From Chapters to The Journey of Grapevine: How I Became Obsessed with Making Workplace Better

Introduction

When I decided to start my own software company, I knew it had to be in the workplace space. Not only in the workplace space but in the “making work better” and “future of work” space. A few chapters in my life led me on this journey and I want to explain them here for you to better understand my passion for building my software Grapevine. And don’t worry, I’m going to keep the recap short and focus on how remote work can empower creativity and a better work-life harmony plus the benefits that are involved.

The College and 1st Job Chapter

My undergrad in Psychology led me to industry experts like Lazlo Bock, Adam Grant, Marty Seligman, and Shawn Achor. Why? Because I had an emphasis on Organizational Psychology. If you aren’t familiar with Org Psych, it’s basically the study of how organizations and employees interact with one another. Due to my interests in Org Psych I focus my thesis assignments on this topic with the Happy-Productive Worker thesis. I learned methodologies on how to make the workplace better, enhancing employee engagement and retention, and the various things companies can do to make the employee work experience better.

However, each time I tried to introduce these methodologies and frameworks into organizations I worked for, I was always hit with, “well that won’t work here,” or “we don’t have time to focus on that because we need to close deals...need to fix unmotivated employees by giving them outdated incentives…need to order pizza to increase engagement.” I remember distinctly one time when I brought a simple idea to my manager at the time, it was met with, “are you f*cking kidding me? They want that? Are you serious? What soft people.”

You want to know what that simple idea was? It was for the managers to start asking “how was your weekend?” before we started our Monday morning huddles. That’s how low the bar is for some companies and managers like mine at the time weren’t willing to do something as simple as ask how the employee’s weekend was. Ironically, in my mind, I was saying to their response, the same thing they said to me when I brought up the idea, “are you f*cking kidding me?” The college and 1st job chapter only increased my interest in bettering the workplace.

The Startup, Leadership,  and Entrepreneur Chapter

After experiencing that type of culture and knowing there were ways to improve how organizations and employees interacted, I unfortunately started working as a management consultant in another no-so-friendly company environment. However, at this point, I knew what type of company culture I wanted to work in and was able to get out and into a Startup company in Charlotte within 6 months. The consulting company I worked briefly for was like working in a time out every day. The manager would get upset if my colleagues and I talked too loud or sometimes talked at all.

I had to escape and I did, luckily. The startup culture was something I read about but never worked in until the next position. That startup environment was better but still wasn’t amazing. However, it did show me how employees can get much more done if they are given a certain amount of ownership and autonomy to execute their tasks. I was finally getting a taste of all the research I did for my thesis in real life. I was able to implement portions of my learning into processes and systems for employees to benefit from. Not a lot but it wasn’t zero any more. 

During my time at the startup, I also ventured into entrepreneurship by launching my own Coaching and Consulting firm iMEO which stood for improving management, employees, and organizations. When I launched this, I thought I knew enough to offer my expertise to others. Although I wouldn’t really be able to offer people great expertise until the next chapter, I did coach a few startup companies. After the startup, starting my own company, I was able to land an amazing position at an Enterprise Video Software company. This is where the game changed for me, in a good way.

Laid Off and SaaS Chapter

The enterprise video company introduced me to the Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) industry and the Go-To-Market (GTM) function for Marketing, Sales, and Customer Success teams. Although I’ve worked in tech pretty much my entire career in one way or another, this was the first time I experienced the amazing business side of SaaS and GTM. When I was laid off from the RegTech startup organization, I thought about going all in on Coaching and Consulting and I’m so glad I didn’t. I would have missed out on the very thing that is making Grapevine a viable opportunity.

In addition to SaaS and GTM, the Enterprise Video company operated 100% remotely. It was the first time I worked in an entirely remote environment and I fell in love for several reasons. What I experienced was an organization that became flat in the sense of hierarchy. Meaning, the corner offices and top executives were on the same level visually within Zoom screens compared to the falsified perception of seeing them in the office. In addition, the flexibility to work anywhere was amazing. 

Remote work, to me, became another resource that could help me achieve my vision as a person and within a company. In my thesis paper, I discovered the research from Hackman and Oldham’s “The Job Characteristics Model”  which surfaced a model on what is needed to have more engaged, productive, and happy employees. The key characteristics are Skill Variety, Task Identity, Task Significance grouped in one category plus Autonomy and Feedback from the Job. 

It’s crazy to me that we have known about the Job Characteristics Model since 1974 and the Happy-Productive Worker thesis from the days of the Great Depression. However, for the longest time, we continued to push the methods of the industrial revolution for measuring and tracking performance of employees. As I digress in this blog, let me continue to one more thing before getting back on track. The way we work is backwards. We tend to believe that if we dangle a carrot or stick in front of an employee, they will automatically become motivated and stay motivated.

When in reality, that is extrinsic motivation that only lasts for a moment of time. The true way to engage your employees is to fucking care about them inside the workplace and outside. It’s to get them onboard with the mission of the company so they can connect what they do with something bigger than themselves. It’s to set and measure goals as it relates to the bigger picture of the organization. It’s the ability to grow at a rate in which they want to grow which is also a moderating factor from the Job Characteristics Model (Growth Needs Strength).

And now back to your regularly scheduled program…

The journey I took you on above is important because it led me here. The combination of my thesis, becoming a leader, working in bad environments, working under bad managers, experiencing the startup life, becoming an entrepreneur, and learning SaaS and GTM led me to understanding my true purpose in life. My true purpose is to make the workplace better for everyone. My method of making this a reality is Grapevine Software. The software that will allow remote and flexible hybrid organizations become the new norm for working. 

The ability to work from anywhere without skipping a beat or missing important updates. The ability to track and measure performance, manage employees in a modern way, and build culture in a remote environment. The ability to see how your company is tracking toward DE&I, employee engagement, and performance in one platform. The future of work is being driven by the employees and organizations will need to adapt to continue to attract top talent. 

To be clear, adapting means that organizations will need to stop focusing on the “in the office” bullshit and start focusing on what matters most, which is employees producing outcomes, being engaged, and having flexibility. The best way to ensure this happens is by having remote work and flexible hybrid models in place. Next, they will need to ensure they have software that keeps employees engaged and connected no matter where they are in the world. Cough, cough** Hint, hint** Wink, wink** Grapevine software is that software 🙂.

From Chapters to The Journey

After typing the paragraphs above, I might have lied that I wasn’t going to focus on my entire path to get here but I think it is important to understand why Grapevine and bettering the workplace is so important to me. In addition, I think the title of this blog, which was going to be “Freedom from the Cubicle: How Remote Work Empowers Creativity,” will now be “From Chapters to The Journey of Grapevine: How I Became Obsessed with Making Workplace Better.” And with that, the Journey continues. If you are interested in following our journey, be sure to join our “Untangled Vines: Redefining Work” LinkedIn Group today!