Michael Burgess:
[00:00:00 - 00:00:29]
I left school just before I was 16 and became a farm labourer. But then I worked my way up, went all the way to become Chief People Officer of Amey to realise the importance of diversity of thinking rather than diversity of appearance. My philosophy is that policy is driven from the bottom up, not cascaded from the top down. I didn't have to justify it. Having a diverse workforce is better, I mean, just is. What's more powerful is for lead to say, well, I don't know.
Raj:
[00:00:34 - 00:00:44]
Hello, I'm Raj Tulsiani. I'm in the Green Room today with Michael Burgess from Amey. Michael, for those who don't know, Amey, could you tell us a little bit about yourself and the company?
Michael Burgess:
[00:00:45 - 00:01:06]
Yes, as you said, my name is Michael Burgess and I'm the Chief People Officer of a company called Amey. Amey's in the infrastructure business. So. So we look after consulting FM and construction type activities in railways and highways and things like this. So we design, we build and we maintain the infrastructure of the country.
Raj:
[00:01:07 - 00:01:08]
How big is Amey?
Michael Burgess:
[00:01:08 - 00:01:23]
We have 12,000 employees in this country. We have a very big SME population and we've got some organizations across the world in Australia, New York and the Bahamas.
Raj:
[00:01:23 - 00:01:32]
Lovely. I mean, we've been told for ages that infrastructure is the thing that's going to pull us out of this economic situation. What's been changing in the last 18 months?
Michael Burgess:
[00:01:32 - 00:02:01]
Well, you're right in that the infrastructure is a real good litmus test to the economic strength of the country. And the funding taps have been switched off for a little while, but we're beginning to see them switch back on and I think that's really important because then that will be the platform for growth within the country. I believe it's a very good litmus test and yeah, so I see that's how it's happening. So I think we're in a positive
Raj:
[00:02:01 - 00:02:18]
position and one of the reasons we were so keen to get you on the podcast and in the Green Room today was some of the things that you've done, particularly around inclusion and social value, but also for Chief People officer. You come from a very different background, don't you? Yes.
Michael Burgess:
[00:02:19 - 00:03:08]
So it wasn't the normal sort of A levels in university and sociology route. Mine was I left school just before I was 16 and became a farm laborer. And I mean, it was a cunning plan because I got accommodation and a job at the same time, but then I sort of worked my way up through qualification and experience and it takes a long time to get a degree if, if you haven't got A levels or things like that. So that's what I did. And, and, and through that I worked very hard. So I wasn't a risk when I got promotions because people knew that I was working above the level that I was getting paid for and so went all the way to become chief people officer of amy, which I'm very proud of because what I can now do is give all that experience away.
Raj:
[00:03:10 - 00:03:25]
How does that social mobility journey and a path less well trodden affect how you do your job and how you may advise people differently from other FTSE 250 CPOs?
Michael Burgess:
[00:03:26 - 00:04:46]
I think when it gives you a different mindset but also for me it gives me an empathy for all types of people and to realize the importance of diversity of thinking rather than diversity of, you know, appearance. And it is frustrating where I mean the boardrooms of are majority sort of middle aged men, white folk, but I can sit across somebody who looks outwardly like me and we could be completely different. He went to university, I didn't. He's a rugby supporter, I'm a football supporter, he's gay, I'm straight and different politics. And that's what real diversity is. And I think that's where we should be moving forward for to get that diversity of thinking. And I think I have the empathy to realize that, but also to understand all levels within a business because sometimes the people that are doing the operations can get overlooked and missed out and don't have their say. And I think it's really important for everybody to have their say. And my philosophy is that policy is driven from the bottom up, not cascaded from the top down.
Raj:
[00:04:46 - 00:04:54]
And I understand you've just won the Investor in People award for your ethnic minority focused leadership program at amy.
Michael Burgess:
[00:04:54 - 00:05:52]
So it's important to help underrepresented groups. I mean, we do want good representation across all areas of the business. And this award was done for a multicultural leadership development program which is, which is now in its third cohort and it's been really successful. We have about 30 people go on it each year and you have to sort of. It's hard to get on it. There's a waiting list. But 70% of the cohort that have been on it have had promotion or an increase in responsibility in job responsibility which equals more money effectively. That's really encouraging. So much so that we've just started this year we'll be starting a disability leadership program as well to help boost representation at the higher levels. Because it's easy to say, you know, you should change the Board, get better representations there. But you've got to work. You have to sort of have a core basis of the talent coming up through the business.
Raj:
[00:05:52 - 00:06:27]
If I play devil's advocate for a second, what's the point of doing that? What's the, what does it add to Amy's bottom line or your, your shareholders value? I mean, we're in a environment now where any kind of spend on diversity inclusion is under a significant spotlight because at some stage you'd have had to go and get funding for that or you put funds from something else. So when you came up with that, what process did you go to if you needed to justify it, but also to articulate what benefit you were trying to create for the organization?
Michael Burgess:
[00:06:28 - 00:07:58]
Well, first of all, to name it, I didn't have to justify it because the return on investments is, it's trodden ground. I mean, by any measure, whether it's financial or job retention, having a diverse workforce is better. I mean, just is. So there isn't an argument there. So that's important. I think what I think more is you get in the leaders of the future. So we're getting 10% of their workforce through disadvantaged groups. That's people from care homes, people out of prisons, people from disadvantaged backgrounds, and all those areas where it's really hard to get work. I mean, if you haven't got a driving license, how do you get a job as a driver and how do you afford to get your driving license? So we've got lots of initiatives where we can bring them into work, where we give them the ability to become apprentices. If you can't become apprentice and you got five GCSes, well, that's not right. So we help them get up at that level and then we retain them. And I absolutely believe that we level out by the age we're about 30, and then those people are just as likely as you are to become leaders of the future. So it's the return on investments, easy. But we're looking at leaders of the future, and I think that's the important thing.
Raj:
[00:08:00 - 00:09:35]
At Green park, we spend quite a lot of time researching what we're calling the asymmetric workforce. And that's this idea that workforces just don't act and think the same as they used to. So some of that, of course, is because of different working patterns. Some of that, of course, is because of politics. Much of it is linked to polarization in society, in the workforce. You know, I'm pro Israel, you're pro Palestine, our boss is pro. Can you get this out of my office. I've got stuff to do. But for years organizations, particularly big organizations, have had this narrative around bringing your whole self to work. But of course, when ourselves are in conflict, then it's really difficult for an organization to go back to saying, well, bring your most productive self to work. Which is kind of part of the conflict we're seeing now in leadership now, because in this asymmetric workforce, it's just impossible to have a leadership template that keeps everyone happy. So how do you advise your leaders on being productive, being humane, helping the organization move forward when they are facing kind of a slightly new situation where a year ago we were saying one thing and now largely because of political change, we're kind of dialing back on stuff. So how do you balance that as a leader and encourage other leaders in your organization to keep on an even keel?
Michael Burgess:
[00:09:36 - 00:10:00]
Change? I mean, it's a bit like, you know, they used to say death and taxes are the only sure, sure things in, in this world. But death, taxes and change are the only sure things. And that's what's happening. It's always is changing completely. And you write about that polarization of views, that tribalism and that's not particularly helpful.
Raj:
[00:10:01 - 00:10:11]
Yeah, it was kind of like you got this slightly more complex environment where people's identity politics are kind of getting involved in their work lives.
Michael Burgess:
[00:10:12 - 00:11:16]
Yeah. What the leaders need to do is, you know, normally you say leaders encourage and inspire people to, to be motivated and change. But I think what leaders should, should go back to some basics and with their teams actually tell them it's straight as they see it. Whether that's good or bad or actually what's more powerful is for lead to say, well, I don't know if you say that to your team, the team, I believe will really help you find what the solutions are and then you can move forward. Single people don't know all the answers. Bring the team together and ask them, I don't know what I'm doing here, what's the answer? And I think if you bring that in and your team is motivated to work, and they will be if you're honest with them and you build that trust. Because I don't think you should be dialing back down. I think you should keep on going forward if you're doing the right thing and that, that's where I come from. So no dialing back, just keep on doing the right thing because there's a return on investment on that right thing.
Raj:
[00:11:17 - 00:12:29]
No, what we're trying to do here is not to tell people go left or go right, but to explain how we see the world and how that's driven some real success for your organization by looking at things differently. And infrastructure, you know, traditionally has not been one of the industries who have had the most forward thinking ideas around workforces. Some of the stuff that they've done been fantastic. But in this area of talent management, diversity, inclusion, the E and the G in esg, you know, that hasn't been as strong. So one of the things that I was really impressed by when we were talking pre interview was this kind of how you help the business move from. Well, there's a strategy or a policy or a change we'd like to see to that actually being something that amends or helps people behave differently. So if you wouldn't mind taking a few minutes to go through your ideas on that. I particularly like the kind of span of control thing around who is actually my boss here. I thought that was fascinating.
Michael Burgess:
[00:12:29 - 00:15:04]
Right, okay. So. Well, first of all I'd say that any organization, I'd like to think the infrastructure isn't that backward because I think ESG should be at the center of every company's. Every organization's strategy should be at the center. And the way I think organizations can go wrong is that they, they, they focus on, on nice shiny objects, nice strategic things that are standalone. And in my view that that doesn't work. You have to build from a, a basis of strength by getting fundamentals right. So in HR is getting the recruitment and onboarding right and getting the personnel records right and getting the payroll right. And once you do that in a successful business that makes profits, then you can actually align the, you know, the, this, the social agenda better and how you, how you implement that is you can't do it from having core people in head office doing these nice fancy hard work and then sort of hoping that the business units are going to sort of adopt them and use them. They won't happen. You have to sort of engage and enthuse them and how you'd, you have to think that what happens to the person on the ground that's for example, sort of laying a railway track, he sees his lead in hand or his supervisor or her supervisor as the big boss. They don't see anybody sitting up in sort of a city office as the big boss. And so really what you have to do is engage the whole of that structure. So the bosses, you know, the contract manager, the supervisors are actually enthusing their staff. And then if everybody's aligned to that Everybody's making a small difference and that's where you get real change. And I was thinking when we were talking about awards, I did mention that in, in the diversity and inclusion world it often relies on one person in an organization to bang the table. Quite frankly that's annoying. But if you get a room full of people and met 100 people in a room and they all bang the table, that's real power, that's real noise. It's a real atmosphere. That's what you've got to do. Get everybody to be engaged and make a difference. And that's where you really turn the dial on making change.
Raj:
[00:15:04 - 00:15:22]
But how do you do that when you've got a head office which is very corporate, you've got regional offices and you've got lots and lots of your people who probably never go to an office, they're out in the field or interacting with directly with customers. So how do you drive any form of accountability?
Michael Burgess:
[00:15:22 - 00:16:05]
So, so what I, what I do, when I started my organization we, I inherited, in this area I inherited a small 3 or 4, a team of 3 or 4 of people in diverting inclusion and it's their job and I disbanded that straight away. It's one of the first things I did because I didn't believe that diversity is somebody's job at the center. I believe diversity looking after that and inclusion is everybody's job. So we disbanded that and then we invested that money in the business. So those issues became part of everybody's responsibility and which is. I still think that's true. But then you see people actually making a difference and taking that responsibility on
Raj:
[00:16:06 - 00:16:13]
what when you got, when you went into the job. My understanding is you got rid of the Ulrich model.
Michael Burgess:
[00:16:13 - 00:16:14]
Yes.
Raj:
[00:16:14 - 00:16:15]
Why did you do that?
Michael Burgess:
[00:16:15 - 00:16:41]
Well, the Ulrich model just don't know. It's the three legged stalls where you have a shared service center for transactional work. You have HR business partners to partner with a business and then you have centers of excellence which I, I'm not saying the Ulvik model is broken, but it can be misused and I think I've seen it misused where the centers of excellence become almost the centers of inertia.
Raj:
[00:16:43 - 00:16:45]
No comment. But I think you might be right in some places.
Michael Burgess:
[00:16:45 - 00:17:58]
Yeah. But also what it does is because you put all that responsibility and accountability to people in the center. So if it's er, that's a central role. If it's recruiting, that's a center. You're taking accountability and responsibility away from the business partners so they just pass it on. But also you're ruining people's careers because if you were a HR business buyer, you should be at the top of your game in terms of technically able, qualified and experience. But you've got no staff. So how do you get career progression? How can you go from a HR business partner to a HR director if you've got no line management experience? So don't think the model really works. So again, what I did there was I disbanded the centers of excellence, had a very, very small central HR function that just looks after policy and then put the responsibility and the accountability into the business units. And the people have thrived since because they've now become experts in things like TUPI and the Equal, so the Employment Rights Bill. Whereas before they wouldn't have been bothered to, to look at, look it up because it would have been somebody else's job.
Raj:
[00:17:58 - 00:18:19]
They just find out who the IR person was and plugged them in. When you look at the environment for the next year to 18 months, what are the non negotiables in a, in a business or a people strategy, do you think? To, to, to, to make the most out of the lean into the difficulty that we're facing.
Michael Burgess:
[00:18:20 - 00:20:05]
So I think the key things facing us at the moment are of course decarbonization and AI and having a motivated workforce that you keep, that people stay in work. And I think, I thought Charlie Mayfield and Liz, Liz Kendall's paper on keeping Britain working was very good. If I do a very poor summary of it, it's about keeping people in work and that's about focusing on, on, on things like gateway decisions where people leave. So if, if you're a woman, the gateways are sort of when you, when you have children, when the menopause comes along or early retirement and it's for business or an organization to prevent those gateway exits because this is where people become top of the game for when they're at that level. So we need to keep those. But also, and that's probably about 90%, 90% of people, the 10% I think we need to focus on as well the people that are off sick or out of work. And what we need to do going forward is create better pathways for, for those people to come back into work as quickly as possible. And so we do have to target those hard to reach areas. So that's from a people point of view. I think the decarbonization speaks for itself and the AI does as well. I think on AI people are using ChatGPT, Copilot and I think they're Using it as more like a fancy Google but.
Raj:
[00:20:05 - 00:20:09]
Or an enhanced spell checker is my guilty pleasure.
Michael Burgess:
[00:20:09 - 00:21:22]
But what they need to think is it's moving so much faster than that and we need to embrace that because you can do so much more. And that means it's going to take jobs away. But we've got to embrace that and say, well, actually that's a good thing because what we can do is use that time and those people to add value in other areas. So embrace the change. Embrace, embrace that. Your job's going to change, but let's, let's keep on moving forward and changing because sort of, with sort of. I remember when people used to put in computer systems, it would be a long introduction. It would always cost twice as much as people said it would. It would take twice as much as they said it would to implement and then they would have a sigh of relief when it was in, well, that's the end of that. We don't have to do that again. No, no, you've got to keep on pushing the barriers all the time. Move forward, move forward, move forward and keep on changing. And again, that's how, where leaders can come in to help promote that and not worry about change, but to embrace that and get the benefits of it. We don't want, you know, oh no people, oh no, that's not me. Oh no, I don't want to do that. We want people that want to embrace change.
Raj:
[00:21:23 - 00:22:17]
And do you think the, I mean, I think anybody who works in a business would have some affinity to the idea of working people with a positive mentality? You know, we have so many things that drain our energy on this planet. It would be great to have people that increased our energy, but it is sometimes very difficult. People have got complicated lives. Expectations have never really been higher in terms of professional leaders, you know, in infrastructure. What have you done or what do you see that helps drive high levels of retention? Because your retention as a firm is just on the right side of 10%, I believe. So what are you doing that's driving competitive advantage through your talent that other people aren't?
Michael Burgess:
[00:22:18 - 00:23:23]
Well, we're doing everything that other people do have to say. So. So that. I'm not saying it's rocket science, but I think part of it is, is having people that want to work. I think work defines people. It's good for people. You get a sense of satisfaction, pride of what you're doing. Most of the people that I, I know that, I mean, they care about their rent or they care about their mortgage and they care about those sorts of things, but once that's finished, they care about what they're doing, whether that's been a street sweeper or, or somebody doing, you know, analytics in computers. They care about what they do. And, and it's having that pride that makes a difference. And I think that that's, that's what we've got to dial down on because it, it really work does really make you feel better. I mean, you get that if you work in your garden over the weekend, you feel better than if you've been watching the, the TV all afternoon. So I think that's where we need to get to have that pride.
Raj:
[00:23:24 - 00:23:56]
How do we increase pride in workforces? It's a genuine question. I like to forever increase the pride in our own workforce. And I think all businesses, again, would listen to what you're saying and saying, yeah, I'd like a bit of that, but there's no, you know, there's no book, there's no podcast, there's no management thinking that deals with, you know, how as an organization, do we actually make the people who work here proud of the work that they do?
Michael Burgess:
[00:23:57 - 00:25:31]
So that's a really, that's a really hard question. Most people say that's a good question, but that is a really hard question. Well, I think you've, it's important in an organization to invest at the early stages. So when you're recruitment, recruiting and onboarding, invest in that. Which is why, you know, I'm not upset with the employment rights bill about sort of day one rights, because you should put the time and effort into recruiting somebody, not, not saying, well, I don't like you, so I'll just suck you in in a few weeks time with no, with no process. So I think even if you invest in, in that and then you actually truly invest in, in people's career paths and, you know, so the, so you are continually developing them. Because I go back to my mindset is I was very happy in, in terms of just being a laborer, and I was a lot. Then I became a lorry driver and I treated that as a vocation and I loved it. My mindset changed as I got older, but work was still a vocation for me and still is a vocation. And so for me, it was naturally pride of that. I have to say, I'd go the other side of things. If you're not proud of what you do, actually find something else that you can be proud of, whether that's in work or in the volunteer sector or whatever it Is, But I think people have a responsibility to, to, to own up and say, well, okay, this is not for me, I can move on. Rather than being bitter and twisted in a job they hate.
Raj:
[00:25:31 - 00:25:38]
Yeah, yeah. Or, or they, sometimes they don't hate the job, but they hate how it makes them feel.
Michael Burgess:
[00:25:38 - 00:25:38]
Yeah.
Raj:
[00:25:38 - 00:26:16]
You know, I think there's, that there's two real important points here in senior people moving jobs. There's this kind of dance that goes on and there really isn't as much kind of a what is this person's real motivations and how well are they aligned for what we need at this organization? So you've either got one side selling yes or one side selling no, or both sides selling yes. And actually what you really want is a conversation that gets away from, you know, can we attract this guy to work here? Or, you know, how long is she going to stay to actually, what do we need to know at the beginning to make this a really good match?
Michael Burgess:
[00:26:16 - 00:27:01]
I think that's a good point. And that's where I perhaps come back to the trust and honesty. Because when what you want in an organization and what individuals want is they want to be able to go to the boss and say, I think you're wrong. Yeah, I think you should do it this way. And a lot of people are frightened of that sort of that boss power dynamic and will not say anything. But the actual bosses want that information and they're, oh, that's a good idea, let's do that. So it's really a lot of, it's how you encourage that honesty and feedback. And if you're, I think if you're a person of integrity, you will let that happen. If you, if you're shallow and, and sort of, you know, a bit insecure, then you, then you use your power to, to dumb things down or more
Raj:
[00:27:01 - 00:27:55]
for you, because it only hurts you when it comes to retention and engagement. And in this country we have a productivity issue. So the cheapest way of increasing our productivity is to help our staff be more engaged. Most organizations already have a reasonable level of diversity in their workforces. So to me it's, you know, bread and butter that we should be doing things to be more inclusive because it will lead to more engagement, which if carefully curated, is the cheapest way to productivity. But it is hard to find organizations who have the will to take that path. I think most people intellectually get it. You know, we're normally led by smart people. But how do you bring leaders in more into the sunshine on, on issues like that, which you have done with. Yeah, a few things.
Michael Burgess:
[00:27:55 - 00:29:32]
Well, one of the keys and, and I, I remember I, I did a, I did a, a talk with, with Race Equality matters and somebody from, asked a question from, from quite a posh university and she was in diversity inclusion and she said she couldn't get traction. I said how do you get traction? And I soon understood why she couldn't get traction because whatever it was from a university dean or a Vice chancellor or whatever wasn't engaged. And I said the secret is to get the leader engaged, the top of the tree engaged because if that person engaged, funny enough, other people get engaged as well, I. E. The MDs and things like that. If Chief Executive is there, the MDs will probably be there and once they're there they help. That sort of. There's a bit of a marzipan layer. I think some people really look like a permafrost, don't they? Where the vast majority of the fruitcake, as it were, are you brilliant people. And I think the leaders tend to get it but sometimes there's those that, the middle layer who are concerned about their pensions or their BMWs or their offices and want to protect that and sometimes it's hard to get through that and I think if the leaders can break that down and then what you get is you get like the fruitcake actually helping that policy and pushing ideas through and I think that's where you really get the power. But it stems from the Chief Executive being enthused and being committed to it. If they're not, then it's really going to be hard to get traction.
Raj:
[00:29:32 - 00:32:22]
Yeah, it's such a lovely example and thank you for your multi year support of Race Equality Matters. You know, as a small campaign, when Jarvan and I started it, we never thought it would get to 6,000 companies and 6 million people taking part in Race Equality Week. I mean if we did, we probably would have done more on data and then, you know, we'd be able to support it much more easily than we do. But we're grateful of the time you spent and the support you've given. I just wanted to talk a little bit about what you just mentioned there, where somebody in an organization and we're talking about diversity and inclusion, but it could really be any form of change and finding ways of getting the senior level of sponsorship. I mean, I remember a FTSE 100 we were consulting to and they tried a lot of things to get their top 300 people engaged in what they were trying to do and in the end the Chief executive got probably the top 25, one woman, top 25 out with us. And we said, look, you need this from government. Government procurement is going to give some scoring to these things that are valuable. You're not doing anything with them. You've lost, I think it was 30 senior women to the opposition over the last four years. You've got one back, not, not someone who's left, but a woman from the opposition. So that doesn't look great. And then you've got this great cadra of senior women within the organization but below your top 300 who just given up on their chance of getting into that top cadre even though they've been there ages. They know where the bodies are buried, they're well respected, but they just see this as a club that they can't get into. So we had to lay that out for them, for them to build this kind of skeleton or spine so that no matter where you were, you could always go back to. Well, for us it's a talent issue, but that took ages and it wasn't, you know, we're very good value for money, but it wasn't at all cheap for them to do that. And without that chief executive really pushing it, you know, it never would have happened. So I think my question is in lots of organizations you do have chief executives, board members, head of nomco, chief people, officers who still see these kind of investments as nice to have. But in today's world, we just got hit our number. So how would you counsel the them to balance today's issue with tomorrow's competitive advantage?
Michael Burgess:
[00:32:22 - 00:34:19]
Well, first of all, I'll say more for them because who would want to have more of the same? You know, you want new ideas. So I do see almost like the highway sector where everybody's expected to be a civil engineer and come through that pathway. But actually you want people from outside the industry to coming in with new ideas. And that's been diversity. So more for them for wanting to stick with some of the short term because that's what essentially they're doing. They're looking at this year's P L and their bonus and their remuneration. But what they should do is they should think about being a steward of their organization rather than just the their own remuneration, their only short term thing. And I think if you look at a business from a steward's point of view, you're looking at what's your legacy, what you leaving. So say if you, I mean my committee is 100 years old, so hopefully it's going to be there for another 100 years. So I'm just here for a few years. So how do I help that stewardship for the next generation and so on and so forth. So I think there should be a mindset of leaders in saying, well, I'm a steward of this organization and I think this is where government can help as well. Because where things change in organizations, if there are those pressures, for example electric cars, the government have made that happen in businesses because if you look at the private cars at electric, very small amount, I'm guessing about 5%. Well in company cars it's like 85%. And that's. The government have changed that. So they can help change the mindset as well by some. I don't want to be over regulatory, but they can have an influence on that just to nudge things along. But I think it's the stewardship is the secret.
Raj:
[00:34:20 - 00:34:37]
Yeah, Governance and stewardship. Stewardship I think feels more personal. If every FTSE 350 chief executive woke up tomorrow morning with a little card by their bedside with one piece of advice from Michael BurgessBurgess, what would it be?
Michael Burgess:
[00:34:38 - 00:35:29]
Oh, do it with integrity. Because people are watching you as a leader and they know if you are false, they absolutely can spot it a mile off. And then I think you've lost it. They can smell sort of people that are putting it on. So you want that. Is it integrity? It's. Authenticity is the word. So that's the secret. Be authentic, Good, bad, indifferent. Because people will forgive the things that you're not very good at. If you're authentic, they'll help you along rather than being false and. And full of bravado. So that would be my tip. Be yourself.
Raj:
[00:35:31 - 00:35:38]
What's the most difficult leadership decision you've had to take recently? And how easy was it to be yourself?
Michael Burgess:
[00:35:39 - 00:35:44]
I made some difficult decisions and being in hr, some of those decisions
Raj:
[00:35:46 - 00:35:46]
affect
Michael Burgess:
[00:35:46 - 00:36:07]
people's lives and can do for long term. I'd like to think that if by doing it professionally and doing it in the right interest of the business and the organization rather than my personal agenda, then I can shake hands with that person and meet them in the street a year later, still on a professional basis.
Raj:
[00:36:08 - 00:36:30]
And where do you get your energy and focus and inspiration to balance that? I'm doing it for the business, but also is attached to me as an individual because sometimes, you know, senior HR people have to deal with difficult situations or move people on. Yeah, but where do you get you, you know, how do you revitalize yourself to keep that fresh in My job,
Michael Burgess:
[00:36:30 - 00:36:54]
I do see some of the worst parts of, of people. So I, I don't forget that the vast, vast majority of people are brilliant and that excites me. And I think on a personal basis I tend to forget some of the, some of the nasty things that I've seen. And then, so when something happens, I'm always like, oh, shocked.
Raj:
[00:36:55 - 00:36:58]
Even though it's a 50th time before at all.
Michael Burgess:
[00:36:59 - 00:37:16]
So I think there's something in me that is naive. But you mustn't forget that you shouldn't be cynical by seeing the poorer sides because as, as I said, the vast majority of people are brilliant. And that's what I love about job.
Raj:
[00:37:16 - 00:37:26]
When was the last time you were doing something and something happened and your kind of internal reaction was, yeah, this is why I do this job.
Michael Burgess:
[00:37:26 - 00:37:51]
It was Wednesday. Somebody who works for me did a presentation. I was there. She took responsibility and accountability presented to a very posh audience and she wowed them and did a very good job, very detailed job, very caring job, and did it in an honest way. And I was so proud of her. I was so proud of her.
Raj:
[00:37:53 - 00:37:55]
I hope you let her know and mean the world.
Michael Burgess:
[00:37:55 - 00:38:03]
Yeah. Not as well as I should do because I'm. But yes, and yeah, she knows I'm proud.
Raj:
[00:38:04 - 00:38:07]
What do you know now that you wish you knew 10 years ago?
Michael Burgess:
[00:38:07 - 00:38:27]
Oh, that you can make a difference. I. I think when you're, when you're the chief, when you're sitting at the C Suite table, you can, you can have much more influence. You don't have to get your boss on board. You, you can push things through
Raj:
[00:38:28 - 00:38:29]
and
Michael Burgess:
[00:38:30 - 00:38:52]
whether that's answering the question. But that's what I've. That's the difference from 10 years ago. I can see you can make a real difference for the better to do the right thing. And then as we said earlier, then there's a return on investment on that as well. But you do go home thinking, yeah, made a difference today. Not have any other. My weekly envelope, but I made a difference to people.
Raj:
[00:38:52 - 00:39:04]
Yeah. That idea of agency is very powerful, isn't it? It's not something you can unsee once you've experienced it. Yeah. What if Amy disappeared tomorrow? What gap do you think would be left in the uk?
Michael Burgess:
[00:39:05 - 00:39:54]
Well, we've seen some big organizations collapse like Carillion, and I was fairly close to that and I knew a lot of the players. I'd say, I don't think there's any good or bad organizations. There's no good or bad government. Departments or local authorities. It's the people there. So. So again, the, the people will, will come together. So organizations may change, but the people will make the difference. And that happened with Karelian. Krillin wasn't a bad business, but he had some really good people. And, and so those people then filled that void. So I think that, you know, that would happen. People fill that vacuum.
Raj:
[00:39:55 - 00:39:58]
What's the one question you wish people asked you more often?
Michael Burgess:
[00:39:59 - 00:40:00]
How can they help?
Raj:
[00:40:00 - 00:40:08]
Michael, thank you for being so generous with your time today. It's been a pleasure listening to you, learning from you and talking to. Been great having you on the show.
Michael Burgess:
[00:40:09 - 00:40:14]
Oh, well, thank you very much for inviting me. I have enjoyed myself and look forward to meeting you again.
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