Culture in the C-Suite: A CEO's Take on Engaging Workplaces with Kevin Robins

Better People Podcast

In this episode, Holly DePalma kicks of a shift in perspective as we hear from guest CEO Kevin Robins. Insightful monologues & real-life leadership lessons make up this candid chat on reinventing workplace culture, building successful teams, and making sure everyone is on board and not left at the station.

Here are a few topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Better People Podcast:

• CEO’s perspective on workplace culture.
• Culture as a business growth driver.
• Workplace flexibility and trust in employees.
• Culture fit is crucial in the recruiting process.

Resources:

• MidAtlantic Employers’ Association (MEA)

Connect with Kevin Robins:

• LinkedIn

Connect with the host, Holly DePalma:

• LinkedIn

Quotables:

• 21:21- And that's what I say all the time when people ask about why are you successful, I say because I have a great team. My job's easy I just, I'm here to support. And I think that's how real leaders and real culture people think about it because you know whatever that saying is culture eats strategy. You know it's true If you get the culture right you know things happen.
• 18:31 - I don't like babysitting people, but I also, when I trust people, I want them to live the lives they wanna live and do the job. And you know, a lot of talks out there about hybrid and virtual, I think it's about flexibility and doing your job. You know, I used to, in high school, I was a painter, I painted, that was the way I made money in high school. Go paint, you know, schools, buildings, whatever. And my approach was work as hard as I can for five hours and do what someone else does an eight hours so I can just take the rest of the day off. And like for someone it doesn't appreciate that but says, no, I want you to be here eight hours, so go slower. I thought that was the stupidest thing I've ever heard of. So I kind of, I think is a vibe I always have like, work hard, play hard, like do your job, do what's expected, meet your goals, and then do what you wanna do. And I think that makes for healthy employees, healthy members, members get that vibe too.
• 16:47 - Holly: So you know, kind of share what are things that you wish you could do but you can't do or what would you like to do? But the smaller organization is inhibiting the opportunity. You mentioned earlier we couldn't go too fast with change. But is there something you wish you could do that you feel you used to feel empowered to do and you don't feel that you can do here?
  Kevin: Well I think the biggest thing would be budgets and how much we spend on sales and marketing versus another organization, you know, a larger organization. I think we have the same commitment to providing excellent service and relationships as any organization does. I think that's also part of being a nonprofit association. You know, it's about the membership. You know, I wish, the thing my wish, like we did better, that I did better was bringing new members on. Because I think what we do is amazing and we bring 60 to 80 new members a year. I wish it was 150.
• 09:30 - So I think, you know, I was just talking to a CEO before this and I think our past always informs our future. And so I think to understand my feelings on change, I kind of have to go back 30 years when I left the law firm and joined this company called SCI came from a very large law firm. We did things that lawyers do, very structured, went to this company that I was a client, but I didn't really know too much about them. And when I got there, they were in the midst of a reinvention, which I didn't know what that word meant, but it meant that they were changing their whole organization. But it was around the business is why they were doing it. And I came, you know, spent 15 years there and realized every year we did a reinvention because that's what we do. But, you know, to be, to come from the outside into an experience where everything's up for grabs, where the organization, the people are moving, it's changing, was very hard for the first year.
• 20:00 - We're doing so many cool things in this region with companies that are using culture to kind of get every, get through the generational transfer that's happening out there. And I think it's awesome, but you have to work it. It's not just gonna happen. You just can't. I just talking to somebody, you can't tell people you have to talk to people, which means you gotta just, you have to listen and kind of figure out what's important to people and but also make sure they know what's important to you. And then I think you create a two-way relationship.