ep. 21 - Joe Gerstandt: Authenticity, Diversity and Inclusion Speaker, Author, & Advisor
Bio
Joe Gerstandt has worked with Fortune 100 corporations, small non-profits, and everything in between. He speaks at numerous conferences and summits, and blogs at joegerstandt.com. He is a featured contributor for the Workforce Diversity Network Expert Forum and his insights have been published in Diversity Best Practices, Diversity Executive, HR Executive, The Diversity Factor, The American Diversity Report, the Corporate Recruiting Leadership Journal, Associations Now, other print and on-line journals and he co-authored the book Social Gravity: Harnessing the Natural Laws of Relationships.
Transcript
ep. 21 - Joe Gerstandt: Authenticy, Diversity and Inclusion Speaker, Author, & Advisor
Kyle Davis: I'm going to go ahead and hit the record. Let's go.
Gail Davis: Go. Okay. Today's guest on GDA Podcast is Joe Gerstandt. Joe believes that we can all afford to continue applying a 20th century approach to an increasingly critical set [00:01:30] of 21st century issues. A strong advocate for resetting the authenticity, diversity, and inclusion conversation. Joe, welcome. Happy to have you here.
Kyle Davis: Yeah, welcome.
Joe Gerstandt: Thanks, I'm happy to be here.
Kyle Davis: I know that we briefly touched on, prior to recording, what it is that you talked about in your background. But for those people listening, give them the short story of how you got to where you are today, and how you started getting [00:02:00] to talk about authenticity and diversity and inclusion.
Joe Gerstandt: Yeah, and I kind of found this work by accident a little bit. My story starts off in Iowa, I'm a farm kid actually. I grew up on a small family farm, next to a small town in Northwest Iowa. After I graduated high school, I enlisted in the Marine Corp. I did that for four years. That was a pretty amazing experience. Got out of the Marine Corp, came back to the Midwest, went to school at Iowa State University, graduated there. Then I spent about the next five or six years doing sales and sales [00:02:30] management. Enjoyed some aspects of that, but I knew I hadn't found my thing yet and made a career change and went to work in the non-profit space, and really enjoyed that work. While I was doing that work, I started to think about and look at issues related to especially diversity inclusion differently, and just kind of felt pulled towards that work. That eventually became my work, and that's what I write and speak about primarily today.
Kyle Davis: What was it? I know we [00:03:00] talked on authenticity, I'm sure that's something that's entwined. What is it specifically about diversity and inclusion that lead you kind of to your life's work?
Joe Gerstandt: Well I think I started to come to understand those issues in a different way. I think I grew up and I believed that there wasn't a lot of real intentional discrimination left in the world, that those days were kind of behind us, and that you were kind of treated based on your behavior and not based on who you were anymore. I [00:03:30] didn't grow up around a lot of diversity, and so I just didn't know people that had experiences different than mine. When I was working in the non-profit space, I was around a lot of people that were different than I was, that had different life experience, and I also saw them being treated differently by people, and organizations, and institutions. Not for anything that they've done, but because of who they were. I started to realize that there was a little bit more to this conversation than what I had thought that there was. [00:04:00] Started reading and talking to people, and paying attention to that set of issues, and just got pulled further and further into it, and decided that helping organizations, not for profit and for profit organizations, better understand this stuff and benefit from it was something that kind of spoke to me and pulled me.
Kyle Davis: For you, I mean, I think in 2017 the post-Obama [00:04:30] era, I was kind of like you where I thought everything was fine and people would be advanced on their own merits. I've since in the last ten years have lived in New Orleans. I've also lived in Iowa, where I went to school at Cornell College on the East side-
Joe Gerstandt: Okay.
Kyle Davis: Of the state.
Joe Gerstandt: Yeah.
Kyle Davis: But I've lived in New Orleans, I've lived in San Francisco, I've lived in New York City. For where I'm from in Dallas, it's mostly just upper-middle class white people, and then once I get out of the world and I start having more friends that are black, [00:05:00] or asian, or latino, or gay, or transgender and everything else, you start to see that the world isn't that rainbow that you saw before. I'm curious as to what are you getting at now, since it's 2017, with these companies that maybe ten years ago was a little bit different with regards to diversity and inclusion?
Joe Gerstandt: I think one of the things that were doing a lot of work on today, is unconscious or implicit bias.
Kyle Davis: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Joe Gerstandt: Ten years ago, there wasn't a lot of that going on. That's kind of the new [00:05:30] thing right now. Largely because there's so much new science, so much new research that's come up around that. I think that's one of the big deals. I think, you know, compared to ten or fifteen years ago there's also a pretty big focus on inclusion. It wasn't nearly as many leaders or organizations using that word ten or fifteen years ago. They were just talking about diversity. That's still an important part of the conversation, but I think most of the work that is in front of us is making our organizations, our schools, our communities more inclusive [00:06:00] to people who are naturally different from each other.
Kyle Davis: Color me naïve, and I'm being serious when I ask this question. I seem to think of diversity, you know you hear those phrases, "diversity hire, diversity admittance into university," or something like that. What is the difference between diversity and inclusion that people need to know?
Joe Gerstandt: Yeah. I think you know, one of the interesting things about this work is that even though we're saying really beautiful things about it today, companies say amazing things [00:06:30] about diversity and inclusion. This is still a body of work that's in its infancy, and still is kind of conceptually and linguistically under developed. You can walk into organizations that are getting awards for diversity inclusion stuff, and you can ask ten people at random, "What is diversity? What is inclusion and why are they important?" You will probably get ten different answers. What we mean when we use these words is kind of an important thing. There's usually not a lot of common language. When I use the word diversity, I'm talking very specifically about difference, because [00:07:00] that's the definition that I find for it in the dictionary. Difference in identity, difference in perspective, difference in experience. Those are all things that exist in the world and that have actual value to organizations. Those are the things that are valuable if you want healthy decision making, robust problem solving. When I talk about inclusion, so diversity is more about the ingredients.
Kyle Davis: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Joe Gerstandt: Who are the people? What is the ideas? What are the information that we're including? Inclusion is about, what is the container that we're putting that stuff in? [00:07:30] What is the culture of the organization? What are our norms? How do we interact with each other? I think again, most of that work is still in front of us. We have done a good job of bringing more and more diversity into our work places. I don't think we've done much to make it okay to actually be different at working.
Kyle Davis: I mean, I've talked about this at a number of podcasts. I've worked in tech in San Francisco, and the company that I was at when I was at Square, we had every [00:08:00] group. We have these like kind of trying to remember the name of it. We had like for the LGBTQ-
Gail Davis: Employee resource-
Kyle Davis: ERGs, everybody had a Square name. They were the "Squeers". We had like "The Bourbon Group" who drank Bourbon on Fridays. Everyone had their own really kind of cool and inclusive group. When I think of a great company, I think of Square. Maybe even Twitter because it's another Jack Dorsey company doing it right. But what are some [00:08:30] things that an everyday company that doesn't have a six billion dollar IPO, can do for making their organization more inclusive?
Joe Gerstandt: I think there's a number of different things. It kind of depends on the organization. One of the things that I look at with a lot of teams, and a lot of organizations, is how they make decisions. Because that's a pretty important thing. It's also kind of a difficult thing that we do together. Again, the research is pretty clear that good decision making, good problem solving is driven by [00:09:00] a diversity of inputs. Are we intentional in how we make decisions when we have decisions to make that are important? Do we do a good job of reaching out and including ideas and information from a lot different people, and a lot of different places? When we engage in a conversation or trying to make a decision, does everyone feel comfortable telling the truth to each other? Do we have a healthy relationship with conflict? Do we do conflict well? To me I think, those are some of the things at the very center of this work. Making sure that [00:09:30] it's safe for the people who are already on the payroll, to fully participate in that process. I think organizations in general have room for improvement.
Kyle Davis: One of the words that I picked up on that you said early on in that was, "intentional." Which brings me back to authenticity. One of the key strands or strings that we keep pulling to these podcasts, is all about being authentic or being, a phrase that I like to use is, "hyper intentional" in your action. If you're going to have a phone [00:10:00] call with me, you better know what you're going to talk about when you call me.
Joe Gerstandt: Right.
Kyle Davis: Don't just call me. I mean those are fine, but I want intention with it. What can people do to have that level of intention, or have that level of authenticity instead of just being just fluff?
Joe Gerstandt: Well I mean on the individual level, I think part of the work is just getting clear on who you are. That seems like maybe a silly thing, a thing that should be self-evident. In my experience for example, pretty much everyone that I meet [00:10:30] loves the idea of having core values. But if you walk up to those people and say, "Well what are your core values?" Most of them haven't done the work to say, "These are my three or four or five core values." I think doing some of that work and making sure that you've got clarity on what your values are, and what your priorities are, and what your goals are, that's one of the things that makes it a little bit easier for you to act accordingly. Some of us just don't like that introspective, reflective, navel gazing kind of work. But I think it's really, really important.
[00:11:00] Again, loving the idea of having core values is a little bit easier than actually doing the work of saying, "These are my core values." Just like joining the gym is a little bit easier than actually getting out of bed in the morning and going to the gym and working out. They're two different bodies of work. I think authenticity is rooted in this awareness stuff that's kind of important, and that gives you something to hold yourself accountable to. I think that's where it starts. But if you're thinking about it and paying attention to it, I think you're in the right place. [00:11:30] A lot of people think that authenticity is this automatic thing. If I think I'm authentic, that means I'm authentic. In my experience at least, it takes a little bit more. It takes a little bit more work than that.
Gail Davis: Who gets the most benefit from driving the inclusion and the diversity conversation? Is it from the top down when the board has complete buy in? Or is it when you have a really strong HR department that's trying to drive it from their department?
Joe Gerstandt: I think you really [00:12:00] need some of all of that stuff. I think this a body of work that really needs to be distributed across the organization. HR certainly has a big role to play, but I don't think it should exist there or belong to them. I think there's a lot of parts of the organization that have an important role to play. I think one of the things that often times leads organizations to not having successful endeavors, is when the responsibility is just on one person or one group, or one committee. I think it's too big and too complex [00:12:30] for that. Certainly having senior leadership is helpful, makes everything a little bit easier. I think we're at a place where it's kind of interesting, because its almost mandatory for senior leaders to say that they get it, and celebrate it, and embrace it. Actually measuring what that level of commitment is, it's a little bit tricky because folks are quick to say stuff, but that doesn't necessarily mean that they're going to invest financial and political and other kinds of capital [00:13:00] in the effort. If you do have senior level commitment, it's kind of important to get crystal clear on what that actually means.
Kyle Davis: Kind of pivoting back into just overall workplace and everything else, you mentioned that as you came into the professional world after you graduated college, you started in sales and you started in sales management. What were some things that you were seeing then that have changed over time, and how can organizations improve [00:13:30] in that regard? Not just with just in diversity and inclusion, and authenticity, but as far as training and HR, just the overall picture.
Joe Gerstandt: Boy, that's a tricky question.
Kyle Davis: Or is it too loaded?
Joe Gerstandt: It's pretty big. I guess I don't know. I think there's so much variance between organizations. I do think comparing now to ten or fifteen years ago, there is more talk. There is more focus about diversity [00:14:00] inclusion, and also some other issues that I think are related to employee engagement. Some of the conversation around innovation is connected to this stuff. There is more talk about authenticity, about making work human, about making the organization more human. I'm encouraged by those conversations. There's more and more authors and speakers out there kind of focusing on that stuff. I still don't think that stuff is mainstream in the business world, but it's definitely [00:14:30] further along than it was fifteen or twenty years ago.
Kyle Davis: That's good. Now, pivot again. You wrote a book with your partner, Jason.
Joe Gerstandt: Yup.
Kyle Davis: Called, "Social Gravity." Could you provide some context for the audience as to what the book was about? I know that the two of you go off and I know you speak individually as Joe, but then together you're Talent Anarchy. If you could explain that for our audience in case there's some confusion.
Joe Gerstandt: Yeah, absolutely, so Jason Lauritsen. Jason and I are [00:15:00] good friends and collaborators. We've known each other for about twenty years or so, and we do some speaking together under the Talent Anarchy brand. One of the first things that we talked about together, is social capital. We used to do a bunch of stuff on the community level, we started a couple of non profits, we were involved in the young professionals movement. At some points, people started asking us, "How do you guys know everybody?" We didn't know everybody, but we had built kind of a big [00:15:30] powerful network that was helping us get things done. We actually just kind sat down and thought about that had come to be, and we built a presentation on it. We eventually wrote a book about it. It's just about social capital, which is the resources that move back and forth in relationships, and what we identified as kind of six laws of social gravity that kind of push that in one direction or another. But it's a book about how to be [00:16:00] intentional about building and managing a large, far reaching, noisy network of relationships.
Kyle Davis: Break it down, just super high level. What does it take to build a solid and reliable network? I know that you mentioned that you have six points to it, but for those listening I'm sure they're curious just as much as I am.
Joe Gerstandt: I think a little bit of intention and a little bit of effort goes a long ways. I think most people already know that relationships are important. [00:16:30] But I think sometimes because it's not in our skill set, or because we think it's political, or it's about popularity, we don't prioritize building new relationships. We don't set aside the time to take care of existing relationships. I think a little bit of intentionality right there makes all the difference. Setting aside one morning a month to have breakfast with somebody you don't know. Setting aside thirty minutes a week to spend on LinkedIn. A little bit on intentionality and effort I think goes a long way.
Kyle Davis: [00:17:00] The word that kind of came to my mind when I was hearing that was nurturing a relationship. I think especially for myself if I'm being radically transparent, is that I kind of somewhat fall under the philosophy of out of sight, out of mind.
Joe Gerstandt: Yup.
Kyle Davis: I'm not super intentional. It's not intentional in nurturing, and fostering, and maintaining those relationships. It's not something that I do intentionally or out of spite for somebody. It's something [00:17:30] that happens because I'm busy.
Joe Gerstandt: Yup.
Kyle Davis: It's something that I need to do. You're saying, and I think rightfully so, that if someone just put in the effort just to think about it as little as thirty minutes once a month with somebody, you can maintain and foster those relationships.
Joe Gerstandt: Yeah, absolutely. Some people set aside a little bit of time to send out a few hand written notes. That's a beautiful thing. If you received a hand written note, you pay attention to that. Some people try to hit everyone in their email list at least once a year. [00:18:00] Jason does a pretty good job every year when it's March Madness. He says, "Hey. I've taken Friday off. I'm going to be at this bar all day watching basketball. Why don't you come hang out with me?"
Gail Davis: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Joe Gerstandt: One of the things that we've both done, is we've set aside Skype dates. We've blocked off the entire day. We set up a scheduling thing on evite. Anybody that wants to, can schedule a twenty or thirty minute conversation with us on Skype. We get together, maybe we haven't seen each other or talked to each other for a year. It's an easy way to catch up. Sometimes it's personal, sometimes it's professional. [00:18:30] I think the trick is just finding things that work for you. A little bit of effort. Staying in touch with those folks, sharing articles or links that you think might be of value to them. Anything that brings them top of mind for you, and makes you top of mind for them kind of lights up that connection again. I think that's a pretty worthy investment.
Kyle Davis: I'm sure you know the person that I'm about to talk about. I'm not talking about individual, I'm just talking about a type of person. The person [00:19:00] who is like the serial networker, but like it's overly aggressive. You're not talking about that person.
Joe Gerstandt: I'm not.
Kyle Davis: You're talking about just being true and authentic, and just making yourself available for others.
Joe Gerstandt: Absolutely. We even a little bit about authenticity in the book as kind of a super charger for building social capital. I think one of the way to stay top of mind with people, is to be true to who you are and to be unique, and not just to be one of 500 other recruiters [00:19:30] that I've met. Yeah, we're not talking about networking for networking's sake. In fact, I'm pretty introverted. I really despise networking events, so I really do have to be kind of creative to do this stuff because maybe some of the easier ways to do some of this stuff I don't really do very well. There's a lot of different ways to do it. Social technology gives us a lot of different ways to approach this today.
Kyle Davis: One of the recent guests that we had on the podcast had a quote [00:20:00] talking about going from optional to essential. It came from being hyper intentional, transparent, working with somebody not just as an individual. His was more of a sales background, it's more an easily applicable to other relationships in your life. Being no longer just an option, just being an essential piece of someone's life, and adding and creating value for them.
Joe Gerstandt: [00:20:30] Yeah, and I think you got to be intentional about it. Again, I think most people already know that relationships are important. Relationships are kind of like fitness, right? I know it's important, but it's a really easy thing for me to push off until next week because I've got all this urgent stuff that's blowing up around me. If you're not careful, five years will go by and you won't have anymore reach with your network than you do today. That's unfortunate because it's pretty easy to keep building that reach if you do set aside a little bit of time and a little [00:21:00] bit of effort.
Kyle Davis: I think probably another great analogy would be like a relationships, even if they're not like a consistent one, they're kind of like succulents or orchids. They just need a little bit of light and just a little bit of water.
Joe Gerstandt: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Kyle Davis: And you're good to go.
Joe Gerstandt: Yeah.
Kyle Davis: It's not grass. You don't have to manage it, you don't have to water it everyday in the Texas heat, or cut it once a week.
Joe Gerstandt: I think, you know, for a lot of us, we probably don't need to be too intentional about our big relationships. Like I've mentioned Jason. Jason and I are really good friends. I don't need [00:21:30] to focus on staying in touch with him, because we do stay in touch with each other. Those people that I meet that I know that we only see each other once a year, or once every other year, there's probably some value in trying to make sure that line of communication stays open. You never know what's going to move though that relationship.
Gail Davis: I know someone in our industry, and I'm a client of his. It's now become a bit predictable, but nonetheless super appreciated. He makes a conscious effort to reach out [00:22:00] every January, usually the first week of January, he's not selling anything. In the most genuine manner, he calls and says, "Thank you. I love working with you and I just want you to know how much I appreciate it. Just checking in. Hope you had a great holiday. Hope you have a great year, but I want you to know, thank you." It just makes you feel so good, you know? That intentional just to show true appreciation.
Joe Gerstandt: I think you know, that's an example of that authenticity coming through. That's something [00:22:30] that he does because of the person that he is. Now he's in a little bit of a different category in your mind than the other folks.
Gail Davis: Absolutely.
Kyle Davis: The industry that we're in is the speaking industry. I know that we've talked about authenticity, diversity, inclusion and just being intentional. But what is it that companies, when they bring you on board to come and talk with them or even consult, what are they having you focus on whether it be for an hour or for a couple days, or a couple hours for [00:23:00] break out? What is it?
Joe Gerstandt: It kind of varies, but I think the biggest answer, the most common answer to that is organizations bring me in when they are getting ready to make a big investment in diversity inclusion, and they want to make sure they kind of understand what they're talking about, and they want a little bit of help in finding out how to get started. As I said earlier, I think in most organizations, inclusion is still a vague abstract idea. It's a very popular word, but it's still a vague, abstract idea. [00:23:30] Before folks get started doing stuff, they need more clarity. They need more clarity in helping to figure out what it means to their organization, why it's valuable to their organization.
Kyle Davis: For people to have an understanding of why it is valuable to have diversity and inclusion, I can understand it but it sometimes is even hard for me to articulate why it's valuable to have people from various backgrounds and different things like that. Why would it be valuable for [00:24:00] your clients for everybody else?
Joe Gerstandt: I think there's a number of different answers to that. Some of them are kind of specific to the kind of organization or the kind of industry. Some of the general answers are you know, right off the top, talent is diverse. Talent is diverse. If you care about talent, you should want to make sure that talent in all of its shapes, sizes, and colors can find a way into your organization. If your organization is only good at finding particularly packaged [00:24:30] talent, I would look at that as a liability. I would look at that as a liability. We should all want to be drawing from the largest pool of talent possible.
This isn't about lowering standards. That's not what this is about at all, but making sure that we can find and identify talent regardless of its packaging. Same is true of customers. We should want to reach out to as many customers as possible that are looking for our product or service. We don't want race, age, geography, language, any of that stuff to stand in the way. The same thing is true of vendors. [00:25:00] I think especially with an understanding of human behavior, it's easy to understand that if we want to reach out inclusively in those three areas, we want to reach out inclusively, that requires some work. Good intentions aren't enough.
On a general level, those are three answers that I think apply to any organization, any industry, any entity. Beyond that, there's quite a bit of research that points to diversity of input as a pretty big driver for healthy decision making, problem solving, [00:25:30] innovation, things that most organizations are talking about. I think those are a pretty big part of the answer for most organizations right there.
Kyle Davis: I think when I look at organizations that have kind of fallen by the wayside over time, you can kind of see that there's like a cookie cutter, the board is all the same. The members of senior level management, they're all the same. I've even worked in a couple of organizations where you know, the sales team was the same person. [00:26:00] This is a funny story. I used to run kind of a network marketing sales, our organization a number of, decade ago now. We would recruit this specific demographic. It was great at the beginning, but then they just ran out because they were the same person every single one. We had to start being inclusive if we wanted to be profitable. It wasn't just being inclusive like you said in the hires that we brought on, but also inclusive in the people that [00:26:30] we sold to. Because initially we thought that the customer type was this, when it really it's everybody. We shouldn't have to shun away people who are throwing their prejudice at for whatever reason.
Joe Gerstandt: Right. It's inclusive and it's in flux. That reminds me, I think it as in whole new minds, Dan Pink talked about how a lot of start ups were very, very good at hiring MBAs. They would hire the best and brightest MBAs [00:27:00] that they could find. That was pretty easy for MBAs to come into an organization with other MBAs, because they had a common language. They had some common tools, some common models, but what they came to realize, is that that group also wasn't learning anything. They were stuck in this kind of shared context. Some of those start ups started hiring people that had Masters of Fine Arts. Now, it was a lot harder for the MBAs and the MFAs to find common ground and communicate. But when they were able to do that, there was a lot of knowledge transfer [00:27:30] because they had different language, and different models, and different tools. I think that's part of what we need to hold onto as well. If we want our organizations to continue to learn and have the ability to change, then we need to keep bringing new and different stuff inside of them. Otherwise they go away, they become irrelevant.
Kyle Davis: One of the things that just kind of on my mind, I don't know why I went on this train of thought, but it's going to involve dogs. I'm a recent dog adopter, I guess. [00:28:00] It comes like to breeding dogs. If you just run the same breed generation after generation, eventually, you're going to have problems.
Joe Gerstandt: Yup.
Kyle Davis: It's not right off the bat, it's six, seven, eight generations down the line and then all of the sudden they're coming out with all sorts of maladies. Whereas if you have a mutt, it's strong, it'll survive like a cockroach. It's [00:28:30] better. It's better for dogs, it's better for us, and it's better for organizations to have diversity. Again, I think to your point like you said earlier, you don't have to like scrape and let people in. You can still hold a standard.
Joe Gerstandt: Absolutely, absolutely. It's funny because like you just mentioned, the importance of diversity in that part, there's no question that biodiversity is a really, really important thing. There's no question that investing, there's great value in diversifying your [inaudible 00:28:58]. There's so many places where [00:29:00] it's without question that diversity's a really valuable thing, but for some reason in this space, in the workplace, it's been viewed as this kind of political, liberal agenda that's not really about work stuff. I think that idea and that mindset is a lot of what we're working against.
Kyle Davis: Right.
Gail Davis: I used to hire a lot of similar people. A consultant once said to me, "Gail. You're so consistent in your hiring." I was like, "Well thank you." [00:29:30] He said, "Everyone you hire is just like you." I'm patting myself on the back thinking, 'Isn't this great?' And then he goes, "You must be exhausted." I was like, "Well I am. Why's that?" He goes, "Well if you hire everyone like you, then you it all rises to the top and you're the one having to overcompensate for the deficiencies that you all have, because you've hired people exactly like you." He said, "That's got to be exhausting." I was like, "No one ever put it to me that way." Then all of the sudden I really tried to take a broader approach. It's [00:30:00] not about the packaging necessarily, but it was a skill set. I was hiring a lot of people oriented people, but not a lot of people that had detail or innovative ideas. That was really eye opening for me.
Joe Gerstandt: I think that's true of all of us. I think we have some natural blind spots there. I think we kind of look for and notice people that are either like us, or that remind us of some ideal employee or supervisor. I mean I think one of the things especially that leaders don't realize, [00:30:30] is that I don't think our thinking in evaluating of human beings is nearly as logical, and rational, and scientific and free of bias as we like to think that it is.
Kyle Davis: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah. I always like to think, too, and this is one of my little lines. Setting up people for success and not failure. I think too often you know when you have these organizations that are like very cookie cutter, that they don't look to innovate, they don't strive to provide people [00:31:00] with the solutions or tools that they need, whether it be training or actually off the shelf items.
Joe Gerstandt: Right.
Kyle Davis: They're not doing it. Whereas if they are inclusive and diverse in their hiring practices and inclusive and diverse in who they choose to be their vendors, and getting new ideas and how to attack stuff, it makes things ultimately much more efficient and much more profitable in the long run.
Joe Gerstandt: Absolutely. They're bringing new information into the organization on a regular basis. Makes it easy for the organization to learn, to evolve, and to adapt. [00:31:30] That stuff doesn't look very important on the day to day basis, but in the long term it's incredibly important.
Kyle Davis: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Well cool. I think we're going to wrap it up here. If was a real pleasure. If you guys want to read the transcript that we had for Joe, you can do so by going to GDAPodcast.com. If you are interested in having Joe and your co-partner Jason as well, or Joe individually doesn't really matter, you can contact-
Joe Gerstandt: Doesn't matter to you maybe!
Kyle Davis: I mean hey, we love everybody [00:32:00] here.
Gail Davis: Jason's had his turn! This is about Joe.
Kyle Davis: Yeah, Jason's had his turn. This is your show, man. But if you're interested in having Joe Gerstandt come and speak for your organization, you can do so by getting in touch with GDA Speakers. You can call 214-420-1999, or visit GDASpeakers.com. Thanks Joe.
Gail Davis: Thank you Joe.
Joe Gerstandt: Thank you.
Gail Davis: Appreciate it.
Joe Gerstandt: Thank you guys. Thanks.
ep. 21 - Joe Gerstandt: Authenticy, Diversity and Inclusion Speaker, Author, & Advisor by GDA Podcast is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.