Learning, innovation and the daily struggles with Hybrid Work
ODD Owtcomes Podcast Transcript
Last week, I had the honor to speak with Tebogo Mogaleemang. He did what many wouldn’t dare do - launching and building a company amidst the pandemic with a different value proposition that combines innovation and social impact. Their most recent project, Hack4Blood, is an ecosystem-driven initiative that aims to immerse the public, the government, the private sector, and academia in an open collaborative process for co-creating sustainable solutions to the national blood shortage crisis.
“Every year the National Blood Transfusion Services shares their blood shortage challenges. A problem that has been aggravated by Covid-19. Inspired by our cultural narrative of motho le motho Kgomo, the project aims to showcase the immense power of inclusive innovation and collective intelligence in the creation of high impact and sustainable solutions.” (Hack4Blood)
We spoke about leadership, organizational challenges, and, of course, hybrid work. I was curious to get his unique perspective on the challenges that teams face with digitalization.
I learned that there isn’t always a direct path to achieving the best outcomes, and we should appreciate that more. Instead of trying to solve every problem outside, we can look inward and start building from within. Tebogo has offered me a great deal of fuel for thought on what it means to have a learning culture, how organizations can build around that, and how to make peace with what we have - one life.
Talking about hybrid work, two key points stood out in our conversation:
WE HAVE ONE LIFE.
There is a wide misconception around the notion of work-life balance and work-life vs. personal life. But, we mustn’t forget that we have one life. If we wrongly associate what we do with who we are, we will struggle more because there will be a conflict with our identities.
HYBRID WORK IS A BUSINESS PROBLEM, NOT A TECHNOLOGY CHALLENGE.
While business and technology problems may overlap, they hardly mean the same thing. Positioning hybrid work as a business problem brings more opportunities to be creative about human interaction and how teams collaborate towards a shared goal. The digital space is part of hybrid work, as we’ve come to know it, but it isn’t the main feature. We should ponder more around that.
I hope you will enjoy the discussion as much as I did!
Here’s the link to listen to the Podcast Interview with Tebogo.
Daiana: Hello and welcome to our new episode of ODD Owtcomes. Today, we'll be discussing how disruption creates opportunities for hybrid work practices and also opportunities for us to rethink our values, priorities, and relationship to business. Hybrid work will not stand with a universal formula. Everyone will have to find their ways to become more resilient, as simply going back to the office as nothing changed is no longer an option. We need to think of how to design better spaces, more flexible ways to work together, and give ourselves the chance to enjoy work while doing something good for the world around us. Hybrid structures are an option that everyone can experiment with to find what is suitable for their success.
Our guest today, Tebogo Mogaleemang, is the CEO of Spectrum, a bold start-up from Botswana who’s on a mission to disrupt the status quo and deliver impactful change through digitization while emphasizing on developing a learning culture. Welcome, Tebogo, and thank you for being here with us today! Before we start, would you like to introduce yourself and the work you do at Spectrum Analytics?
Tebogo: I tend to think of myself as an organization lead. It’s not for me to bring the solutions, but I also challenge the team to continuously give the best of themselves. Our company, Spectrum Analytics, is an innovation studio that goes out there to create magic from the disruption that is happening around us. As a company, we want to come and say, “Hey! We know it can be “challenging. We see the risks, but here are the opportunities. With these opportunities, we can make the best out of them.”
We offer organizations consultancy on how to navigate disruption, but we also build bespoke solutions to help organizations get started, sustain, and then accelerate their digital transformation journeys to get the best out of the technologies.
It’s all about getting the best of your data assets. And as a company, that’s why we have the model that says, we innovate with your data so that you can create value as a business.
I really love everyday business decision-making. I realize it’s quite intuitive when having you have an engineering background.
The power of digitization is to be able to capture data. The value of digital transformation is in what we are able to do with it and how we collect more of it to get more insights out of it. And to allow us to experiment, innovate, exploit imagined opportunities while maximizing value from what we have been doing before. And then comes something that organizations struggle within. Old models of doing things don’t necessarily guarantee success going forward. So, as much as you may be successful now because you’ve been doing things in a certain way, it doesn’t guarantee that you'll get the same level of success. Then, you have organizations that really think about maximizing value from what is imagined. And for me, digital transformation and disruption are really about that.
Daiana: I want to discuss with you the complexity around hybrid work, how it impacted Spectrum Culture and the way you interact with your team and the community around you. Some people tend to reduce hybrid work to remote work, being able to work from home. And on the surface level, it is about workspaces, but on the deeper level, it’s about working processes and the culture that needs to adapt and learn. How did hybrid work translate into the culture of Spectrum and its long-term development?
Tebogo: When we think about hybrid work, we also can’t discount the culture of people, what kind of environment they are from, and in this environment, what are the biases or the fundamental beliefs. Organizations are still hierarchical. In such an environment, leaders struggle, micro-managers struggle, and people also struggle because they need to rethink their relevance to the company. And what I’ve seen is a real struggle precisely because most organizations hadn’t digitized enough to remain operational, to remain resilient during lockdowns. That’s when things went really, really bad.
But now that we are out of lockdowns and talking about going back, we are finding there’s a mix. Companiesthere's limit the number of people they have in their offices. I think that’s what led to the idea of having mixed models. For us as a start-up, this future has us thinking, “Hey! As a team, let’s build a learning culture.”
Normally learning happens through physical interaction. People try to do things together because they are in the same space. And being in the same space means that we connect. I think the lack of human connectivity is one of the things that I felt most. With smaller teams is easier to get things done because people create bonds. It’s something that we talk about in terms of business and in terms of bonds. Some think, “We’re not friends, we are here to work,” but I can’t get the best out of our people if I don’t understand their motivations, how people think about their own roles.
The biggest struggle for us to think about was how to continue interactions, how to ensure people learn across distance, virtually. It takes time to discover the gaps that exist among us. It’s a work in progress. I can’t say there’s a marker that we close this point, and now we have a proper hybrid model in place to allow us to continue to do what we want to do, to learn together as a team… It always has to be a work in progress.
Daiana: The digital space alongside digital tools is becoming more embedded in the work structure, sometimes as temporary placeholders for physical interaction and sometimes as the only way to do collaborative work. What are some of the tools you are using to bridge these gaps, and how do you and your team feel about them? Is there an ideal tool that allows you all the flexibility you need in your work?
Tebogo: For us, it’s been an experiment with tools. Currently, we are using Microsoft Teams. We had to learn how to integrate and make sure that work remains visible, progress remains visible, communication remains transparent so we can update each other. And it’s still a struggle because even if we put these tools in place, even if there is a well-understood and shared process among the people, we don’t have the same expectations to get work done. And, any tool will expose that. Then, you realize it was never about the tool but really about the culture in place. To me, that’s been the greatest insight that I found.
We, then, invested in setting the culture right: how do we work, how do we track progress, how are we working, how do we record progress. Having everyone discussing the same thing is not the best use of everyone’s time as well. We use (digital) platforms to see progress and then record our success, what we are struggling with and how we can best assist each other to achieve our goals.
It’s quite a challenge as we understand some of these tools better, how to make people share with others when they discover something. But when something is not working, we need to let it go. We migrated to Microsoft Teams because we are also using Office 365. As we now have an ecosystem of tools, it doesn’t make sense to have other project management tools on top of that as we did before.
Daiana: If I had to pick one out of the many tools we experimented with at Owtcome, it’s Miro. The blank canvas and its simplicity allowed us to bring our complex thinking to the table by being able to visualize and experiment in so many ways. But we also have a fondness for the Metaverse and 3D space where we can level up our abilities to perform and challenge our limits. No tool can please everyone, and there are likely to be different challenges depending on the organization, the external means and developments, and, of course, its general appeal. What kind of challenges do you encounter when you think about trying a new tool? Would the Metaverse be something you’d like to experiment with in the future?
Tebogo: I love more design-oriented interactions. I struggle with strictly task-oriented tools, so I really understand why your team would like to use Miro. There’s that flexibilityThere'sou are actually doing things that are in your control, that you are curating together in the interactions. The challenge is that some of these tasks can be accomplished across multiple tools.
In terms of collaboration in the Metaverse, it is quite a challenge in itself. I’m hoping that with collaborations, we will converge towards something that allows us to showcase what we can do physically together and combine what we can do digitally together. The Metaverse is interesting, but I think that in an I'mironment like ours, the challenge sometimes is basic. So, you can imagine the bandwidth needed for us to connect on that level. If you are still struggling with connectivity as we do, it becomes a challenge. And it’s been our reality, to be honest: I think for all the meetings we’ve had, there’s always someone who can’t connect because of the Internet challenges.
We can’t copy everything that works in other environments. We really need to think carefully about what we want to do and the resources we have at our disposal to get the best out of that, rather than maybe trying to bring in tools and then imposing them on the environment. Because (when we do and they don’t work), we start thinking it’s something wrong with us, but maybe it is the infrastructure that isn’t ready to support it.
Daiana: I find your position fascinating and precious as it paints a different picture of how we reassess things pragmatically depending on specific contexts and environments. This has helped me learn more about the challenges that I want to solve and also the challenges I am powerless to even approach. I got to see a very diverse range of personalities and perspectives, a wide “spectrum,” if you may. But I’m also sure it has its challenges when it comes to aligning people, especially in asynchronous modes of collaboration when action needs to happen. Tell us a bit more about how Spectrum came to embody a learning culture. I know such fundamental shifts do not happen overnight, and when it comes to conscious business, small changes need to be integrated continuously to propel a transition. What is your vision of a learning culture, and in what areas do you think it has the greatest impact?
Tebogo: For us, the first thing has been to accommodate mistakes. Over time, people are getting interested in the idea that they don’t always have all the answers. Maybe the most unfortunate thing we have done with leadership is to assume those leaders have all the answers. And that is problematic.
We are not challenging people to challenge themselves and know that they are part of the solution and process. If we don’t have the answers, it's our responsibility to find answers and create an environment where we all give our best. For us, that’s why we have put that's as the bedrock of our company. It is how we build with it. We recognize that if people interact and don’t learn to get the best out of each other, then someone has to create something that attempts to do that. But it’s the people interacting that can achieve that better than anyone who’s outside that interaction.
As a start-up, we were really deliberate (on it) from the beginning. And it has become part of how we recruit. I don’t think we do recruitment in the normal way. Instead, we have conversations to find where we align. It’s at the heart of howIt'sconnect. It then becomes easier to understand how critical learning is to us and get the best out of each other. Even when things are not going right, we ask the right questions.
What can we learn from what didn’t go right? It allows us to have conversations that are harder to have. Because we have the right to disagree. So, we work to help each other to get the best out of each other. I think for a company that cannot learn, you’ll see it in the performance of the people as well because learning translates in the other spaces of our lives.
If I am growing and enjoying what I do, it allows me to unleash my inner potential I can translate it into other areas of my life. I see that I’m adding value, I’ll become more fulfilled, and then it starts tying into something that is my purpose. Without that, if I go to work because I’m there for the money, it’s not tying it to my purpose over time. People are quitting jobs right now in high numbers because these jobs are not satisfying them.
For us, the main thing has been the purpose that we share with the people that we bring on board. It kind of simplifies things a bit, but it's harder in an environment like ours, where learning is not explicitly understood. People think learning happens when you’re in school. Old school people think I have graduated, so now it’s time for me to go out there, get paid.
For us as a start-up, we better be digital-ready. And being digital-ready means then, basically, learning. Because the digital solutions that we want to build require us to continuously refresh our skills, we need to be learning all the time. Innovation is always ongoing. If we are not learning, we are going to stagnate, and it’s going to affect our existence as well. Even hybrid work is like an experiment we are looking to learn from. As long as people are open to learning, it offers space for continuous improvement. That, for me, is the primary thing to look out for. It never stops. It should never stop.
Daiana: I think the reason people struggle with hybrid work is that it weighs a lot on the individual and its possibility to have a complex lifestyle. I think it’s hard because we have a complex relationship to work, and it’s time to rethink if we are good at balancing work and life. What do you think is the issue that makes us so slow and causes friction when it comes to determining better ways to approach hybrid work?
Tebogo: Some problems show something that is really interesting that maybe we are not discussing. I have one life: how do I find harmony between the time I spend at work and the time I’m outside work? I think we are not talking about that “one life” and making harmony with it. We are trying to say we have two lives that we need to harmonize. It will never work. It’s the mental model that I think is broken. And all this relies on is a single life. It’s like energy from thIt'srson, and this person chooses to be this or that. These two aspects, if they are conflicting, you can’t reconcile them outside the individual.
I think, in it, there lies something about the flexibility that we need to bring into the conversation. When I’m in the office, I’m there 8 to 5. Whether I’m adding value or not, it’s a different ball game. I’d rather be allowed to give my best at any time than to be told that these are the strict hours you have to do work. I don’t know about other people, but I’m challenged to deliver more around that. I don’t think the value doesn’t lie in the number of hours. It can take someone who’s a novice three hours to do what someone with experience can take one hour to do. So then, where’s the value then? Is it in the hours or the output? Should we be tracking hours? What should we be looking at?
I don’t have all the answers, but I just think that no matter what, we are always going to experiment. If we reach a dead end, we should also be flexible enough to admit we reached a dead end. I’d rather be open to experimentation, remain open to admit things aren’t going right.
When we are curious about something, we want to do it well. That curiosity becomes fuel. I think that it might be the missing link in the old model of how we were working. People didn’t realize that people need to feel that they are trusted. And now, when we’re at a distance, we discover our dissatisfaction, we are trying to reflect. We’re quitting those organizations that are not giving us that sense to continuously discover better ways of doing things. Because it’s about that, it’s not about following an idea because it came from the top guy. When I watch organizations stagnate, it’s because people start thinking it’s one person’s responsibility to bring results. And then everyone becomes a follower. Over time, the entire thing becomes about personalities instead of results and the best ways of getting results.
Daiana: I think you’re right. We are prone to habit and try to seek comfort in routine, but hybrid work overrides our sense of stability. People need to be bolder and keener on taking initiative, speaking up, and embracing uncertainty. So, my last question is, how do you, as a leader, encourage that? Is there any structure or system of reference that your team can relate to so it doesn’t feel like reinventing the wheel every time they come together?
Tebogo: The discomfort is fundamentally there all the time. We are looking at work through our frame and say things are predictable. The world is volatile. But you are right that it cannot just be let to the extreme, to be like “oh, everyone needs to b” really comfortable with this.” We need to put some ba" ic structure in place around how we measure results without perhaps maybe prescribing how people should work.
I find that having certain goals helps. It gives better results and also allows people to own their roles. Because you can also hire people and then, in the end, be the one who’s telling them to do their best. You won’t find much sense in that. But you can set the goals based on shared objectives. If the shared objectives are clear and everyone understands what the goal is, then it should, over time, become easier for people to own up roles and define how to execute their own responsibility so that they achieve the shared goals.
We want people to connect and give their best from wherever they are. That, for me, is what drives the hybrid kind of model or the need for that. Because if I can’t be in the same place for whatever reason, that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t be able to contribute from wherever I am. So how do we empower people to collaborate across distances? How can people do their best even when they’re not physically in the same place? For me, that is the fundamental problem we are trying to solve.
Once we figure out how to have continuity and we’re delivering our best, the last question has to be which tool can enable us to achieve that. As you were saying, sometimes we start in the tech, and then we build everything on top of it. It becomes a more complex problem. It isn’t a business problem, but it becomes a technology problem. Fundamentally, hybrid work is a business problem.
Daiana: Thank you, Tebogo, for joining us today on this episode of ODD Owtcomes! This has been really humbling and insightful. I hope to see what comes next and how Spectrum Analytics will grow.
Our vision on Hybrid work is to embed systemic thinking inside companies to cultivate flexibility. This is just the beginning of a new revolution that disrupts the norms because they no longer withstand the complexity of who we are and what we do. Embracing change and being open to these new opportunities that arise will make companies flourish on multiple levels. Success is not defined by profit solely. It’s about the positive impact on communities, the environment, and the wellbeing of our teams.
We'll continue to build tools for collaboration to help innovation teams think more critically and have more open conversations to reach better outcomes. We hope you will join us for more episodes of ODD Owtcomes as we uncover these amazing pathways to the future!