Accessible Disruption - Strategy Table

Who is Ryan Hill Transcript
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Ryan Hill: [00:00:00] One of the things that I think makes change so exciting is that you get to take some risks. You get to play with the unknown. You have enough creativity right within your organization to completely redefine your industry if it was necessary.

Podcast Host: The world is changing. For most human beings, change is uncomfortable and challenging to address. Whether you are a startup working on agile processes or a mature organization, navigating change within existing complex structures, the mindset and skills to adapt has never been more vital. The team from the strategy table want to help the wider world understand the need and approach to meaningful and impactful change management, helping organizations navigate disruption and make change accessible to everyone.

This is accessible [00:01:00] disruption.

Tahira Endean: Well, hello, it's Tehir from the Strategy Table and I'm here today with one of our co-founders, Ryan Hill and Ryan. We're gonna talk today about change, how it's affected our lives, but we met because we went back to school and did a master's of science. In creativity and change leadership at Buffalo State University.

Well established in our existing careers already, but both having a passion for the power of change leadership and why it's so important. And what we're gonna do is we're gonna go back to the beginning of your life actually, and talk about your young life and why that has made you more adaptable.

Ryan Hill: Well, anyone that has.

Any experience with the military, you know that one of the hallmarks of growing up in a military family is moving all the time. And, uh, my dad spent 30 [00:02:00] years in the military, so I, along with my siblings, we followed him to every assignment that he went to, which means that every I. Two to three years it seemed like we were moving somewhere new, which kind of forces you to grow up being pretty resilient and adaptable.

You're constantly having to adjust to new environments, sometimes to new cultures if you were moving to a different country for a time. And so I think that's really the root of where a lot of my desire for change comes from. And like, I guess it might be nature, it might be nurture, but I have like a wanderlust now and I need to.

You know, see new places and to try new things, and I think I get a little bit bored when I'm. I'm static for too long.

Tahira Endean: I think that that is sometimes human nature, but for many people, they have never left where they grew up or haven't had that same exposure. So how many places did you live? How many schools did you go to?

Ryan Hill: Oh, hold. Lemme do the math real quick. A's lot easy for me to work. Yeah, it's easy [00:03:00] for me to work backwards. Let's see. I went to three, three different high schools in four years and three different middle schools. I think I went to 10. 10 total schools. Probably it's hard,

Tahira Endean: isn't it, when you always are having to make new friends?

So I told a story about one of our moves where we actually stayed for a while, but my brother and I just told our parents we weren't even gonna bother making new friends because we would just move again. And of course that was long before there was things like social media or phones to keep in touch with people.

So do you have a defining story or a moment that you remember that stands out for you that helped make you more resilient? You probably have 10 of them.

Ryan Hill: Yeah, it's, it's hard to pick maybe just one, but I think, I think one of the things that allows us to be resilient is having a place we can go back to sometimes, like, one of the things that I think makes change so exciting is that you.

You get to take some risks, you get to play with the unknown, and that can push people outside of their comfort zone. But when you know you have someplace that you can return back to, like some sort of [00:04:00] anchor or a centering point, that goes a long way to allowing you to build comfort with the uncomfortable So.

I guess I don't have a particular moment to dial into one, but since we moved all the time, one of the things that felt the most, like an anchor or like a, a common centering point for us was going back to my grandparents' house. Every, you know, every so often. Usually for holidays. For me, the one thing that was consistent or one thing that.

Made me okay with all the change was knowing there was one anchor point that we would go back to, and I built a really good relationship with my grandfather growing up. So I think that was probably, for me, the thing that made inks easier was he was always a very brilliant and experimental person. They would come out and visit us at all these different countries, you know, he was a.

An avid reader and a scholar. And so I just think that for me, I don't have like a, a singular moment. I guess that defines my resilience as much as I have like little [00:05:00] moments across time where I would go back to a common safe anchor point and, you know, spend time with family and especially family that I.

Hyped up the experience I was going through. I may not have appreciated it at the time, but they, they were all jealous or envious of the experiences and I think that just helped me reframe it a little bit better.

Anthony Vade: Let's take this opportunity to take a short break now and hear from some of our sponsors.

I. But of course, if you want to hear this ad free, along with extended versions, access to our book club and the chat community, you can visit strategy table.co or click on the link in the description. We'll be right back.

Podcast Host: Our world is changing. For most human beings, change is uncomfortable and challenging to address by keeping up in a competitive business environment requires confidence in your team's. Adaptability, leaders are expected to [00:06:00] lead adoption initiatives. Evolve team member skills and build resilience with intentional change management strategies.

But even the most seasoned leader or executive can find it challenging to get things started on the right foot and in the right direction. Engage with Strategy Table to kickstart your organization's change management and continuous improvement initiatives. Address and elevate your team's agility and build a confident innovation culture.

Make your team feel and believe in the shared responsibility supporting each other bravely and boldly into the future no matter what it has in store. We are not your average consultants. We are skilled guides helping you elevate your team's thinking, and turn it into impactful doing. Find more information@strategytable.co.

Ryan Hill: They were all jealous or [00:07:00] envious of the experiences, and I think that just helped me reframe it a little bit better.

Tahira Endean: I think that that is actually a really, you know, good jumping off point to say, you know, when we look at what we're doing at Strategy Table. And we're saying we're gonna be bringing in all of the experience that comes behind us.

Your experiences is in the military. You know, if people look at the experiences that we each are bringing us as the co-founders and the change guides, the ability to reframe change is actually what we're anchored on. And that ability to make change more accessible and. I love that idea of having an anchor point and, and reminding people that, you know, everybody's gonna have a different anchor point.

For some people, they, it might be the home that they go to. For some people it might be something to do within a workplace, but. Quite often, our anchors are not gonna be in our workplace. And so if the change is in our workplace, you need to make that accessible. You know, if we look at our life as a series of frames, there's a frame.

That's our work frame, a [00:08:00] frame, that's our home frame and where our anchors can be. And I think that that's a really interesting positioning. You know, and you are still in the military, so you have. Three children and a lovely wife, yet you still need to be deployed. That is part of your, your working life experience.

So with the work life being anchored in the military, how is that coming forward into validating the work that we're doing with the strategy table?

Ryan Hill: Yeah, this is a, that's a really good question. I feel like sometimes my experiences are so different from yours or from Anthony's that I, I get a little bit of, of imposter syndrome, like what do I bring to the table?

And I have to remind myself that some of the things that I have experienced doing are building teams under very stressful conditions and having to be a very hands-on. Active creative problem solver like in the moment. So to consider myself to be very hands-on, and that's what I hope that [00:09:00] I can bring to the table is, is modeling or, or helping other leaders.

See how do you invest in your people? Like how do you pull the most out of your people to, to maximize their contributions, like their talents? Because that was one of the things, not that I am disappointed with my military service, I, I. I'm very happy with it. As happy as one can be, I guess. But in the early years, I felt like I was constantly being told that the way that I wanted to do something wasn't the right way because it wasn't the way that everyone else was doing it.

And it took me over 10 years and enough promotions to get to a point where like I have more influence and control over that. And one of the philosophies that I think I developed over those years of getting constant pushback from other people is I would rather be told what needs to be done than be told how to do it.

And that's the mindset that I want to take into these facilitations with folks is. You have enough creativity right within your organization to [00:10:00] completely redefine your industry if it wasn't necessary. The trick is learning how to see it and learning how to pull it out and learning how to invest in it and to cultivate it and to grow it and to.

Give that power to your employees, to your teammates to come to the new answer, the new solution. That's what I feel that I'm gonna be able to bring to the table the vision for how to cultivate that human capital side of this.

Tahira Endean: We've all been through enough change in, in our own lives and in our own careers to also understand that.

As much as organizations might need a change are ready for a new process, sometimes it does need an external voice to help really pull that forward and, and bring and bring it the best out of people. And I'm excited about what we're gonna be able to do with the strategy table to be able to offer that to people.

So how about you? Are you excited about this, what we're doing?

Ryan Hill: I, I am, yeah. I think excited. It's probably an understatement, but I can't think of a better word. So I think we'll stick with it. I just, I kind of like. [00:11:00] Right now it's. I'm at the point where I go to sleep at night and I, before I fall asleep, I let my brain kind of wander.

And I just love, like some of the crazy visions that I, I can see for what we're gonna be able to accomplish and the type of people we're gonna get to meet and who we're gonna be able to help. And it's, it's a different vision every night. Like they're all positive. It's just, I can see it going a thousand different ways and, and I'm excited for all of them.

Tahira Endean: You know what? I agree. So I think let's leave it at that to just, I'm just gonna close with the reality that after having worked with you on multiple projects, over two years of change management masters, I. We, I know that there is no imposter syndrome and I love the creativity and the different way that you think and how it pushed me to think differently too, and I look forward to us being able to bring that to our Strategy Table clients and change guides.

So thank you

Ryan Hill: the you hero, and I am looking forward to officially working with you on all these projects. This has been a blast [00:12:00] so far, and I'm just excited for the journey.

Tahira Endean: Well, we'll see you on the flip side.

Podcast Host: Accessible Disruption is written and spoken by Tahira and Dean Ryan Hill and Anthony Vade. All content is developed in collaboration with the team at Strategy Table Podcast production by experience design changing. An association with the change lead network. Find more information@strategytable.co.