And, um, we would run classes. You know, that's really led us to just continue on with this work. Um, it's led to other conversations outside of fitness for these kiddos could, um, be hard conversations, could Be fun conversations. They're really what if conversations. What else could I aspire to do? What else is possible if I had just had a little bit more confidence? Um, so that's kind of where things have gone with that part of learning.

Speaker B: Hugely impactful.

Speaker A: Yeah. A really powerful experience, it sounds. And how incredible that you're able to harness this power of learning for the young people in your local community. Because the part about being able to have an opening, uh, through strength training, fitness, and that could lead to so much more learning and continued learning and continued belief in yourself. Um, so that's really amazing. Could you, uh, share a little bit about how you have exported those lessons, uh, to your role currently as a leader in a corporate environment?

Speaker C: Yeah. So, you know, 24 years in this industry, you see a lot of organizations that you work with closely, you build a lot of friendships, and you meet a lot of individuals. But there are some things that are pretty consistent with each of those experiences. When I think about the power of learning in the context of DaVita and other organizations I've been around, it reminds me that organizations, or the village in our case, is the primary setting for teammates to find three things, primarily. One, it would be a sense of belief. So think of that as meaning and purpose. One would be the ability to become so, learning and growth. And the last would be a community of belonging or connections and teams. You know, when any organization can organize around a sense of belief, learning and growth, community of belonging. It allows each learner, in our case, the opportunity or the invitation to change, which is a really powerful thing when you can say about learning, because the invitation to change is a moment of opportunity for us to rewrite, edit, add to our story. And it's this notion that we're all capable of development, every single one of us. I truly believe that every org should cultivate learning for everyone, personally and professionally. Wow.

Speaker B: Um, you know, what really strikes me in what you're talking about, Gordon, is I think that if a lot of people heard about corporate training, they would think about technical skills, learning how to use, um, the machines that are being utilized in that organization, or the computer programs or things like that. But I think what's differentially different about what you're talking about is this deeper commitment to the human being and supporting that human being. And that's what I love about davita, is we are committed to that deeper development of the human, um, not just the technical skills. We want people to have the technical skills, but also that commitment. And so I'm wondering if you could Share an example of how you've applied this to a specific and particular team or teammate that you've led.

Speaker C: Yeah, you know, um, just drawing on my background and experience. It primarily comes when you're leading large projects and in my case it's been transformation projects over the years that required small and large teams to come around or together around a specific objective, but over like a very defined period of time. So if you've ever been a part of one or led one, their reason for existence is to help someone or something like an organization make a big change in the way something is done. I find them to be extremely challenging, uh, and at the same time extremely exciting and rewarding. They're usually met with a lot of self doubt. Right, totally. Is this going to happen? How are we ever going to get to the end state here? Um, if they can be accomplished and yet somehow they contain a massive amount of opportunity to learn or increase your capacity to perform. There's so much benefit in going through these experiences, even though they are difficult. And the reason that transformations exist are because they're complex by their very nature. They contain many opportunities to learn across people, process and technology. And one client example where I was leading the implementation team around this, they were very clear about the sense of belief, the meaning and purpose behind this particular change. They wanted to be the best place to learn in the heavy manufacturing industry. Uh, and this extended to their entire dealer network because they operate a pretty large dealer network. Um, that was amazing. Their vision to grow, to be more connected, to use technology to help them scale and to win into the future is quite amazing. They've leveraged technologies like AI, Internet of Things, 5G to really advance their proposition. And this was a big vision for them. If they could get there, uh, the ability to become all the learning and growth opportunities that would come with this transformation. The opportunities for individuals to step up and lead, maybe do something new that they had not done before, but they were very excited about doing so, um, leveraging their strengths. Always opportunities to be innovative, ask questions, fail fast, be creative. And this was in the end, the client really wanted to build heavy machinery tooling to simplify the lives of all of their, all of their customers. And then the last one I would say is the community belonging, which I find to be the most interesting and introspective one the entire project. And it was a multi year thing. We always were very free to bring our kids to work, uh, have indoor basketball games as an example, rollerblade in the office, you know, essentially be ourselves. We uh, had each other's back. That led to just more camaraderie, more connection, more trust. We had each other's backs in good times and tough times. We cared for each other in a way that everyone did their part, you know, even if it meant that somebody had to do something else to get to the next milestone. I'll never forget the story. Oftentimes with work like this, there's a technology component of things that has to happen on a weekend. It's back in the days when you had to carry a pager, right, for these kinds of deployment windows.

Speaker B: Back in the 1900s.

Speaker C: Back in the 1900s. Exactly, exactly when that technology existed. And I'll never forget this, we were doing some testing on some work and we needed a more automated way of doing so. It was very, very manual. And we had some of our leaders step in and help us build some things in Excel that would automate that process. And I'll never forget experience because they could have easily just walked away or left for the evening and sort of, you know, let the rest of the team sort of fiddle with it and just get it done. But they decided, no, we're going to lead from the front. We're going to get our hands dirty, we're going to help the team achieve more or simplify what might be necessary to move us forward. And I'll never forget that it's one of those experiences you have where you just, you start to look for that kind of a thing, um, in future leadership.

Speaker A: That really resonates with me, Gordon. And I'm realizing here that I'm understanding you a lot better through this conversation. And it certainly, uh, shows how consistent I think your leadership brand is around learning. Because we just happen to be in the middle of a transformation with DaVita University. And I know that at times it can feel really overwhelming to folks and uh, that uncertainty or that self doubt. Right. And the way you show up as a leader, it makes sense. I think now understanding how dedicated you are to that belief in the power of learning and uh, how much capacity, uh, you believe our team has and our teammates have for growth. And so kind of knowing that and understanding that and your commitment to that, uh, is really powerful and I appreciate it. Um, and I get it, I get it. So thanks for staying on brand so well, um, well, I'd love to now hear a little bit. Cause everybody stumbles at times. So I, I'd love to hear about a time when you stumbled in this area, maybe a time when you didn't lead others with a Learning mindset or perhaps when you passed on an opportunity to learn that you regret?

Speaker C: Yeah, this is a great question. And these are the stories I love to sort of spend more time telling because they're the biggest growth opportunities, things that you realize they're not always the glamorous things, but they do help you realize. What do you want to do differently going forward? You know, I'll share a time when I failed to have a learning mindset and did not accept an invitation to change. As I was mentioning before, my own thinking behaviors. I always think about this as being pretty uncomfortable to think about just given the situation, but eventually got things back, uh, and things turned out okay. But I still regret at that moment that I didn't embrace my learning opportunity a lot sooner. So here's the story. Uh, you all know I was working in the management consulting space. I was asked to take over a business line where we were asked to own their L and D function. This was, um, early 2000s. We're going through the team and going through the structure and the talent on the team. Uh, and I have a star design thinker, product manager on the team. Any role asked, you know, this type of person, we've all probably been there as leaders. They would take it and outperform their peers. Um, this person asked me about taking leave, and it wasn't a leave that had an expanded benefit as it is now. At the time, the common practice in the industry for this particular leave was one week for, uh, a life event. And, you know, in the conversation, uh, they accepted the common practice, and the conversation ends. But, you know, something told me we were both unsatisfied with that interaction. You know, the stumble part is where I really want to go with this. You know, they wanted to have a much deeper conversation around how we were going to craft this for them. How were we going to make this feel special for them in terms of what could we do? Um, as an organization? Um, you know, obviously it became more important than the pay or the leave policy. They were essentially extending an invitation for me and the organization to change, and I didn't accept it initially. It was jarring at a deep level to have worked so hard and then be treated like everyone else. Um, as we had this conversation with this person later, they simply weren't doing a job. They were creating outcomes that wouldn't be possible if they had disappeared. And so I think the moral of the story for me in that situation, the learning, was the takeaway. You have to create unique categories sometimes for folks like that, even if that means adapting your organization to ensure they have the unique opportunities, it still sticks with me today. Um, it was probably born out of just moving too quickly and not listening and spending some time doing some intentional listening.

Speaker B: Yeah. Thank you for being willing to share that, Gordon. And I think that that's, you know, our star performers, there's probably a lot of lessons for all of us around how we've related to them and interacted with them and, um, the pressures that we feel and how they reflect on us and our results. And so thanks for being willing to go there and share that. Really, really, really appreciate it. Um, pivoting a little bit to look at, um, how you invite others into this conversation. How do you coach other leaders to leverage the power of learning?

Speaker C: You know, over the years, my leadership has been refined by a really simple framework that we use in Diving University, which is think big, start small, fail fast, but above all else, learn always. If you think about that end state, you think about where do you want to be at the end? You're starting small, you're taking a small step in that direction. You obviously need to fail fast, possibly to redirect as needed, and then every opportunity that failure will bring is an opportunity to grow. Lots of failing is just fine. It's just a redirection of what you didn't know before. And then learning, always being open to change. The invitation to change is the opportunity to learn. So that's what I would focus on.

Speaker A: I love that. And I know that's become our motto here at DaVita University, and it also transfers to my home life, too. I use that with my kids. Um, I usually. If they run into something and it's hard and they don't understand why they had to go through that experience, I'll ask them, what were you meant to learn from this? And it helps to shift that mindset a bit to, um, how can this actually be helpful for me? So, um, always. That always resonated with me. So, Gordon, thanks so much. I know we're at the end of our episode now today, and I want to invite you to offer one practical tactical tip. We end all of our episodes this way. Um, what's one tip you would challenge our listeners to try right away to leverage the power of learning for themselves or others?

Speaker C: Yeah. Thank you for the opportunity, Grace. You know, I would say for all teammates, actively commit to one thing, one thing only. You'd like to learn and be open to the invitation to change on, and then, you know, vice versa. For leaders, the same tip. Do this for yourself and share this tip with a teammate and support their efforts to change. That's, uh, I think that's the practical tip I would offer. It's very actionable, it's very simple. And I would say, uh, I'm going to offer a wrap to close. If we can just close this out right now.

Speaker B: Not just one, but two wraps.

Speaker C: Well, you have to have the outro.

Speaker A: Oh, my gosh. We're gonna have to start adding this to how we close all of our episodes. We'll ask for a wrap.

Speaker B: You're resetting a bar for other guests.

Speaker C: I just. Yeah. In thanks and in thank you to everyone who's helped support this podcast. So thank you all. We had a blast on air. It's time to say goodbye, but we'll always be there. Keep listening, keep exploring, keep having fun. This is the end, but a new journey just begun. Peace out, be well and much love. Thank you.

Speaker B: Thank you, Gordon.

Speaker C: Woo.

Speaker A: Yay. Nice. Uh, wow, Doug, that was, uh, an insightful discussion with Gordon and I loved his rap at the end. Let's just acknowledge that it was a rap. It was a rap. It was amazing session episode. You're right. That's gonna be my adjective. Nice is, uh, rap. Full discussion with Gordon. And in, uh, addition to the rap, I really loved his tips at the end. For me too teammates to actively commit to one thing you'd like to learn and be open to that invitation to change. And then for leaders, same tip. Plus, uh, share this tip with a teammate and inspire and support their efforts to change.

Speaker B: Completely agree, Grace. And, uh, it was awesome. I had a little intimidation interviewing my boss. So that was, that was kind of fun. Like on m the spot. It was cool. Speaking of tips, uh, it's my turn to follow up on our tip from our last episode with Eugenie, which was all around service excellence and the tip at the end. I love this tip. It's such in alignment, um, with our self reflective approach in dvu. Her tip was to pause, self assess, and ask, what else can I do to lead with service excellence? And I'm in the middle of that right now, Grace.

Speaker A: Really?

Speaker B: Yeah. As we've moved to be more virtual, we used to have this. It would be easier to navigate attendance when we were in person. You're either in the room or you're not.

Speaker A: Right. I remember.

Speaker B: So, um, we're in the midst of figuring out how to best do that. And I've had to pause because I've tended to want to go one direction and really ask myself what's going to be the best for the learner here and create the best experience so that we can better serve them. And it's had us innovate in an interesting way in terms of have better communications and make some adjustments around, uh, how we enter a program. Um, but we're still in the midst of really wrestling it and figuring it out.

Speaker A: M. That's great, Doug. Thanks, uh, for sharing that. What a timely tip for you and the team. Yeah, and for our listeners. We would love to hear your stories and tips as well. Please check out our show notes and click on that listener mail link to find out more about submitting your stories and tips in writing or through a voice message. And if you haven't yet subscribed to this podcast, please click that subscribe button so you don't miss any episodes. And, uh, while we're at it, don't forget to subscribe to our new DaVita Power of Women podcast while you're at it.

Speaker B: And if you enjoy these podcasts, please do go over to itunes and click on the survey link in our show notes so that we know how we're doing. We'll end this episode how we end all of them, with a one for all, all for one.