Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:01 No, the gross sneaks up on you when you're in hyper-growth like that. My biggest learning is, like I said, for founders is invested in early. If you can do it under a hundred people do it. Um, because the more easy to establish the foundations, if you think about your HR technology stack, your applicant tracking system, your HR, I S getting things built out deal, hopefully in the mix on the stack. Um, thinking about your core principles and foundations across your compensation philosophy, uh, how do you drive a performance culture? Those things obviously much easier to establish with less people.
Speaker 1 00:00:38 Um,
Speaker 2 00:00:43 You wouldn't be in missing wondering whether Alex disease or shoe Wayne co-founders of deal had a crystal ball where they launched a deal back in 2019 pre pandemic that San Francisco had called it scale-up helps businesses hire anyone anywhere in minutes, you automate onboarding payroll and compliance across 150 plus countries globally and of 6,000 plus customers from SMBs to publicly traded companies. Now in 2022, there were really 650 plus team members strong, globally distributed, and have an eye watering, a valuation of $5.5 billion in 2021 alone. They grew from 50 to 550 plus employees. They're a team that truly are creating the new world of work together. I was lucky enough to chat with Casey Bailey head of people of deal formally at VP of people and places at DV and head of global HR VP for Uber. Casey shared some incredible learnings with us. What they'll be doubling down on throughout 2022, and what she believes future of work really looks like Casey is a true champion of the people team and advocates for investing in talent early on as a startup. If you listen to one thing today, I'd recommend you listen to this. Casey, really pleased to be speaking with you today. Um, first off, thanks for joining us on the podcast. Great to have you with us, um, for our listeners, um, to kick us off as well. Can you tell us a bit about yourself?
Speaker 0 00:02:11 Of course. So Casey Bailey, I currently lead the people function for deal, um, joined in December of last year. But prior to that, you know, a little bit of history about me. I spent about 11 years in my early career at HR and benefits consulting for a boutique firm based in the U S out of Dallas, Texas, and really had the wonderful opportunity to run the gamut of just everything possible that you would touch from a people realm across HR payroll, uh, really running into every possible thing that you could think of and solving and trying to tackle whether it was for healthcare, retail, uh, transportation and trucking, the wine industry, uh high-tech at the time. So also had the opportunity to work with many different of teams, cultures, executive leadership, workforces, and I really credit that time to really establishing the foundations for me.
Speaker 0 00:03:07 And what's gone on to lead me down the career path of moving into higher level leadership roles in the people realm after spending about 11 years and consulting. Um, I did want the chance to go in-house and learn what it was like to focus solely on one workforce, one company, one internal client base, and see what it would be like to really try to build that culture. And so I went to a company called retail, me not who was in the no brick and mortar stores at that time, uh, in the retail industry for outdoor goods, but a tech company at heart. So heavily engineering and product R and D based, um, building out their HR business partner function, and then had the opportunity from there, uh, to go, um, to Uber and, uh, you know, Uber. I was there a lot of interesting commentary about people who have spent time at Uber, for sure.
Speaker 0 00:03:59 And I was there during 2017 and the midst of all of the PR debacles and, uh, internal and external communications of that year, which were, uh, every, a daily occurrence at that time. But I also credit that with being probably the learning experience of my career because sitting in an HR leadership role at times, covering, uh, 90% of our executive team across our global ride sharing business, our global Uber eats business, uh, sometimes Uber freight, sometimes global customer support, you know, in a 20,000 person, fully global organization, uh, with many different business units, right from flying cars all the way down to the core ride sharing platform, trying to steer the boat on culture, core people, programs in a different direction or any type of change management was just such a massive feat. And oftentimes because working at Uber speed, um, you know, wanting to try to solve these problems that would take other companies of that size six, eight months to solve.
Speaker 0 00:05:03 We were asked to solve them in three to six weeks. Um, so certainly, uh, you know, like I said, a learning experience of, of a lifetime. And then from there, I wanted to go early days into an organization wasn't necessarily looking to make a move, but had the opportunity to meet a CEO of a FinTech company based in the U S in Utah called D um, Devi. And at that time, really trying to rethink what is expense management or spend management in the FinTech space and not making traditional SAS type of revenue, uh, making money like a credit card. Um, actually, so really interesting from a platform perspective of what they were in product to market launch. And I happened to join when they were doing about 500,000 and ARR, uh, 30 employees, right? Super early days in series a and B, which were raised in eight weeks of each other.
Speaker 0 00:06:00 And the summer of 2018 met the CEO. And he said, whatever HR person longs to hear from a CEO founder, and that, I don't know how we can build the business if we don't build our people foundation right alongside it. Right. And I think that's one of the most impactful things I think that founders and CEOs can actually do is thinking about people, leadership of foundations early. So how'd the opportunity to go there. And like he said, build alongside the business. So when we were acquired by bill.com last summer, we had increased head count from that 30 to five 50. We had increased ARR from 500,000 and ARR to 118 million in ARR. And you know, about two and a half years time. So while building a wonderful, nurturing, uh, culture, uh, where a best place to work and you'd top it across the U S so then after that, uh, that acquisition, uh, was planning to take some time off, but had the opportunity to meet Alex at deal. And didn't want to talk to him for a while because I just thought I wanted to take a break, but, uh, he kept reaching out and I kept saying, it's series D it's worth 5.5 billion at this point, you're 500 people. It's too big. I want to go early days and build again. And he said, no, no, we are building, uh, even though we're series. So I had the opportunity to join deal last December.
Speaker 2 00:07:29 Excellent. That's a great story to hear, actually. And it sounds like you've had quite some experiences. That's really good. Um, one of the things you sort of started to touch on there is, you know, building, um, and leading a global people team that the company founded in 2019, just before the pandemic, no one could have planned for that. Let's be honest. You know, you've already reached a valuation $5.5 billion grows from 50 to 550 plus distributed employees globally. That's, um, that's immense. And on top of that secure what 6,000 plus customers in Kleenex motion spend desk Intercom, Shopify, Dropbox, the list goes on. So that's, that's staggering. Um, before we dig in, dig a little deeper into the people side of things, can you tell me in your own words a bit more about those mission and vision?
Speaker 0 00:08:22 Yes. And they do look Schewel and Alex, the co-founders looked like they saw the future, right? Because launching, launching pre pandemic any that's what's so compelling is, you know, we have, since the pandemic, so many people trying to figure out what is the future of the work? Um, how do I access the global talent marketplace in a really meaningful way? How do I, then once I access it, they give out building a culture around it. That's meaningful, um, a way where both contractors, uh, FTEs are treated the same as global team members. And we are able to build in best practices. And how you think about a global workforce. That's what deal is building right across our platform. Truly how can businesses hire anyone anywhere? Um, yes, that's the heart of it that, gosh, there's that deeper level of how you do that in a meaningful way, from how people access and use the tools that technology to have transparency around their contract or offer letter, uh, their pay, their invoicing, their benefits, perks that they're eligible for. Um, and then on the backend side, um, from an administrative side, how do we see our global workforce in one place? Um, you know, there's tons of tools on the market at, for an HR technology stack perspective, but really being able to create a tool where you have access to people that you're employing in a variety of different ways all across the goal. Um, so that's, what's so exciting. I think about the technology and again, they, they definitely saw the future and to where the future of work or setting.
Speaker 2 00:09:50 So the timing was fatigued. So we should never say that about a pandemic for that, that works really well. So I suppose, you know, you can hear the passion and what you're saying there. So was that ultimately what drew you to the company at the end of 2020?
Speaker 0 00:10:04 Yes, absolutely. You know, um, when Alex was reaching out to me, as I was considering, you know, moving on after the Devi integration, uh, I had not heard of deal. Um, it wasn't something that we were necessarily trying to solve being a US-based company. So I just wasn't in that same kind of track, but for, I could immediately see the first time that I spoke with him. And did some research of you have seen the future of work? I have been having this conversation for the past year with my executive team through the pandemic of the workforce is going global. It's not just about being remote across the United States and being able to provide access for people to work in North Carolina versus Texas versus Utah. It's people are moving. Um, it's not having access to people on H1B, visas, or people needing to go home and be with family wherever that is.
Speaker 0 00:10:55 Uh, people wanting a different lifestyle, a different cost of living. I mean, just to be nomadic, uh, you know, at this time in their life when they can and how do we meet people where they are, um, and truly be able to hire the best person for the job and for the company at that time and access global talent. Um, and that's what I saw very powerfully that they were unlocking and the platform and really pushing the boundaries of how do you think about that, but also trying to be smart and thoughtful and intentional and leveraging this global community through our customers. We have access to, uh, like you said, we have 6,000 customers and growing all of their HR teams and people leaders thought leaders who are also pushing the boundaries. How can we leverage that to create playbooks and resources and collateral for people that may or may not be skilled in having those conversations with their executive teams or thinking about their global workforces? So, yes, it was just, it was so compelling to hear what they were doing and to be part of it, not just in building a world-class internal people, team function at deal, but also as a people leader, it's a dream, right? To be able to influence an HR technology platform that then is going out and helping others push forward the future of work.
Speaker 2 00:12:14 I think it's great that you, you're not just developed a product that can help other people you're operating in the same way yourselves. And I think had I known about something like Dale in previous organizations that would affect so many issues is great. So it's really clear that daily is very much operating in the future of work workspace. Um, and for you, what does the future of work look like in reality and how is it going to evolve from what we're experiencing?
Speaker 0 00:12:44 Yes. So I think the number one thing, which is, is the core thing that deal is trying to, um, activate for people at the beginning is just how do I access and actually employ those individuals. Um, so if you think about our platform, right, having an immense contractor workforce, having templates built all of the collateral and pieces of how you can access where you've got a one-off person sitting in Spain, or your top account executive needs to move back to China or someone, you know, people are moving all around and how can you solve for both one-off things that you're experiencing your workplace, but also just accessing the global talent market in a different place to no matter where you find a person who's going to be the best fit. Great. We've got a solution across being a contractor in our EOR business or in our global payroll solution, uh, actually where you stood up your own entity and paying directly as an FTE.
Speaker 0 00:13:35 And so I think that's where the future of work is moving in. This first phase is just how to access and appropriately taco the employment status, the documentation, the compliance of meeting people, where they are, right. And handling that in a legally compliant way, which is definitely something that is our bread and butter. We've employed. We've taken a little bit different approach from some of our competitors in market to actually wanting to control that experience for the end user, that contractor, that employee, but, and also on the backend, you know, for the HR administrative function. Um, so that's critically important to us then I think that nets next step is again, kind of the visibility and putting it all in a platform, the transparency it's about how do you want to treat your workforce, right? What is your culture, um, what's important to you and how do we think more about it as a global team member perspective, independent of contractor versus employee status within your workforce?
Speaker 0 00:14:30 Um, those are the technical details and there's some, you know, very hyperlocalized things you need to understand about those as you deliver benefits and pay. Um, but the global team member workforce, you know, sometimes in the past, it's been seen as a contractor could be, you know, more like a second class citizen, if you will, are not given the same access or different things. And I think this opens up the ability for you to think about that global workforce in a different way than we have in the past and think about how do we push the boundaries or the envelope to get to a best practice that's going to meet the future of work needs and truly having a global workforce. And then I think the third part is the connectivity. I know we get asked that in almost every interview, we've got team members, we've got 682 members as of this week sitting in over 54 countries around the world.
Speaker 0 00:15:20 And you'll notice we're investing in it from a technology perspective. We acquired a company called roots. Um, that's a different slack plugins to try to create connections, connection points for you to talk to people outside of your silo or department or team create profiles, um, deeper than what a slack profile could create. So you know where to reach out to people, what to talk about creating employee or team member resource groups to bring people together. Um, and then having a force. I think, you know, the budget, uh, specifically as COVID maybe stabilizes out to be able to bring people together, whether that be in region. It's definitely something that we see across our internal workforce, as well as what we're seeing in our customer data that although the office looks different, even for those keeping an office and not moving fully remote people are using the office in a different way.
Speaker 0 00:16:10 Not necessarily desiring to go back five days a week, you know, nine to five, but leveraging it for connections or to work on very specific projects or times when they need to collaborate or even to get out of their home with their dogs and children and better wifi. And so how can you think about in your, uh, you know, your workplace programs, whether that be an actual office environment or that just be connections through technology or even something like, uh, uh, you know, a global WIWORK subscription or coworking spaces. I think that's a piece too that will have to evolve, um, as we get further into the future of work,
Speaker 2 00:16:47 Absolutely. Shifting that focus into your role and the people function. What will some of your goals and initiatives be as a team in the next year or so? What you really,
Speaker 0 00:17:01 Yeah, so it's interesting. And I mentioned this a little bit at the beginning, you know, deal is series D uh, did go from 50 to 550 people now already 680 people, um, as of this month. Um, but you know, operating on the, on the P internal people side, uh, like where we would need to be in building out from a series a B perspective, and, you know, the gross sneaks up on you when you're in hyper-growth like that. Most of that hiring that head count happens in Q3 and Q4 of last year. And so you began to stand up and then obviously I was hired in December at the very last part of the year. So a lot of it is foundational for us, things that my biggest learning is, like I said, for founders is invest in it early. If you can do it under a hundred people do it because the more easy to establish the foundations, if you think about your HR technology stack, your applicant tracking system, your, uh, HRI S getting things built out deal, hopefully in the mix on the stack, um, thinking about your core principles and foundations across your compensation philosophy, uh, how do you drive a performance culture?
Speaker 0 00:18:09 Those things obviously much easier to establish with less people, but that's what we're building now is how do we establish those foundations across technology, our core principles and philosophies, and then our workflows, and how can we automate as much as we can so that we're not doing the manual work that can be done in technology, but also all doing this while we're also hiring, uh, I think we have 550 open requisitions today. We'll double the head count again this year, uh, looking at mergers and acquisitions. So the business goes on, um, even though we're building our foundations, we still have to keep track and not be a roadblock, you know, for the hyper-growth environment. So it is a delicate balance of prioritizing both. Um, and so an immense part of that is just building our team, uh, to scale alongside the business as well.
Speaker 2 00:18:58 So it feels like you're building the plane. Mid-flight
Speaker 0 00:19:01 I told someone that yesterday on an interview, we are building the plane while flying it. The cockpit is not completely built.
Speaker 2 00:19:09 Excellent. It's exciting though. It really is exciting. So when you think about those fundamentals that you talked about, what do you think is really important to you when it comes to, what, what do you need to plan for when it comes to try and achieve that and what sort of foundations and frameworks?
Speaker 0 00:19:25 Yes. You know, a big part of it, uh, you know, for a people team, our closest partner in the business is finance. We deal with finance, from everything from payroll, uh, to obviously our budget and expenses audit for our technology stack and the programs that we're delivering stock administration, but also from a financial planning and analysis perspective, and been a big part of being an hypergrowth is your workforce strategy and plan your headcount plan, right? That enables us specifically when we're looking at a bottoms up plan of 550 open roles and doubling head count this year. Um, it's critical for us to understand from a talent acquisition standpoint, you know, how can we, how do we best think about how we meet the needs so that we can make sure we're hiring on track on target to hit the revenue targets that we have for this year incredibly important, but also how do we do that by really taking control of the candidate experience?
Speaker 0 00:20:18 Um, to me treating our candidates and any experience and being intentional and thoughtful with it is the exact same as how we should be treating our customer. We care deeply about having five star reviews, for example, as a Trustpilot score for customers, we should care just as deeply about the candidates and what their feedback is as they're going through the process and not something that is a very significant initiative for us, uh, to get right this year. Um, because like I said, the majority of hiring that happened at such speed last year was without talent acquisition in place, a myriad of hiring managers, early TAs, starting and external agencies. And that's hard to control, right? The experience when you've got all the different hands in the pot. So bringing that back in house is going to be incredible for us, because I think about each and every candidate independent, if they get the job at this time, that those are future future dealers, you know, should the right role come available later.
Speaker 0 00:21:15 Uh, their potential customers are sitting in a customer to date, and there are certainly branded boxers for the future of work. They were interested in deal. They're passionate about the mission. So how can we activate that better? So that's definitely something that we're digging into right now, also compensation philosophy. I don't think it's ever too early to think about and have conversations across specifically your CFO and CEO around what is our philosophy? What do we believe at DLP parody is incredibly important to us. And that can show up in a couple of different ways as we think about, like I said, operating in 54 countries around the world with team members sitting everywhere. And so, um, you know, a very thorough compensation infrastructure, everything from leveling of our jobs and how we issue and think about salary and equity, also being very important, being a pre IPO company.
Speaker 2 00:22:07 Fair enough. Fair enough. Well, thank you very much for that. Are there any big learnings that you've had, um, whether that was during your time with Uber, et cetera, that you always hold close to you and what you bring into Dale and your team?
Speaker 0 00:22:23 Um, you know, probably my most significant learning is that, um, well, I guess the, the principal I, I hold closest to heart is that the people team must be trusted. Um, it's just of utmost importance to me that we are a trusted and respected within the organization, uh, trusted from that. We're transparent that we're authentic, that we're honest, that we're effective communicators, that there's never any question too hard to answer. There's a way to answer anything that gets asked and people, we want to have a culture where people feel open, represented, and are able to bring that forward. And it doesn't even need to be anonymous because they know that it's going to be handled in the most respectful way. Um, that's just critically important to me. And I don't think obviously I was at Uber. I don't think that that's all always happened right across the board, or it happens in silos across the people department, especially when you get so large.
Speaker 0 00:23:19 So that's just something I've always really taken to heart of. Uh, it's just critical to establish that from the beginning and to sustain and maintain that trust over time and the way that we build our cultural foundations, our programming, the way that we talk about it. Um, those are all things that contribute and how we show up every day, um, that all contributes to, you know, how people view us and their trust of us. And then of course, certainly, you know, making that programs around pay equity, um, benefits are just seamlessly happening, that they are not a disruption point to people. They aren't a black box again, the transparency piece coming forward. There
Speaker 2 00:23:58 Absolutely. Is there any people tan advice that you've seen banded around that you'd love to dispel or warn fellow people, leaders to avoid
Speaker 0 00:24:09 The biggest learning? I think again, comes, comes from Uber, but certainly I've seen it in talking with founders, venture capital investors, uh, CEOs and specifically pre IPO companies is, again, that piece around you can't invest early enough, um, in the people function. And that doesn't mean that it's a talent acquisition. I think sometimes you'll see companies. And I know this was prevalent specifically in the bay area, in the U S um, in early days was we have a people function, we've stood up telling acquisition and we're focusing on hiring, but the earlier you can have those conversations around what your compensation philosophies are. Like. I talked about how to drive a performance culture. What's important to us. Um, values exercises, I think are incredibly important, uh, to push down from the executive team and then push down to your total workforce, whether that's a survey or workshops that you put people through specifically when you've been growing so much and specifically in the case where you've had early leadership or hiring managers in the absence of talent acquisition, hiring for their teams and silos, it's interesting work to do, to see how close or far apart were we in establishing what our culture is, which to me is just, how would someone describe working at XYZ company any day that you ask them, right.
Speaker 0 00:25:32 Like what's important to them. And I think values should iterate over time. They should not be static. And I think sometimes people forget that or sometimes a founder or founding team will put values up. And then it's like the, how do we test those? And do we really make business decisions that gets those? Would we make, uh, our investor decisions against those would be terminate someone because they aren't a fit there. How do we articulate the fit and hiring? Um, those things I think are, are incredibly important. And again, uh, things that should be spoken about earlier as the company is building and developing, but if you've missed that boat, then, um, you know, having them as soon as possible, like I am a deal.
Speaker 2 00:26:17 Yeah, I've done that before myself. And it's interesting what you say about having the philosophies in place with Alaska and philosophies and stuff like that. Because I think if you, if you can get that in really early, it makes a massive, the ripple effect from that is immense. Um, and I think, you know, I've been where you are going to start with probably have one HR manager and everyone else sends, suddenly builds around that. And it, it can be it's, it's painful, but exciting all the same time. I think you're absolutely spot on that fills in quite nicely into my next question, which is, what would you say are the pitfalls to be aware of when it comes to building teams or people practices and in a fast growing scale-up environment? Like,
Speaker 0 00:27:01 I think you you're always tempted me, included everyone, no matter your intentions and relying on your personal network, when you're trying to build in hyper-growth mode and you're looking at, gosh, I've got 10 people to fill and I need them yesterday, and it's very easy to go to your network. And I think sometimes when that happens, it happens out of necessity, but being able to slow down and stabilize a bit, when you think about your hiring practices, one from the cultural value spit, and actually being able to articulate, what does that mean? What, who is going to be successful here? Um, for us, you know, we definitely know and speak to people about resilience, adaptability, flexibility, uh, okay. With change, uh, being autonomous, uh, being a really intense and true owner. Those are things that are very, you know, uh, those will lead to people being successful at deal. And every company has those and been the quicker that you can get to understanding both your skills assessment of individuals, plus that, that cultural fit and foundational assessment, uh, the better,
Speaker 2 00:28:08 Excellent, next question. It sort of links back into this. Again, it's something I'm reasonably reasonably passionate about, and this is sort of the culture element. So as a fast growing company and more so in one that is distributed like a sales, it can be tough to scale culture and values particularly. So that has knowing pretty fantastic values. Actually, I think the full optimism, the unequivocable transparency to name a few that, you know, well, full tail. So how do you go about embedding these findings across an organization and then as you scale, how do you make sure these scale with you, especially with that distributed setting, because with mass growth comes risk of fracture, doesn't it? So how do you, how do you do that?
Speaker 0 00:28:56 Yes. So one don't just put them on the wall or write them down and then never ever talk about them again. We've got to keep them visible, right. And that's where, how do we embed them into the foundation? Um, we're actually doing some really interesting work around this right now, because I think they actually should iterate a bit. Um, you don't see ownership showing up in ours, right. And that's something we definitely, you know, is coming out. That is very important as we think about, think about our own so should iterate, but you've got to keep them front of mind. So building, the first thing that we do is we build a playbook for hiring around them so that we can actually do some assessments. We're actually looking at some really interesting tools, uh, coming out of Australia, UK, and us great out there, uh, from a technology stack, uh, that actually helped you with AI on the backend and, and helping your managers.
Speaker 0 00:29:48 Cause they thinking about first-time managers or managers who aren't as experienced and like how to delve, you know, dig out the cultural fit piece or do an assessment so that we see better information instead of not a culture fit on talent, acquisition feedback. Well, what does that mean? And what questions did you ask and how consistently did we ask them? So showing up definitely in the interview assessment piece, but then also showing up in performance review, promotion review recognition, uh, throughout the organization. So how do you embed them into the foundation so that they're showing up, they're talked about and we're rewarding recognizing, hiring again, making business decisions right internally about our people, um, based in that value set. Um, and that's the thing I think is, is so important is as you think about a performance review, right, we think about them in the way of, yes, we move really quickly.
Speaker 0 00:30:41 We need to have ongoing performance, um, feedback because we just moved too quickly to wait until a formal cycle to get it done. But in that moment, when you're giving feedback, give it about the what and the, how right as it shows up. So again, constantly talking about them and also then it's not a surprise if something is, if we're giving critical feedback, uh, about, you know, something on the more softer side or subjective side, uh, which does happen, right. And play relations issues and things of that nature. And then it's not such a surprise in what we're anchoring it in and work. We're trying to tie it back to, and we can also give examples of what great looks like.
Speaker 2 00:31:17 Sounds like you're already bringing them to life. Like I say, it's not just on a wall, which is definitely, um, definitely taking lots of organizations. So that's, that's, that's really good. I'd love to hear what you feel like the ideal people ops function of the day should look like, especially at the hyper-growth stage, what types of roles are a necessity in your eyes?
Speaker 0 00:31:39 Yeah, so I'm biased because I come from an HR business partner or a people partner and consultants. So I'm naturally going to be biased this way, but I really think about people partners or HR business partners, whichever you prefer to call them as being the connective tissue between the business and the people function. Um, you know, people functions it's, it's easy for us to get into our own siloed thinking and have the list of things that we know that we need to develop and crank out from either a compliance standpoint or just what we know from our past learnings and experience. But without that connective piece to what is the business actually trying to achieve, or a lot of different ways we can do performance management. There's different ways we can do compensation. There's different way we could think about performance equity grants. You know, there's always different ways that we can think about, uh, different things that we're doing.
Speaker 0 00:32:28 And yes, we're the subject matter expert we have the foundations, but that additional touch point to making sure our people strategy is always connected back to what the business is trying to achieve is just critical. And there's really no better way I've found to do that than having your people, partners or HR business partners aligned to key leadership across your organization, constantly feeding back information to us and the centers of excellence on the core people teams, so that we're building the right programs prior, prioritizing communicating effectively, trying to solve problems before they become a problem. Um, and then also out there in the business to again, deliver and help coach and counsel and support and lead through difficult conversations, help the managers see around the corner and to where they're going and what the watch outs are, and always be thinking from that people perspectives.
Speaker 0 00:33:18 So that's the number one thing, and I'm actually hiring for those. Now I'm looking to set up that structure and network across the deal and in a global environment too, right. Wanting to make sure you reach all the time zones, the leaders where they sit and, and BPS are more focused on the leader. Um, so kind of in tandem with that, making sure on the people operations side that we, I liked to promote self-service, um, I don't like to be a people function that's doing administrative or clerical work and getting people's pay stubs or things that they could be finding, but like, how do we tell them where to find that and how do we set those expectations around self-service and how do we make sure that our knowledge management systems are built out, whether that's in something like a notion intranet or your LMS or your KMS, but how do people get the information that they need when they need it?
Speaker 0 00:34:07 And then how do they escalate that, right. If it's, if it's not exactly what they need or they need a human touch point, I don't want to take the human elements out. So I think that's a good balance of people working directly in the business, but then also building that support function for people to reach out, to directly more than your individual contributor workforce. And then we have key areas around knowledge learning and development. Um, how are we supporting the organization overall with things that are coming from legal finance product, people that the entire organization needs to know whether it's from onboarding onward, kind of in their career journey, um, or as new products develop or whatever the situation might be, but also who are the enablers within each team that are thinking about the very Dobbs specific onboarding or ongoing training and in our world that certainly our talent acquisition team, making sure that they are up to date with how we pitch and talk about the company externally and what are we doing and updates in our products and updates on our statistics and moving forward the future of work to really get a candidate excited and that brand piece, um, to also like, how do we talk about our compensation and how do we close offers?
Speaker 0 00:35:16 You know, there's a big part of enablement that happens just across the people team itself and making sure that we're scaling, um, and again, being able to hit those goals. And then of course, total compensation, uh, and rewards huge thing, obviously for us pay parity is key. So really building out compensation infrastructure, um, and making sure that we are transparent and do education stock administration also key and a pre IPO partnership with finance, but that's such a big, you know, I didn't mention this in my biggest learnings question, but having been in companies that have IPO or had an acquisition or an exit, uh, right where there's that liquidity event, I think the financial education and we're FinTech plus HR tech. So we should, we should be investing in this, but really every company I think, should think about what's the financial education as you start heading toward a milestone like that and getting, and preparing your workforce. So we're, we're trying to think about that early too. And then tell them acquisition sits in there, our people operations, thinking about our HR tech stack, um, also sit in there as just kind of the core foundational team that we're building out.
Speaker 2 00:36:26 Um, sorry, I just lost my train of thought. Give me a second Laura sort of thing, or you might be in the document at the same time, so it just jumps. So cool. So, um, next question. So Dell has just launched this state of global hiring report, hasn't it? So, um, in this you've gathered data from hundreds of thousands of work contracts and third-party data points in over 150 countries. Um, we'll pop a link to download the full report in the show notes for our listeners. I'd love to hear from you, what was your biggest takeaway from this report? And is there anything that's surprised you or any data points that you think talent leaders and founders out there need to take note of as they look into look ahead to 2022.
Speaker 0 00:37:14 Yes. This was such a special report for us and, uh, such an exciting time, right? We've been talking about this future of work, this accessing the global talent marketplace, like you mentioned a hundred thousand contracts to be able to review, and it's a wonderful dataset, you know, to have, if they get about, are we right? Is this, are we validated or are we really all moving towards the future of work? And the answer I think was resoundingly yes. Global hiring up 200%. So that accessing the global talent marketplace, thinking broader outside of your, uh, geographical location as a, as a company and being able to access people definitely happening, um, interesting things and like where it's happening more significantly like Latin America was leading in that increase. If you look at the data, which was fascinating to me, um, and as you actually talked to people on the ground, both in our customers, as well as in our own workforce, as we talking to people from Latin America, the access that they feel to be able to work and really interesting, compelling mission-driven companies, it's like a very, very exciting time for Latin America.
Speaker 0 00:38:19 So feeling really excited for some of these areas that were most heavily impacted by that access. Um, also increasing salaries, which I think is phenomenal, uh, leaders, uh, that we saw where Mexico, uh, Pakistan, the, uh, were some good examples of where wages are increasing or where you can see that employers are thinking about paying us dollar equivalent, um, as well. So fantastic information coming there from just a salary insights perspective. Um, you know, we paid out over a billion dollars to people, uh, globally to workers on behalf of our customers, which is just a tremendous amount when you think about accessing the global workforce, but probably the biggest surprise for me. Um, and we could talk about crypto investments separately on different podcasts, but, uh, was 2% of our payments were made in crypto. And I think that that's just super intriguing and that we give that optionality right on the platform, uh, for either our customers to pay us in crypto and then we'll issue payments to your people. But also, um, as customers are paying us, then we will convert and be able to issue payments, um, in the currency of the choice of the contractor, right? And 2% of people chose crypto
Speaker 2 00:39:38 Know when your platform earlier on. And I saw the crypto piece and that's quite a negative, actually, you hear crypto and all of that starting to make its way through. And there's probably still some reticence on that side, but the fact that you've recognized that people will take that now as a currency is immense credit to you guys. I think it's something it's brilliant. There's questioning. If, if there was one thing that you could wave a magic wand fix when it comes to people and talent, what would that be?
Speaker 0 00:40:07 Oh my goodness. Um, I think it's the technology stack. Um, you know, there, there's so much out there, right? That, that you can choose from. And I love, I love all of the startups that are coming into this space. As of course, you've got people more established in the space and there's different technology that you can think about and you need different technology and different stages as you scale. But I don't know if you've ever felt this it's, it can be overwhelming your technical stack, right?
Speaker 0 00:40:38 The list of things that you need. And so I tend to always, uh, look for, even if they don't have it established today, but is it on their product roadmap? How are they thinking about themselves as a platform specifically on things that I want, uh, immediate connection points on that are important for our organizational health? So I think about, you know, performance okay. Ours or goal setting, uh, engagement, uh, gosh, if those are in the same place, in the same tool and, and, you know, creating, I think about, you know, from an HR business partner perspective, creating those insights for you automatically, and yes, you've still got to go back to your HRS or other systems to look at overall attrition, you know, and things like that. But gosh, if you could have more things that are, that are put together and those automatic insights and the creation of dashboards, that where you can tell a really compelling story as you're going back out to the business and trying to help them achieve their goals, but all the talent side, that's super powerful. And I think that we're, I think more and more are starting to think that way, but, uh, yes, the tech stack definitely overwhelming. So I would love to wave a wand on that.
Speaker 2 00:41:48 It's a tough gig, isn't it? Because even some of the big ones, stock shops don't have everything you want in the way you want it. And I think this is again where your platform works quite well, because I've noticed the open API and you've got the good sort of set of connections. I think, I don't know what your view is here now, but more all people are no longer going for just that one big stop they're looking for something that can connect to multiple other things.
Speaker 0 00:42:14 Yes, exactly. Because like, like we said, right, the tech stack is still immense. You can have all of these different programs and if they don't talk to one another, if you're having to create even one spreadsheet down, you know, to like bulk upload it breaks. Right. So the open API, the, the connections and integrations are definitely critical.
Speaker 2 00:42:33 Absolutely. Absolutely. Okay. A couple of lighthearted high questions to bring us out to a close today. Is there anything that you find that you're super passionate about that you really find a lot of joy in this kind of course be professional personal or,
Speaker 0 00:42:50 Yeah. So the professional one, maybe it sounds boring, but I am just, I'm crazy about pay parody. I love compensation. Um, we did so much work on this at such large scale at Uber. My prior I reported to Liane Hornsey, who's now at Palo Alto networks. And I think I take this passion from her of just pay parody can make such an immense difference to so many people and the heartfelt notes and stories that you get from people all over the world. But specifically as I think about females or mothers and the workplace, so it's just, I think very close to my heart of, of just creating pay parity and having the transparency around that. Um, from a personal side it's cars, My husband actually just turned 50 and we just returned from Sweden where we raced Mercedes around and frozen lakes. And it was just the most fun thing that I've ever done as an activity ever. So I just love fast cars and it's just a, a little passionate virus that I share with my husband that we're able to partake in away from our other loves our three children when we can.
Speaker 2 00:44:04 Uh, that's definitely quite reasonable. One. I don't think of that. That will pull up. That is great. Absolutely great. And is there a store of value or phrase that you live by
Speaker 0 00:44:17 Stay fierce? I've left that to my teams at every, uh, at every company that I've left to move on to the next realm. I've told it to my executive teams, my peers, um, staying fierce to me means just staying strong, right. Especially when you're in these hyper-growth environments where so many things are going on and the priorities are ever changing and it's hard, you know, it's hard work and it's fun. It's so rewarding because you're making such an impact. And if you love to build things, then yes, you know, here for it. Um, but staying fierce and determined like in the face of a lot of challenges is, is just so important and they never go away. You know, there's something different at every stage. And, uh, but yeah, that's, that's the thing I've always signed off on as I've moved to the next endeavor.
Speaker 2 00:45:07 Excellent. Excellent. And follow me and very folks that have inspired you when it comes to building teams, taking a people first approach, someone you think could be pretty good for us to chat to you for this podcast, perhaps. Yeah. Anyone that's inspired you from that side.
Speaker 0 00:45:26 Yeah. So, um, you know, outside of the people function, definitely a gentleman named Sterling snow. He's the chief revenue officer for divvy, that company. Then I recently left and I've, I've never seen anyone so intentional, so passionate about building, not just a high performing team, which is teams, never miss a number on the revenue side. So pretty amazing. They always find a way, but they find a way because of the type of team that he's built and how much ownership they have and how much respect and collaboration they have within their own team for each other. Right. So they can not let each other down it's, it's just, he has an amazing story to tell us if you ever follow him, he's quite active on LinkedIn as well. Uh, just a really interesting, uh, gentlemen to follow. I also think about, um, in the education realm, Francis fry, um, from Harvard business school, just the workshops that I've been a part of, uh, with her, she was a consultant to us at Uber on building teams.
Speaker 0 00:46:35 And she does this analogy of ancient Rome, but it's just so fascinating and thinking about just, uh, the trust aspect. So like I was talking about for me, trust, respect of just me, my team members and my function are so critical and she does some really fantastic work around that. And then finally, probably like in the people's space, um, Liane Hornsey Palo Alto networks reported to her at Uber. She's their chief people officer, they publish so much transparently around compensation, their perks and rewards and benefits their culture. Um, probably no one who's more passionate about parody, um, and transparency than her. So those would be my three.
Speaker 2 00:47:18 Excellent. Casey, thank you so much for joining us today. It sounds like there was seen some incredible growth, quite rightly the founders must've been able to see the future in 2019, as you said earlier. But what I really loved is that upon joining, you're looking at this year as a time to really build and solidify some of those foundations, I love how much you champion the people team and the importance of investing in talent early on. That really resonates with me. I'll certainly be championing, championing you and the team from the solid lines, and I'm excited to see what, how sort of things play out for them and how you continue to scale. So thank you again, Katie. It's been, it's been great.
Speaker 0 00:47:59 Thank you so much. Thanks for having me.
