Dr Lauren Tucker Of Do What Matters: Five Things You Need To Be A Highly Effective Leader During Turbulent Times
An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis
Build a relationship with your activist employees. Your relationship with activist employees, like those who lead Employee Resource Groups, should be a two-way street, not a highway and a bike path. They can provide key insights that will help you avert the egregious incidents that spur some company leaders to seek us out. The emergence of these egregious incidents typically indicates that the leader is not in touch with their talent force or the communities in which the talent lives. Always be educating yourself about the ever-changing context in which you operate and activist employees can help you navigate these turbulent times.
As a part of our series about the “Five Things You Need To Be A Highly Effective Leader During Turbulent Times,” we had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Lauren Tucker.
Frustrated with the lack of progress on diversity, equity and inclusion, Dr. Tucker left her position as an agency Chief Strategy Officer to promote a different approach to increasing diversity in an industry that is still more than 75 percent white. Tucker designed Do What Matters as an inclusion first management consultancy to help companies build sustainable inclusion, equity and diversity programs that fuel increased employee engagement and drive growth in a multicultural, transcultural and global world.
An entrepreneur with a history of leadership, research, practice and activism in race, ethnicity, and gender, Dr. Tucker is an honorary research fellow at the School of Mass Communication Research Center at the University of Wisconsin, where she received her doctorate. She has worked at some of the world’s most renowned advertising agencies, including Leo Burnett, Burrell Communications, and the Martin Agency and is also co-founder of Indivisible Chicago, a progressive political organization dedicated to making civic activism easy, accessible and impactful.
Thank you so much for your time! I know that you are a very busy person. Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you got started?
When it comes to diversity, it’s hard to be a prophet in your own land, so I decided to turn my 30 years of ad agency experience into a business focused on inclusion management consulting. Traditional diversity first management efforts have often hurt the very people they are intended to help and good intentions have not led to sustainable impact. So after the murder of George Floyd, we focused Do What Matters on inclusion first management that helps companies address the operational inefficiencies that foster bias and exclusion and undermine the creativity and innovation required to connect meaningfully with an increasingly multicultural, transcultural and global talent pool and consumer market. In short, we realized that if everyone in the organization felt safe, valued and heard, then introducing policies and practices around equity and increasing diversity would face less resistance, be more sustainable, and increase representation and fuel quality growth.
Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lessons or ‘takeaways’ you learned from that?
I’m often asked questions like this or, more likely, questions like, “Are you having fun running your own business?” Everyone that works at Do What Matters is personally invested in this mission, so any mistakes we make aren’t very funny. But, because this mission and our sessions with our clients can be emotionally exhausting and just plain tough, we make sure we take the work seriously and not ourselves. To that end, the team has a lot of laughs and those laughs often come at my expense because I sometimes lose sight of the limitations of the impact we can have. While I am deeply committed to the mission, my team will often say “Panama” to remind me that at the end of the day my personal goal is to fund my retirement and move to Panama or the south of Spain.
It’s an important reminder that my father taught me which is to never let your career goals or your company’s mission lead your life and define your personal goals. If you let your career or company’s goals take priority, you leave too much power over your life in the hands and the decisions of others and you lose perspective. The key to being successful in inclusion management consulting is not to lose perspective or you’re no good to your clients or yourself.
None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?
My family and friends have really been the champions of my career and my life. As a Black female professional and entrepreneur, I have never found the type of championship in the corporate world that I have seen accelerate the careers of my white counterparts. Throughout my career, I’ve had a lot of cheerleaders who stood on the sidelines and hoped that I would win and I’m grateful for that. Champions, however, get in the game, investing, risking their financial, social and political capital to help you win. Outside of my own family, I have not experienced that level of active championship.
When I started to Do What Matters, I was unemployed and still looking for a way to pay my rent by obtaining a full-time job. My family, realizing I was dividing my efforts, told me to focus on building Do What Matters and they would support me financially if needed. They were willing to invest in me, firmly believing their investment would pay off and it is paying off.
I’m fascinated by the incredible rise and unsurprising fall of Elizabeth Holmes, the founder and erstwhile CEO of Theranos. She was championed to the tune of a half a billion dollars without any real proof of concept. I have rarely seen this type of championship for Black women business owners who have viable, proven offerings. Culturally and historically, Black female business owners only have their families and their “hustle” or self-championship to rely on to see their business dreams come true.
Extensive research suggests that “purpose-driven businesses” are more successful in many areas. When your company started, what was its vision, what was its purpose?
As an inclusion management company, Do What Matters is inherently a purpose-driven business. The vision was to achieve the impact on inclusion, equity and diversity that employees and consumers expect of 21st-century businesses and organizations. What’s not so apparent on the surface about our business is that we are really focused on eliminating the abusive culture of work that dominated the model of the relationship between employers and employees during the late 19th and all of the 20th century.
Our purpose is to transform corporate culture, one organization at a time, by helping company leaders adapt to the needs and demands of a 21st century “talentforce,” a term I use to indicate that our economy has evolved from the abusive model of labor abundance based on the perceived commodity of workers to the more realistic and productive model of talent scarcity in a world where the knowledge, culture and service industries drive our GDP and our standard of living. Ultimately, our purpose is to help 21st Century companies transform into inclusive, talent focused organizations that get the right talent doing the right jobs so they can all reach their full potential while creating services, products and content that connect with an increasingly multicultural, transcultural and global world and, most importantly, DO NO HARM.
Thank you for all that. Let’s now turn to the main focus of our discussion. Can you share with our readers a story from your own experience about how you lead your team during uncertain or difficult times?
The key to leading a team in uncertain times is to not be afraid of letting them lead you. I’m clear about the goals, the methods and the targets, and then I ask my team to share their ideas on how we will meet these expectations. My favorite response to my team members is, “Let’s do that!” Our business is serious, but we’re not saving lives here. So the key is being transparent about the GPS destination, getting ideas on how to get there and then making a clear and definitive decision about which path to take. If we find ourselves lost, we just make another decision to get back on track. To paraphrase General Ulysses S. Grant, not making a decision is what gets a leader into big trouble and can cost you everything.
The biggest challenge we face is that the pendulum is always swinging back and forth around issues of inclusion, equity and diversity. There are always knee-draggers out there that wrongly position these initiatives as a zero-sum game. This lack of leadership fortitude is a drag on the culture and can wear on the souls of those who push inclusion strategy as a proven business growth initiative. We hate seeing businesses work against their own interest because of the fear of a few fearful but influential leaders that continue to live in the last century.
Did you ever consider giving up? Where did you get the motivation to continue through your challenges? What sustains your drive?
I wake up every morning ready to give up. When I wake up to see news about company leaders like McDonald’s CEO Chris Kempczinski making ignorant and unacceptable remarks about Black parenting or University of Michigan’s president Mark Schlissel getting fired for inappropriate relationships with a subordinate or another gang of white police officers yanking a young Black food delivery out of her car and arresting her for no reason, and all of this two and three years after #Metoo and the George Floyd murder, I wonder if anything we do will really matter or make a difference. Then I pull up my big girl panties, look in the mirror and say, “Panama.” My team and my clients remind me that we really Do What Matters and that should be enough for me.
What would you say is the most critical role of a leader during challenging times?
The most important role of a leader during any time, not just challenging times, is to make a decision. I referenced Ulysses S. Grant’s perspective earlier, but here is the actual quote: “Anything is better than indecision. We must decide. If I am wrong, we shall soon find it out, and I can do the other thing. But not to decide wastes both time and money and may ruin everything.”
I can’t say it better than that.
When the future seems so uncertain, what is the best way to boost morale? What can a leader do to inspire, motivate, and engage their team?
Define a clear GPS destination and then include your team in the strategy for getting there. Inclusion management is all about ensuring that everyone feels they are part of the mission of the company. Unfortunately, too many company leaders want to be heroes and lead without inclusion. But in uncertain times, you don’t need a hero; you need a team. Then encourage team members to use their own superpowers to help the organization find the light in the dark and get to the destination successfully.
What is the best way to communicate difficult news to one’s team and customers?
Delivering tough news is tough, that’s why leaders are paid the big bucks. As the Superman origin story makes very clear, “With great power comes great responsibility.” Too many leaders abdicate their responsibility. They like the power, but then fold like a lawn chair when the going gets tough.
The key to delivering hard news is to be as transparent and explicit as possible without compromising confidentiality. Take real responsibility for your mistakes and don’t turn the mea culpa into public relations theater. Be a builder. Don’t live in the misery of the past or get stuck in the problem. Deliver a new vision for getting beyond the issue and set the GPS destination for the solution. The final tip: Absolutely, positively don’t blame up or down. That undermines your credibility and credibility is the one asset that leaders need to lead. Once it is lost, it is hard to regain.
How can a leader make plans when the future is so unpredictable?
I’m a fierce advocate of solution building over problem-solving. The first principle of solution building is that change is happening all the time, so the key is to find useful change and amplify it. Unpredictability is part of life. As humans, we just choose to ignore change because it’s uncomfortable. Comfort and familiarity are the enemies of creativity and innovation. Solution building focuses on the small but impactful changes that lead your organization into the direction of your GPS destination, a destination that is always in motion, so don’t make big hairy plans. Stay agile with small incremental changes, which can make a big impact while preserving momentum.
Is there a “number one principle” that can help guide a company through the ups and downs of turbulent times?
I can’t repeat this enough. Change is happening all the time. The key to successfully building solutions in uncertain times is to find useful change and amplify it and don’t waste time trying to avoid the “dreaded future.” Focus on getting to the “desired future,” which is where you want to be. No one uses a GPS to find out how they got lost or to identify the routes of where they DON’T want to go.
Can you share 3 or 4 of the most common mistakes you have seen other businesses make during difficult times? What should one keep in mind to avoid that?
- Indecision. It undermines credibility and leads to stagnation and failure.
- Blaming up and blaming down. It undermines credibility and erodes morale.
- Normalizing deviance. It undermines credibility, eventually undermines the company’s reputation and in egregious cases like sexual harassment, racism and abusive management practices, it exposes the company and its leadership team to legal action that can destroy the organization.
- Command and control management. It may make you feel better about yourself, but it erodes morale and corrodes the creativity and innovation that you need to succeed in the 21st Century. The Bit Quit should prove that leaders must earn followers. They can’t demand them.
Generating new business, increasing your profits, or at least maintaining your financial stability can be challenging during good times, even more so during turbulent times. Can you share some of the strategies you use to keep forging ahead and not lose growth traction during a difficult economy?
Stop focusing on growth as your first priority. If you focus on hiring, retaining, and advancing the best talent, growth will follow. Talent is the engine of your growth. Focus on keeping that engine running smoothly and you’ll get to your GPS destination.
Here is the primary question of our discussion. Based on your experience and success, what are the five most important things a business leader should do to lead effectively during uncertain and turbulent times? Please share a story or an example for each.
- Focus on attracting, hiring, retaining and nurturing the best talent. Do that and growth will come through a more stable talent force. We have helped our clients implement an inclusive talent management program that addresses the operational inefficiencies associated with the old-school approaches to managing talent. This program starts with explicit, performance-based job descriptions and transparent, structured interviews and interview panels. This approach has the additional benefits of reducing the time to hire by 50 percent, improving hiring decisions and increasing retention, all of which increases stability in an uncertain environment. This is the key to 21st Century leadership.
- Focus on becoming a 21 Century Leader. The 20th century is the century of talent abuse. We’re almost a quarter of a century into the 21st century. You must create a humane, inclusive, equitable and diverse culture if you want to compete and grow in an increasingly multicultural, transcultural and global market. Our client, Kristen Cavallo, CEO of the Martin Agency in Richmond, Virginia, came into a demoralized culture in 2017. Through her strong, inclusive leadership and that of her executive team, the struggling agency emerged from the rubble to be named Adweek’s Agency of the Year two years in a row. She is the only female advertising agency CEO to win once, let alone twice. The agency’s Chief Creative Officer Danny Robinson is the only Black CCO to have ever led an agency to win this accolade.
- Build a relationship with your activist employees. Your relationship with activist employees, like those who lead Employee Resource Groups, should be a two-way street, not a highway and a bike path. They can provide key insights that will help you avert the egregious incidents that spur some company leaders to seek us out. The emergence of these egregious incidents typically indicates that the leader is not in touch with their talent force or the communities in which the talent lives. Always be educating yourself about the ever-changing context in which you operate and activist employees can help you navigate these turbulent times.
- Don’t revel in the power and then abdicate the responsibility of leadership. Be clear and explicit in your expectations of your talent and then get in the game and help them win. Too often, people leaders will blame their direct reports for career failure, placing responsibility on those with the least amount of power to create the conditions for success. Our talent engagement research includes technology that allows our client companies to gain insights about how managers impact talent engagement and what they can do to help their direct reports achieve career success.
- Invest in your own learning and development to be an effective leader for the 21st Century. Times have changed and the C-suite must make time to understand how these changes should impact their leadership model. Today’s C-suite behaviors are largely modeled on an obsolete style of leadership that will not be effective in managing talent in an economy driven by the knowledge, culture and service industries. Unfortunately, C-suite leaders rarely invest in learning new ways to manage. Ignore your own learning and development at your peril.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
This exchange from Kill Bill 1, especially the comment by the Bride, played by Uma Thurman, to O-Ren Ishii pretty much sums up my whole professional life.
You didn’t think it was gonna be that easy, did you? — O-Ren Ishii
You know, for a second there, yeah I kinda did. — The Bride
Silly rabbit… — O-Ren Ishii
Tricks are for kids. — O-Ren Ishii and the Bride
How can our readers further follow your work?
Thank you so much for sharing these important insights. We wish you continued success and good health!
Dr Lauren Tucker Of Do What Matters: Five Things You Need To Be A Highly Effective Leader During… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
