[MUSIC]
Welcome to a series of alumni conversations.
Our mischievous description of them is, we titled them as hot topics and
cold reflection.
And we have two amazing Stanford alums who are actually here with us today.
To my left is Michelle Cline, Stanford GSB alum,
very accomplished organization builder, right from her days from BCG
on to her new incarnation that she'll actually be sharing with you in a moment.
And to my right is Rob Siegel, GSB alum, a wonderful lecturer at the GSB,
somebody who of course, has done a lot for the school.
Both of them have been extraordinarily generous alums to have given this
time on our topic of understanding millennials.
Welcome Michelle.
>> Thank you.
>> Welcome Rob.
>> Thank you.
>> Okay, I want to keep this very conversational, so
Michelle, let me begin with you.
What's your favourite memory of managing, if you will, a millennial?
>> [LAUGH] I have a few, but I would say the one that I just keep coming back to,
is an experience with some associates in our firm that are of
a millennial generation.
And they were very frustrated about something and
they asked if they could have a meeting with me.
And there was a presentation, there was graphs, and it was about the fact that
there were not feminine hygiene products available in the office space.
And that when they attempted to expand some, that it was denied.
And there was an immense amount of energy that was put toward this
presentation to me.
And I was really a little confounded by it because of course
not to make too much of generational shifts, but my time,
I would not have thought to bring it up, let alone to bring it up in that way.
Nothing wrong with them asking the question but
the presentation was quite shocking to me.
So I went to Costco and got VATs of it and said we'll deal with this later,
[LAUGH] we'll talk about it later.
But that definitely was a small little snapshot into we're doing
a little something different here.
>> Differently, so is this a signature moment drum?
What does this wonderful episode suggests here?
>> Well, there's a sense that there's almost a lack of a line between our
personal lives and our work lives, that was very different.
I think when we graduated, I was having a bad day and I was at Intel,
that was a very tough environment when you graduated.
You couldn't actually kind of go in and say, hi,
this is how I'm feeling because no one cared.
I mean, I think I remember, as a venture capitalist,
I was working with a young CEO who was 25 years old.
And sometimes my job as an investor and a board member is to push them a little bit,
sometimes it's to hug them a little bit.
And we finished one of our one on ones, and the CEO who was 25 looked at me and
says, Rob, I'm realizing when I finish our one on ones, I feel bad about myself.
And you're pushing me to do all these things and it's really hard.
And I had to stop myself in my tracks there and
kind of meet him where he was and realize he's only 25 years old.
And even though I was over twice his age,
I had to spend some time figuring out how to make him effective.
Realizing that he was going to be internalizing and feeling things and
expressing things that I wouldn't have done when I was his age, and
I had to meet him where he was to help you effective.
>> Wonderful, I'd like to kind of come back to the theme of meeting them
where they are, but before we do that, I want to go back to your episode, Michelle.
As I was listening to it, I just sort of thought of myself my God, work domain,
personal domain, is that a boundary?
Is that not a boundary?
Am I an employee or am I an activist?
Am I mistaken or- >> No,
I do believe that the boundary has blurred and there is more of a holistic
approach to one's journey that involves a balance between the personal and
professional, where perhaps, for me, it was more a little separate.
I do think that that has happened and there's a number of reasons for it.
But without question, you have to bear in mind that the number of employees
are coming to the table with their entire being, right?
And that is this necessitates understanding that they're coming in
with their personal as well.