About this talk
This session discusses the importance of placing people at the center of high-performing teams while navigating rapid technological changes, particularly in the context of AI. The speaker, Shugufta, along with panelists Anya and Kimberly, explores the gaps between technological advancements and human behavior in organizations. They highlight that as new AI tools emerge, there is a need for leaders to foster an environment of psychological safety to encourage open communication and collaboration. Anya emphasizes the importance of creating a culture that allows for uncertainty and experimentation, while Kimberly stresses the role of leadership in modeling curiosity and engagement. The discussions reveal how organizational culture can significantly impact the effectiveness of teams in a fast-paced AI-driven landscape.
Full transcript
Um Are we ready to go? We are ready. Okay. Yeah, you can hear us. >> hear us. Okay, maybe we're waiting for a micro photo, but I guess Yeah. Well, good morning everyone and welcome to today's session. Higher? Uh higher. Welcome to today's session where we're going to talk about how we can grow high-performing teams by putting putting people at the center and not not the technology,
not the fast pace, but actually to make sure that everything's going well with people. My name is Shugufta. I'm a senior manager at Capgemini with a focus on AI strategy, governance, and agentic implementation. I've studied PhD in the UK in business informatics with additional studies at MIT in artificial intelligence and machine learning. So, [snorts] what's happening in that society and to our culture, I'm actually experiencing it
it first hand with our teams cuz everything's moving really, really fast and sometimes it feels like it is difficult to keep up with. Every day a new AI tool coming up, a new AI company is there, and there are so many teams that are struggling to keep up. What should we use? What is the next thing that is actually good for our organization and for our team?
So, I actually witness first hand um the change in our culture, in our teamwork, and in the society in general. But today I have two amazing panelists that uh have joined me to help us basically uncover these questions more and more. Anya, Kimberly, welcome. to my right, to my left actually, yes, [laughter] Anya Hydrovska. She is the founder of Engage Lab and a psychological safety practitioner working
closely with fast-moving tech companies across Europe. With nearly 5 years at Adyen through its IPO, she experienced firsthand what rapid scaling does to teams. And now works with organizations like ASML and McKinsey on human conditions that make teams effective, inclusion, belonging, and building environments where people can speak up and perform under pressure. Welcome, Anya. Thank you. And we also have Kimberly Fieuke. She's a senior executive and
speaker and leadership advocate with nearly 30 years in the tech industry. As a director of customer experience for Microsoft's EMEA region, she leads transformative strategy that helps global organizations convert ambition into impact. She's also the founder of Luminous Leaders, a professional development company that helps executives and emerging leaders find their voice, communicate with clarity, and create cultures where inclusion and high performance go hand-in-hand. Welcome, Kimberly, and
thank you. I'm very excited to to kick off this conversation. Just to give you an idea that how our team structure is changing at the moment. I'm a senior manager, and sometimes to prepare proposals or presentations for customers, I would have asked my junior colleagues to help me with the presentations. But what I do now, I just use Cloudera. So, practically, my colleagues have been replaced with
with Cloudera. In terms of preparing reports, again, I would have asked my colleagues for help. But now I use Copilot or ChatGPT. So, practically, that physical interaction with my colleagues have been very much replaced with AI. But how does it make me feel in general? How does it mean the atmosphere of teamwork with with the different people? and how organizations like how the leadership are tackling this.
So, I'm going to start with a question actually for both of you in the beginning just to kick-start the conversation that what are the gaps? Like we're moving really fast. What are the gaps that we we're seeing today between where the technology is leading us and how people are behaving or working in organizations. Anya, maybe you first. >> Sure. I think we are still very much structured
in a way that we optimize that certainty as speed and answers. And I think we need to start moving into more of an experimental space or a structure. So, make make space for that uncertainty, make space for I don't know how the things go and also make space for more collaboration, especially in technical for technical roles, many developers are also used to working alone or and they
actually sometimes very much enjoy working just with the machine. And we see that with AI actually we need to create more space for that team collaboration and communication. Yeah. Yeah. I think some of the gaps or at least one of the gaps has to do with what's happening from a leadership perspective in organizations cuz certainly our developers are you know, as you said, they like to work
with machines, they like to work with you know, the the technical part of it. But it's the leadership that's saying we need to transform and we need to go faster. And one of the things that's missing is them asking the right questions of developers, of program managers, of project managers, of people who are delivering on these programs and projects within the organization. So, I I really believe
it's a curiosity gap more than anything. Um, and then that curiosity gap is really driven by the fact that many leaders, especially the higher you go they think that they should have the answers. Yeah. And I believe that's what AI is changing. It's changing that in our evolution. Because in our evolution, we you know, as humans, oh, the higher up you are, the smarter you might very
much changing. The people Yes, Sorry, that the top-down and bottom-up approach. Top-down and strategy is still important, but that strategy must be informed, and it must be driven by what we're seeing on the ground with people using the AI tools and solutions. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. It makes sense. Yeah. I relate it to my everyday work. So, what what you're saying is actually very much making sense in
in organizations. We're talking about moving really fast, Anja. What happens to the culture when when the technology is somehow accelerating, teams have to be high-performing? What happens to the culture? Yeah, so when we When an organization move fast, and under pressure, people naturally and subconsciously will look for efficiency behavior. So, what will happen is that in a in a team setting, we are going to look for,
for example, the voices that sound similar to to us, because we don't need more disagreement when we need to make decision quickly. We are going to look for voices that are confident. We need those confident voices when we act under in in uncertainty. We want to follow the leaders who know, even if we don't know if what they know or they think is true. So, we will
follow those also the kind of sometimes fast-speaking people. We also will naturally follow them uh more than than those that are processing information more slowly. So, what happens is when you do that, you would create a bit of a superficial alignment. But in the long term, you will think it's alignment. questions asks. Uh but it doesn't necessarily mean that uncertainty is not there anymore. I think there
certain is uncertainty is still there, but it's being solved individually and not collectively, which which matters. So, I think that the challenge here, the speed itself is not the challenge. The challenge is when you you want to move fast, you need to optimize it for in the way that you still create a space for that culture of learning and experimentation. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. It's so to create
that environment that people can still experiment and Yeah, and reflect, exactly. Reflect, exactly. And not because subconsciously, automatically we are going to to not do that if we want to Yeah, fast, yeah. Yeah, great. Now, I think Kim, in one of our conversation, you mentioned that technology and transformations doesn't necessarily break culture. It actually reveals the culture in organizations. Right? Just Just like humans, right? So, when
it's good times and everything's going well for you, it's easy to show up as the best version of yourself. It's the adversity that actually reveals who you really are. And it's the same thing One of the things I I want to kind of maybe add on to the speed and the I was thinking a lot about that concept. You know, what what does speed do to culture
or maybe what does culture do to speed. Um maybe it's the the better way to put it. And I was thinking about my running. So, I like to run. I'll give you a a little story about myself. Um that will relate to this topic. So, I think it was 2022. I was going to run the Dam to Dam. So, that's the race from Amsterdam to Zaandam through
the Eye Tunnel. And yeah, I didn't train all that well. I'd been a runner for 20 years, run 10 half marathons, many other races, but I didn't train very well for this race. I didn't prepare very well because I was late getting on the train. And so, when it was time for me to step off the train, I was already late getting to the start line for
the race. And of course, it was one of those lovely cold rainy days in Amsterdam. And I also didn't have the right mindset. I was rushed. I was I got to get there. I got to hurry up. You know. So, didn't train, didn't prepare, didn't have the right mindset. Culture. Get to Hendrik Prince Hendrikkade, which is a street right outside of Amsterdam Centraal. And I'm hurrying up,
speeding along, trying to transform myself into the runner that I needed to be for this My foot slips. I land into my foot gets stuck into a tram track. I'm traumatized to this day by tram tracks. And I face plant it. Okay, so that's number one. Then, I get up thinking, oh, I I was only down there for a few minutes. And then I continue on to
the start of the race. I get to the start of the race, it had already gone. So, I missed But, I walked the whole time not realizing until I got to the hospital later on that day that my foot was broken. So, let me take that now and relate it to organization and AI and speed. If you're not trained properly, you don't train, you don't you don't
prepare, you don't have the right mindset, and then you try to speed up, you're going to miss the race. The organization will miss the race. And not only that, you won't even realize that you missed the race until the race is long gone started because you'll walk around just like I did thinking, "Oh, everything's fine, you know, no problems." Cuz as you said, a lot of people
in the organization will not speak up. Especially if leaders are not asking them to speak up. Um I saw a statistic recently that said 84% of AI transformations are failing not because of the tools, not because of the individual contributors or the rest of the organization that's trying to get those tools and implement them, but because of leadership. Because they're not asking the right questions and they're
not asking people to step up. And that is a big part of training, preparing, and having the right mindset, culture. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And do you think that um forming the culture is coming from the leadership? How do you see it? >> Absolutely. Absolutely. They have to model it. There's a um mantra that I've heard for most of my career is model, coach, care as a
leader. So, as I managed, as I, you know, took my career and advanced it, you know, within Microsoft. That was a thing I think that helped me to be a better leader is I had to model being curious. I had to model being prepared. I had to model having the right mindset. Otherwise, the people around you will not think that that is important. Yeah. >> Um I
mean, and you don't want to it's not necessarily a parent-child relationship, but it's similar. Because they're looking to you for guidance. What What do you see, Mr. or Mrs. Leader or leader person, as important? Because what you see as important is how I will conduct myself as a part of your organization. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. It makes sense, and I think looking back back at where I work,
which is a big corporate with a lot of employees, how can we influence it in any way? Can we activate it? Can we Yeah. Yeah, I think And yeah. Uh how we can we >> And then more questions for you, Kim. That's Can >> Oh. Can we influence >> Can we influence it as as employees? So, a couple ways >> A couple ways you can influence. One
big way you can influence is by using your feet and walking out the door. If you are not feeling as if your voice is heard and you feel unseen, unheard, and not valued. >> Yeah. I always recommend and this goes you know, I work at a large company, so it's a little bit different because there's so many different areas that you can work in within Microsoft and
still stay at Microsoft. Um but I have recommended to people at that I mentor and that I sponsor, "Hey, if you don't feel comfortable in the role that you're in, don't stay that role. Have enough Know that you are valued somewhere. If you're not valued where you are, then you need to step out. Now, before you do that, hopefully you have the opportunity to voice your thoughts,
your ideas. But, if you do that and you're not you're not getting the feedback that this information that you're providing is considered valuable by your leadership, then I do think you need to make another choice. >> Make it. Yeah. Cuz otherwise, you're harming yourself. Yes, exactly. And talking about that, Anya, that when it comes to the fast-paced in times, a lot of people don't speak up. They
feel threatened. Yeah. Why is that? There's two two underlying causes for not speaking up. The first one is neurological. So, if our brain brain is under pressure, we actually the part of our brain is responsible for critical thinking, creative thinking, speaking up is not going to be as active. We are actually going to be more focused. We are going to be in that flight or fight zone.
So, we will optimize risk. We're looking at optimizing our image, our uh competence, and not really finding you know, courage to speak up. So, we will constantly evaluate is this environment safe? And the second one, which is actually linked to that, very important one, cultural one. And what I meant by cultural is that we subconsciously always evaluate what's happening in a group. it's basically that group behavior.
And if we notice that if somebody in that is going to disagree with the the others, we are going to subconsciously uh regard for that reaction either of the leader or of our colleagues. And if that reaction is harsh, if there is a dismissal, or what happens a lot in also technical teams that somebody bring an issue and the conversation or discussion will last for another hour,
we are really calculated doesn't make sense to speak up next time cuz I don't want to see that this meeting for another hour. I'm done. I have enough work. But also, I also don't want to feel like, you know, embarrassed by asking that question. Yeah. So, so that what happened on the on uh, you know, the team level and the challenge there is that leaders are often
not aware of that. Um, and there's they're not aware of that because first of all as I mentioned already especially when there is a speed we enjoy the silence because we just believe okay, no questions, great. Let's move on. [laughter] Thank you. We have no time. But there's also a second aspect of that is that impact of our behavior and that's for everybody here. We never really
know what's the impact of our behavior on another person. It's impossible to know it. Uh, so very often um, small moments uh, like interrupt interrupting somebody or dismissing the idea because we didn't have time and will cause uh, that impact another meaning that will they will block others from speaking up. Um, and we might really didn't we we we won't pay attention that that moment was so
so significant significant for others. And that's why measuring psychological safety is so handy and important because then you can understand why there's a silence and something that I might have thought it was not significant actually is a significant person for many reasons uh, yeah. Yeah. So that was my second question. How does it psychological safety because that's your expertise? Yeah. How does it affect in general the
the safety that they feel inside company? Yeah, so so I mean it affects in the way that people are not not going to speak up. They are not going to bring for example when the we are working on a project new features and uh, and [snorts] again we want to move fast. You are not going to uh, point to that to the potential issue uh, that is
happening because you you can't you know that there's a pressure of delivering another feature. Uh, so there is a bit of a we we think that we are moving faster. We think that we there is there is no errors but actually the errors are there and they're accumulating and at the end uh, things are breaking down. So when you look at the statistics in a long term,
the psychologically uh, when psychological safety is high in the team, there is actually, you know, they catch more errors, but they also act faster. So, in the in the long run, the performance is better than in the teams that pretended there's nothing nothing happening, and once it break, it usually breaks in a very critical moment, and the impact is much harsher on the performance. Yes. Yeah, I
quite enjoyed the conversation, and I think we can go on forever, but I see that there's not much time, and I know that you might have also questions for our speakers. Please do connect with us on LinkedIn. We were happy to answer any questions that you have. Unfortunately, during the session, we're not able to take any questions, but please do do connect. And um so, going to
the final remarks, if you have one takeaway for our leaders of today and tomorrow, what would be one takeaway from this session for them? Mhm. Uh okay, I will I think when you look, especially when you are operating in the AI environment, well, one takeaway is of course to create a space for the disagreement, and and structure it properly, but also I would say measure the psychological
safety, because then you can really understand what's the impact that you are having on your team on your on your colleagues. Um Yeah, and I think showing how to function in the uncertainty, how to model the that the new type of leadership in a certainty is extremely important, and allowing people to admit that they don't know what the answer is at the given moment. From you, Kim?
I just recently returned from Security Days. It's an event that Microsoft puts on. It's a flagship event. It was put on in Paris. We had 500 plus security cybersecurity leaders And I bring that up because we talked a lot about the great things that you can do with AI, so agentic AI and how we're using AI agents to actually detect threats and vulnerabilities in the environment, but
we also talked about the importance of questioning what's happening with AI because just as much as our companies and our organizations are using AI to make uh harden the security posture for many of these organizations, we also have just as many if not more people using AI to attack those organizations. And one of the things that one of the uh security experts from Microsoft brought up is
you have to ask the right questions. When you see AI um working in your environment or if you're setting up an AI solution, where is that data coming from? How is it being trained? Um how will it be used? Who will be using it? And the people that are using it, do they know how to detect when it's good AI, when it's the AI solution working the
way it should work, or when it's someone using that as a cyber attack? I bring that up because as we mentioned AI is causing an existential change in many ways. I was hoping that existential change would be, you know, fixing the climate issue, finding a cure for cancer, >> [laughter] >> doing great things like that. But the change that it's causing is that people we're going from
here when it comes to it's already high when it comes to dangers in cybersecurity for organizations to all the way up here very quickly. So the changes are happening with cyber attacks not few months or years, we're talking every week. Microsoft gets over 100 trillion pings a day. 100 trillion pings a day. I want to emphasize that because that is quite serious. You ask about what I
want to leave with leaders and potential leaders. First thing is must be curious at the top to the middle all the way to the bottom. People should be asking And don't be afraid to question your leadership. Now, you may have to be prepared because some leadership doesn't like to be questioned. Let's be honest. You may have to be be prepared as I said before to vote with
your feet and go to another role or job or company. But don't be afraid to do that because when you don't question, then you're putting yourself at risk and the entire organization. Because those 100 trillion pings are happening at Microsoft, but that means that other companies are getting a billion pings and 10 billion pings and 1 trillion pings, right? So, it's not just courageous. Be willing to
put yourself on the line and have courage to do that. The second thing, and I know we're almost running out of time, is to listen. We think that with AI, oh, we have all the information we need. I'm smarter now than ever because I have my cloud, I have my ChatGPT, I have my co-pilot. No. What that's doing is taking data that's already there. We need to
be more creative and more innovative, and the way we do that is by listening. Listening to what those people who are asking questions have to say and listen to those people who are developing our solutions and who are putting um putting those solutions into play, implementing those solutions, listening to them very carefully, and then thinking about what that means for your organization, or what you might have
to change, or what you might have to slow down before you actually implement the AI solution. Well, thank you very much. I think our message to be be curious, be um, courageous, experiment, fail, but definitely have culture at the center of growth and the center of organization. Thank you very much, everybody, for attending. Thank you, Anya. Thanks. >> you very much. Thank you, Kim. Thank you.
