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