Mass Customization: The Next Workplace Challenge

Design Nerds Anonymous

Recorded live in Chicago, this episode explores the tension between individual employee desires for flexibility and the organizational need

Key takeaways

• Tyler Blackwell explains that changing office attendance requirements, such as moving from three days to four, can erode employee trust by altering the perceived employment contract.
• Erin Koop identifies 'friction' as a primary tension point between individuals seeking autonomy and organizations seeking results.

Main topics

• Mass Customization in Work
• Generational Shifts (Gen Z)

Notable quotes

One size fits all never really fit everyone.

Conclusion

True mass customization requires leaders to set clear boundaries and e

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) Some managers are like, hey, you need to be here five days a week. I don't care if you've got a dentist appointment on Friday. Whereas other managers are more flexible. They understand your productivity and success in this role is not going to be measured on time in office. Speaker 4 (0:16) Welcome to Design Nerds Anonymous, the podcast that sparks curiosity at the intersection of business and design. I'm your host, Amanda Schneider. We're back on the road with Work for What's Next, and this stop takes us once again to a showroom in Chicago, where we recorded live from the Hayworth showroom with their newest dealer, Office Revolution. Now, there's a tension that I've been thinking a lot about since writing the book. We've spent the last few years giving people more choice than ever in how they work. And for good reason. As we learned on last week's episode, one size fits all never really fit everyone. But how far can we take that? If everyone wants something different, how do you create a workplace that still feels fair? How much should an organization bend to the needs of an individual? And at what point? Does flexibility stop helping the business actually work? That's what we're unpacking today, because this conversation gets into something much bigger than where or when we work. It gets into trust, leadership, fairness, and what happens when the needs of the individual collide with the needs of the organization. So come with us to Chicago and listen in on the conversation. Speaker 4 (1:35) First of all, I just want to thank you all for coming. We are recording live from the Hayworth showroom in the Merchandise Mart in Chicago. We've been brought here by their newest dealer, Office Revolution. So we've titled the episode Mass Customization. We know that people are looking for flexibility today. Since 2020, how we work has changed. But if we have so much flexibility that the business can't meet its goals, probably not effective because we all need paychecks, right? And then if we have so much rigidity that we don't have flexibility, suddenly the human sustainability is not there. We're all burning out. We're all struggling. So when we talk about mass customization, it's really about how do we meet individual workers where they are and help to figure out something that's going to work for the sustainability of the humans and the sustainability of the business. All right. So I've invited two phenomenal panelists here to help us unpack from very different perspectives kind of where we are. So introduce yourself then in one word. How would you describe the tension between what individuals need to thrive and what organizations need to thrive today? Speaker 3 (2:42) Hi, my name is Erin Koop. I am a strategic advisor. I run a company where we go in and work mainly with executive teams on helping them decide how to help their people perform more sustainably and create behavioral and cultural shifts. I also do a lot of keynote speaking around a lot of these topics. That one word, I would use friction. I'm Speaker 1 (3:02) Tyler Blackwell. I work for a company called Morningstar. I lead workforce strategy and transformation. And I guess like one word. I would use that comes to mind is like trust. And Speaker 4 (3:14) do you think it's trust or mistrust right now? I Speaker 1 (3:17) think it's a mix. I think like your employer is one of the last like remaining places where we can place our trust. And I think it's like shifting even now though a little bit, not in a good way for organizations. I think, yeah, I think it's a mixed bag. Speaker 4 (3:34) It's interesting. I love this one word exercise because when you see these words come together, friction and trust or mistrust, it kind of gives us a quick snapshot of what's happening between individual worker and employer today. And I like that you said a mix of trust and mistrust because I think that's Speaker 2 (3:49) definitely true. Speaker 4 (3:50) Everyone in this room knows I was recently on the Oprah podcast and there was a viral Gen Z-er and they're talking about the Gen Z stare. The Gen Z stare is when they look at you like buffering, buffering, buffering, like I'm trying to figure out what you're saying. But all of this friction, trust, mistrust, balance is normal to us. Like we've watched it form. But Gen Z is coming into this environment with no background and understanding. And so a bit of that Gen Z stare, I feel like they're looking at the workforce right now and looking at jobs and looking at some of our norms, like you stay loyal to. a company for 20 years, even though inflation is rising like this and our cost of living raises are rising like this, right? Like they look at some of these things with their own Gen Z stare about how we got to this moment. So I guess let's unpack these words a little bit. How did we get here? Why do you think we're in this moment? I Speaker 3 (4:45) look at things as taking a step back for the person behind the performance. And so when we think about an organization, We think about growth. We think about results, business outcomes, and strategy. And none of that is possible without the people. People are the ones that produce those results and outcomes. And yes, we have technology that will help us do that and do that better and faster. But at the end of the day, it's the people. And so I think what has happened or what I've experienced both myself and with clients is that over the last, call it 10 to 15 years, and certainly since the pandemic, We have had this friction between people wanting agency and autonomy and ownership over their days, their time, their energy, their attention. And at the same time, needing to produce results and perform at a high level for the organization. And what I find very interesting is that these two things can coexist. And so there's this like almost black and white scenario where people are looking at it like I either need to make it to 65 so I can retire and not have to work and then I get to live or I have to just sell my soul and let it be crushed and like have no life and be miserable. And I don't agree with that. I absolutely disagree with that. But I believe that is where the friction comes in. And it's why I do the work I do because I changed my own perspective of that from the person that would tell myself. I'm just going to be miserable until I'm 65 and then I get to live to the person that's like, oh, no, I'm going to be in this and perform well and actually crush it and make the most of the money I'm earning and my potential so that I can live more now and not just wait for a vacation or to be 65. Speaker 4 (6:28) Which is interesting because I feel like Gen Z is starting there. The book really talks about using Gen Z as a lens and they're getting a bad rap for it. People are like, oh, these kids, they have no grit. They have no, you know, so I think what's interesting is what all of us really need to is what Gen Z is coming into the workplace asking for. But Tyler, I'm sure you have something to say about this because we can't accommodate 400 people's desires with 400 different policies. What would you add to that? Speaker 1 (6:54) Certainly Gen Z has come into the workplace in the last six years and a challenging time. But I mean, it's also impacted all of us in the same way since I'm not Gen Z. And I guess some of it's certainly related to in-office versus remote kind of work. And then some of it's also related to how work is changing because of new technologies and what that means for us and for people at a more entry-level role. Your question about customization or personalization, I think, is an interesting one. one. So if you are working for a company and you accept a job there, and let's say you are three days in office, and then a year later, they go to four days in office. From the employee perspective, that feels tough. And I think to name it, in some ways, it can start to erode trust because you signed on to something like a contract, right? Certain working norms, right? And then there are other elements of work that are not necessarily a part of that contract but we often like blend them into the same thing and so by the contract i mean like what you do every single day who you work with what's expected of you you know how are you going to be graded in your performance these kinds of things and then like the other element of it which isn't contractual when do you go to work how long do you go to work For a lot of us, this is ingrained in the culture, but it's not necessarily written down anywhere. All those sorts of things that are a part of an organizational culture, but it's not like you signed on to them, right? And I think a lot of organizations are sort of thinking about personalization and they're trying to like boil the ocean. As you start to take things away, two days remote and now you have one, it starts to erode trust. And I think that that impacts people a lot. Speaker 4 (8:52) It's interesting that you brought up kind of this RTO as one of these things that's like trust, mistrust, you know, where does it fall in that balance? And I love something that you said in our prep call is this standoff is a zero-sum game because we still measure contribution by time and visibility, an analog norm that survived into a digital world. And it's interesting, again, why I love to look at it through this generational lens. We did a little would-you-rather question at Neocon, a little trade show here, and we asked, would you rather work five days a week fully remote or five days a week fully in office? Now, most people tried to put it on the line, but we discounted their votes. They didn't count. But the only generation to vote more, a higher percentage of five days a week back in the office was Gen Z. So as we look at this trust-mistrust, I think one thing that's happening is... Gen Z and others are told that they have to come into the office for mentorship or they have to come into the office for collaboration and then they get there and their superiors aren't there because they're traveling for business because responsibilities because whatever else we don't know so this policy that's designed to create camaraderie is actually starting to destroy it so talk a little bit more about that optionality and maybe Tyler what you've found that helps to create that customization without, I guess, fueling that mistrust. I Speaker 1 (10:13) know Aaron probably has thoughts about this, but I really