Stephanie Mehta: Welcome, Anjali. I’m so glad you’re here us today.
Anjali Sud: Thank you, it is great be here.
SM: At Vimeo, you lead a workforce of 1,300 worldwide — you have creatives, you have finance people, you have technologists. So I’m to start with a really easy question: what was it like to manage this workforce through a global pandemic, a racial reckoning and a very fraught return office?
AS: Oh, it was a breeze, Stephanie. No, it was really challenging. know, I think the only constant has been change. And a leader, you obviously — you have a workforce that’s for certainty, and they’re looking to control what’s happening around them. And I what we all found, as leaders, no matter what company you were … responsible for, was that couldn’t offer certainty, and you couldn’t always control the environment and the things around you. And so, know, for me, it was really about agility. How do stay flexible as a team? How do we communicate in real time keep people informed as we try and move through things? And then, also just how do we lead more humanity? You know, for Vimeo, one of the I’ve really learned over the last few years is we each experience the world differently. We have employees who are remote. We have an incredible team Ukraine … employees who are on the front lines, who are at war. On the other hand, you have people in different parts of the world who are mental-health challenges or burnout, and so I think it was really just — the hardest was not being able to give everyone certainty, not able to just apply a one-size-fits-all rule for everyone. But ultimately think it forced us, as a company, to build more trust, because to agile and flexible, and to lead with humanity, you have to trust each other. And so, I’m sort optimistic that actually we’re emerging from this time with a culture is more flexible and nimble, and also, hopefully, has trust.
SM: Can you give an example of something you put into place, perhaps during the pandemic, to enhance or build trust or create a greater sense of community or even to communicate there is no certainty, that is a muscle that you you’ll continue to use in the organization far into future?
AS: There’s a couple of things that we did. One — and we a video platform, so I obviously have to talk about video, but I mean this sincerely — of the hardest parts, when you’re all sort of disparate, is you lose context and you lose nuance you communicate. And we did make a concerted effort to move away from email chat, text-based communication, as much as possible, and actually try, particularly for our leadership team, we were communicating, to do it with your face, your hands and your body and your emotions. And we that through live streaming a lot of communications, recording lot of videos. We sent asynchronous video messages. So send … I record my screen and just send a out to people. Every new hire does a video to welcome and introduce themselves. A of our meetings we’ve actually replaced with just quick video presentations. And actually, what that really did was the humanity and the context to come through and I think helped us a lot to, kind of, stay close. So that was one, I think, important thing.
Another important thing is, I think, just creating to make it easier to talk about when things aren’t working, because a critical part of being agile is we have an area that isn’t working. And so one of the things that we do Vimeo is we try — I do this in of my town halls, we do it in a of meetings — is always talk about what’s working, what are top three things, and what isn’t working — yet. we’ve kind of created, I think, a framework that sort of takes the stigma from talking about what’s not working. And when you make normalized and comfortable for people, I feel like it’s allowed us to be more open, as organization, about what do we need to change, what do we need to pivot. And of those, being more video-first in our communication and being more transparent and normalizing what’s not working, I has been really helpful, and certainly something we’re carrying forward.
SM: I love that advice about video-first. So many of our members of our workforce live a video world. They’re used to video as a means communication. Which brings me to my next question. You’ve about how the organization has changed. How do you see the changing? What is different with the young millennials, and even, now, the first wave of Gen Z into the workplace?
AS: I think it’s incredibly different. And, you know, one of things that we think about at Vimeo a lot is a of the mechanisms and communication modes that we still use today, they’re really antiquated. They were for a totally different environment and a totally different generation. I see a lot of differences. One of them, think, is the line between your personal life and work is definitely blending. … If you think about your personal life — at TikTok. This generation is used to consuming content, learning, engaging, in a very way. And if they then have to come to work and to trained on a job, read a 300-page manual? Like, it’s not going to happen, right? Or you miss the meeting, and you have to watch the Zoom of a three-hour meeting — that’s just not going to happen. And I think that there is definitely sort of this — you know, talk about the “consumerization of enterprise.” Those are just words for saying the way … we communicate and in our personal lives is going to translate to work. And I definitely think that’s an area of opportunity.
The other thing I see from sort of generation, the newest generation coming into the workforce, is sort of, of course mission-driven, but I think there’s desire to really understand the “why” behind things. And one of our communication mantras is never talk about the “what” without the “why.” And I think there’s a desire to — idea that, well, there’s a hierarchy, or “My boss told that this is what we’re going to do” or — that, I think, increasingly moving away, and people, they don’t just want do something because someone with formal authority told them to do it. They want to do it because understand why it matters, why it ties to the mission. And I think that forces leaders to really bring more of the “why” how we communicate and motivate people.
So those are two of the things I see, then, you know, the third I think is just flexibility. think — and this is true of all of us, but particularly the younger generation — I they’re looking for flexibility and they want options and choices. And it’s always easy and feasible to provide ultimate flexibility, but this is where I try and orient it more agility. How can we have approaches and principles and be committed to things, but also when to question, and when to actually pivot?
SM: Yeah. Anjali, can share a few examples of ways that you at have tried to really be proactive when it comes to or understanding what your next generation of employees are to want, either in terms of purpose or in terms of benefits or in terms flexibility? Are there programs or processes you’ve put in place that really speak to this big sea we’re seeing in terms of values from the workforce?
AS: Firstly, of course, it’s about listening, right? And I think, like many organizations, the we’ve tried to listen and understand our workforce is very similar: it’s Q As and engagement surveys, and things like that. And of the things that we’ve done, we have a people and NPS, net promoter score, the same way we have for our users, for internal teams. But I would say one of the things that we’ve tried to do is appreciate that when we get inputs our employees, 1,300 employees … you can’t look at the averages. can’t look at it all in totality and try and pull out an “Oh, this is how everybody’s feeling.” Because what you actually — when you really into it and truly listen and do focus groups and talk to people — what you’ll is actually there’s very different experiences and desires among your employees. And so, I think for us, we’ve really just tried to do is have a bunch of different listening and then resist the urge to conveniently pull, like, “Oh, this what everyone’s feeling, let’s just do this thing as the action.” it’s hard, and we’re still kind of figuring it out, but I will tell you, of the things that we’ve heard from employees have changed our approach to hybrid work or or even things like our approach to compensation or our to DE and I. So I think it’s more just like I said, that agile listening, constantly understanding what’s happening, but not treating everything as, like, average or the same. And for us, it’s been particularly because we have offices and teams in so many different and the differences, they’re substantial. They’re really substantial, about the we solve different things. And we used to have a very, sort of, “One Vimeo” global approach the name of consistency and fairness, and what we found is we have to more localized. We really do. We have to design mechanisms support our teams in a very different way, because their and the world around them is quite different.
So think that’s definitely been one, and I will tell you, it has involved a lot of — as executive team and leadership team — it’s involved a of trying things, it not working, and changing them. And a example is our Q and A. I feel like every I know has a perspective on whether they do open Q and A or anonymous Q and A, real-time Q and A. We’ve changed our approach there multiple times, and I know we will again, we’re still figuring out the right way to listen and a dialogue with a very diverse workforce.
SM: I to stay on newcomers to the workplace for just another moment, because another thing I from CEOs of my generation and older is a about making sure that we are not just providing our employees with the flexibility and the purpose that they need, also the training and the wisdom that comes, oftentimes, from in close proximity to a mentor or to somebody who’s done the job for more years. What is your philosophy and take on making sure that knowledge transfer is happening?
AS: think it’s a major challenge that I don’t know that everyone will sort of a solution for. I think about that all the time. We a very distributed workforce at Vimeo. We have people in over eight countries. My executive team is distributed. So I’ve really realized the benefits of being to have a distributed workforce and being able to attract talent and just more inclusive. On the flip side, there’s definitely, I think, a lack the same kinds of learning opportunities and mentorship, particularly for the folks that are entering the workforce. So I think it’s a challenge. of the approaches that we’ve been taking, and what’s of nice, is we’re modeling it at the top. So my entire executive team is distributed, that means I to learn how to provide real-time feedback, mentorship and development for a set of new executives who have just joined. We have sort of changed up the executive team almost in the last twelve months. So I’ve had to deal with the same challenges. And we’ve to literally — we call it our operating system — we’ve had to design an operating system, as an team, for how we’re going to work together in that environment. How do we share real-time feedback? do we create the right communication loops? And so think, from my perspective, it’s more we have to be able to do it and model it and then, I think it’s a proven mechanism for young people. I will say, like many companies … I do believe in-person collaboration is really important for learning. We do — we bring people into an office. If you’re remote, we folks to come in and spend time in a room their team, do social activities, all of those things. I don’t think they will go away, do I think they should. But, you know, candidly, it’s area that I don’t think we’ve really figured out and I think it’s really critical that as leaders, we do that, so that next generation is able to get the same growth opportunities that all had.
SM: Well, and it’s interesting — the that you mentioned at the very beginning of our conversation, around video, can really helpful there. I’ve heard of a number of organizations have really encouraged their young people to present, as a way of having to go out find the information they need. And then, because we have tools available to us now, you know, they have an to share their ideas with a large group of people, first, kind of going through the fact-finding and the research, and then sharing ideas. In an earlier comment, you talked a little bit about mental illness and different things that people are bringing to work, whether it is, you know, exhaustion, burnout. During Black Lives Matter protests, we had a lot of coming to the office feeling trauma, and feeling really personal bubble to the surface. I’m wondering if you can share a bit about how you deal with this increasing personal — know, when people bring their whole selves to the office, we encourage, sometimes, they bring things, parts of themselves are challenging.
AS: Yeah … I’ve always thought the responsibility of a is to empower people to do their best work and responsibility of a company is to empower our people to their best work. And so, of course, we have a role to play in supporting things like mental-health issues burnout. And, you know, the way I think, like companies, the way we initially probably sought to do that was more, you know, you’re seeing a problem you’re reacting by trying to provide mental-health resources or support or off. And, I think — and empathy, just empathy. think that’s really important. And I always say, to so of our managers … just care. If we just care, lot of things get easier. You don’t have to design hundred mechanisms if you just have the right people in place who care. At the time, I will say what we’re realizing now, in sort of next phase, is that that’s a reactive approach and actually root cause — that we can control at Vimeo — root cause of a lot of stress and burnout sometimes people either don’t have enough … focus, we’re people to do too many things or they don’t feel like they’re supported in those things. And that, I think, is actually where we should be more time — is how do we actually set the right and focus. There’s some issue there, right? There’s a root cause there that’s a “Oh, I like I’m stressed because there’s too much going on. I don’t feel equipped to solve it.” Then, we get into the “What is the detail there, and do we need do things differently?” And, you know, one of our themes at Vimeo year was “Do less, better.”
SM: As the economy starts to, maybe, move sideways, do you think that are going to be stakeholders who say, you know, “Out all of this touchy-feely, the workplace-as-a-family stuff. Where are results?”
AS: Absolutely. I think the pendulum has already swung clearly. I mean, I work in SAS, software as a service, so we already went from “growth all cost” to “profitability,” you know, pendulum swing. My perspective on this — it hasn’t changed — I think the best leaders and cultures deliver results and treat people well. I actually think, if you treat people well, with and empathy, you will get better results. And so, you know, for me, I think what observed over the last few years is — that part, I think, hasn’t changed and shouldn’t change. There were, think, a lot of times when companies, we did because maybe it was lip service or we felt pressured. that’s not going to be sustainable. But that’s not what — ultimately, that’s what people need, in any case. So, you know, I of see it as — the way you channel how you are caring towards your employees how you are empathetic, always should be in service of helping people do best work, which will deliver results, which will be for the bottom line. And you have to believe that. You to be committed to that and if you use that in your decision-making, it should not be a trade-off. are not mutually exclusive things.
SM: Anjali, how have you been taking care of during this period of tremendous turmoil and change, but also growth? You you just had a baby. There’s a lot on your shoulders. How, a leader, do you practice some self-care or how you make sure that you’re getting the balance you need to the most effective leader you can be?
AS: I think — recently, the I use a lot to myself is “two things can be true, both can be true.” say this a lot. And for me, I think of as, like, “This job is hard, and it’s gotten harder.” We went public the height of the pandemic and last year, market volatility been tremendous. You know, we’re obviously going through a ton with post-pandemic, we have a team Ukraine going through a war — all these things that happened. And so, it’s a hard job, and it’s an privileged job. It’s a gift, right? And so, I think for me, it’s sort of acknowledging of those things has helped me a lot. The way I’ve tried to kind of lead, been — it’s always been this way, which is, me, it’s I have to have passion. I have to have passion. I to believe so deeply that what Vimeo is doing is important and matters the world. And if I have passion, I have energy and then I will — I kind of move through anything. I have to find joy in my team. feel like, especially in hard times, I look back at my career actually, some of my most fulfilling times in work were when — the hardest business situations. But it’s because it brought a group of people all on one team, and so I think that’s been, you know, really big part of it. And then, yeah, like, have to be a little selfish sometimes, and take care of yourself. And I really fortunate. I think I have a great support network around me I do … My husband and I have a deal, where on Sundays, disappear for a couple of hours. I just disappear and walk around the city and I listen to my music and whatever I need to do, and that’s really important.
SM: you talked about how hybrid work is going to very different in the future than how we describe it today. It’s basically in office couple of days, work from home a couple of other days. Tell us little bit more about what you could potentially see that into.
AS: I think the idea of an office a time and place completely goes away. And I think it’s really going to be people are going want to work from anywhere, anywhere in the world. Even the concept where you’re located is going to change. And then idea of like “I’m going to work on this zone” or “I’m going to attend this meeting that’s scheduled on this date” — think that’s going to go away. And I think what you’re going find is more and more work, particularly from knowledge workers, is going to be done anywhere, anytime. Communication collaboration will happen asynchronously and we will be using tools and — whether it’s video, whether it’s AI — to basically that at scale among many people, anywhere in the world. And then I think leadership, leaders are to look different. Because I think it’s going to — if you think about the skill set to a global CEO 30 years ago versus what that will require — I think in the future … the skill set is going to be like, “How you communicate with diverse, global audiences and employees across zones in a way that is effective, that provides and alignment at scale? How do you organize programs, it’s compensation, whether it’s, you know, training?” All of that going to look very different. But I think the ultimate thing you’ll see is just … were these constraints that we’ve lived with, whether it time or place or budget, in some cases. And I those constraints are going to go away. And the is that if we are flexible and smart and we use technology in the right way, we’ll actually come away a much more evolved and workforce.
SM: Well, I think you just showed us of the passion that you’ve talked about as being the thing that you energy to lead that organization of 1,300 people worldwide. Anjali, thank so much for being here today.
AS: Thank you. This great.