People centric business at P3 People Management – Charlotte Dean

Charlotte Dean (00:00)
I founded P3 because I wanted to get out of the corporate world. I wanted to work with small and medium-sized businesses. I love variety and I love pace and I love that ability to make decisions and make a difference, have an impact.

I remember sitting with my father at the time, who was very much a mentor, and saying, I'm just gonna go out on my own. And it was a case of, I think, how hard can it be? How wrong was I? So we started working with all types of businesses. And I think over the years, we did have that mentality of, we'll just work with anyone and do anything. Then over the years, it's growing in confidence to say, you know, we provide a particular service, our target market is a particular type of business with a typical type of mindset and seeking them out and the type of businesses, they're those that are people-centric so they see their people or human capital to give them the proper phrase but they see them not just as you know cogs in a machine or a money-making resource, they value them, they appreciate the impact they can have.

P.H. (00:53)
Which is what? Tell me more about that.

Charlotte Dean (01:16)
If those people aren't working effectively, they aren't happy, aren't motivated, they aren't being developed, then they're not going to give of their best. So they're not going to be as productive and they're going to have more issues and more negative aspects to deal with. So those that are interested in understanding people more, getting more from their people, adding more value, that they see their people as an extension of their brand.

P.H. (01:38)
So what are the hallmarks of a firm that does that? How do you spot it? What sort of questions do you ask in order to work that out? Because a lot of people can pay a lot of lip service to our people are our, you know, prize moment. You know, we look after our people and they really don't, you know, the culture doesn't stack up. So what do you ask? How do you investigate that?

Charlotte Dean (01:58)
It's sitting with them asking the right questions. How do you value people? How does that show up in the workplace? What are your key values? How do you ensure you bring the right people into your organisation? I think by asking their questions about their own drivers, their motivations for their people within their business, you get an understanding of their passions, their motivations themselves for their business. Without sounding unclear, the more questions we ask.

And one of our values, our key value is being curious and understanding. And I believe in asking why. I did it as a child, annoyingly so. I still do it now. I think if you can ask why and keep asking why until you really get to the detail, that there provides you with the gems that someone wasn't actually going to tell you in the first place because it wasn't front and centre of their mind.

P.H. (02:48)
Yeah. So you go into companies and you tell them what to do. The role of the people professional is so far-reaching, isn't it? That you basically have an eye on everything, don't you? So your own personal confidence as a new business owner, how has that developed over the years in how you work with people and how you, you know, be a strong leader for them?

Charlotte Dean (03:17)
That has evolved incredibly over 20 years. As a youngster, pre-work, I wasn't confident at all. I used to associate myself with strong personalities at school and university. I didn't really find my spark for some time and I watched and I learned from others. And I think over the years, you learn to know yourself.

And what your strengths are and embrace your weaknesses and own them and I think a lot of confidence comes from that. It's that: don't aspire to be somebody else, create the real version of you and love it. And I think that's come over time in the 20 years I've been a poor manager, I've been a poor leader, I've made mistakes, I've learnt from them. I think that's the key.

And for a little while I hung on to the regret, let's call it that, but then it's the important thing to let go, take the learning and let go and in and of itself there's confidence there that okay I didn't do that as well as I could have done, you make amends or you take the learns and you move forward and I think my confidence has come from that. My confidence also comes from achieving the success through clients so...

When we see the work that myself, my team do, that boosts my confidence. It's like a shot of vitamin C, it's just, and vitamin D, it just boosts me. It's just, yeah, we are doing the right thing. And it's that validation. Because confidence, I think, can come and go. Some days it can be, yeah, I've got it, I'm all over it. And other days, it's, I don't know, it just seems to have slipped away down the shower plug. So you sometimes have to go searching for it back and reminding yourself.

What it is that gives you that confidence and mindful not to tip over into the overly confident, arrogant stage. So I think it's a journey. I've been on a journey.

P.H. (05:20)
Yeah, and it's not, it's a journey actually I talk about with organisations to try and build their confidence for individuals, which is great. And then of course, as a team and then as an organisation. So for me, as you might imagine, the host of a podcast called Workplace Confidence, it's absolutely key to everything else, unlocking so much. In your experience, would you say that it's quite uncommon though for people, leaders, busy people to have time or the ability to reflect or the support around them to reflect and notice strengths and weaknesses, validate themselves externally, internally, and gather self-awareness, which is so important to being a great leader. How would you sort of measure that at the moment where people are, where are people at with that journey?

Charlotte Dean (06:11)
I don't think we spend enough time talking about confidence, exploring confidence, teaching confidence. We don't do it at school. In fact, I would say some activities and methods at school knock our confidence. It's more of the stick than the carrot. But to your point about individual needs, that's absolutely key. And the development that we do with businesses and individuals is we always start with...

Who am I? Who are you? I think you have to understand yourself first. You have to put the mirror up and identify actually what's my preference? What are my strengths? What are my weaknesses? What value do I bring to my team? And what do I not? You know, the same as you would in any partnership and any team that you're in, a football team, a rugby team, a swimming team, is what role do I play? So you have to understand what your strengths are in order to know your place in the team.

And we do, we're doing more of that with businesses now, or businesses are more, they're more prepared to put the time and the resources into exploring this because of the value it will bring. It's not a quick fix though, you know, whilst you can get quick learns and we run a great workshop with teams and we did this with an organisation, a senior leadership team recently, and we've got them walking around this particular mat wheel that we use on the floor. And you could see the fake, the aha moments.

My, that's why you are that way. That's why you do that. That's why you talk incessantly through the day. And that's why you sit in a corner and hardly speak. But you see, it's the simple things. And it is about identifying the strengths of the individual and investing that time. And it is a bit of time. I've got two, still relatively new people in our team. They're still in their first year. And I continually go back to their...

P.H. (07:45)
Well, they're working with me.

Charlotte Dean (08:05)
Profile that we use and understand them and share that with them. So using that, help me understand you better. So it actually is a leverage to have a conversation. Don't assume people want what you want, you know, that treat people how you like to be treated. It doesn't always add up because what you value. Exactly, yeah.

P.H. (08:24)
So start with self-awareness.

And then develop into self-acceptance, hopefully, and then acceptance of others and all our foibles and warts, yeah, and different agendas. Yeah, it's an interesting journey. What do people generally call it? What do you refer to it as when you're dealing with organisations? Because we've got profiling, we've got the discs and the insights, we've got imposter syndrome, that's a phrase that people recognize and are talking about a bit more. So how do you...

Charlotte Dean (08:31)
Yes.

Yeah, and that's really important.

P.H. (08:57)
Talk about it? How do you begin and go, you know what, your people really don't know themselves and that would be really useful so how do you describe it?

Charlotte Dean (09:03)
It depends on the scenario. We do use the insights and that gives us a point of discussion. You know, if we have two individuals who are not working effectively, then we introduce this as an option. You know, if we were to do this, understand each other better and it gives us a route for conversation and dialogue.

P.H. (09:20)
Okay, so at the moment, let's zoom out, think about all of the companies that you work with over the last few years and what people are talking to you about. What trends are you seeing at the moment that companies are grappling with regarding their people? Is it quiet quitters, the engagement issues, gender pay gap, retention, culture, mental health? You know, the list is really long. Is it all of those things or is it one particular thing that springs out to you?

Charlotte Dean (09:50)
I think there are differences depending upon the sector. So pay is a big issue. I think we're seeing more of an impact in the manufacturing or engineering where the national minimum wage increase has been a big factor because not just did it put everybody's wage up but then it shrunk the differential between those who are marginally above that. So from a business perspective it is an issue as to how do we pay the relevant amount and a competitive amount whilst managing our profit margins.

But equally pay in a professional services sector where in 21, 22, 23 the employment market was quite volatile so people were moving for more money and that's had a knock-on effect now to, in my opinion, where some people now their expectations are greater than what is actually going to be available to them. So pay is an issue, I think it's always going to be an issue pay with, but more fundamentally, culture is a key one because this is the driver of the business, it's the engine, it's the culture and the value, so if we haven't got that right, or our culture has evolved over the last four years, because some businesses are different now, some businesses are wholly working from home, some businesses are hybrid working, this is all new for many businesses who weren't thinking about doing hybrid working in 2019.

So we're still, the landscape is still shifting. I think we're still finding our feet on the hybrid work. And that for me links with the future of work, what's coming down the track. Did you know actually read the other day, there are more Gen Zs now in employment than there are baby boomers. So that's 16 to 25 year olds. And how aware are we as business owners of what a 16, 18, 20-year-old needs and wants from a career, from development, from communication, from teamwork, from a workplace, work environment.

So I think that this whole future of work and managing the, I call it the decade principles, but you know, the generations is really important because they're the individuals who are going to be driving and managing our people in the business in the next five years. So we need to start moving that now and linked with that you mentioned mental health we talk about it much more now which is fantastic it's keeping those conversations going but not paying lip service not just saying well I've got a mental health first aider that's me done.

You know, your mental health first aid in the workplace aren't there to solve the problem. They're not qualified to solve the problem. They're not psychotherapists, they're not CBT specialists, they're not counsellors. They're there to signpost. So it's ensuring that you, whilst you mean well, you want to sort someone's problems, as you're not the right person. So their mental health and your divergent understanding of how people communicate and what we're missing. I think that's a huge piece there that we need to be more aware of.

P.H. (13:20)
The mental health aspect is interesting. From a communication point of view, so few people are willing to discuss their mental health challenges with their line managers. I think there's numbers out about saying, you know, 68 or 70% of people would rather put a pin in their own eye than, you know, discuss how they feel with their managers. So they might claim they're off work or they're under stress or pressure, but it might be coming up as something else.

So for me, having a conversation about confidence or values, for example, is a good entry point to discussing something on a more vulnerable level that helps people understand each other. How would you encourage people to talk about, declare, get support for their challenges, which we see a lot of, so much absences down to mental health, stress, anxiety, depression.

Charlotte Dean (14:20)
I think the measures are key so you mentioned absence as one and many businesses may see this as it's a nice to do it's on the nice to do list rather than a must do list and it's when you put the measures in place now what gets measured gets done that old saying but certainly from a HR perspective is it's not being pink and fluffy, it's not just doing the nice thing, it's actually what impact does this have on the business? So you're absolutely right. If someone's suffering with mental health, it will affect their performance. It will affect their relationships at work, which will affect performance from the business, from the team. It may affect their attendance, so they may be off. It may ultimately cause them to leave a business, which is costly. You've invested time and resources and training, and then you've got to replace them and retrain that individual. And it's all, that's not, number is it's priceless that number because it is immeasurable the impact that that has in my opinion.

So it's using the data if we're talking to MDs or FDs it's using the data and the impact on the business and therefore what can we do to that? So where's the return on investment? If we're going to invest in an employee assistance program or a wellbeing program or we suggest that you create a wellbeing committee that has initiatives running on a monthly basis, whatever the topics are, use your colleagues in the business to be the drivers and the champions of that and set them clear.

So what would you do if we all go walking as a team? What will that do for us? How could we utilise that to promote our brand on social media? This is an organisation that looks after wellbeing. I'm looking to change my job and I see this note on this company and look what they're doing. Wellbeing, keep posting these things, what they do as an organisation. I'd like to work there because they care about their people. So there's a value add to it as well as...

As well as it being the right thing to do because we all struggle, don't we? Some days life just seems a bit much and sometimes I look at my to-do list and go, my lord, how do I start with that? And that personal resilience some days isn't as strong as it might be. So businesses I think have a duty of care. They have a duty of care from a health and safety perspective to, for example, make sure there's not wires trailing around the office and they're using safe equipment in the warehouse. The duty of care goes to the mental wellbeing as well as the physical.

P.H. (17:00)
Corporate governance code stresses that and people preoccupy themselves with this a lot don't they, how I can promote good business, how I can promote this business I don't mean externally but just kind of how can we create better ways of working and that's a real bottom line imperative isn't it to look after the wellbeing of your individuals and your people often overlooked.

What are your thoughts on confidence and whether our workforces in the UK and beyond have enough of it? Confidence, you know, can we get more self-belief?

Would that be useful to, you know, UK PLC?

Charlotte Dean (17:52)
Yes, I think wholeheartedly yes. I think it should be taught in schools. I think individual youngsters should be understanding, whether they're confident or not. And I don't say that we have to pull people out of their shells. I hate that saying because I might be very happy in my shell and I can be confident in my shell. I don't have to come out and shout about it and be on stage. So I remember having a lesson at school and it was called, wait for it, The Helpless Female. And I was taught how to change a tyre, light bulb and a fuse in a plug. Right, we won't mention this school but there we go. So I'm no longer helpless but confidence should be a topic in school, like general studies and confidence should be built into whatever we call it personal effectiveness, whatever we want to call it, to help the kids of today.

Understand what how that means, how that shows up for them to bring that into organisations and from an organisations perspective is yes and for me confidence goes hand in hand with being brave a lot of our work in dealing with people is about having, call them what you will, brave conversations, different conversations, difficult conversations, is saying the things that you don't always feel comfortable saying.

But you'd say them to your kids or your sister or your friend, the drop of a hat. But you wouldn't necessarily say them to a colleague. And this for me is about confidence. Who has it? Who needs more of it? What happens when it slips away from us? How can we boost each other's? And more importantly, how do we steal each other's confidence? Because we can undermine people with a small saying, and you may not even know you've done it, and you walk away, well, that's that done, and the other person's left devastated, and you have no idea the ripple effect. We are not self-aware enough.

An organisation should grab this as part of their, not just leadership and management training and development, but as part of their overall cultural values piece, is what does confidence mean? Listening to your podcasts are just brilliant and so easy listening. And how do you spot who needs that support? And there's some easy spots, aren't there? Because it's noticing people's behaviour, but then you have to pay attention.

P.H. (20:10)
And it's not just in, I mean, you mentioned arrogance, confidence tipping over into arrogance. I would suggest that arrogance is actually a sign of a lack of confidence and a bluster. So there's the displaying confidence aspect of our self-belief. And like you say, you can remain in your shell and be perfectly confident. You don't have to become a sudden all singing, all dancing extrovert telling jokes at the fireplace, raconteur style.

No, no, no, no, no. In fact, we could do with more thoughtful, confident people who aren't shouty or, you know, style over substance and listen to those people. And that comes into the neurodivergent thinking, vulnerability, listening skills, all the rest of it. But when you were talking then, Charlotte, I had a flashback to a moment when I was working at the BBC as an employee, as a producer, and I came back from work after a holiday and my boss said to me,

P.H. (21:30)
Penny, you're here again. You're like the poor. We can't get rid of you. Do you know how welcome that made me feel? Not one bit. So that impact of your own confidence and your own bluster on others is to be made aware. People just need to be more self-aware, don't they? But it's difficult to lead that horse to water.

Charlotte Dean (21:45)
They do. But they think that... many people think it's banter. Now we've all had banter and we say something and... I'm just joking. But it's you know, it's how that impacts on that person. Even if you speak to someone speaking to you, very confident person, you've no idea what's going on in that person's life or in that mind on that given day. And I think you're right about underconfidence. You know, it's a sign of weakness as that arrogance and speaking over people or seeming to put them down whether they mean to or not.

You know, are you trying to make yourself look better, sound better, feel better? And this has a huge impact in the business. In HR terms, we end up with grievances, poor performance, unhappy colleagues, people who leave. And it's true what they say, people do not leave bad businesses, they leave bad managers.

P.H. (22:32)
And the people professional is left to mop up the dirt of it all, aren't they? They're kind of, if only people could adopt more of a coaching culture, more of a confidence and vulnerability, wellbeing culture, then the rot wouldn't come towards you in such a negative way, would it?

Charlotte Dean (22:42)
Yes.

Absolutely and you've sent that person off to another business feeling defeated, feeling deflated, feeling lack of confidence means for our manager X is just carrying on doing what he's doing and the same thing will happen with the next people coming through. So we have to deal with the problem at source so that we embrace, you know, as you say, confidence and understanding, it comes back to that understanding self and others, impact that we have on other people and stopping to notice that once in a while.

P.H. (23:16)
So you've been successful in inputting and in supporting your SME client, fantastic. What sort of successes and outcomes do you typically see in the work that you do at P3 People Management?

That you can, you know, that actually at the beginning of the conversation you said helped validate your skills and your input and build your confidence. What have you seen as a result of your input?

Charlotte Dean (23:46)
So I think from a personal perspective and a recent one, I've had the pleasure of working with an organisation recently and focusing very much on their strategic people plans and getting them to have a strategic plan aligned with their business goals, restructuring their HR team and to get the feedback from...

The individuals when we're dealing with certain cases that, you know, words like you've really made a difference, you've helped me see things differently, you've created a different mindset, you've elevated the people agenda to the betterment of our business. When we hear, when I hear things like that, I think, yeah, I know I've done good work.

P.H. (24:37)
So, how do you measure that betterment? Is it simply bottom line or are there other metrics?

Charlotte Dean (24:47)
There are other metrics, so bottom line is the easy one. The other metrics are engagement, retention and quite often it's just personal confidence. So with one particular HR manager we're using a particular matrix as to how capable they are in the responsibility ladder. One to five and where they were at the beginning and where they are now. And that's very personal to them. And then my view is X, you know, asking them how they're feeling is a big one for me. How confident they're feeling. It is a word we use. How they're feeling about their role, how they're feeling about the support they've got, the impact and influence I've had. I think so there are there are quantitative and qualitative measures that you can gather. Again, you have to spend the time to ask the questions. And then there's just the general, I've got to say feeling.

So people want you around, so if they ask for your input they want you present in a meeting, I take value from that is that therefore I must be adding value otherwise you wouldn't want me there or that question has really got us thinking so it's that you're right it's not always a tangible measure it's what has that done what has that generated what output has that created for them.

P.H. (26:00)
That's lovely to hear and I think people would really take heart from that because, you know, hearing stuff and anecdotal verbatim comments about how people feel is really heartening, isn't it?

Charlotte Dean (26:16)
Yes, they're feeling because you can't put an ROI on it. My team are the same, they get such a buzz from conversations with their clients who just pick up the phone and just say, I just wanted to chat you through this issue, I think I know where I'm going. They're just seeking that affirmation. My team then are seen as a trusted advisor. Yes, they often provide advice and guidance, that's what they do. But many...

Many calls that they get are reassuring the person at the end of the phone that they're doing the right thing, that they're being the sounding board and you wouldn't come to someone unless you trusted them to share in some cases quite delicate issues, quite personal issues. So I think being that trusted advisor and having that reputation in and of itself is a measure that we're doing the right thing.