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