Peer Effect
As founders we’re sold a lie. The journey has to be tough. Isolation is normal. We have to choose between work and life. On this podcast, James Johnson, renowned coach to Series A+ founders, explores a better way. One where you build a great business and a great life.
It’s time to take back control. The answers are out there. Your peers have already uncovered hard-won insights, practical tips and people to look out for.
That’s the Peer Effect.
Tune in every Wednesday for 30 minutes that will inspire new thoughts, avoid expensive mistakes and keep you energised.
Peer Effect
Building Sustainable Teams and Resilient Leadership, with Anouk Agussol
- The pivotal role of strategic HR practices from the start-up phase through scaling.
- The importance of a founder's presence and attitude in shaping team dynamics and maintaining morale.
- Techniques for balancing transparency and strength to foster a resilient, aligned team.
More from James:
Connect with James on LinkedIn or at peer-effect.com
What separates a good team from a great one? It's a question a lot of founders find themselves asking, especially now that many businesses are shifting their goal from rapid growth to sustainable profitability. Today, we're diving into this topic with Anouk Agassou, founder of Unleashed. They're partnered with over 120 startups, leveraging people-first strategies to build strong, effective foundations to enhance both employee satisfaction and business growth. You're listening to Peer Effect, the podcast that fuels you with new ideas and inspiration through interviews with founders and experts who've made it happen. I'm your host, james Johnson, and I coach Series A Plus founders to take back control so they can take their business further and live a great life and live a great life.
Speaker 2:So this particular business that I was referring to was lots of disciplinaries, lots of policies, very transactional. There was tribunals. It was, like you know, all of the things that I want to help create businesses that mitigate against the need for these things.
Speaker 2:So it was very not me, but it gave me an incredible grounding in employment law, to be fair. I then moved to a company that was very focused on people and culture and I started there relatively junior. There were about 250 people. I grew with them to kind of head of people and by the time I left there were about 1000 people. So I'd really seen that scaling journey. But I love to build. I like doing things from kind of the ground up. So I went into a series B startup there were about 70 people at the time and started you know, started doing doing the building of great people infrastructure.
Speaker 2:But what I realized is that a lot of the problems that I was having to fix in the business were actually problems that should have been, that shouldn't have existed, because we should have been thinking about the people strategy far earlier.
Speaker 2:But startups and scale-ups don't necessarily need a people person when they're really small. They just need some really good support to be thinking about these things to mitigate the problems which are going to come and they always do, and every business faces the same problems as they grow. It's just that the solutions are different because each business is different. And that's when I founded Unleashed and the idea was really to help these businesses and we kind of I used a house analogy, certainly in the early days where if you've got a hut and everything's perfect and nothing's leaking and you can quickly fix hut and everything's perfect and there's nothing's leaking and you can, you know, quickly fix it, that's fine. But actually if you want to start adding floors and making it bigger, if you haven't established strong foundations, then everything just collapses, and so that that was the idea behind it. So, working with early stage startups and scaling businesses and now much bigger businesses as well, actually on all things people and culture.
Speaker 1:So a lot of expertise sitting around people, culture, just building the right foundations. What is a unique insight that you'd share with founders around this or something else?
Speaker 2:It's a hard question because I've got a lot of learning over the years, both from being a founder and kind of growing my own business, and I think actually my biggest learning and it goes against popular doctrine really is that you need to show up as a founder how your team needs you, not how you need to be. I know that kind of goes against the grain of being vulnerable and sharing. You know sharing things and expressing your own vulnerability so that your team can share their vulnerability and feel safe to do so. And although I completely, completely agree that it's really important to create an environment where your team feel totally safe to be able to express themselves as a founder, I actually think you're a bit more limited in doing that. I think actually you're a lot more limited.
Speaker 2:I think it's fine to say you know today's a great day, feeling really productive, but actually your team need you to be. Especially when times are tough, team need you to be motivated, to be energized. They want to feel aligned to a vision and a mission. It's not about kind of being falsely positive, but it's very much about being there and supporting your team. When you get to a point of like your team are feeling like they're supporting you, then actually that's a balance that doesn't work. So I think my insight for founders would be to every day put on your big girl pants or your big boy pants and show up how your team need you to, and find your own personal support elsewhere.
Speaker 1:And is there sort of a particular instance that gave you this insight, or is it a series of different events?
Speaker 2:So I'll be vulnerable now. Not to be vulnerable, I think I've always been on the as a leader. You know, share how you feel up um in the place that that you're at, if you've done the work to create team resilience, then actually everyone's got everyone's got each other's backs when there are bad days, um, and actually I think that's that's still fair to say, that that would be accurate. You know, every now and again, um, I think from my personal story perspective, you know, over the last, the last two years, have been very, very difficult for many businesses and particularly those that are vc backed um, inflation, interest rates, the redundancies, kind of. You know, left, right and center, is very, very rare to speak to a business that hasn't made redundancies and that obviously impacted us as a business as well, because businesses are needing to cut costs, extend runways, all of the rest, and it became really difficult for us over the last couple of years, especially towards the back end of last year.
Speaker 2:Combined with that, I was going through a really messy divorce and I was kind of needing to adjust to being a single mum and still being a founder and I think I ended up showing up for the team as being, when I showed up, I've got to say, because some days I found it too hard to do so as not being stable, as not being energetic, as being withdrawn, not being stable, as not being energetic, as being withdrawn, not being inspirational, not clear on you know. Okay, so we're facing a problem. How are we going to solve for this? Where are we going to? You know all of the rest, and and I didn't do that and it caused problems because, in the end, no matter kind of the team dynamics that you have and we had a very close knit team no matter the team dynamics that you have, you are still the founder and you are still looked to to provide the strength and stability and the guidance that exists from a job security perspective, really anywhere anyway.
Speaker 2:But feeling secure and feeling that the founder has got your, your back kind of disappeared. So when things got tough, the team ended up disappearing as well and I completely get that um, because I wasn't there for them in the way that that need to be so there's a sense of sort of you can be authentic with your team.
Speaker 1:It's just you're there to support them rather than them being there to support you. And you said like looking elsewhere for those sources of support.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely, and it's hard because you are still a person and I think you know that that can sometimes be forgotten, you still go through things, but ultimately you've made the choice to found a business, to create something, to grow a team, to create a product, and then you have responsibility for that um, and you can't kind of shy away from that responsibility when it gets, when it gets hard um, and you might need some support. So you should get some, some support and in fact, even if you don't feel you need support, you probably do so. I would, you know, definitely rely on and it depends what it is. You know, coaches like yourself, therapists, if necessary, other founders.
Speaker 2:Joining founder groups can be really valuable as well, and being able to share that. In fact, unleash ended up being acquired by a company called Foundation who, one of the founders of Foundation, was part of a founder group that I had joined. So there are really good additional reasons beyond personal support to join these, because it helps with networking and all of the rest. But, yeah, it's very much of every morning, pull up your, pull up your pants and get on with your day. Um type insight.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, it it sounds like there's a sort of degree of distance to keep maybe a healthy distance to keep between yourself as a founder and your team, whereas some of the today now it's like oh, you're, you're, you're, you're a family, you're all in it together, which feels like quite unhelpful language when you really dive into it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it is unhelpful language and I think it's potentially really lovely in theory that that might be how people experience the world of work, but it's not in practice. You're not all in it together, the world of work, but it's not in practice, you're not all in it together. I'll start with that point because as a founder, you can't just choose to leave whilst others can choose to leave and that's fine, right. That's the difference. And as a founder you get the upside of that when the times are good. But I think you have to recognize, as a founder, to expect people to be by your side and forever there with you and for them to feel as in it, as you are, is is kind of is misplaced, right. So it's nothing against the people, it's as a founder, it's misplaced judgment if that's what you think is going to happen.
Speaker 2:The family piece, I think is very dangerous in any case.
Speaker 2:I mean where you don't choose your family.
Speaker 2:You know, striving for profit especially, it is now kind of prior to the last two years it was all about growth at all costs and now it's very much about performance and striving for profit and having a really good plan to get to profit as quickly as possible, which never was before.
Speaker 2:Like those same investor pressures don't exist in a family Whilst at work. You have to perform and you have to be clear about what performance is, and if people aren't performing, you can't send them to the naughty step that doesn't you know that's not going to work. You need to get them to perform and if they don't perform, you need to be able to have open and honest conversations about whether it's the right company for them, whether it's the right role for them, if you've tried to support their development. So you can't do that with kids. There have been a few times I would have loved to have said to my son, who's a teenager you're going to have to think about whether this family is the right one for you. It's just not going to happen. So, yeah, it is quite a dangerous dynamic, I think I just had a very strong vision of you.
Speaker 1:If you're seeing your son down and getting on a performance improvement plan, um, so maybe then we jump on to the second question, which is like what's an external insight that's been powerful for you that you'd share with other founders?
Speaker 2:so I've read, like I read lots of books I. I've listened to lots of podcasts and I find that there are small insights in everything that I listen to which I like. I like to take on board the one I'm. I follow them on Instagram, but I read their books first. Liz and Molly um, have you heard of them?
Speaker 2:they've, they've written no, they've written two books, one's called, and it is on the kind of the, the feeling side of things. So this perhaps kind of talks a lot to to kind of the situation that I've been through and I'm out of the other side now but one's called Big Feelings and one's called no Hard Feelings and it's around kind of communication and work relationships, but obviously feelings as well, and I'm always told by my friends that I'm very good at reframing situations and helping kind of people see a different way to look at things. But they are like exceptional and they do it through really simple, lovely drawings where you look at it and you're like, oh God, that makes complete sense and it's like it's the true kind of adage of you know, a picture tells a thousand words. They kind of zoom in and zoom out on things and that I have found to be. Every time I see one of their pictures on Instagram I'm like, ah, yeah, that's exactly right, but they're definitely worth a follow on Instagram, even if you don't read their books.
Speaker 2:You end up in a position of power. Ultimately, whether you feel like you have a lot of power or not, that's irrelevant, because you are in a position of power and that comes. I'm worried that I'm going to start quoting Spider-Man here. That does come with responsibility, and actually I think it's definitely something that sat quite heavy on my shoulders, like the the idea of having, especially when times are tough, like someone's livelihood on your shoulders or a team's livelihood on your shoulders.
Speaker 1:Um, so you do have to be careful with that yeah, because I suppose that that that idea of responsibility sitting on your shoulders can become responsibility for their success, which probably starts drifting into like slightly parental yes, I'm responsible for everything.
Speaker 2:So there's there's an important balance to to get here yes, there is an important balance, and that's where I think kind of, you know, making sure that founders and leaders articulate very clearly their roles, the team's roles, what performance looks like, what the mission is, aligning everyone, because everyone has a role to play and it doesn't just sit on one person.
Speaker 1:I speak to quite a few founders and often when they're going through a change programme they agonise over the sense of responsibility to their team and I think sometimes then it surprises them when someone might leave and it's kind of you always get a sense where a founder can spend about three months agonizing over whether they should do this change program because it impacts people, and the person that spent all this time agonizing is like oh actually I've got another job offer, I'm going yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think there needs to be. You know, when it comes to change programs, there definitely needs to be thought into it Because, for example, if we're talking about a restructure and their redundancies and kind of exists and that the people that have left, if this were to happen again, have been kind of treated well in their departure, so there needs to be some thought put into that, because the impact isn't just on the individuals themselves, it's also on the rest of the business.
Speaker 2:That said, spending so much time agonizing because basically when you're agonizing, you're making assumptions about how other people are going to feel and you know, and assumptions aren't really sometimes they're right, but they're rarely right and the the best way to go ahead is to be able to have kind of really good adult conversations about these things, and if that's how you've been working and running and leading as a business, then that, then that can work well as well yeah, my clients do that actually make the make the right decision and then figure out how to implement it in the kindest way possible.
Speaker 1:Yes, rather than sort of agonizing about the impact on people and then making decision according.
Speaker 2:Yes, that yeah, that, that. That's absolutely right.
Speaker 1:You make the decision and then work out how to implement it, um, in the best way possible, and because also, you've been doing this for for a while now and like work with lots of sort of companies that's an early stage, series a, series c, sort of publicly publicly traded companies around. How do you feel the best companies get this right, this balance of kind of caring after their team but also making the right decisions for the business?
Speaker 2:I think the businesses that get it right are the ones that are most clear. I don't necessarily mean fully transparent about everything, because I don't think you necessarily can be, but certainly about most things and especially in terms of why a decision was made. The clarity around performance, clarity around expectations all of these things being really clear is, I think, is really important, and it's how businesses that do it well keep people informed, and it's all down to communication really, and I think that that openness and that clarity is what makes it right, makes it good, makes it better. It's people feeling like they're being treated as adults and they can be adults in return, rather than either the parental well, either parent right, the loving, overbearing, caring too much parent, or the kind of disciplinarian type parent, if we're going into transactional analysis, but it's being adult to adult which I think is the really important bit.
Speaker 1:It does feel like transactional analysis shows up in so much of what we do, both on our personal lives and even en masse in companies.
Speaker 2:Yes, it's everywhere the theory for people that are interested in transactional analysis and I'm not an expert so I'm not going to kind of go in deep on it but the theory makes sense. I mean, as an individual, you want to be treated like an adult and therefore, like most people, want to be treated as an adult. People don't want to be treated as if they're children or a parent really. So I think it's a really think about my kids. When I open up to my kids and speak to them nicely and explain things and all of the rest, they really respond really well to that. Not because I'm treating them like a child, I'm not necessarily treating them like an adult but I am not treating them like they know nothing and and that they just have to do what I say. Because they have to do what I say because I'm their mum.
Speaker 1:It's same at work it's weird, even sometimes as a founder's boss, you can almost find yourself in the child state. You can give too much to your team and almost flip it from adult to adult into where you're the child and they're and they're the parent.
Speaker 2:Sometimes yes, absolutely, and I think either way, when, when the relationship doesn't feel mutual I guess would be a way to describe it by both parties involved, or all parties involved, that's where there are problems, no matter whether you're the parent or no matter whether you're the child. It doesn't function properly. You can't communicate properly.
Speaker 1:Then you end up sitting in the drama triangle rather than the empowerment triangle. It's too much stuff which is not a fun place to be.
Speaker 2:No one likes the drama triangle. We talk about the drama triangle quite a lot in our leadership development programmes and making sure that we kind of stay out of the drama triangle, but supporting the people, you know, if it's a conflict situation, supporting people to be able to deal with that rather than getting involved.
Speaker 1:Well's put a nice lead on to the third question, which is what's? What's a practical tip or hack that you would share with other founders, like for making it happen?
Speaker 2:not really good with hacks, um, because I always I'm always a little bit worried that they're um fly by the seat of your pants it's their one minute, gone gone, gone the next.
Speaker 2:But I've got to say and this is really recently that I've started drinking electrolytes in the morning this is going to sound ridiculous, but it's the first thing that I consume in the morning and I honestly feel my brain kind of switch on and it could be just in terms of timing because I've, like woken up and it's 10 minutes later after I've woken up, so I've switched on, but it kind of really feels like I'm going, I'm ready to go right now and then back to kind of the insight around that I was saying earlier in in our call.
Speaker 2:That's when I then pull on my big girl pants and I kind of choose the the three things I've been doing this religiously every morning the three things that I'm going to accomplish that day, and they can be really small because it can depend how I'm feeling. So the three things can be really small or they can be big, it depends how I am. But every day I try and set three things to do and get those three things done Amongst others. Like I'm not saying I only do three things, but if I've done those three things done amongst others, like I'm not saying I only do three things, but if I've done those three things that I set out to do at the beginning of the day by the end of the day I feel good it's really.
Speaker 1:My wife has just started drinking electrolytes in the last two weeks as well. She, and it's been a running joke in our house that I basically anything.
Speaker 2:It's like she goes oh, I'm like are you dehydrated? Get those electrolytes in.
Speaker 1:Yeah, she's definitely found that impact.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh good, how funny. We've probably both started about the same time.
Speaker 1:But I really like how you've compounded those habits into one sort of one action. So it's kind of it's a daily thing they link together, they sort of reinforcing, and it sounds like it's giving of. It's a daily thing. They link together, they're sort of reinforcing and it sounds like it's giving this real setting you up for the day, right yeah, and that's that's where.
Speaker 2:No, it sounds silly because obviously that's where the day starts, but I think you know once you wake up how you are going to be, for the rest of the day is almost unless something happens. That's really good or really bad part way through the day. If it's a standard day, where it's just the day as it always is, you're setting yourself up in the first 30 minutes. Um, if you kind of miss that, you're not quite set up how you're, how you want the day to be. It's about intention.
Speaker 1:For me, I think it's so easy as a founder to lose control. Like you, you lose control of your time. You lose control of your time, you lose control of the agenda. You become driven by your clients, by your team, by just events, by the market and actually everything that you can do to regain control of your success. Yeah, and that really does start with you, with your habits, with how you really practically translate your having long-term intentions, but how you really translate that into your day-to-day activities. Without that, you're just, you're kind of at the whim of everyone, right?
Speaker 2:you are, and but it is. I mean. What I like about what I do is that it's really small. You're completely right in that your time is taken up by other people constantly, um, whether it be team clients, kids, partners, whoever it might be. Your, your time kind of goes away and we hear it all the time and we feel the benefits of it. You know when, when you're told or when you think to yourself but to be able to look after people, I have to look after myself first. You know that whole piece.
Speaker 2:Actually, it's really hard to do because there is a finite level of time and when you are being pulled in lots of different directions. Yes, you can prioritize as a founder, if it's your family, if it's your team, if it's your business. It's not that easy to prioritize. Like there's a lot at stake of de-prioritizing any of those things. So, finding then time for yourself, it's a very, very difficult thing to do, which is exactly why, like I think what I'm now doing in the morning is really helpful for me, because I don't feel like it's all for others, because I feel like I've accomplished what I set out to achieve at the beginning thanks for joining me on today's episode of Peer Effect.
Speaker 1:Today, Anouk Agassol walked us through the critical role of strategic people management in transforming startups into thriving businesses. Anouk emphasized the importance of establishing strong HR practices early and maintaining a people-first approach. Join me next week as we continue to explore powerful strategies and personal stories from founders and experts who are making it happen. Thank you.
