Eric  0:00  
Matt, welcome, welcome. Welcome to Episode 54 storm readiness. This is our New Year's Eve or New Year's episode for 2026 episode 54 of the achieve workplace culture podcast, where we help you think about your workplace culture and find actionable ways to strengthen it and grow it. I'm here with my two co hosts, Chris Downey and Wendy Loewen, as we wrap up the year and head into 2026 and we thought that for this particular episode, we should talk about, how do you make sure your culture is strong enough to handle whatever life throws your way in the year to come. So in a word, as you think about that, how are you to doing today? Enthusiastic present. I am curious about the year ahead, and hopeful that there's many good things. Yep, if you could start off this podcast. Maybe each of us could do this just help to set the stage. We have all been working as leaders for quite some time now, for what, a couple of decades, for some of us, or for each of us, probably actually, and leading in different kinds of places and ways. My hunch is we've all been in a leadership position when things were going along, what we thought was great, and then a storm hit, something happened. Could you give one example of a storm that you faced as a leader? Could be a small storm or a big storm, just a couple sentences, and we can use those as a place to anchor this conversation today.

Wendy  1:44  
Years ago, I was working in the school system, and the storm was they were going to completely revamp the curriculum, which is a major undertaking, and for any teacher involved in it, is a little fear inducing. So there was a lot of apprehension attached to it, and it was a real I mean, I was anxious as well. What does it mean for me? And my learning was and out of it actually came a pretty enjoyable role. And job was to say what's, what's my contribution going to be, and to be present in that storm, whatever it looked like. How are we going to navigate this? I have a

Eric  2:26  
role to play. Got a storm

Chris  2:28  
in mind? Well, I've got one that most people can relate to, covid, covid, yeah, I know. Was that a thing for? Yeah. I mean, for me, where I was at the time, heading into the new year, things were, were great. We had just signed some of the biggest contracts we had ever, ever signed, and we formally launched a business. You know, in at the beginning of the pandemic hadn't even started yet, and then everything changed, right? So, I mean, I know that's one that, I know it's a bit cliche to say, but that is absolutely one that would be rough waters, as you

Wendy  3:07  
very rough.

Eric  3:09  
Yeah, I thought about that one also, yeah. But I also thought about the housing crisis back in 2008 2009 right? And being a part of an organization that was reeling from the economic impact of that and wondering what the future held economically, how that was going to impact the business, right? So we've each been through that, and sometimes, you know, there are big storms and there are small storms. There are the storms of, oh man, we've got a really unhappy staff member right now, and things are going sideways, and we're not sure what to do. We just learned about it. We didn't know. But all of a sudden, I What? There's this thing happening over here, and this group of people that I'm supposed to be leading, I didn't even know, and it's terrible. That's a storm, sure, right? There's a budget cut. We didn't know that was coming. There's a new curriculum, so it doesn't have to be covid, right? We we face situations all the time as leaders that we weren't expecting when we walked into work that day. Right? And here's the big question for us, for our listeners, sure for ourselves, how do we build the container of our workplace so that it can hold itself together in rough water? What are the practices that we can do? Because, you know, we don't if you think about the storms that hit the big storms that hit the Atlantic seaboard, and you see people images of people putting plywood up on their windows. They don't live with plywood all year long, but the people that have plywood in their garage are ready, and they can put it up and cover their windows when the storms they know there's going to be storms. So what about us as leaders and organizations? Curious, if you can reflect back on your experience, what are some of the things that you wished you'd have had in place, or you did have in place, and you were grateful for those.

Wendy  4:48  
I want to say what you said is important, Eric, this idea of having the plywood and being ready to actually recognize that there is going to be the next storm. So we. Might not know exactly what that is, but we need to be prepared for that. We need to have contingency plans, small ones, big ones. We need to have redundancy built into our systems, but to know that that storm is coming, I think, is we don't want to be putting our head in the sand and saying there is no storm around the corner.

Chris  5:19  
I agree, sort of. And the reason I say that is, you're right, there is a storm we can't prepare for everything. No, there's, there is this is the one thing that that that I think it's important to we can, we can come to contingency plans for this scenario, that scenario, but we don't know what that next storm is. So we can also prepare for the storm, but we can prepare for uncertainty. That's what we know is going to something's going to happen that's going to be uncertain. And I think this is the key that I think this is where our culture comes into play, that we want to create an environment where we can provide clarity. You could both have talked about this around, around what we're there to do, what's most important to us, and then build connection amongst the people that are part of our culture, around what's really important, who we are and how we want to operate. Yes, the reason this becomes so important is when that is alive and well, and then a variable comes in that we weren't expecting a storm hits, then our default becomes those things, and that's how you that's that's the strong container that you're talking about, that we can navigate through, versus it busting apart, which can happen in organizations when those variables are there. And I think what happens is when we try to, you know, there's big business continuity, you know, in large corporations, and how do we what about this? What about that? Which is all true, but if you don't have a healthy culture, the best laid plans are just going to just like you could have the plywood, yes, but if you, if you don't have people willing to pitch in to put that plywood up, forget it. It's not

Eric  7:07  
gonna happen. If you have terrible relationships with all your neighbors, nobody's gonna come to your aid. Yeah, good luck, right? So what you're talking about is culture. You're talking about the things that bind us together and make us strong. And one of the things that I think about is strength with flexibility. Because an organization, the way I've seen organizations adapt or not adapt, have been really instructive. The organizations that weathered, say the covid 19 pandemic, were the ones that asked, How can we continue to do business, to do to work towards our mission or our vision, despite the challenges so and not got getting too hung up on doing it like we've always done it before. It's been it was the organizations that said, Well, my role is to provide food. I'm a restaurant, and I can't provide food this way anymore, in person. But what can I do? I can start a delivery service. I can I can feed people at the food bank. I can do there's I can. That's what I do. And so I work with my staff, and if my staff have that strength of relationship and are attached to that vision and mission, they're going to follow.

Wendy  8:19  
Yeah. So the culture is literally, that is the plywood, that is the plan, that is what you're working towards, and your mission is what constantly is your what you're steering towards. You might have to, you know, move a degree off, move another in a different direction, but you're always moving towards, yeah, what your mission is,

Chris  8:39  
and what that can provide in a storm is clarity, right? Given all of that stuff that's going on, like the sirens going on in the background, Scott, are we gonna have to pause for that? Or is that relevant, that the sirens are going off? We could keep that in if we want to. But so, yeah, so when there is that variability that's going on. It's actually our mission, or the thing we're there to do, right? That actually provides us a bit of comfort, right, right? And we saw it through the pandemic. There's, there was a lot of success stories, organizationally, when that was

Eric  9:15  
at play, right? Absolutely, it was.

Chris  9:18  
I. One of the things I want to add, though, I think about navigating those rough waters, it's almost human nature to get into this panic situation where it's like, this is unprecedented. We've never seen this before. Well, we've never seen that before. We've seen things like this before. And I think one of the things that's really important from a leadership perspective is to actually remain calm, yes, right, in the face of these things, because it's we, if we are just freaking out, well, that's definitely going to send a message. And again, even even covid 19, the world had. Faced challenges before, absolutely and so getting hung up on, well, this has never happened. This is unlike any other time. There have been times of confusion. There have been times when public health was at risk, okay, we've been through this before, and I even remember, I think we should actually talk about this organization, because it actually weathered quite well. I was on the outside at that time. And I do remember a communication, Eric, you were on it just about, kind of, some of the re thinking the business to, how do we respond to this? I do remember, I'm an optimist. I can't help this. I remember responding to you and the rest of the leadership group at the time where I just acknowledge, I said, You'll be okay, achieve and teacher, I have reinvented themselves before. You know, this is just a different piece. And when I as a at the time, as an outsider, that's what I saw. I saw reinvention, but it was rooted in knowing what your purpose was and how you wanted to be. And, you know, I think I read you could actually step in here. I think the organization did quite well actually through that, even though it was very uncertain. So tell me what happened that

Eric  11:08  
contributed to that? Absolutely, it was nerve wracking for leaders here when the pandemic hit, but we very intentionally said, we sat down and we assessed, who are we? What do we want to be doing? What do we care about? Where are we going? What like globally, despite the pandemic, what do we want to be as an organization? What service are we providing, and how can we do that, and what are our resources? We asked all those questions, and we sat down with staff, and we shared everything. We said, This is how much money we have in the bank. This is what we do. What are your ideas? How can we get through this together? And it was incredible how we all started rowing in the same direction, and we were doing pretty good rowing in the same direction before, but that sharing of information, we're in this together. Here's what we have, here's where we want to go. The mission hasn't changed. Our values have not changed, right? And that can steer us in terms of how we act right now.

Chris  12:08  
Yeah, I love the story. Go ahead.

Wendy  12:10  
Wendy, no, I Eric, I remember that time, and I also remember thinking, this is going to take a lot of energy. And you, Chris, you said about when leaders are freaking out. It's like that is just wasted energy. It's like we have work to do. We have things to focus on. And if we are becoming consumed and spending our energy in ways that are not helpful, we are poorest people, that energy is felt by other people, and they start to become stressed and anxious, and then we've created a lack of ability to navigate well. So staying calm, staying present in it, focusing our energy on the things we do have impact on is important.

Chris  12:52  
Well, I think I think so. I think so. The the words I wrote down here because I was listening to you speak, and you just validated this. Wendy, the first was they were incredibly clear. Now the interesting thing is, I, obviously, I was on the outside, but kind of on the inside at the time, this wasn't new to you, what your mission was. It wasn't new to you what your values were. Those were well known. Those were already cemented into the organization. So the cool thing about that is you leaned on those in that difficult time, did you was it perfect? Probably not, but it was because you knew who you were and how you wanted to be that you're able to navigate through those things. But it was, it was that healthy culture that was at play that helped so and it was, let's be clear, because that's what humans need in the face of chaos, we need clarity. What's the path out of the path to victory, what's the path to whatever? And you through your open and, you know, transparent, and said, What are your ideas that built connection? Sure did, and it's those two things that helped give because I'm guessing people were dealing with stresses outside of the workplace as well. Work was probably one of the only things at that time, for yourselves and for staff, we've actually had some clarity and actually even felt a little safe once things got rolling, even despite what was going on. So I think the best thing you can do to help navigate those rough waters that are going to come is make sure we are as healthy as possible. And unfortunately, people wait until there's rough waters to pay attention to their health. Pay attention to your health now so you're ready when the inevitable does hit.

Wendy  14:30  
Yeah, it's one of those things that is important, but doesn't always feel urgent. And yet it really is urgent. It's always pressing. Culture should always be a focus

Eric  14:40  
when you don't have a healthy, strong workplace culture, and then you hit rough water, you're going to struggle. So if you're a leader listening to this, and you're thinking about the year ahead, we really want to encourage you to think about and be clear about your values, to be clear. Care about your mission as an organization and to build strong, healthy relationships in your organization, because it's those things that are going to hold you together when you face those inevitable storms that are going to come during 2026 let's hope that there aren't too many storms. Storms can make us actually stronger, but let's also hope for the good times that are to come as well, because our strong, healthy workplace cultures are going to make the good times that much better. And with that, we want to wish you a happy new year and all the best in 2026 you.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai