Workday Podcast: The Tech Talent War and the Secret Weapon

Nicole Carrillo: Welcome to Workday Shift. In this episode, we're diving deep into the talent management challenges shaking up the financial services industry. In an era of constant change, staying ahead of the curve is crucial. So, let's break it down and get you the insights you need to hang on to your most valuable employees now and in the future.

As always, we're here to discuss what's top of mind for you. We'll ask, what is the future of loyalty in FSI? And can internal mobility help institutions retain high potential employees? How is AI transforming the role of CHRO and driving a tech forward, collaborative C-suite culture? How do you predict and plan for emerging skills when tech is evolving so fast? And can skills-based HR platforms help? 

I'm Nicole Carrillo. Managing director for financial services at Workday. And I'm here with Brian Christman, Chief People Officer at Circle. Founded in 2013, Circle is a global financial technology firm that enables businesses of all sizes to harness the power of digital currencies and public blockchains for payments, commerce and financial applications worldwide. So welcome, Brian, can you introduce yourself to our listeners with a little bit about your background and then we'll dive in. 

Brian Christman: Sure. Thanks, Nicole. I appreciate the intro. So, my name, as you said, Brian Christman, I joined as Chief People Officer of Circle early last year in 2013. My background is mostly in what I would call scaling up technology companies. I've worked for a variety of technology companies that were public, private, or in one case, you know, made the transition through an IPO. So, my background comes from more of a technology, frame and, but joining Circle has opened up this new, exciting world of, financial companies, which I'm, getting used to every day.

Carrillo: That's great. I come from a background of FSI companies, so I think we'll be a good match to discuss these trends today, hopefully. So then let's kick it off by getting to know a little bit about Circle. Can you tell us how it's different from traditional financial organizations? 

Christman: Sure, as FinTech would imply, our products are kind of a juxtaposition of finance and tech. Culturally, we blend the most of both worlds. At least that's what we aspire to do. we bring in our own special ingredients, to make a formula that we feel is unique to Circle, it is safe to say that we don't really fit neatly into a category. We might be described as a payments company or a blockchain company or a financial institution or platform software company. The reality is we're a little bit of a mix of all of it, which makes us a bit unique. So, our business model and technology, you know, we, we believe benefits for the network effects that are similar to other internet platforms, but at the same time, we're building robust set of financial market infrastructure against constantly evolving regulations. So, in that way, we're much like a financial institution. We take pride in our regulatory first posture, so we are investing heavily, to have the technology and the processes to respond to all the appropriate. And applicable regulations globally. So it is, it is truly a blend. As for our own kind of special ingredients, as I mentioned, you know, we are a high performing company and we're also, uniquely, a probably remote first company. We don't have any offices or very few kinds of physical offices around the world. And we have about a thousand people. We believe this gives our employees maxim flexibility to both be productive, but also tend to the things that really inspire them and motivate them outside of work. 

And then, you know, finally, I'll just say that we have a, we have a set of values. Most companies have sets of values. We've taken a lot of pride in our values, and we integrate them widely and deeply within our organization. And we believe that also provides a very special ingredient to make Circle unique and successful.

Carrillo: Yeah, I think it's interesting, the classification of fintech is really changing. nowadays because every financial services company has had to lean so much into technology in order to provide the service and the products and the things that consumers now need. So, I think it's going to be really interesting to bring some of the insights from, let's call it a technology first company, to some of our more traditional FSI customers.

So then tell me, as Chief People Officer for Circle, can you give us an overview of what you're focusing on for the next 12 to 18 months? What are the talent hot topics and trends that you're seeing in the sector? 

Christman: As I said, we're about a thousand employees, we actually grew pretty substantially from just a few years ago where we were maybe a couple hundred employees.

So, you know, we're continuing to scale and we're continuing to grow. So, from a talent perspective, I think a lot about infrastructure. You know, you know, with the assumption the Circle is going to be wildly successful, you know, for the future. We're building infrastructure systems processes to be able to allow us to continue to scale on a global basis.

We're also very geographically diverse, so we have employees in, every region of the world. I believe 14 different countries. We've got a wide footprint, but we also have this remote first philosophy that creates its own set of challenges. So, we're always looking for looking to find ways to ensure their employees are effective, you know, in the way they connect with each other virtually through systems, but also importantly, physically when they can. So, can we create opportunities for them to get together? Get together in hubs or conferences or company sponsored meetings so they can connect on a more personal basis, which we also believe is important. And then finally, you know, just because we're continuing to grow, we're constantly looking for the best, you know, values aligned talent across the world to fulfil our mission.

And we have to we recruit deeply into kind of technology and also into financial services. So that is obviously an important part of our role as a growth company. 

Carrillo: Yeah. And I think that search for talent for the right talent and especially with the right technology skills is something that we hear from all of our FSI companies, but especially those that are in such a high growth mode, like Circle is, maybe we can talk about that a little more, the talent war, which you obviously know from your background in a high growth tech industry, but did you see a similar scarcity problem in financial services that you're trying to tackle as well.

Christman: I'd say that scarcity is an issue across any industry. I think we, you know, as a company, we tend to focus on and are very focused on, you know, hiring top talent from both financial services and from high tech top talent has always been scarce, you know, in every, any industry I've ever worked in, and so, you know, we don't tend to obsess about like the scarcity issue.

We just try to find a way to break through the noise and, and to kind of differentiate us. Why would somebody who's, you know, in a very successful career at a very successful financial services company. Want to join a company like Circle, you know, where it's a little bit new unknown We're a little bit new kid on the block.

We're representing something new. It's a risk, you know we believe a worthwhile risk, but it is a risk, right? So, you know, we have to be able to find the people who are inspired and want to take that Leap of faith to be part of something that could be transformative, and they know they can have very wide and deep impact in a company like Circle.

So, it's more to us. It's about branding. It's about breaking through the noise. It's about networking. It's about connecting with people at conferences and, and other kind of venues. It's kind of an all-out war, so to speak, to go find those, niche people, that's kind of what we think about scarcity. Yes, we need to be able to find our special sauce and like what makes us different. 

Carrillo: Yeah, I like that. It's kind of this holistic, fully pronged approach. You're not just relying on the recruiting department in order to do this. You're really pulling in employees and brand and all of that to, to try to, I guess, if it's a talent war to have all of the different assets at your disposal to try to, Bring those top people. I like that kind of that holistic way of looking at it.

Christman: Yeah, we say every employee at Circles a recruiter, we have employee referrals programs, we have active ERPs who are great sources for untapped or uncultivated pipelines for diverse talent. We, you know, our CEO is a recruiter, you know, the most junior person in the company is a recruiter.

Like our recruiters are not, you know, full of ego that they're the only people that can go find talent. So, it is a full-on approach.

Carrillo: Yeah. You could probably say the best recruiter is a happy employee. Don't have to be in the HR department. I like that. So, link to that you, you find with this great holistic approach, you find this great talent and you bring them in. But then we link on to talent retention. Last year, Forbes ranked the world's best employers. The top 10, as usual, were dominated by IT and internet, electronics, software players, apart from an honourable mention from PayPal at number 17. FSI didn't really make an appearance until number 45: it was MasterCard, Amex, the places that we often see in these rankings.

So, my question is, is it even possible for financial services to compete with the Apples and the Googles and the Metas in terms of hanging on and retaining those top employees?

Christman: It's a great question. I've been doing this, when I say this, you know, kind of HR for a really long time. And so, I've been at companies that have appeared at the very tops of these, these types of lists.

And I've been in companies that didn't even participate, but had really great cultures, right? So, I think that clearly some of these large tech companies with their profitability and their kind of mountains of cash have, you know, have structural advantages that a lot of other companies don't have in terms of perks and other programs. And clearly not only can they pay at the top of the market in many ways they are the market like they create the market. So, it is a challenge right to kind of breakthrough That said, I think it's worthwhile, you know, for companies to figure out what is it that helps their employees stay engaged?

Is it the perks? Is it the things that might make you, kind of a good sound bite on a, on a news article or a list? Or is it something different? Is it the way that you approach the relationship between managers and employees and, you know, is it your value system?

So, I think every company really just has to find out, you know, what makes them special, how to amplify their culture, that they already know is great and how do you, you know, kind of design a company that. You know, once you get your, you know, the culture really humming, both attracts new talent to it because it's just known through word of mouth that it's a great culture.

And then when, when there are, when you do have a, you know, potentially a mis hire or something like that, it's almost like organ rejection, right? Like, it's like, it's just not a good fit. And so, you know, we do try to appear in these lists, you know, we do make it into, you know, kind of, we get recognized by the same types of companies, the great places to works and the, and then, and so on and so forth.

And we think it's important for branding. It's a good way to kind of, you know, validate what we already believe to be a great culture. so. I think it is possible. I, believe it is possible. I don't see why it couldn't be possible. so, I think that, you know, maybe there's just in the, in the short term, there's this just that structural advantage.

I also think last thing I'll say is, you know, some of these tech companies that Google's in the Apples or whatever, like, you know, they, they wouldn't be at the top of those lists if they didn't have some intentionality, right? Like they, they do invest heavily in programs that they know will increase employee engagement.

And so, it is also a set. It is a choice, right? You know, you have to, as a company, be able to invest in the right places. And, and I think that that is also true. So, I'm not disparaging those companies. Like they do a lot of great work, they wouldn't be where they were if they didn't, so there is a choice. Do they have advantages? Sure. But it is also a conscious choice they're making to go deep on employee engagement.

Carrillo: And I think you brought up an interesting point that some of these companies from the beginning have structurally been built around. Being a great place to work. Many of our financial service organizations have been around for, let's say fifty, seventy five, a hundred years back when these companies were built, they were built around customer, profit things like that. So, I think, I feel like we see more of our FSI customers. And FSI industry in general, leaning into some of these things that you are saying, the values, the programs, things like that. But I think it's going to take a little bit of time for it to catch on and become, let's call it part of the reputation of that industry, that the engagement You know, really take hold since they have, they have farther to go. They haven't been built that way from the beginning intentionally, but I think they, a lot of them are intentionally leaning into these types of programs and we just need to see them get a little bit more traction and get a little bit more amplification, as you said, from, from some of their employees.

So then, how, since Circle really is this blend of finance and tech, how have you managed to recruit from the tech industry into financial service? And how are you approaching like retention of that? You know, retaining them in this fintech company as opposed to just the straight technology industry?

Christman: We are a blend, so I would say, you know, at least 50 percent of the company is either directly or indirectly related to, Kind of product engineering, information technology.

So, we do, and we are a product and tech led company. So, we view ourselves as a technology company. So, attracting people to a company like Circle tech, tech talent to a company like Circle. It's not easy by any stretch, but you know, we are well known as a leader in kind of blockchain, crypto stable coin technology.

Alright, so we're building kind of some core foundation for what we believe will be the future of how money is used on the internet. So, in that way we, we feel like we are leading edge and that in itself can be attractive to the right people. So, I, think that we're doing well, but it is, you know, it's always a challenge.

I think convincing people out of financial services to come to Circle is equally challenging. I think that we represent something new. So, for the right people, it is a is attractive opportunity again. And this is a gross generalization that maybe you can dispute, but like, you know, I think many, a lot of talent coming from financial services, I would dare to say are risk averse.

So coming to a company like Circle, which, you know, certainly as a startup, there's always inherent risk and coming to a company that's trying to kind of break an industry or transform an industry using blockchain and, you know, crypto is also, you know, A leap of faith into a future that is a little bit grey.

So that is, that is also a challenge, but I think that we've been successful, by, you know, that, that kind of newness or that transformative nature of our business is what allows us to be successful. And then, turning to retention. Once people are here, the way that we represent our business and the way that we prove kind of our moment is successful breed retention. So that's good. We need to continue to ensure that we are being competitive, run our pay practices, try to be competitive, around our benefits, practices and those sorts of things that kind of block and block and hacking. But we also particularly because we have, we are regulated business or pieces of our business are regulated business.

We also have to be very thoughtful and intentional about how do we want to play in this new industry that could be unfamiliar. So, what I mean by that is people coming from tech aren't used to having, you know, regulators kind of slow you down. Right. So that can be frustrating, you know, people coming from financial services are not used to having a few hundred software engineers and product people that want to kind of move fast and break things, right?

So, like that clash of cultures can be difficult to manage. So, we try our best to, you know, kind of look at everything as an opportunity. Yes, regulation, compliance, enterprise risk management. Those are hard things, and they, you know, could be perceived to be blockers. Well, what we do a Circle as we try to present those as like, no, this, these are competitive advantages for us because we can do this better.

We can, we can be compliant, leveraging technology and moving fast. We can be better about rest enterprise risk management by leveraging technology. We can be better about, you know, kind of all these things and make it a competitive moat right for our competitors that want to come to this business.

We feel like it's a strategic opportunity for us to be able to, you know, kind of lean into these things that might be unfamiliar and sometimes uncomfortable for new people coming in. So that's how I think we have to retain people once they're at Circle and obviously having a great culture and making people feel happy and engaged.

Carrillo: That really resonates with me. So, I would say I am a recovering bank CFO who now works in the technology industry. So, I know exactly what you mean by we are risk adverse. We are in the business, you know, banks, insurance companies, we're in the business of managing, even investment management, our job, our business is managing risk, making the right decisions based on the risks we see every day to, you know, maximize for customers and investors. Then you come to a world where you don't have some of these, what were perceived as guardrails and just part of normal life, the way you did things. And it's, it is a change it's something to adapt to. But I think you highlighted something I definitely agree is a strength is FinTech companies that are leaning into these regulations and leaning into compliance and saying, we can still be innovative.

We can still grow. We can still go fast. We just within these guardrails, I think that is somewhat of a superpower that creates more trust. From the consumers, from the people that you're interacting with, I know that as I've gotten to know Circle just through my exposure through Workday, I definitely could feel that as part of the culture there was, we are regulated, we do have compliance that we have to manage as we innovate as quickly as we can.

Christman: Yeah, and it's also part of our ethos. Like we have this kind of walk through the front door approach and we have to, this, is who we are, and so, you know, being innovative around these, these kind of tough, you know, guardrails, as you say, is like, again, we, we, we view them as opportunities and it allows us, if done well, it actually allows us to move faster and that is what we're about, speed.

Carrillo: Yep, absolutely. We had a similar topic discussion in one of our other podcasts about how you turn compliance pain into gain. So, you're going to be the next person that comes to that topic for sure. So, moving on from that retention topic. One thing that we all hear a lot about is Gen Z workers, hiring Gen Z workers, and financial service institutions in general have had a trouble attracting that new generation of workers.

What do you think makes them skeptical of financial services and how do we think about turning their heads, getting this next gen of workers to come and help turn and change financial services institutions?

Christman: It's a great question, and I don't want to be since I don't come from financial services.

It's hard for me to, you know, to understand because I don't have personal experience here. I think I could maybe speculate and just in talking to people that I know, you know, what would make them choose, you know, this industry or this company, one over the other. And I think that for especially for young people that have grown up, you know, and unfortunately, an environment where respect for institutions, respect for, you know, kind of politicians is like, you know, really low.

And I think, living through the financial crisis, you know, I think for, you know, fair or not, you know, put a stigma around financial services. It's like it. Why would I want to work for you? Like this giant corporation that is, you know, doesn't have integrity is putting profits over people and that sort of stuff.

And I think that kind of the Gen Z, you know, the millennials Gen Z next generation coming after them are really looking for companies that come from a place of high integrity, lead with values are mission driven, and they want to feel like they're working at some place that is going to have a positive social impact on the world that might be an overgeneralization, but I think that that's, you know, that's my general point of view. I think there's obviously exceptions, and I think there's great financial institutions that do have positive, you know, social outcomes for the world, but I think they get lumped into kind of all the. You know kind of the badness just like I think there's some really great politicians out there but like it's hard for them to shine through because they are lumped in with a whole bunch of craziness and badness, right? So, I don't know if that answers your question?

Carrillo: Yeah, I think that's interesting thinking about gen z and when they were born and what they you know the fact that the banking crisis of 07 08 09 was something that is probably things they hear about from their parents. Maybe they've seen impact their lives.

And that forms a core impression of banks and financial institutions, I could definitely see how many of us in the prior generations didn't have that type of core memory foundation of what a bank is and what a financial institution is. 

Christman: So that's I think maybe along with that, I mean, I think that for good reason, you know, be these large financial institutions have to be regulated to protect consumers and make sure that everybody's doing the right thing, which of course leads to a lot of regulation, compliance, enterprise risk management, a little bit of bureaucracy. And so that as those things get layered on and on and on, there's a perception that these large financial institutions are just slow moving, right? They make decisions slow. Everything is incremental. And there's like processes and processing on top of processes, right?

And so, I think. You know, that also, you know, is probably a turn off for, you know, kind of a new breed of worker who is used to things moving much faster, right? So that kind of full Circle goes back to how do we leverage technology to make those things easier and faster and more strategically important that can help these financial services companies, you know, have their mission shine through rather than, you know, the bureaucracy that they have to operate within be the kind of the primary story.

Carrillo: Yeah, I think that's a good point. The bureaucracy and, and the guardrails that they have to, that they have to work with them. I want to jump forward a little bit to, kind of pivoting off Gen Z and what they are, you know, coming into the workforce with, it's an expectation of a modern technology platform, an expectation of the ability to have flexible or remote work.

AI ML is also a big part of that. What do you think about financial services? I think financial services, as you said, is risk averse. We may not be the first ones to be pushing out AI, ML in our back office. We've seen a big, big acceptance of it in front office for customer office offerings, but in back office because of the risk and compliance.

What if financial services placed AI and ML at the heart of their talent offering? AI to make jobs more efficient or maybe, you know, to change the perception of the industry, maybe being seen as a pioneer of AI and ML in the way that people performed, maybe more meaningful work. Would love to get your thoughts and perceptions on that as it relates to helping the financial services industry really, compete in this talent environment that we're in.

Christman: Yeah, it's, it's a, it's a great question. I mean, at Circle, we talk a lot about this, we talk about AI and how to best leverage it within our walls. And that's obviously, you know, even though, you know, we're maybe perceived as a technology company and to some people we are financial institution.

And so, we have all the same worries about, you know, kind of leaning too quickly into AI for internal use because much of it is not understood. Right? So, we as a company, are taking very intentional steps to leverage AI internally. And we believe this is really strongly that this, will happen.

It's not a matter of like, if it's, it will, and, and how, and when a little unclear. I don't know if AI is something that could be marketed as like a talent offering, although it's an interesting idea only because I think that AI and ML technologies in the workplace is just going to be adopted so fast.

I think it is. It is going to continue to accelerate. I think that the tools that companies will need to put in place to be competitive, will require some competency, within the company around AI ML, and it'll become, like a 401k plan or like a health insurance plan, like employees will just expect that the company is investing in the right tools to be efficient and, successful because, and I believe they will have to, they have no choice.

So, in putting it out as a talent offering, maybe there's an opportunity to say like, look, we. We provide training for our employees on how to best use these large language models and how to train AI tools. And like, that could be kind of an interesting offering to attract new talent because those are skills that everyone is going to have to know how to use and so for companies that have the resources to be able to offer these types of training programs for employees, I think that would be a fantastic idea. And I do think that I will obviously, like, you know, remove unnecessarily kind of repetitive tasks and burdensome tasks and make jobs a bit more interesting. I don't know the whole, looking forward, like socioeconomically, like how that impacts the, you know, the workforce and where did the jobs go that require this kind of repetitive work. I don't know the answers to those things, but I do believe there will be a whole new set of jobs and that we haven't even thought about yet that will be caused be a result of kind of AI and ML, being much more widely adopted and all of our tools, and our and our companies. So that's kind of the way I think about it.

Carrillo: Yeah, and I could definitely kind of going off what you said, I could definitely see how if you're entering the workforce knowing that you're going into a role or a job where AI ML is already part of that a little bit of the apprehension. We often hear sometimes from workers about AI ML is, will I be replaced?

Will I lose my job? If you know that you're going into a role where that is already part of the work that you do. I think that could be a little bit of security that you feel walking into a new role, starting a career in an industry. So, you know, financial services, we have leaned into ML and AI in the past, but just not in the way that we are seeing it progress and advance so fast right now, you know, and things like fraud detection, every credit card fraud alert you get, that's AI, that's ML, but it's just moving so much more quickly. I'm excited to see how they embrace it, knowing that they have used it for a while, just in different functions than where we're seeing it now.

Christman: Yeah, absolutely. Just, I mean, even as a small example, like I'm thinking about a recruiter in a company would probably love to come work at a company that has already invested in some great recruiting tools that can help write job descriptions through AI and ML, rather than literally opening up a word doc or a Google doc and starting from scratch from every time, because they'd much rather be recruiting than writing job descriptions, right? Like there's just like a simple example, but I do think there's some benefit. I guess my larger point is, I think that effect I think we’re probably there for a few more years, but then I think the adoption is going to be so widespread. It's not even going to matter anymore. That's my Uber point.

Carrillo: No, I definitely, I absolutely agree with you. Definitely agree. And I also would love to have a recruiter that wrote a job description for me. I would sit and ponder over those things for hours. Finance and Accounting people are not good at writing job descriptions.

We're too black and white, so pivoting off of this topic, AI ML. I think it really, and what you said about how it's going to be the norm going forward, it's not like this is here for a little while. I think one of the themes we hear is that it's now requiring every person in the company to be more tech forward.

It's not just those in the IT department or in the senior team. I'd love to get your thoughts on the new expectation on leaders around AI. For example, how is it making you think differently about the HR platforms you choose at Circle? And do you do that work in lockstep with the CIO CTO as you develop your people strategy?

Christman: Yeah, this is also a great question. I'm going to give people a quick peek into my background. It's a long, long, long time ago when I first started working, I started as an HR IT person., I was a people soft implementer, I was writing code, you know, writing benefits interfaces and that sort of stuff.

So even though I’ve spent, you know, last 10 years or so and kind of like the top job, HR systems are like my… I still geek out. So, and I think the industry has gone through massive changes or, you know, since the, you know, kind of the beginning of, you know, since 2000 or late 90s, right? It's gone through kind of different cycles of ERPs and different cycles of like what you know what ERPs can do. I've seen, you know, a big shift to kind of best of breed software. And then I've seen a big shift back to no enterprise, you know, kind of ERP Systems that do everything like that. And it's gone back and forth over time. I'd say that, you know, the way I think about, well, one, just backing up, I think that leaders across the board have to be, you know, they don't have to be experts in AI, but they certainly have to understand the landscape and they have to understand how AI is going to help them in their particular role and what is the opportunity out there for them to hit other strategic goals.

So as CHRO of Circle, I think a lot about like. I don't want to be the type of HR department that has all the information and people have to constantly come and ask me for it or ask my team for it. I want to push data insights out to the people who actually make the decisions and help them make better informed decisions.

I can only do that if I have really sophisticated software and tools that can collect and present those insights and in a way that's easily digestible for somebody who has only a couple of minutes to look at something right and doesn't need to be an expert in whatever tool. So, as I've been kind of watching AI evolve over the last year or two.

It’s strengthened my conviction that I think, you know, at least for the foreseeable future, companies and leaders will have to think about tools as platforms, meaning they have to find, understand how all the data they need that will flow into a decision framework is going to be accessible by that AI Engine or that ML Engine, right? So, there are certainly large systems like Workday and others, have some advantages here because they have, they can do lots of things, right? There are obviously lots of other software companies out there. Best of breed that could, you know. That can do things really, really well.

Sometimes even better than Workday, but, it is how much value are you going to put about, not just the UI. And not just the features, but the data. And I think that that's where AI is really kind of changing the landscape of like how it's, it's not all about the UI. It's about the data and how it could be accessed and trained and leveraged into insights and decision tools. So that's how I think about it. So, on our HR tech stack, which obviously Workday is a big part of it. I want to understand from my team. Where is the data flow? Where does the data reside? How are we going to leverage the data at the end of the day? If it's scattered among a bunch of disparate systems that are not well integrated together, that's a failure.

If they are highly connected or on the same platform, and it can be leveraged by AI, that's a success. So that's how I kind of think about the future.

Carrillo: Yeah. And I think that is something we hear from many of our financial service customers, not just on the HR, but on the finance side. That, all of their loan deposit, you know, transaction data is stored potentially in two to three different places.

Reporting is over here. GL is over here. How do you even start to think about utilizing some of these AI tools when it’s not all in a unified platform or accessible in one place, how do you plug an AI functionality on top of a massive data warehouse where the data dictionary might be different depending on what you're using.

So, I think that's great. You know, being able to have that point of view and build that in from the beginning as you're, as you're setting up the structural organization. But also, once you have that talent in house and as you're growing, predicting the skills and the needs of the business when technology is moving so quickly, is there a way to foresee skill gaps, maybe map those skills that are going to be required by your strategy or your development path?

How do you pull skills data in for all of your employees to ensure you have the right people to take you where you're going. I would love to kind of get your thoughts on skills and managing that workforce for a growth environment.

Christman: Yeah, it's a great question. The short answer is we don't at the moment. And it's not because we don't want to. It's just we're early in our journey. Right. We absolutely see the value of building an internal skills library for Circle. You know we've done, I think, a good job of building out some core competencies that we believe are a core for every employee, mostly rooted in our values.

We can make our values kind of actionable in the form of competencies. That's a form of skills, and obviously we do that. But there's all sorts of skills that reside across the company within engineering or, or in our treasury team or an accounting team or finance team that we don't track as a talent team.

That the people, the leaders in those functions are absolutely aware of the skills and, and the needs and the competencies that they expect from their teams. But we've just up until now, we have not been in a position to help them organize those skills, evaluate them and understand what the gaps are.

So, we believe that that is, you know, kind of the next frontier for Circle, for talent teams to, to start building that library. And putting in very smart, lightweight tools, potentially powered by AI and other tech to make it easier for leaders to be able to evaluate. Okay, I know that I have XYZ skill set within my team. I know how to evaluate it. I know how to develop it. And by the way, if I don't have that skill set in my team, something, somebody or something is going to help me find it. Whether it, whether it already exists in the company. Or that has to be driven into kind of a recruiting conversation.

So, We believe that, you know, we're small enough now at 1,000 employees, we can kind of get by with, you know, kind of doing that a little bit in a hacky sort of way, but as we continue to scale, we know that we have to build in the tools to be able to do that so we can proactively assess those skill gaps and something I'll use just as a simple example, like a skill could be a language. It's come up at Circle, probably comes up at lots of companies, like, hey, do we have anybody that speaks, I don't know, German? Like, wouldn't it be great if, like, I could say, yes, you know, these five people, because I just pressed a button. We can't do that today in Circle like we need to, but we can't because we have not made that investment yet.

So, it is absolutely a priority for us to start building that database of skills that people have that are currently relevant for their job, but also skills that could be relevant for a different job or, or a task or a project or an assignment. so absolutely, I'm excited about that project.

Nicle Carrillo: Data we have shows that internal moves, even laterally have significant positive impacts on employees and the organization. But our latest study really shows that industries, not just financial service industries, but industries in general, like kind of the things you were referring to, they're stagnation in that percentage of internal hires.

Possibly because of what we're seeing about not having that full inventory of people's skills. But again, as we were talking about with talent retention, there's an uptick in voluntary turnover that, people are trying to mitigate at this point. Can you share your thoughts on skills growth internally?

And the priority of that, do you see positive impact offering employees, those opportunities for internal mobility, just like you said, about a project or an assignment or, you know, a language learning opportunity.

Christman: So, I think that at Circle, we're kind of at that moment now. As I said, we're we've grown really fast. Most employees at Circle have been with the company for less than three years, I'd say the majority, probably closer to two years. So, you know, as a growth company, it sometimes is a little bit easier because, you know, new opportunities are always kind of popping up that allow people for either lateral moves or promotions or progressions within their role, but that's not always going to be the case.

So, we have to find opportunities for people to take on different assignments, take on different projects within their role. there could be, as I said, we have a large geographic footprint and we're expanding internationally. There could be interesting, assignments, into different geographies.

So it is absolutely in our mind, to think about, okay, we'd now hit maybe the right scale around a thousand people that when we need to open up a new role or we have a need or have a skill, can we start looking internally? Can we start looking inwardly? Because it's too easy just to, you know, as we said, like write a new job description and, you know, hand it to a recruiter and go buy that skill, right?

So that, that is the default, right? When you're, when you're a growth company, but it is going to be a new motion for us to think about, how to ensure, especially for our top talent, our most high potential talent to ensure that they're not stagnating. And that I think, you know, tools are certainly an opportunity, like Workday and others to, to help us, kind of anticipate that.

Carrillo: Yeah. And I think it's interesting because some of these tools also, as you said, it's important for companies to offer the opportunities, but these tools also help put some of that onto the employee and give the employee control over that, you know, their skills story. How do they nurture it? How do they develop it?

How do they identify where there might be a hole that they could work on or develop for the next thing that they see as their job opportunity? So, I think. It's an important part of talent management, but also of empowering the employees to really assess where they are and what they need in order to continue to move in the direction that they want to go.

So, jumping forward a little bit to this skills data, like you said, Circle is in their infancy of thinking about how to track this skills data. You know, many companies that are much bigger than Circle with many more people are trying to figure this out as well. And I think there can be a little bit of, I don't even know where to look or how to start.

What advice can you give as a place to start? Whether you're a thousand employees, 5, 000 employees. How do you start this journey with your employees? 

Christman: Yeah. So, I think, listening to them, number one, I think that, you know, asking them, we and as I’m sure many companies listening to this too, we do a lot of engagement surveys.

We do pulse surveys. And so having a good understanding of where those engagements start to start to like tail off, you know, we can see it in data that after a few years, you know, kind of after two or three years, engagement in place tends to tail off. I think that's not just Circle. That's kind of most companies.

So, anticipating that and then reaching out and talking to employees about, you know, where are you? How are you? What is your next step? How are you feeling? Like, I think that sometimes just having an encouragement. This is just not just HR. This is managers having active ongoing conversations with their employees about where they are, is important. And in terms of skills, I think that, you know, companies generally don’t do a pretty good job, but a terrible job, I should say, do a terrible job understanding the skills that employee has, like, we kind of know what there are when we go through the recruiting process.

The recruiters might go deep, but once they come into the company and they get integrated into their job, it's kind of like you forgot about everything else they had on their resume. Right? So, I think there are opportunities to encourage employees, smartly, easily, and lightweight ways to capture their skills within a centralized system that you can leverage.

Employees are obviously, like, updating their LinkedIn profile all the time, trying to make themselves attractive to other recruiters, when they start getting disengaged with their current company. So, how do you connect with them when they are in a good place when they are highly engaged and feel like they're going to work at your company forever to be able to share that information with you so that you could leverage it and then have a better opportunity to keep the long term.

So, that I think is like goes back to this kind of skills library. It's not just, the skills that the company needs today, or the team needs today. It's about. You know, what are you not anticipating, that you might have in your own backyard, and you didn't even realize you had. So, I think that is the opportunity, and, and engaging with employees, asking them to participate, you know, and giving them the why.

Like, why are you collecting this information? Are you just being big brother? Are you doing this, like, somehow, whatever. I mean, you know, no, it's to help them manage their career at your company, and being able to have like an open, honest conversation with them about that as your strategy, I think is a good first step.

Carrillo: Yeah, and I think the way I envision that is also that it's more than just HR's role. It's, it's HR educating, enabling, and training the managers and the people in leadership positions to have these conversations, to not always look out, but you think you know your employees, but maybe you don't really know them as well as you think you do and that's okay being curious about people and digging into what else could they do and where these opportunities are for them. So, I like that, I think that's some great advice for people of where to start.

So, I'd love to wrap it up with a question kind of about soft and hard skills, really in this digital first future of the industry that we are leaning into financial services in general, trying to catch up maybe to the digital first where Circle started.

Many of these soft and hard skills haven't been as prevalent within traditional financial services institutions. There's a number of new skills that are required for success, and existing skill sets that they need to maintain, like regulatory and compliance. What are your thoughts on the changing nature of hard and soft skills needed today in FSI? And do you see anything new emerging that people could walk away with and, and consider, as they look at their organizations?

Christman: So, I'd say that soft skills and hard skills, I think are critical business skills, period. At Circle, we talk a lot about this a lot. I would even argue that some of what is perceived to be a soft skill is actually a hard skill. It is something that people can learn, can be trained on, can practice and can be evaluated on. I think too often like soft skills kind of get put into a kind of a bucket of like, oh, are you nice? Are you a nice person? And that is, I think that is not, you know, kind of the focus, at least that's not the way we think about it at Circle.

We think about soft skills as important business skills, important leadership skills that build trust between individuals and between teams. We believe the trust, you know, it requires a few different things, but a chief among them is, you know, people have to believe, you know, that the person you're working across from, whether it's a team or an individual, whatever. Do you trust that that person has empathy for what you're dealing with, right?

Do they understand me? And that requires that person to have good listening skills and could, you know, And patience and openness. And those are kind of considered soft skills, but they're critical. You need to know that the person that you're sitting across to that is actually being genuine and authentic.

How does that person represent that they represent that by having great communication skills. They show integrity. They're honest. They, they, they do what they say. Right? They apologize when they get it wrong. You know, it's like simple things. And then finally, like trust means that I trust you that you're going to be able to do the job that you are going to be accountable, and you have the right skills to actually get the job done.

And if you don't like that also breaks on trust. So, it's this combination of both soft skills and hard skills that breed trust between individuals and teams, and we believe that is so important, especially for a company like Circle. I would argue all companies, but especially a company like Circle that has to move quickly, has to make decisions quickly, and you can only do that if you could have open, honest dialogue with people to be able to make very quick decisions. And so maybe I'm preaching to the choir here, but I think that it is absolutely essential. I think the companies need to stop thinking about soft skills as like a different category. These are all business skills that have to be prioritized.

Carrillo: So, it's almost, said a different way: soft skills are the new hard skills. To build a high performing organization. 

Christman: A hundred percent. Yes. 

Carrillo: I have so enjoyed this conversation. I feel like we've had a lot of insights that we can share with our customers. And just anyone who's listening from the financial services industry or interested in, you know, a more technology forward, human management organization. So again, thank you for being here. We've been talking about the tech talent war and the secret weapon with Brian Christman, Chief People Officer at Circle.

If you enjoyed what you heard today, be sure to follow us wherever you're listening. And remember, you can find our entire catalog at Workday.com/podcast. I'm your host, Nicole Carrillo, and I hope you have a great Workday.