Navigating Financial Stress: The Power of On-Demand Pay in HR
In this episode, I'm joined by Amy Mosher, Chief People Officer at isolved.
Amy shares how their company is revolutionizing the payroll process by introducing on-demand pay, a system that reduces financial stress and boosts productivity by giving employees access to their earned wages ahead of the traditional pay cycle.
She also discusses how they navigate economic downturns, leverage opportunities, and shape the company culture, putting people at the heart of their business.
Episode Highlights:
On-demand pay is reducing financial stress and boosting productivity
HR professionals navigate economic downturns and leverage opportunities
HR executives shape company culture and handle high-stress roles
User feedback is driving product development in HR tech
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Amy Mosher 0:00
On Demand pay is huge right now, with the market the way that it is, there's this bright plan study that showed that an employee loses like over 11 hours of productivity every week to this financial stress that they have, where they're just like pouring out of their pores is like how do I make this work? How do I put these people people stress about money all the time?
Chris 0:29
Tell him a little bit more about you and your journey. We are now
Amy Mosher 0:32
people officer and I saw the most amazing job in the world. Honestly, I'm so lucky. I really love this business. It's fun to work for an HR business and HR enablement, you know, business at the NH scamp and payroll provider in the US and I get to do a lot of things that are not your core internal HR, I get to do a lot of sales, a lot of marketing, a lot of interesting conversations about the product and, and where we're going the future of the business and, and that makes it a really kind of interesting, exciting thing I've been in HR for gosh, I'm gonna date myself 23 years. And it's a lot of fun. I fell into it. I'm just a people person, right, like people. So it seems like the right thing to do, you know, in my use?
Chris 1:17
I don't know about that whole. You have to be a people person to be in HR, what do you think about? There are lots of different HR roles. I think some people are not a people, people people.
Amy Mosher 1:30
Like we do a lot of analytical people. Comes in all flavours. Sure.
Chris 1:34
Yeah. Cuz you always hear like, like, you know, eyebrows, also people person. And I'm gonna go to HR, and I realise that that doesn't always translate.
Amy Mosher 1:44
Doesn't it did for me, but it doesn't always translate, because I think you're right.
Chris 1:47
Yeah, lovely. Right. How's it? How's it? When you kind of did it? Why why? So did they reach out to you kind of had an opportunity come to you? Yes.
Amy Mosher 1:56
Yeah. Mark devil, who's the CEO, James Norwood, who's our head of strategy they had worked together before, for other excellent KKR, private equity owned businesses. And we, you know, we're going to take on roles with isolved. And because Mark and I had worked together before, he called me and said, you know that they're CPOE. Just left, I'd love if you'd like to come by. We were just in the middle of an exit for the prior company that I was with. So it was perfect timing. I said, I'll be there in five minutes.
Chris 2:26
Got a washer. So King, what's wrong?
Amy Mosher 2:30
It was, right. It was it was meant to be? Absolutely. I already knew about the company I had. I've been a client, the software. All right. And so I you know, I had spoken with their executives before, I knew a lot about the company the product. So it just kind of made sense.
Chris 2:49
When you go into this role, is there is it discussed in a conversation on the onboarding and part of your role is sales or not really, it's just like indirectly, like, just like curiosity? Because it wasn't
Amy Mosher 2:59
no, yeah, it wasn't as a part of that discussion, I really didn't even think about it. When I came on board. It was a it was a culture shift kind of onboarding, you know, it's here for a reason, we wanted to grow the business even faster and go further. And a huge part of that is culture. So that's my main corner of HR. So it just made sense. And Mark is an incredible sales leader and executive and James is incredible. You know, it's product marketing. So it just made the we're through corners of a triangle, really think about it. So it was, it was really meant to be in a really, really quick transformation, especially from a cultural perspective, the employees are so ready for it. And the product is great. So that helped a lot
Chris 3:43
how, how often they bringing you into all of a bringing you into the product team to have conversations around? Because obviously you are so the end user. Yeah,
Amy Mosher 3:57
yeah. So we're a little bit bigger than our target market for the product. But that's not good or bad or indifferent, right? It's a great product for our size as well. But so we get to, you know, beta, everything, break everything, right? Like we're a QA beta, we're sitting here, but my whole team has the opportunity to interact with our product team. And we have regular meetings, I'm very close to talk almost every day to our head of product, project. Gupta. And it's fantastic. It feels so great to be a part of the innovation of the product.
Chris 4:31
Yeah. Something different right, as well. Yeah. It's,
Amy Mosher 4:34
it's very, it's a different, it's incredibly motivating. It's really motivating for my staff, as well, because they get to kind of take it to the next level and really be honest about what it is that they're working with, which is also really cool. And, and we get, you know, access to a lot of resources and a lot of best practice that we probably normally wouldn't have access to just at our fingertips.
Chris 4:54
So who's your target only came across the company recently who is the target audience size companies?
Amy Mosher 5:00
For your work, we we can serve as any size, you know, five employees to, you know, 5000. And let's say and even bigger. We have a lot of franchises, for example that are on similar instances have many, many, many 1000s of employees. But target market, I'd say probably just in my opinion, you 500 to 1000, maybe we've got the product is great, it actually is really easy to to use on the back end, which makes it really attractive for administrators, which is not always the case. So they definitely know I really appreciated about it. When I came on board. I was like, oh, it's very intuitive. I know exactly. You know what to do. I don't ask me to do the math and figure out the technical things, Chris, that's not gonna end well. So if I can figure it out, it's easy to use.
Chris 5:48
Yeah. Well, we kind of discussed my first question kind of goes free. 62 Are we didn't mean for this to be related. But our first part of this conversation was about the economic downturn. And I know something that stood out to me when I looked at the website was the on demand pay, and how that's supporting employees during this economic downturn. So it kind of works quite well, actually is a segue. Could you share a bit more about that? I think that's really interesting. Yeah.
Amy Mosher 6:12
On Demand pay is is huge right now, with the market the way that it is, there's this bright plan study that showed that an employee loses like over 11 hours of productivity every week to this financial stress that they have, where they're just like pouring out of their pores is like, how do I make this work? How do I put these people people stress about money all the time? Well, I
Chris 6:35
know it was a single mom. And for kids it was every day, I don't think it was a day that went by where we didn't worry about how we're going to make pay for electricity, get our next meal. So living like that is, is really, really hard. And that's what also led to my anxiety and stuff like that as well. Yeah, still even stays with me, even to
Amy Mosher 6:55
think about if your mom would have had access, you know, in those tough months, or those tough weeks to her paycheck early, right on demand pay, right, like sometimes it's about when the bills are due? Yeah. Right. It certainly was for me as well, growing up press. So I, I totally get it, I get why it's important to get why technology is helping us to, to be able to do it, you know, faster, better, stronger. I think that if you have more control over your finances, you're gonna stress less,
Chris 7:25
yeah, break it down, work in the company, like, you can just break it down a little bit for the audience, how does that work?
Amy Mosher 7:32
You know, if you want your paycheck ahead of time, you can have it ahead of time, they're gonna assume you're gonna have a certain number of hours, this is how you can set it up as an employer, you can pay the card, right? If you want, you can have it downloaded into your bank account, right direct deposit. But it's just knowing that you don't have to wait for that next paycheck and use you can sometimes you can set the parameters of when it can be, you know, withdrawn example, many companies already pay at least a week in arrears. So it's not like, the company is not going to know that those hours are due, right. Which, so it just makes sense to be able to do that for people who need it and are working, especially paycheck to paycheck or at a lower hourly wage, and they need access to their money. You know, one of the things
Chris 8:19
I know for me is in place to make sure you're not misuse that or like, there's only so many times I can do it, stuff like that,
Amy Mosher 8:26
yes, you can set it up that way, it depends on the technology, but it's very common for you to be able to advance a check or to pay yourself a check for the amount of time that you're already in arrears. So the company knows that you're not going to leave and then they'll be they'll have to pay the money. And usually, for most companies in the US probably a week can be two weeks, it can be a whole lot longer than that as well. But it's very common to pay in or so there's really no when you pay in arrears as an organisation, there's no risk as a business, right? Or you could you know, not do that and decide you want to advance pay in a different way, right. There's some technologies that allow you to do that as well. And the risk kind of outweighs the reward for most things. If you're in a state where you have to pay out like paid time off that's accrued and not used and things like that there's there's money out there that you can kind of offset
Chris 9:21
looking at instead of looking into the data of your customers just you see a lot of them use it quite well used. Is it something that
Amy Mosher 9:28
it's a fairly new offering for us as a company but it's picking up speed? So the industries that we're in have a lot of hourly workers Yeah. So and those individuals who may need access to franchises for example that you mentioned, exactly, yeah. Think quick serve restaurant or, you know, hotels, you know, accommodation, they you in those kinds of environments, we have those those types of workers you're going to potentially have morning or something like this. So again, fairly new operating, but it's definitely picking up speed and it's very, it's because I'm in kind of a buzzword right now. But it's something that will just be standard, I think going forward. Yeah. And something that we allow, especially, you know, as the economy continues to kind of ebb and flow and flux, it's one of those areas where you can bet an advantage for your employees and in a bad situation right there and set up ahead of time, just in case, I suppose, the car breaks down, or they
Chris 10:23
never know when those moments are going to come up. Or something. No one can plan for it, but at least knowing that you have something there to help you out. Right? Exactly. You never know when those moments are gonna pay what you need to extricate.
Amy Mosher 10:36
Right. And it's becoming an employers duty really to look out for their employees more and more, or even from a personal perspective, right, where we need to be we're a part of their lives, right as an employer. And. Right, exactly, exactly. So why not, you know, give them the option and the opportunity, you know, to not have to stress if something happened,
Chris 10:58
I don't want to make this a sales pitch. And I wasn't expected to ask you this. But every time like we were approached by many, many companies in your space, you know, obviously, you know, we worked with a larger, I don't want to say the names out there, because I might get in trouble. You know, do you noticed the larger hates DMS? Everyone knows? What makes you different? Like?
Amy Mosher 11:20
He says, Yeah, absolutely. First and foremost, it is just the ease and usability of the product. Things really, we were talking about it earlier, it's just the back in the admin the reporting incredibly easy, very intuitive, you know, you don't have to take 40 hours of classes to figure out how this thing works. A payroll administrator or an ACM administrator perspective, so really incredible their differentiator for us also, it's just the service level, we have a named service representative for our customers, which is crazy. You just don't get that level surfacing for every person. Wow. For for every client. Yeah, it's it's incredible. And we're just so incredibly accessible, I think, to our client base, we talked to a lot of clients, we've done, you know, 52 roadshow so far this year, which is where we get our clients in a certain location in a room and chat with them and talk to them about how they can utilise the product and optimise the utilisation of their products and, and ask their questions and even even saw, you know, potential opportunities that they that they might have got very happy, brand positive employees, which you don't always have. You know, we have a walking billboard. Right. But, you know, it's crazy. When I walk into any of the offices I was in Charlotte last week, I 90% of the employees had something I sold on like a whim. does that even happen? Never. Right? These people are happy to be here, we have low turnover rate, like they're clearly engaged. It's honestly, it's a jolt of adrenaline from an HR for an HR person. Feel that just incredible.
Chris 12:51
You can't have a product and have those values and not live it internally. You know,
Amy Mosher 12:56
you can't, and we're improving things every day as well. So you know, I mean, I think all a lot of software companies can say that, but it's really good items that we're working on from a product development perspective that are aligned to what the clients have asked for, because we've been listening to the client. So there's, it's a lot of, it's not like, what's the coolest new thing out there unnecessarily? It's really about what will make the most sense for your business? How can we help you do this faster? And more effectively? How can we just get it done? Yeah, right, that's incredibly important for us as well help you get it done. So you can spend time doing all of the wonderful things and engagement and, and developing yourself also really, really big. Right?
Chris 13:32
Obviously, a lot of the customers are small to medium sized businesses. You know, we're starting to we're continuing to see hired struggles, tech layoffs. What are you seeing at the moment? Is it is it just tech? Or is this a widespread issue that you're seeing?
Amy Mosher 13:52
Right now a lot of tech, it's a lot of businesses who are highly leveraged, you know, those interest rates going up. And, and unfortunately, that that means that there are a lot of white collar workers out there. Looking for new roles, we track them all, we we hire many of them, right? We we do active reach out for companies, or individuals online that have have been laid off in lots of different industries. And so we take advantage of that, because we're always hiring great talent. And we're in a market, the AFC HCM market isn't as volatile as many of those other businesses. So we're very lucky that we can continue to hire and, and grow. But yeah, we're seeing a lot of that. Not a lot in our smaller client base, and not a lot in the service industries, which is great. We're going into a fairly busy time, it's still doing for the most part, but we're starting to see that there are some travel related industries that are starting to not see as advanced bookings as they used to or they were maybe this time last year so there's a little bit of people holding back I think a little bit from a spending perspective just just a bit now, but we'll see how it continues. We'll see how it goes, we're doing a lot of work supporting clients that that do have that situation happening, right? There's a lot that your HCM provider and payroll provider can do to support you and your benefit provider can do just for you. And even small things, you know, if your company is struggling, you know, look at suspending your 401 K match or, or, you know, put a little more money back in the, in the tail for a little while, for example, or, or limiting PTO. You know, there's some things in now these all impact employees, and that's right, from an engagement perspective, you have to weigh that. But yeah, if you can do those things before doing layoffs, I think that's that's huge. There are lots of things that you can do as a business to, to curb spending, even if it's temporary.
Chris 15:50
Jobs. I've definitely seen a lot of people cut back. No, yeah.
Amy Mosher 15:55
Not saying just quite at the level that yeah, we did. Maybe Yeah, he doesn't die. Every hire. Even my
Chris 16:01
brother's girlfriend works inherits, which obviously, he's like, Yeah, super expensive. Yeah. I've been there. Yeah. But she's like, it's empty. Yeah, she's like, no one's coming. Like, you know, people felt like, you know, you're not gonna go in there and buy a 500 pound t shirt. Like, during a time where, you know, people pounce? Yeah, so she's like, Chris, I've never, you know, she's been there for like, 10 years, I've never seen it so bad.
Amy Mosher 16:28
That's where it starts. Right? And it gets down to, you know, the people who wait your table, right? Because you're not gonna go out to eat, because that's a nice to have, right. So they're gonna lose their jobs. At some point, if it continues to kind of go down that yeah,
Chris 16:39
we have to bring down inflation. Let's just do one of the things that you mentioned. Last time we spoke though it was about combating impostor syndrome in the workplace. Why is that suffering? Was it something that's top of mind for you?
Amy Mosher 16:52
Well, I don't know if you've experienced this, Chris. But I certainly have experienced the I am not enough. Everyday thoughts in my head, right? Like, I am failing at whatever it is that I have tried to do right impostor syndrome, like, what? What am I really doing? Do I really know how to do this job? Do I really know how to be a great parent and a great wife and a great partner, and sister, and brand and daughter and all those things at once? Can I really do that? I that's what impostor syndrome is. Right. And it's, I think it's rampant. I feel like it's normal. And I really actually appreciate how it's been coined as imposter syndrome. Because it really kind of, I think it resonates with me a little more than it probably would, if I would have had access to the awareness of something like this, when I was younger in my career, or was earlier in my career, I probably would have been able to get over it a lot sooner than I think I was able to, and gain that confidence, just by acknowledging that it's real, and that it's okay, and that lots of people have it. And I feel like it can be career limiting for someone who just can't gain that confidence and doesn't understand where it comes from, or thinks that they're the only person who feels like this on the regular. And it can come up all the time. And even even for me, I've been doing the same thing for 20 years. And I still feel like especially in my role, a lot of people look to me and go, What do we do? I've never dealt with this and think about the pandemic, Chris. Like,
Chris 18:23
everyone says, Everyone, HR was like, hey, what do we do? And you're like, What do you mean? Oh, be on the person's gonna make the decisions? Yeah, I can imagine I was in that role. But I spoke to 1000s of people, hundreds of people that were in a row deposition.
Amy Mosher 18:40
And it was insanity. That's a lot of what HR I think, does we pick up the pieces and answer the questions other people can't answer, right, where people always throw something new at you, and you're dealing with people, it's always going to be new and unique and crazy. And, and, but that internal confidence, it's not something that I think is innate in everyone.
Chris 19:00
What would you say is the toughest thing about being an HR executive,
Amy Mosher 19:03
I would say the toughest thing about being an HR executive is probably having to be on all the time. For me, I am on all the time I have a high energy level, like I operate at that level. And that high frequency level for most of my day, and it's exhausting. It really is exhausting for me. It's also natural so I can't imagine if if I wasn't kind of wired like this, how tough it would be but people
Chris 19:31
don't realise what do you mean by being all the time right that now you're
Amy Mosher 19:35
you're presenting your very best self you're you're marketing the business all the time. I am right now, right? But this is normally me like I'm not it doesn't mean you're not being authentic. It just means I think you're projecting the best. The best part of yourself for endless hours a day, right you're you're marketing the company to candidates and to to other executives that You're helping people through their emotional opportunities, and they're just emotions in general and the even even the emotions of the organisation right culturally, right, you're thinking about how do we move and flex these things? How do we how do we have really difficult conversations, there's a lot of brain power and kind of emotional power that goes into that. And I think that you run on high for a long time, when you're an HR person every day, it's very constant. And sometimes it can burn you out. And I think that's the case with a lot of individuals in either high power, high stress role. Yeah. And that that is the hardest thing. I think about HR. I think, if you're not wired, especially with growth businesses, I think you're not wired, to be able to roll with the punches, and, and change, make change, and have those tough conversations and deal with people that are emotionally draining, and in lots of different ways. Every day and be able to sustain that level of, you know, commitment and understanding and acknowledge it. I think it can burn you out pretty quickly. I think that's how a lot of us get jaded. I think later in our careers. I see it a lot. Where, you know, we've just seen it all, we just know,
Chris 21:09
how's it going easier? Does it ever get easier?
Amy Mosher 21:13
I think it did. For me, I think that confidence has definitely helped with that. Because you're not using as much of your emotional energy on things like, I'm not good enough, or I don't know how to do this, or I'm really worried about that conversation. I don't wake up in the middle of the night thinking about what I'm going to say, in this tough meeting that I'm gonna have to have the next day anymore. I sleep really well.
Chris 21:35
Okay, just
Amy Mosher 21:38
actually quite the opposite. I think when you when you do have a good routine, and you can sleep and you can give all of yourself and you have a lot more time for people you know, throughout your day i and then you want to be in a for your for your family as well, right? Like I'm burnt out, I don't talk about work after work. I'm done.
Chris 21:57
It's almost like a rule. You say, Oh, we're just an unspoken rule.
Amy Mosher 22:02
For me, to rehash it would. But you know, my husband likes to talk about his day. And I think that's fine. And that's part of his process. And I'm totally open to that. Maybe that's the HR person in me that's like, what do you need? What can I do for you right now?
Chris 22:16
Because sometimes when my wife asked me that, to that point, I'm trying to want to talk about No, like, I just don't. What do you mean, she gets upset? I'm like, I just I just need to not talk about work.
Amy Mosher 22:27
Yeah, just let me just focus on not to our own personal podcast at home.
Chris 22:35
She's like, how does it make you feel Chris? And I'm like, Oh, no. No, okay, I get what you're saying. No, I get it. Sometimes you just want to leave work there and just separate How do you re energise? How do you
Amy Mosher 22:51
sleep again, I sleep really, really well. I'm the person who can roll over me it seemed like two seconds. I know people who can't do that hate people, like
Chris 23:00
my wife, my wife, my wife will drink a cup of coffee, no joke and go to bed. I'm like what? Absolutely. can of Coke just full of sugar and caffeine? And she'll run over and she'll be snoring in two minutes. And I'm like,
Amy Mosher 23:12
Yeah, this thing's a gift.
Chris 23:15
I'm so jealous. I wish
Amy Mosher 23:17
there's no there's no other way to put it. It's just dispute. Some people are wired like that. And they can do it. I couldn't do it though. When I was younger. My career I used to rehash things in my head. I wake up at three o'clock in the morning, like, I need to send that email or I need to, like write this down. I'm sorry, I just don't do that anymore. All the things
Chris 23:30
I've learned to do that is to get that out. I write that list and then before sleep. Yeah. So on to get it out of my head, if that makes sense.
Amy Mosher 23:41
Yeah, absolutely. So it doesn't have to sit in there all night anymore. You don't have to think I'm gonna forget about this when I wake up.
Chris 23:47
Alright, tomorrow begins. Look at my list. Look at my list of tasks. And I'm like trying to translate what that even means. I'm like, yeah, yeah.
Amy Mosher 23:55
Yeah, the only thing I think I do is I just don't leave things for tomorrow that I can do today. And it doesn't mean I work in until midnight. It just means if I know I can get that done. Yeah, I'm just gonna do I'm not gonna procrastinate about it because procrastination is my kryptonite. And I can't I know that about myself. I can't wait until the last minute my work product will be great. Even if I wait to the last one. It's not that it has to do with like the level of emotional turmoil you put yourself there for absolutely no reason. You've literally got it here.
Chris 24:21
So is that something that you've discussed with your team? In terms of this ain't gonna be easy. Like, yes, you know your experience along the way? Because yes, them doing their masters in HR, you learn that occation piece doesn't prepare you for what it truly means to sit in the seat.
Amy Mosher 24:39
No, I couldn't agree more. Because I'm sure you hear this from a lot of executives that it doesn't even matter where you went to school for like HR is a totally different animal. And it requires a lot of that you can learn all all about all the best practice that you want. But until you live it and go through this, you're not going to know I run into a lot of you know, new HR professionals just coming out of school and they're like, this job is not what I thought I was gonna meet
Chris 25:02
the people challenges, like people asked me about business, I'm like the business actually running the business to product is the easy part. It's managing people, personalities, you know, those people issues and challenges and relationships?
Amy Mosher 25:17
Yeah, you're talking to people about problems that nobody else wants to tackle. That's why you're talking to him. Right? Like, clearly, these are the hardest things, these are behavioural opportunities that people have, that they've never been able to change, or thoughts that they have, that they've never been able to address, or, you know, relationships between people, like at different levels and different people and different problems, and, you know, throw a person in there, and it's gonna be totally burnt soup, right. It's a, it's a weird job in that way. But you always have the business kind of going on in the background of your mind. And you're like, you know, how do I, how do I build a fair practice here? How do I communicate this fairly? You know, how do I, how do I mitigate risk for the organisation as well, right, as a support, this employee is clearly going through a horrible thing for them, right there various reasons
Chris 25:59
you would like to contrast, you're holding two opposing views in your brain, same time. Does that make sense?
Amy Mosher 26:06
Yeah, absolutely. I feel like I use my left and right blade at the same time all the time. Like I'm like, oh, emotional support. Yeah, we need to make sure that this risk is mitigated for the organisation like, it's a weird place to be. That's why we have jobs so that that insurance, job security for HR, because ultimately, it's very unique, right? Not everybody could do it.
Chris 26:27
But I definitely I could do it. I've been I've been very I know myself well enough. I don't think I think, yeah, I'm the guy. I'm the guy that if I have to have a tough conversation with an employee, I'm not sleeping the entire night. And if I have to, if I, if I, if I know I have to let someone go for some reason, I'm probably not saving for a week before that. A week. Like I'm really fine. I just I've never, it's never been. I don't think it ever should be easy. And I think that's one thing. If I get to the point where I don't care, and I'm just like, why do I need to stop? I shouldn't even be in that position. If that's the case. That's the
Amy Mosher 27:06
day that I quit is the day that I stopped getting the butterflies and all about having to let people go, I think I say when you lose that empathy again, I think you you, it becomes just, you know, ABC 123. Right. This is not a person that you're affecting someone's life. Right? Yeah. Like, you have to feel some kind of way about that. I think in order to be a person. Oh, no, in order to give everything like I actually have to feel like, look, you can treat people the same way on the way out as you do on the way is on their way. You know,
Chris 27:38
I was because I always like, I'm always like, Did I do the best I could? To for that person to succeed? Yes. Yeah. Wherever it's from the environment, wherever it's Yeah, give him the right tools. Right coaching. You're right. Yeah. Always. Yeah. Kind of, from what else could I have done? You know,
Amy Mosher 27:58
very to do. I love that, though. As a leader, I think not not enough leaders think about things like that. I think in HR, you see it all the time, where leaders will just go take care of this problem, right? Like, I need this problem to go away instead of thinking about people as people, and they're all going through something and they have different skill sets, and they need different things. And in this leader, you have to change the way you do things in order for them to be successful. And
Chris 28:20
maybe it's always because I obviously have founded the business. So it's literally emotionally tied to it as well. Right? So every Yeah, every employee so far has been hired by me. So I have this. You know, I pride myself in trying to make sure that I can do the best I can, you know, so when it when it fails, I kind of see it as like my failure, not theirs. If that, if that makes sense, if that makes sense. Absolutely. We all have choices. Right? Exactly. Exactly. So it's like so like I'm and let someone go recently, and the first thing I did was go on LinkedIn to try to get a job. And I did I was I got a call the other day from my friend of mine. I won't say his name. And he was like, Hey, I just spoke to the person. What do you think I was like, Yeah, this is this is what went well, this is what didn't this, you know, full transparency. And now they're working there, which is great. It's like, hey, what's the workout here? But it wasn't the right
Amy Mosher 29:22
times it can be the best thing. I think that eases my mind a lot when I'm doing things like that having to let people go, I think it's it eases my mind to know that not everything is a fit for everyone. Yeah. And that you're actually doing them a favour by being honest. Yeah. Yeah.
Chris 29:37
And but unfortunately, that's the hardest thing. You know, sometimes I haven't again, having those conversations is the hardest, but they're the ones instead of ones that needs to happen and the longer you believe it's not fair to you, it's not fair to them. You it's the sign of respect. I agree that you're having that conversation. I agree.
Amy Mosher 29:55
Real human beings having a real conversation like Yeah, not conflict avoiding Chris.
Chris 30:02
No. What would you? What message would you given? Younger Amy? Looking back now?
Amy Mosher 30:12
I think so I was a very hard working young person, which I think at some point you, if you're a hard working young person, and you're just rolling with the punches and you're dealing with things and you're not really planning, you could that only gets you so far. And I think I realised too late that I needed to plan and I need to proactively learn and grow in areas that I wasn't as natural didn't come naturally to me. Like the planning the data, all of those pieces of me, I get my people skills got me really far. Right, my hard working skills got me really far. My resilience got me far, but then you kind of at some point, there's a tipping point. Okay. You know, I have to be more strategic about this. And I should have learned I wish I would have learned that a little bit sooner. Now. I'm not a coulda, shoulda woulda kind of person. I'm like, I'm exactly where I need to be right now. This is where I have to be right now. I have to is the wrong word. This is where I would love to be right now. Right? Like, I feel very good in my own skin. I feel very, you know, I'm creating value for myself and for others. Like I feel really good. And I probably I've always kind of felt that way. But that's one thing that I look back and go. You know, I probably could have gotten further toward my goals if I would have known what they were.
Chris 31:34
Yeah, you can't you can't hit a target. You can't see. Yeah.
Amy Mosher 31:38
Right. Now, no,
Chris 31:42
no, me too. I was in the same job for 10 years, the exact same job, same responsibilities for 10 years. And I was like, almost like waiting for permission for someone else to give me a pat on the back or the promotion or the or the sign I could move and I realised Oh, you actually own your own career. Chris? Yeah. And it's up to you to take charge of your career. Yeah. And to plan where you want to be and set that in motion. And is to realise to realise I was doing well, I know, we're successful in a row while realise that? Oh, okay. You know, the business is not going to move me because I'm too valuable in this position. Yeah, making them literally millions of pounds. So also, obviously, they're not going to lay Cresco try something else. Where, you know, they should have done that. Because the the the, the outcome of that was that I left the company. Yes. As opposed to them being mean, new opportunities to grow and developing the business. Yeah. But yeah, to your point, I wish I would have realised
Amy Mosher 32:41
a lot earlier sooner. Yeah.
Chris 32:44
I'm gonna be 45. And I mean, I was there when I was since I was 17. So like, it was a long journey. And I learned a lot. And I don't think, to be honest, I don't think if if I the amount of lessons I learned during those 10 years, that's what prepared me. Yeah, to be able to start this company and be where I am. Yeah. So
Amy Mosher 33:00
right where you're supposed to be Chris, right? It is, it takes a lot of the stress off of I should be doing this I should be which is what we all do.
Chris 33:09
We beat ourselves up again. I just you just spoke about this on the last podcast, right? And my coach is always like, Chris, stop beating yourself up. Like a lot of times, it's like, give yourself a break everyone listening right now. Just give yourself a break. Like,
Amy Mosher 33:20
give yourself a break. Like that's because that's really it. People ask me something like that. What? What's the last self help book that you read? And I said, I read a lot of books, I read everything. I'm like, huge reader. And I often will say like, what's the last time you read a book that you didn't have to read? Or you didn't feel like you were learning anything from it? But it was just like relaxing for your brain? How would that How about go read that romance novel that you've been that beach read, so that you can ease your mind and like press the Reset? Let's do yourselves a favour here talking about you know, self improvement self help, like go go do something for fun, routine show that
Chris 33:59
I could talk to you forever but I gotta let you go at some point. As well, where can I? Where can people reach you if they want to reach out say hi and also learn more about the organisation where's the best place
Amy Mosher 34:09
to reach out to me on LinkedIn. Love it. You will see my full contact information there. You can always also reach out we have all of our career emails go to all of us and human resources off of our website, which is I felt hcm.com/careers and we're very accessible.
Chris 34:27
Cool. was good to have you on the show. And I wish you all the best until next week. Enjoy your sleep. I know you will. I know you do. As a pleasure has a lot of fun.
Amy Mosher 34:39
It was a pleasure for me as well Chris. Thank you
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
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Steve Degnan, Advisor, Board Member, and former CHRO of Nestlé Purina.