5.4: Focus on future-ready leaders, with Danny Harmer

Speaker A: Foreign. Welcome again to series five of the HR Most Influential podcast where we explore big ideas with small conversations. Later on in this episode, I'll be speaking to Danny Harmer, Chief People Officer at, uh, the insurance business, Aviva. Danny is one of the very latest additions to the HR Most Influential hall of fame which recognises consistently game changing HR practitioners and influencers, people who repeatedly continue to make their mark positively on the people profession. Sharing insights from her outstanding career of more than 15 years in HR, uh, and business leadership, Dani Harmer speaks about how to support the development of future ready leaders, the leaders of tomorrow and beyond. She's passionate about this subject and I can't wait to share this interview with you. I. But wait, I must, because before we hear from Danny, we must of course check in with HR magazine senior reporter, uh, Hannah Ross to hear her take about the evolving nature of leadership today and how HR can best support the leaders of the future. Thank you so much for joining us in the studio today, Hannah.

Speaker B: Thank you for having me again, Carissa,

Speaker A: always so good to have you with us. So today's main interview is all about leadership, future leadership, how we can improve leaders going forward. So I thought it would be great to get you into the studio and talk about any impressions that you've got from all of your HR magazine reporting that you do for us.

Speaker B: Sounds good.

Speaker A: Well, let's kick off then with the advent of technology and how that might impact leadership. It was reported in the Nationals in April that the social media company Meta is creating an AI clone of its boss, Mark Zuckerberg, so that employees can interact with that rather than the physical man himself. So your namesake and, uh, our other incredibly talented senior reporter, Hannah Davenport, reported on this for us in our cover story, which focuses on digital doppelgangers. But what's your take on this, Hannah? How is technology shaping leadership today?

Speaker B: On this story from Meta, I can understand for a company like them, with so, so many employees, that something like this could form, albeit not a real connection for employees with their boss with the hopes to boost engagement. Like they said, people resonate better with a familiar voice, so that could be a useful tactic to keep employees engaged. But for me, I think it's a really tricky spot to try and replace leadership and our workplace relationships with AI models completely. We had a comment piece on this exact topic from Lena Reen, who's the Vice President of Leadership at skillsoft, and she warned against allowing AI to enter our workplace relationships by it craft, crafting, uh, messages to send to our employees who could be Sitting next to us with something called social offloading is what they called it. And she said that this kind of behavior, these over polished messages, it can feel impersonal and over time it erodes trust in the organization and between, between our employees. And to me it just generally feels impersonal. And I think the importance of human touch in organizations is still, is important and I really hope it doesn't disappear with the advancement of AI in the workplace.

Speaker A: I mean, I completely agree with you and I think HR leaders will probably agree with both of us as well that human interaction should come first and they certainly shouldn't replace really important leadership conversations that need to be had and that might be enhanced in a real life environment. Right. But for other leaders, this kind of technology really saves them time. So how do people balance that?

Speaker B: I think it's about keeping human touch and leadership and ensuring that if you're going to be doing any big announcements such as redundancies like layoffs, then we should be not doing that through an AI bot because that really reduces trust with your other employees who are staying, who are not going to feel like they're being valued with an AI version of a leader, basically telling them instead of them telling them to their face. So, and that's something that Mark Zuckerberg is still planning to do apparently by keeping big announcements himself and not his AI bot.

Speaker A: Let's hope that uh, turns out well for both employer and employees at Meta. We'll be following the story for sure. Here at hr UM magazine, Today's interviewee argues that anyone, even those who don't have a natural talent or propensity to leadership, who aren't drawn to leadership, anyone can learn how to be an effective leader. So do you agree and how important is it that leaders should be trained in your view?

Speaker B: I do agree that most people, I think, could be leaders placed in the right environment with their natural skills developed into leadership skills, and that would be through training. I was speaking with Dave Williams, the uh, chief people officer of Jaguar Land Rover recently, and he was speaking about his own personal journey in his three decades in the industry. And he was speaking about how his leadership style has changed from a directive style to a more coaching style. And he said that was all down to organizational change and coaching programs that he'd been put through in his career. He described this shift from a command and control type environment and how that transformed the culture and in turn the performance at Jaguar Land Rover within their employees. So that reinforces the idea that when leaders change and their leadership style changes and how they show up, the organization can follow with really positive results. Like performance, like engagement.

Speaker A: Absolutely. I think it's all about having that balance as well, isn't it, to develop one's, uh, own leadership style. Do you think everyone has a natural ability for leadership then?

Speaker B: I think it's about your personal goals as well. Like if you want to be a leader and maybe you think you're too shy or you don't have the skills, I think you can still achieve them, those things. But again, it's like making sure you're in the right environment, the right workplace to do that, and supported in the right way.

Speaker A: That makes sense to me completely. And, uh, let's get into that then, in terms of people who want to be managers or people that don't want to be managers. Because of course last year there was that seminal report from Investors in People, that piece of research they did which revealed that 52% of the UK workforce across all ages don't see management as an aspirational career path. It isn't. Not attracted to becoming senior leaders in organizations. And I wondered what you could tell us of all of your conversations that you've had with HR leaders about their reaction to that stat and whether HR should be worried about people not being drawn to leadership roles.

Speaker B: It is a worry if young people don't want to progress to middle management and upper roles. And I think it signifies that there needs to be some kind of change in your organization when these patterns show up. Most HR commentators were saying to me that stress in managers is a big reason that younger workers don't want to follow in those footsteps. And to change that, you have to deal with the stress that managers are facing in the moment. And it's also about preparing young people in the right way into middle management roles. HR commentators have said this can be changing the perception of management being about giving out tasks and controlling a team, to seeing it as a way to enable people's growth and seeing it as a position that has purpose because people are more likely to step into roles that they find meaningful.

Speaker A: So what are HR commentators telling you, Hannah, about good leadership? What does good leadership look like?

Speaker B: HR commentators just consistently talk about the need for transparency in leaders and leaders who can create an environment for their employees to feel supported and to grow and to really show up for their employees rather than being judged for falling short on something because workplaces really can't run, uh, on fear. That's going to create toxic cultures. So while working on my piece about neurodivergence in the workplace commentators were talking about the importance of leaders creating this psychological safety and uh, creating a space for employees to be able to disclose either their neurodivergence or just any accommodations that they need. And that could be for any employees that need different accommodations. Managers can do this by responding to employees needs with empathy. Empathy rather than treating requests for accommodations as an inconvenience or a disruption to them. Because these conversations are going to create an environment for your employees to really do the best work they can in the future, you're looking at it with a long term view.

Speaker A: So good leadership is inclusive leadership in your view?

Speaker B: Yeah, I think it is. It's just about getting the best out of your workforce and sometimes that's changing things that people may need. If somebody suddenly is in a position where they need to care for somebody else and their family or friends, then they need different accommodations to be able to work best in their own new personal life.

Speaker A: That's super interesting. I completely agree that all of these inclusive factors are, uh, what can make leadership so effective and management so effective. I just wonder whether that resonates with your own career experience. Really, how inclusive have you found leaders in your career so far?

Speaker B: I think the best examples of leadership I've seen is when leaders have shown up with empathy and care. This has really helped me feel valued as not an employee, but as an individual person who has needs. It makes you feel much more human and appreciated. And I think that's so important in leadership is to show care.

Speaker A: Absolutely, I hear that. And I'm sure most leaders would agree with you. Last question then from me. Do you consider yourself a leader and why?

Speaker B: That's a really interesting question. When I was growing up, I actually always wanted to be a teacher, which is quite a leadership role. My grandmother was a teacher and it was probably because I looked up to her so much. And then, um, my career took a different path. But I did teach in university in my master's degree and that was such a great experience. I really do like being able to help people and get people to do their best work and see them progress. And at university that was great because I could see students really becoming the better versions in their work.

Speaker A: Sounds like a leader to me, Hannah.

Speaker B: Well, I don't actually see myself as a so called natural born leader, but I definitely enjoy the benefits that come when you do mentor and um, lead people.

Speaker A: Thank you so much for your insights and I think you're a leader, Hannah. I, uh, think you've already got the skills and thank you for leading this conversation about leadership.

Speaker B: Thank you for that. Bye.

Speaker A: Hello and welcome all you lovely listeners of the HR Most Influential podcast. Today I'm excited to be joined by one of the latest new additions to the HR Most Influential hall of Fame. Today's guest has, ah, spent five years leading global people and culture strategy at ah, the insurance business Aviva, and she was recognized seven times as one of HR Magazine's Most Influential HR Practitioners before finally being inducted into the HR Most Influential hall of Fame in July 2025. She's previously worked as Chief People Officer for Metro bank, and she's held a variety of roles in HR and business leadership at Halifax, Lloyds Banking Group and Barclays. The Financial Times called her, uh, outstanding LGBT ally and recognized her for being a heroic female role model. I am, of course, talking about the unstoppable Dani Harmer. Welcome to the studio, Danny.

Speaker C: It's great to be here.

Speaker A: Today we're focusing on future ready leaders and how HR professionals can build effective leaders for the future. And this is a topic that's close to your heart, isn't it?

Speaker C: Yeah, absolutely. Anyone you speak to will be able to tell you the impact that brilliant leaders have had on their, on their lives, on their careers as mentors. And then they'll also probably be able to tell you all the things they've learned that they never want to replicate from leaders who aren't so great. And I think it's really important to remember it goes back to this point. Basic thing about our profession, which is that, uh, you know, my job, our job is to help an organization be brilliant and deliver through its people, because ultimately that's all every business has. And I think, you know, you then take the logic one step further and go, who has the most impact on the people in your organization? It is the leaders. So how do you equip them to be the very best they can be?

Speaker A: You've been in senior leadership roles for many years, but when did it start for you? And, um, when did you get your first management role? Or maybe the more crucial question is when did you first consider yourself an actual leader?

Speaker C: I was very lucky and I, you know, I had the opportunity to go to university and my first job, I walked in, worked in a really small trade finance house. I was their graduate trainee. They only had one. It wasn't as fancy as it sounds and basically did everything that needed doing. And just with time, I was there for sort of two and a half years. I started to get responsibility and ended up, amongst other things, leading the support team. So the EA's receptionist looking after those and just making sure the office ran smoothly. And it just sort of crept up on me and I probably didn't really notice it at that point. I then went to the Halifax Building Society as it was, and they were doing a sort of scheme to get people in as branch and operational managers. So they were stealing people from other grad schemes and going, right, you've got a bit of the experience and now we want you to start doing leadership. After I did my training program, my first job with then was running a branch, um, in Norbury, actually, quite near where we are now. Physically, you have keys to the door, a team of people, and you gotta deliver stuff for your customers day in, day out and manage the risk of a banking environment. But I was so lucky because the team in the branch were really experienced, really stable. I was covering a maternity leave for the branch manager, the previous branch manager. And honestly, I may have been the branch manager, but they all taught me brilliantly how to be a good leader. You know, to take into account the human side if you want to get the best out for the work side, and to treat people as individuals and be respectful and try and understand what it is that makes them tick and set them up to win. I was very lucky to have that as my first kind of proper team.

Speaker A: You learn as much from the other people around you in your role than you know, what you brought to the table. As with all of your management and leadership experience that you'd had, no one can know everything.

Speaker C: And I know, you know, we talk about diverse teams. The strength of a diverse team is the experience and the different perspectives that they bring. And have you thought about what about, you know, that teams that think like that and operate like that can make better decisions. And I think it's sort of, in some ways. I have three children. I'm very lucky. Similar to parenting, which is you learn with them. Um, you know, I've never been a parent of a teenager until my oldest was a teenager and she'd never been a teenager before. And we worked it out together. And yet ultimately I am accountable and responsible. But people can have input and you've got to be prepared as a leader to make the decisions and to be accountable for those decisions.

Speaker A: I imagine the expectations of leaders have changed over the years. What's your sense of that? Do people expect more from leaders now than they did before or.

Speaker C: Oh, exponentially more. When I first worked, what leaders were expected to do was manage the work, manage the output. And again, you know, I was Very lucky with the branch team I had in Norbury. I don't think most leaders gave consideration to the human aspects of the team and how you could support them and get the best out of them. Now, leaders roles, yes, you still are accountable for delivering the output, whatever it is that your team is responsible for doing, but you're also accountable for the team's wellbeing. From a work environment perspective, all the data says that feeling that you belong, that you are included in an organization is a massive driver of engagement, which is a massive driver of performance. Understanding the skills that your team need, making sure that you're developing them in the right way, and those skills are becoming much more complex and sophisticated as we use technology to help us. And the way that customers want us to deliver things for them is changing dramatically. So 20 years ago, 30 years ago, we'd have been talking about leaders as managers. I think leaders now have to be leaders. It's much broader, it's much more all encompassing and it's how do you arrange, change everything that's in your sphere of responsibility and align it to move in the right direction for the organization. With a team that have a voice and have opinions and are all, you know, different humans who are there because they want to be there, hopefully, but uh, also want to be considered and respected, you can't just demand an output from them. I think leadership is becoming much more complex and sophisticated.

Speaker A: Do you think that puts people off from coming into leadership roles?

Speaker C: I don't know. I mean there are some people who, when they look at my job, you know, and I go, you could do my job, you'd be amazing at it. They go, oh no, I'm not sure. All that people stuff could be quite tricky. I think the, uh, sort of stuff that's hard to get hold of around leadership and relationships can put people off doing a leadership job. I think what people can fear is the potentially slightly. And there are occasionally you have a difference of opinion with someone who works for you and it can feel confrontational or anxious. But I always say to people, if you're the leader, you have to remember this isn't about you, it's about them. If you are about to have a conversation with someone about their performance or their attendance and it's not going to be a positive conversation, you have a, um, massive influence on that individual. And you have to remember the person sitting opposite you is thinking, this person has, you know, a fair bit of control on, you know, in terms of what happens for me in my working life. So they May be defensive and they may be difficult and they may be anxious and they may be emotional and they may, you know, react in um, a myriad of ways. If you can try and remember it's not about you, it's about them then having the experience to start to put yourself in those situations. But I think organizations have to put support around leaders for those scenarios. For sure.

Speaker A: Yeah. And I think from what you were saying as well, the evolution of expectations on leaders sounds so similar to what I hear as editor of HR magazine with regards to HR professionals own jobs and how that, that leadership arc has changed almost in terms of the more and more responsibilities that are being put on HR as a profession. Here you go. Have the sustain, have the wellbeing brief, have all of these other things to do. Um, have you felt that personally as a HR leader yourself?

Speaker C: I think our job has become, our profession has become more interesting and more impactful in terms of the performance of the business. So again, you know, if you go back sort of 30 years, personnel as it was, uh, paid people, uh, issued contracts, exited people might have dealt with attendance and health issues. I think what personnel used to do was take some of the sort of tricky admin out of a manager's job. But you can't separate a person. You know, I know some organizations use separate teams for example to manage attendance. But if I'm having a conversation with you about your attendance and there's an ongoing issue, how do you separate that from. Right, we can't talk about your attendance, we're talking about your performance and we're talking about your well being and how are you, you can't take bits of a person out of the hole that you're leading and accountable for. So I think the leader's job has become more challenging as ah, a profession. Our job to support leaders has become also more challenging. But I think if you put the right support in place and you get that right balance between, look, we're here for you as a leader, we'll give you advice, we're here for you as a colleague as well and we'll give you support. But equipping leaders to be able to do the best job they can, like end to end with that human that's in their team is when you get the right leader, colleague relationship with sort of mutual accountability and an understanding of the individual.

Speaker A: It's almost like they all have to work in tandem. That's the ideal. Right. But in reality we know that it doesn't always happen. So I guess that's where HR professionals Have to use their skills to navigate those tricky waters.

Speaker C: Yeah. And I think, um, business partners, or heads of people, as we call them, Aviva, Have a really important role with the leader to just nudge them to have the right conversations and to put support in place where that's proving to be tricky. But, you know, we want leaders to start to build those skills. So even if maybe that isn't something they feel equipped to do now, they maybe feel slightly more equipped to do it the next time or the time after that.

Speaker A: Are there moments in your own career that changed your sense of what leadership is and what leadership means?

Speaker C: My first leadership job, I think, was very helpful in that regard, leading the team, where actually they taught me. Thank you, all of you. The team at Norbury branch. I actually think having children was quite a big. And, uh, you know, I know some people don't or choose not to or can't have children. If you want something that's gonna make you realize it's not about you anymore, which really is true of leadership, then having three young humans who you're accountable for, that brings it into sort of close focus. Right. And understanding that the people in your team work might not always be the first thing on their mind. I think I became a better leader when I had a family. People in my team would be delighted to tell you I am quite driven, I'm quite focused. I'm very irritating because I'm like, look, that was great. I do try and remember to say that. That was great. Thanks. Now, how do we make it better next time? How do we do it better? How do we. How do we. Because complacency is probably one of the biggest sort of risks if you want an organization to be successful. So definitely being a parent just gave me a broader perspective about how people feel. And then there are some challenging moments in my career. So the financial crisis, when I was still at the Halifax, had become Halifax bank of Scotland and was acquired by Lloyds banking group in 2009. During the financial crisis, that was a. I mean, a really challenging time for everybody because you had people incredibly worried about their security of employment, incredibly worried about the organization they worked for. Saying that you worked for a bank was something that most people didn't want to do. I mean, the sort of the noise and the media around banks, the Halifax H boss had had to be rescued by, you know, Lloyds, by the government. So that whole experience of people, everything that people thought they knew to be true about the organization they worked for, the industry that they were in, I think A lot of employees, they felt it all just fell apart. And it is this fascinating thing, isn't it, that when you see an organization that's maybe struggling, the people who are doing the work for and with customers usually are still doing the same thing, right? They're doing a great job, they're trying to support customers, and then they find themselves in a situation where the share price goes horribly wrong, or the organization has to be acquired, or the media coverage is really negative, or, you know, customer sentiment drops dramatically. I think it's a real conundrum for people in the organization because they go, I'm still doing what I did and I'm trying to do a good job for customers, and I'm doing the same products and giving the same advice or selling the same items. And yet suddenly everything's going horribly wrong. And I think that's when you see in organizations engagement drops and these questions around, do you trust senior leaders? Do you believe in the strategy of the organization? You watch that fall away and you can lose it so quickly. And I think, uh, leading through times like that, you really learn how important it is to over communicate, to be clear, always tell the truth, repeat it. Only reassure people with what you know to be true. You know, always tell the truth, treat people like adults. Over communicate, over communicate. So, yeah, there have definitely been situations like that where you just go, I just need to think a little bit more about how to dial up my m leadership here because people are really worried or scared. I mean, the other one was Covid when we sent people home and just reassuring people that we do what we can. But that whole thing of you can't say to people, look, this is what's gonna happen because nobody knew. And there are still. We're all leading through change and the PA of change is escalating, but communicating what you can, pulling people together. During COVID in um, Aviva especially, we, we spent a lot of time thinking, not just about, obviously, we got people home, we got them safe, we got them m the technology. We made sure we could do what customers needed. We could run the organization with nobody being together. And then we went, right, how are people actually feeling? They're not together. So we did the whole, look, here are ways to think about doing one to ones when you're on teams because you've never done them like that. Check in with your team more often, not less often, because they're not having sort of serendipitous water cooler moments and, you know, all that kind of stuff. And then we started to do fun, daft, don't know stuff to just go, you still, we still want you to have that feeling of belonging to an organization. So we did big fat family quizzes and you know, we did a, uh, workout on a, on a zoom for everybody and we. Nothing to do with me. Please note, someone had the brilliant idea to set up something called Aviva Radio on a Friday. We'd just have an hour of Aviva Radio and you could choose your songs and do shout outs and just trying to get people to feel, you know, back to that belonging. I understand the organization that I'm part of.

Speaker A: I think that's such a good point to note because leadership in the remote hybrid dispersed whatever word you want to use it, ah, era is completely different, some would argue, than the leadership model that leaders are trained to expect, I think. And um, with all of that in mind, I wonder what your view is as to whether HR professionals are prepared for the challenges and demands of leadership roles today.

Speaker C: I hope so. I think as a profession we have to invest in ourselves, right? And actually, when I talk to my team, I say you need to be three things. The first thing you need to be is commercial. You need to understand how the organization works, how it makes money, if it's a charity, what its purpose is, is how does that organization work. Therefore what do people need to do and what are the interventions you put in place to make sure the organization is successful. The second thing you need to be is expert. And one of the things that we sell pedal train is leadership is leadership skills. So we have to be role models and we have to understand what leadership looks like in the organizations we're in and make sure that we're investing it and um, that there's some foundation and academics behind it. Let's not get too fancy and highfalutin, but pragmatic I think is better. But it's not just go on, go and be a great leader. You've got to give people frameworks to hang stuff off and to build themselves. And then the third thing I talk to people about is that we have to be future focused because just leading the organization for today isn't enough. We need to be thinking about the future more so than ever. And I think the future focused is probably for us as a profession, the biggest challenge for us because it's about, I don't know what's coming. I've got a pretty good idea we're going to use technology a bit more than we do now. And I've got a pretty good idea that Some simple work won't, you know, might not be needed, that AI can pick it up. And we know that people probably are going to work remotely more than they did five, 10 years ago because technology allows it and people want flexibility. So we could all sit here and make some good bets. But you've got to be interested and curious about where the organization's heading, what customers want more from, what can be competitors are doing. So for us as a profession, do I think we're equipped to do all of those things? I think we can be, but we just need to make sure we are. Uh, don't take it for granted. Back to the complacency thing.

Speaker A: I can imagine a lot of people listening to this will agree and align with a lot of that. But one of the things, one of the many things I wanted to pick up on was to do with what you said about the leadership capability that you're trying to build within your organization. Right. And the fact that we need to be more curious as individuals in order to be better, in order to be commercial of the things that you've said. Right. Should HR then be encouraging all employees to build leadership skills? Or are there people or uh, you know, a group of people for whom it's just never going to happen because they're not natural leaders?

Speaker C: Probably most of us were children and at some point went to school. Right. And there are just those people around you who were, uh, charismatic, prepared to put themselves forwards for stuff, you know. Who wants to read this? Me, me, me. Those people who just have a bit more self confidence, prepared to, you know, get out of comfort zone, pull a team together. I think there are people who are naturally drawn to that kind of thing. And you know what? I think people are probably naturally more or quite often more drawn to people like that. But I think you can teach people how to be leaders.

Speaker A: Everyone.

Speaker C: Yeah. If they're prepared to listen to feedback and adapt. You've got to be you as a leader. Right. Which is probably you with more skill. I just have to lead like I do. I should listen to feedback, which I get plenty of from, um, my lovely team, and try and use that to be better and to adapt and to think about what it is that I could do to help all of us be better. For a fever. There are some people who are going to find it a struggle that it's not necessarily their comfort zone that, you know, they don't understand why people don't just want to turn up and do a good job. How other humans behave is something they find Difficult to understand, but I think everybody can be given a decent kind of tool bag to do the basics of leadership. But it's got to come with investing time in their development and feedback. And if someone is not prepared to act on feedback and is not prepared to invest in their leadership skills, then they probably shouldn't be a leader. Whether or not they can't is a separate question.

Speaker A: It sounds like what you're advocating for is a continuous learning culture, essentially, where throughout the entire organization, from, you know, top levels in C suite down to all levels of the organization, we need to have that curiosity, we need to keep learning. And part of that learning is to do with feedback. Right? It's taking it, listening to it, and then acting on it. But what does that continuous learning culture look like for you? And how can we, as, uh, HR leaders make sure that we embed that to then fuel successful leadership? What other practical tips you'd give?

Speaker C: One of the things we're doing at Aviva, uh, is really investing heavily in leadership development. So, um, we've put in place a leadership program. The first thing we're doing is putting everything through it. We recently acquired Direct line, so it's 6,000 leaders to go through it over the next couple of years. The program has four levels, so it's new to leadership. Leading teams, leading through others, and then leading Aviva. And the aspiration for that is that that people who are joining now as new leaders will work through the programs. And what we'd love to see is that Aviva is known as the place where you go to have a great leadership development and a career, that we are a standout leadership developer. And actually, we all know it's the thing that when times are challenging, organizations cut back on. And one of the great things about Aviva, my boss Amanda, and the leadership team that I'm part of is that every single one of them understands that we're only as good as our people and our team. So my job most of the time is an absolute joy. So I think you have to have some sort of infrastructure to develop people. I think it needs to hang off a consistent definition of leadership. As I said, nothing too fancy. Everyone needs to be able to understand it. When you look at it, you know, you want to cut through it, and like a stick of rock, it needs to say a viva. It needs to feel like it could only be Aviva. But let's not get too sophisticated. Of course you want the science behind it, but, uh, when they look at it, it should look simple and obvious. That's the best leadership development. And then on top of that, I think you do need to have a culture of feedback. I'm not talking about highly complex, anonymous 360s and you get 73 people emailing you for feedback on their annual review. I'm talking about when somebody says, I'm just not sure it's good, like it to be better, you know, I appreciate what you're doing. What else do we need to think about that in the organization? People go, okay, not well, hang on a sec.

Speaker A: The thing is that defense, defense, you just.

Speaker C: I think the cultural difference really matters. If you want an organization where people are learning and developing and improving, it's

Speaker A: all well and good for, like, larger businesses that have got the money to be able to invest in these universities and these programs. But what happens if. If you don't, what do you advise people who are in a smaller charity, maybe practising H or who don't have as much funds behind them? But what you also said was be clear in the definition of what leadership looks like for your organization. And perhaps that's the answer to the question.

Speaker C: Almost. Yeah, I think so. When I was first at Metrobank, I joined, we had 300 people and not a lot of money. And we needed to be clear about what are the behaviors that we expect to see from our people. And to be fair, before I joined, the organization had been really clear on its customer ethos. You're going to think this is ridiculous. I still remember it. So what we expected from all our employees was that they. It was a maze, right? Attend to every detail, make every wrong, right? Ask if you're not sure, bump it up. Zest is contagious. Share it. And E was exceed expectations, right? And I said to my boss at the time, I said, tim, this is. This is brilliant. That everybody understands what great customer service looks like in this organization is fantastic. But we haven't described leadership behaviors. He said, well, you can't change Maze. And I think it's a very important message here about strategy. Try not to. To change it. Try not to change your values. Because the execution, if it's about right, the execution is almost more important than the twiddling about with it. So he said, all right, we'll have to make it amazing and we'll spell it with an E in the middle. The fun we had, and it was like. So I said, well, do you know what? We can do that? So we had. I was inspire. Inspire colleagues to create fans. N was nurture. Nurture colleagues so they grow and g was game changer. Because this is a revolution, right? So inspire people, grow them and change, be future focused. We did that with no money. The team had already done amaze. We added on ing, job done. And actually it was good enough as a framework. I hope they still use it. Um, and in Aviva, our leadership behaviors are aligned to our four values so that people can see that. Confidence, care, community, commitment. They run through what we do externally and they run through what we do internally. Because. Because you're only one person, you don't do a different thing with customers to that which you do for your colleagues and for each other and for your team. So just keep it simple and execute it brilliantly, is what I'd say to, uh, organizations that don't necessarily have massive resources. Because the thing about big organizations is you only have big resources because you're spreading over a much bigger workforce. But you can always find a way through.

Speaker A: What role can technology play in building leadership capability within an organization?

Speaker C: Clearly, there's the digital learning perspective, and I see that learning is getting much more sophisticated in terms of being able to engage. And then I have a very clever team who do loads of data analytics around the engagement side of things and also people data. And, um, the more sophisticated that we are becoming at using and interpreting data and getting insights from it, the sort of two bits of the team that look after that, we now have have a leadership index called the Lead the Way Index that we can roll down to every individual who's got a team of more than 5. So we can say to them, look, this is what your leadership looks like against what we expect in Aviva, here are the things that maybe you need to do more on the sort of care side, which is leadership nurturing people in their career. Maybe you're brilliant on commitment, which is about delivery. So we can give people lots of insight now, using technology to help us. And then I think as a leader, if you can start to use some of the stuff that we're putting out for people in Microsoft, Copilot, ChatGPT, whatever it is that organizations are using, use the technology we're giving you so you can focus on the stuff that actually only you can do, which is not writing stuff, it's leading your people.

Speaker A: Let's talk about the future focus bit a little bit. Young people are increasingly turned off the idea of leadership roles. There was some research findings published by Investors in People in May 2020 showing that 68% of people under the age of 35 have no desire to be managers. Does that worry you and, um, what do you think it means for the future of leadership?

Speaker C: I wonder, you know, if you look at the age group of the people that were asking that question, whether they really know what an absolute privilege it is because it sucks you in. It's not always the most glorious thing to do, but, God, it's when you see somebody do a brilliant job, or you see a team deliver a program, or you see how the organization performs with everybody just seriously motoring and all pulling in the same direction, that's hard to resist, isn't it? So I do wonder whether there's something about the age group there that makes me question they haven't just been beguiled by the opportunity yet.

Speaker A: Uh, see, it doesn't sound like Danny's worried about this at all. Just haven't sold it to them. Right? Yes, that's the same. Research was saying that when asked what would make management roles more attractive, almost a third of them said, stronger mental health and wellbeing support. Maybe they're seeing a lot of managers being stressed and they see the negatives, but maybe we're not selling the positives enough. How can we do that as HR leaders?

Speaker C: I think the first thing is calling all leaders. It's not about you. So you should not, as a leader, put your issues on your team. So if you're going to, going, I'm feeling a bit of stretch or challenge in my role, then find someone to help you with that. But that's not your team's responsibility. That's your responsibility and your boss's responsibility. And, um, the people function should be putting support around it. So I do think organizations do need to make sure that there is support for wellbeing mental health. One of the things we look at, Viva, is just checking that there doesn't seem to be too much stretch in a role. You want some stretch? We all perform better with some stretch, but not so much that, that you go, I'm just, you know, I'm not sure. I'm not sure this is achievable. But again, it's very easy. You don't have to spend a lot of money. Back to the technology point. There are loads of organizations out there now that can support you on data and getting insights from your people about what's working well and what's the challenge and what you need to focus on. And the most important thing is that you then work with them to solve it. You can't impose the solution on them. You need to talk to them, have an adult conversation, go, right, what do we need to do differently. But leaders, you've got to sell this leadership thing. Be the leader that you'd like your family, children, spouse, partner to work for. Be that leader. Now, that does not mean holiday camp, but it does mean stretch, challenge, support. Just help them be the best they can be in the work context.

Speaker A: I love that. And I do want to pick up on that holiday camp reference as well, because there is this view, isn't there, that HR is too nice? I wonder if that sometimes creeps into leadership, because leaders at all levels often have to navigate tricky conversations. HR also has to have that ability to deliver news that can be quite tough. So how can leaders build that capacity to hold that tension and still deliver for the organization?

Speaker C: Yeah, I mean, I don't think HR is too nice. You know, if you go back to my philosophy that we are commercial m, the biggest indicator of the performance of me and my team is Aviva's performance, our share price, our business performance. That's. That's how you know whether or not we're doing, doing a good job. That's true of leaders as well. But you just got to remember, if you want the organization to perform well, you need the people to perform well. And if you want the people to perform well, you need to look after them, support them, develop them, make sure they've got the right skills, they're in the right job, but it's got to be in service of the organization. And I think that's where you have to remember that it's not about just doing things because they're nice. You can lead and set strong expectations and clear goals and challenge people to really deliver for an organization and still be a warm, kind human. But just putting in nice initiatives that have no commercial grounding, no scientific grounding. There's no data that suggests they make any difference. Um, I mean, my pet peeve is free fruit on a Friday. How does that make a difference to the performance of an organization? 2% of people do actually want fruit on a Friday, and everyone else is not bothered about it. It's like, you've got to think about things that have an impact across the majority of your workforce and that have a positive impact in terms of the organization performance, belonging, engagement, you know, that sort of stuff.

Speaker A: Yeah, it's the call to be strategic, isn't it? And it goes right back to what you said at the beginning. It's, um, not about you. It's about the people deliver what they want. Technology can help us with that. Building your leadership capability can help with that. And it's kind of about finding all of those strategies to build that and deliver that for your people as a profession.

Speaker C: Sometimes our desire to prove that we add value, we can focus on the input rather than the outcome. And that's I think, when we can trip ourselves up because we go, ooh, new shiny initiative. Apparently this technology scheme development is amazing and is life changing. Unless you execute it brilliantly, it's not going to be life changing. But also, does it do something that you need? Do you already have something that should achieve that outcome? Is the outcome relevant? Is there data that suggests that that's actually going to help you get to it? Avoid the bright and shiny. What's the outcome you need? What's a sensible way of helping the organization? Get to that. And remember that your business can't cope with with too many people interventions because they all take time from leaders and colleagues to do them, deliver them, change the behavior. Don't pile too much on because ultimately we are there in service of the business being brilliant.

Speaker A: You've given us loads of tips in this conversation. If you could recommend just one, just one action that HR leaders can take right now to help build that leadership capability in their organization, what would it be?

Speaker C: I would go back to be commercial. Understand how your organization operates, what success looks like in your organization, then be expert. So understand what great leadership looks like in your organization. Make sure you are putting those interventions in the organization and then be future focused, thinking about what leadership needs to look like today and um, for the future, for your business.

Speaker A: It's been such a pleasure chatting to you. Thank you so much for coming to the studio today.

Speaker C: Thank you very much.

Speaker A: Thanks as ever for tuning into the HR Most Influential podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, you can listen to previous episodes@hrmagazine.co.uk podcasts. You can also listen to the HR Most Influential podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts. Don't forget to subscribe so that you never miss an episode. That's all from us for now though. Till next time.