Knot ResourcesClaire Kemp

Hi, I am Claire and I am a People Gardener. Unboxed is my garden, What I have learnt playing in my garden is that the people are NOT resources. Recently I founded Knot Resources as a means to spread the word.

Now, What do you do? (Ask a couple of people in the audience).

Thinking for a Living

AnalyseMonitor

OrganiseSearch

Learn

Network

AcquisitionAuthoring

Control

Manage

Share

SolveTrack

Communicate

Maintain

Negotiate

Advise

Count

CaptureSupport

Report

All of those jobs require at least one of these skills.

The world of work has been changed by technology. We are now required to “Think for a Living”

So my mate and I went to watch Derren Brown’s Miracle show in November. And we were running late so we thought we’d stop for MacDonalds.

This is who I was expecting to see. But look what has recently happened to his job.

Fast food just got faster. As businesses increase their dependence on IT, ideating is what enables them to solve problems in new and better ways.

Knowledge and Ideas are today’s currency. Knowledge Workers are entering employment in vast numbers. They are changing the way we work There has been an enormous shift in power

Reports like this are not uncommon. People want to be both seen and treated as an "asset" rather than a “cost." It’s a challenge, a game I have had fun playing in my garden!

Attracting and keeping Knowledge workers is one of an organisation’s biggest challenges. It requires that they want to work for the organisation in preference to all other opportunities.

"User Experience of Employment" card trumps the “Human Resourcing” card as we try to win the Game of Retention.

Retention Game

Employee Employer

If we have a think about the reasons we hire people we might find that it is because They are clever and have good ideas They have the right attitude They will make the organisation better

But, when they walk through the door, there is no “GO BE AWESOME” button !!

So we have a great new hire who crushed 4 other candidates for this position! But, instead of feeling brilliant for getting this job, the great hire feels Vulnerable. Incompetent.

Why is that?

Well, there is so much that they don’t know about the organisation that gets in the way of what they DO know about the work.

Here is what most companies do to fix this problem Has that happened to you? Boring

What abut when things change? The minute you start doing something new or stop doing something old, the whole document needs a time consuming upgrade. This solution is not easy to maintain, read, understand or change

What are the most important things a new employee needs to do to keep the business afloat?

Onboarding Game

At Unboxed we have put those things on a virtual project board: arrive at work, sign a contract meet the team and complete a timesheet

We groomed the board, by prioritising and ordering the tasks … look familiar? like “release planning”. Our result is an online interactive game. It starts 1 month before a new employee joins and it primes the organisation for their arrival. Now on Day 1, instead of wasting a pile of nervous energy, a new employee is fully briefed and ready to contribute as a part of their team.

What about changes? All at Unboxed have access to the virtual onboarding game template and are encouraged to reflect changes that they know of in the template. We added this

Onboarding Game Template

Keep this game real by ensuring

that any changes are reflected in the template found here …

… a “Keep It Real card”. This empowers a new hire to update the template. It is an opportunity for making their first mark in our organisation!

Retention Game

Employee Employer

This tactical move has put new joiners at Unboxed in control of what got them through our door initially. It is servant leadership as Unboxed serves the new person’s need for competence. Also, we are showing a that person that we have put as much thought into their joining the organisation, as they have.

So that works for engaging new joiners but… what about engaging people have been around for a while? How do you create platforms for problem discovery and resolution? When a start up grows quickly you will have new people joining the organisation who have no connection to the founders. It is only natural that groups of friends form. And what happens is that you find people moaning in groups in the pub. Stop that. Give them a place to air their thoughts

Whines and Cheers

At Unboxed we have Whines and Cheers where we look backwards to move forward.

We discuss "whines" that form in clusters. We generate ACTIONS in order to respond to change requests. By doing something about the "whines", we remove impediments to people being … awesome. This is agile in HR and it matters because:

Retention Game

Employee Employer

Empowering clever people to make change boosts retention. Driving the changes means people will find things to celebrate and more people will join in To set and win their own incentives.   Making Unboxed a much better place to work

Whines and Cheers is Unboxed’s Friday social

People who are working offsite arrive in time for our weekly sessions

Some of the people who come to Whines and Cheers are New Joiners for some insider knowledge before Day 1 CLICK

Inspire others …

Spark more ideas

With whines and cheers in the calendar we were pretty much primed for change. So when a new joiner raised a question about a contractual clause, it was like unlocking a new level in a game that I was becoming a little addicted to. I didn’t understand what half of it meant and so I blocked out a couple of days in my diary to comprehend it. Then I wrote it in simple English One of the benefits in Unboxeds contract is Innovation days. What that means is that our people are given “time to grow some new ideas”. The ideas can be personal or professional. We have this benefit because we believe that new ideas inspire others and spark more new ideas. As I read through the contract though..

Retention Game

Employee Employer

it seemed that Unboxed OWNED everything we THOUGHT?! Hmmmmm … This did not align with our claims to value a vibrant entrepreneurial community So, the Unboxed team joined forces and challenged the IP clause.

There is more to LOSE by scaring away creative entrepreneurial people than there is to potentially WIN if an employee started a new, successful business.

Today Unboxed’s contract reflects that Knowledge Workers often have great ideas … over beers. They do not stop thinking after work. And Unboxed wants to support the creation of new and exciting digital products. Their intention is that instead of the company owning all the ideas …

The company and employee enter VC conversations - similar to Dragon’s Den - for debating equity and effort required for further development.   In support of this change and to bolster Unboxed’s innovation strategy we released Linkers and Thinkers, ANOTHER GAME

In this game, people are randomly paired to have lunch together and bounce ideas. Each person is paired twice. To each pair Thinkers bring the thoughts and entertainment whilst the Linkers make all the arrangements and capture good ideas in a shared virtual project board.

Retention Game

Employee Employer

PEOPLE WIN!!!

It was over lunch that Knot Resources was born. The new company is not in competition with Unboxed’s current products and services but is a new and better way to solve a problem that is very real them

Teams are currently collaborating for potential equity in a resulting product.   Another thing we noticed was that Unboxed’s attrition halved in a year! Clever people stopped leaving for reasons that were within Unboxed’s control.

We made Unboxed employees the designers of their experience of Employment. It is how they have been winning the game of Retention.

Thank you