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