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The Opportunity Divide

As current events reshape how work gets done, Allegis Group is dedicated to addressing the opportunity divide. In this episode, President Andy Hilger discusses how employment breeds hope through stories about people who have faced adversity and achieved purpose and dignity through their work. We also learn about ways Allegis Group is keeping opportunity alive amid challenging times. Check it out today!

Andrew Hilger

Transcript

F: Welcome to Subject to Talent, brought to you by Allegis Global Solutions. Similar to you, we're always trying to learn more. On this podcast we speak to talent experts around the world covering workforce management, market trends, technology, on a forever evolving dynamic industry.  

Welcome and thank you for joining us on Subject to Talent. My name is FrankEdge. Today AGS’ Global Executive Director of Human Resources, Sara Babin sits down with Allegis Group’s President, Andy Hilger. He is responsible for driving alignment and growth across a network of specialized companies, collectively a $13 billion enterprise. Known for his versatility and strong work ethic, Andy spearheads Allegis Group’s digital transformation strategy, leveraging partnerships, state-of-the-art technology, data and analytics to create unparalleled experiences for our customers. Hilger has a passion for driving an innovative culture that continues to create opportunity for Allegis Group’s team members and customers.  

In this episode Andy and Sara discuss The Opportunity Divide: Let’s learn more… 

S: Thanks for joining me today, Andy. I'm really excited to speak with you about a very relevant and interesting topic. Before we get into the questions, I'd like to start off by asking how did you get your start in the staffing industry? 

A: Yeah, sure. First, thanks for having me. I'm really excited. I am a podcast geek. I was excited to hear a lot of the early Subject to Talent podcasts and really thrilled to have the opportunity to speak with you today. Like a lot of people, I think I stumbled into the staffing industry. I had finished graduate school and moved to Syracuse, New York where my wife was in nursing school and spent a few years there while she finished nursing school and served out some time that she owed the hospital and in those couple of years, I think we had about 15 feet of snow and it became really clear to me, maybe less clear to her that Syracuse was a fantastic place to be from and an exciting place to visit, but that was probably not where we were going to plant our roots. We really picked a number of cities and somewhat sight unseen, I had some good friends in Baltimore and decided, hey, that seems like a pretty good place, which I don't know that a lot of people choose Baltimore if they've got... the world is their oyster, but we loved the proximity to family, the feel of it. It's just a good, not a lot of pretense to Baltimore and I called a friend and said "Hey, don't you work for a company that helps people find jobs." She said, "Oh, you have to come work here." And got me set up with an interview and I probably went through five or six interviews. At that point still didn't know if I had gotten the job. Didn't really know what I was going to do. Didn't understand what this company did, but there was something about it. There was this a really infectious enthusiasm, and there was this sense that we were building something in this culture that I just wanted to be a part of but I took a leap of faith and now 23 years later, haven't looked back and have really been fortunate to have found Allegis Group and found this industry. I would say like a lot of people it's been more about the people and the company and the mission than the industry, but I've really come to appreciate the staffing industry along the way. 

S: Wow. That's great. It's funny. I have a similar story in that, I came from Upstate New York to down here, so I completely can relate to getting out of that weather and coming down to Baltimore. It's good stuff. Allegis Group says opportunity starts here. What does that mean to you? 

A: Yeah. I mentioned, we talk a lot about opportunity and during that interview process where I didn't understand what we did, I did understand this sense of purpose and mission around opportunity but for us that has to be internalized. I think about an office visit I made when we could travel to our Southern California office and usually I field a lot of questions during a town hall and at some point I'll turn the situation around and ask people questions and I asked, "Hey, why are here?" but then this woman said, "Hey, I'll share." And she shared with me that she was here because when she was 21 and a single mom, she needed a paycheck and we hired her as a receptionist and now 12 years later, she had moved into three different jobs. She was now in a very healthy, stable relationship and had bought her dream house. For me, that's why we exist. That's what opportunity starts here means. I think there are thousands of stories like that. Now, that's a pretty dramatic one but I'll give you one more because I love telling it. I was in India in November and one of our best recruiters in India is a gentleman named Gokul. Gokul as a rising university student had a virus that took away his eyesight and he ended up in a pretty dark place as he was then trying to find employment after his university experience and through a partnership with Allegis Group and Enable India, we hired Gokul. He went on to become our top recruiter in India. He travels, I want to say 90 minutes through Bengaluru traffic on public transportation every day. He's now been promoted three or four times and to hear Gokul talk about his opportunity is what I think of when I think opportunity starts here but I also think about the people who work with Gokul and how he's completely changed their perception of what's possible and how they've developed empathy as leaders and they've just become better people through the experience. We're so much about purpose and we're so much about helping people realize their potential and what's possible through their experience. That's what opportunity starts here means for me. 

S: Wow. Those are two incredibly powerful and inspiring stories. Thank you for sharing those. That was incredible. Now, thinking about 2020, what has Allegis done to keep the feeling of opportunity alive despite all that the world has been through this year? 

A: Yeah, it's a great question and it's something that as leaders we've had to be really intentional about. When you're not growing and you're contracting some of those stories that I just told about promotion and how people are realizing their dreams, don't become less important, but they feel a little bit out of reach and I think we've had to really focus on what is opportunity during this time and risk being the 7 millionth person to say it. These are unprecedented times and there isn't a playbook for 2020. How we've thought about opportunity has really been informed by first the pandemic and then the protests around racial injustice. Let me hit both those, if that's okay. I think from a pandemic perspective, this virus doesn't discriminate. It doesn't know what your political beliefs are. It doesn't know how much money you have or your race or ethnicity or your gender, but at the same time for us, we have a pretty broad survey of people working in different industries, in different professions and we got to see how while the virus didn't discriminate, there was a really disproportionate impact on populations least able to deal with the kind of shock that was coming to our system. We had lots of people who were dealing with the stressors that are very real and the challenges of picking up on a Friday and working from home on a Monday. We also had thousands of people who were being informed that their job was going to go away for a while or maybe permanently. When you're a company that's so focused on opportunity, we really had to look very closely at what are we doing to help those people. At first it was how are we treating them with a great deal of compassion and empathy as they were going through a really difficult time and frankly, as our teams were going through a really difficult time and I couldn't have been more proud of how our teams really responded and focused on the people who were most impacted. That was first, and then how do we help place them? How do we help find them something? I watched our offices, our company, our regions all rally together with this tremendous sense of purpose. The pandemic I think has really just shed light on how critical that focus on opportunity is and how employment is such an important aspect of hope. It's an important aspect of dignity and purpose for people and we play a really critical role there. Fast forward a little bit, I think we had dealt with some of the initial shock of the pandemic and we're all still working through that but I was really proud of how we had responded and then some of the issues of racial injustice came to light. The George Floyd video being probably that flash point that shined a light on some terrible injustice that was happening in our country and then I think as other countries rallied around this recognized that this was not unique to the United States. This was something that was happening globally. For us I had a really challenging week trying to get my mind around what was happening after the George Floyd video, the Breonna Taylor killing, things like the Ahmaud Arbery, which had happened months before suddenly became a focal point of the discussion. I felt this real sense of frustration and despair. I'm a positive optimistic person and yeah, there are challenges and we're going to overcome them and I think there was a real recognition that there were some fundamental issues where we had not made much progress. I did a lot of listening. I talked to a lot of people and tried to understand as best I could where we were falling short, where I was falling short, what that needed to look like, and like I said, I can't ever feel the full weight of that burden, but I did feel a fair amount of responsibility and despair around that. At some point, I started to recognize that, hey, maybe this is really just the start of a movement and that really these issues which have been around for 400 years in this country and certainly 240 since we said, all men are created equal. Maybe this is the time. This is the time where we need to address them. I started to shift from a feeling of frustration and despair to what can we do? What can I do? And how does opportunity play a part there? How do we help bridge the opportunity divide that's been a part of this challenge that we're all facing? 

S: Yeah. I love that mindset. I think with all the heaviness of this year, between the pandemic, between all the racial injustices, I think taking the negative and trying to turn it into a positive is really inspiring. Thank you for sharing that. When did you first realize that this opportunity divide existed? 

A: Yeah. First, I've been so inspired by other people, so I appreciate you saying that, but I'm probably more trying to amplify voices and ideas that I've heard and maybe a quick comment on that. I was thinking a lot about this. There's a developmental model that says we all start out unconsciously unskilled and we move to consciously unskilled, and then we move to consciously skilled, and then we've got to ultimately get to unconsciously skilled. Relative to this movement for me and for a lot of us, I think this is really just the first step in moving from unconsciously unskilled to maybe consciously unskilled. I want to maybe clarify the early days, but hey, that's an important first step in this journey. You asked, how did I sort of realize this opportunity divide existed? I say I was unconsciously unskilled. I certainly was aware of what was going on, but I grew up in a pretty homogenous place. I grew up in a town outside of Philadelphia and I went to college and I... that was probably when I was really first exposed to difference and that was through the academic course that I was taking. I remember reading Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. I remember taking an African American lit class that exposed me to Ralph Ellison, and Richard Wright, and James Weldon Johnson, and W. E. B. Du Bois, and these really amazing thinkers. I started to maybe awaken to some of the challenges, but it was also a really interesting time. I went to a school that had been not the most diverse place and the school had made a concerted effort to say, hey, we're going to really figure out diversity. I was on a multicultural executive council, and I remember talking to some of my friends from this council about their experience and one of them just said to me, "Hey, I feel like the school's much more interested in cultural visibility than cultural diversity." I said, "Well, what do you mean by that?" He said, "Hey, I was recruited really heavily to come here." This was a really, really sharp gentlemen who probably had his pick of schools and chose Notre Dame, where I went and he said, "Hey, I come here, and I don't feel that welcome. I don't feel like there's a place for me to sit in the dining hall. My dorm doesn't really pull me in. I go into the bookstore and there's no hair care products for me." That might sound like a simple thing, but that's such a symbolic thing and so for me, I started to realize that not everybody was born on third base and that this was something that was more than an academic exercise that cultural diversity was... and now I think we talk about diversity versus inclusion as maybe that distinction that he was making some 30 years ago, but I started to really understand maybe that this was a bigger deal than I had maybe understood. 

S: Wow. That's pretty impactful. How did that realization change you? 

A: I guess for me, Sara, the... and this is maybe the model I can think of now. Like up through high school, education's about individuation. It's about how do we... I'm sorry. It's about socialization. It's about how do we teach you the things you need to function and succeed and then once you get to college, it's about individuation and you start to really, I think, find who you are and what you believe. For me, as I was finishing up college, I didn't know what I wanted to do, but I had this sense of duty and obligation to serve and I think it was because of conversations like that, that I had had with this gentleman and my experience up until that point. I remember going to a volunteer fair, and I was going to go do the Peace Corps somewhere, or a Jesuit Volunteer Corps or something along those lines. I met a gentleman named Chris Karpinsky and he represented this organization called Boys Hope, and I'm walking to different booths and I said, "All right, what does Boys Hope do?" And he said, "Hey, we find these amazing kids who have all the potential in the world, who could do just about anything, but their circumstance or their situation is likely blocking them from achieving their potential and we need people to come as volunteers and live in group homes and houses where these scholars would come live and help them realize their potential." That conversation right there so struck me as this is what I want to do. This is what I need to do. This is how I can give back and I can feel like I'm maybe helping someone else realize the same opportunities that I was afforded and didn't realize it when I was the fish in the water. I probably was this wide-eyed idealistic person. I got put in a house outside of Akron, Ohio. Most of the kids were from either Cleveland or a few from Akron and it was really hard. I was leaving 8,000 people who were about my age. We were having a great time and suddenly I'm alone with eight teenage boys. I'm 22 years old. 

S: Oh, wow. 

A: I'm supposed to be their parent, I'm cooking, I'm teaching, I'm working with them on their homework and I realized that this was pretty tough, and they didn't accept me. They pushed me away pretty quickly and gave me a really hard time and I just kind of said, "All right, I got to suck it up. I can do this for a year. That's why I'm here." That fall the boys went trick or treating. They were seventh through 10th grade at that point. I don't think all of them went trick or treating. I didn't go with them. They were old enough. I didn't need to walk around the neighborhood with them. About a half hour into their trick or treating, a neighbor called and said, "Hey, a bunch of people in the neighborhood are calling and are worried because they see these kids walking through the neighborhood that don't belong." I can't remember what the phrase was, but that was the feeling and I thought, "They're trick or treating. What do you want them to do? It's October 31st. That's what kids do." That was a bit of a wakeup call for me that while I had been this wide-eyed idealist, and now I was feeling like a victim and poor me was living in this house. It was a real wakeup call that I didn't fully understand what they were dealing with and it wasn't just about giving them access to this education. It was this burden that they were carrying, and it was the way people were looking at them. If that decision changed my life, I'm still very involved in that. I met my wife through that program. 

S: Nice. 

A: I still stay connected to some of those kids. It's certainly changed the way I've seen the world. 

S: Wow. That's again, another very impactful story. Thank you for sharing that. As you've shared these stories about privilege and opportunity, how do you connect that to the subject of talent? 

A: Makes sense you'd go there since this is called Subject to Talent. We're in the jobs business and as you asked me earlier about opportunity, we're in the opportunity business, so is there a more fundamental way to help people and help our country and our world move from a state of inequality to one where there's a equality to ultimately equity to justice then really addressing something so fundamental as access to opportunity, access to skills and that job that is so central to dignity and purpose. That's how I connected and that's where we've really tried to figure out how do we have a voice in that, and how do we really focus and redouble our efforts on bridging that opportunity divide in that world of employment. 

S: Yeah, and in really trying to move the needle, what do you see today that's not really working relative to access to jobs and opportunities? 

A: Yeah, gosh. There's a lot that works. I think we have so many examples of people who are thriving from all walks of life but there is clearly bias. There is an unconscious bias in the way we hire, the way we promote, the way we dole out assignments, and part of moving from that unconsciously unskilled to consciously unskilled is recognizing and acknowledging that there's bias and that bias isn't inherently bad. We have to compartmentalize things and figure out how we can make quick decisions to move forward but when it's disproportionately impacting certain groups, certain races, certain ethnicities, genders, et cetera, that's when we have a problem. It starts with how do we surface and recognize that bias, when and how do we slow down our thinking and making sure that we're mitigating bias when and where we can. There's lots of smart people who are doing some amazing work relative to those biases, but it starts there. Beyond that, I think about the way that we hire, and I'm filled with stories, Sara. I'll- 

S: I think your stories are great. Keep going. 

A I'll tell you one and this is going to take us down a little bit of a different path, but there's a gentleman that I've come to know who's become a friend who is a really inspiring leader in the inclusion movement. He's really focused his energy on inclusion in India as well as inclusion in the autism community. He has a son with autism... on the autism spectrum. His name is VR Ferose. He was explaining to me how he looks at the hiring process and said every hiring process that you have is screening for social skills, visual cues. Are you able to make eye contact? Are you able to connect with the person that you're interviewing? As well as the ability to demonstrate how you're going to function really well in a team. He said, "Andy, my son will never get a job if those are the criteria, because that's not what he does well, but he does some things incredibly well and given the right opportunity and given focus on his strengths, I promise you he'll outperform 99% of the people, but we've created a process that's going to exclude him." I think about that unconscious bias, which is much more of a decision-making paradigm, but I also think about how do we focus on people's strengths? How do we rethink the resume? Right now we've automated a process that's matching keywords or experience and filtering out people who don't meet very specific criteria and that has probably saved lots of time and has served a lot of good things and I'm not proposing that we do away with that, but how do we think about the and there and how do we understand what people do really, really well and put them in a position to win. 

A: Those are some pretty systemic issues that are just in the way that we hire, and we have to address them. We have to think differently about the talent that we have coming in if we really want to be inclusive and we want to bridge this opportunity divide. 

S: Yeah. I love that concept of the and, not just what we've historically focused on with a set of skills or the buzz words you said that we're looking for in a resume, but also looking at the person and the opportunity that could be out there for them, because there's probably so much untapped talent that we're not even thinking about right now. That really resonated with me when you talked about that. 

A: Yeah. Just back to my story, I'm an English in creative writing master's degree with an English in philosophy undergrad. There's no way anyone would have found me through some automated matching system to have had this experience. Frankly, most of the people that I know that I really think have done some pretty amazing things, they're not leveraging what they learned in university. They're learning on the job and they're willing to throw themselves in there and figure stuff out. I mean, you're an example of that. Somehow, some way we've got to build that into the way that we access talent and we give people access to opportunity and that's part of that shift from equality to equity. Equality is, hey, we've got to treat everyone the same and equity gets to fairness and how can we really shine a light on people's unique talents and put them in a position to win. 

S: Yeah. I love it. I think it's great. How do you see the current focus on upskilling helping to bridge this divide? 

A: Yeah, it's an interesting question and I'll answer it maybe with a broader aperture first. We've talked a lot, or I've talked a lot about 2020 and some of the challenges. The upskilling and reskilling is an issue, was an issue that is going to dramatically affect the future of work and the global economy period. Forget 2020. 2020 aside, that's a macro trend. The reality is there's a lot of concern about, is automation going to go kill jobs? And the answer is, yes. It's going to kill jobs and it's going to create a lot of jobs. By most estimations and the ones that I certainly buy into, it's going to create more than it kills, but do we have the people who are ready to take on those jobs? Upskilling is part of addressing that digital skills gap. It's part of recognizing that we all have to invest there as individuals, as companies, as countries, as a world. It's also a recognition that our educational system is really not built for the digital world. That the... I can't take credit for this quote, but I love it. It's from the founder of Degreed. Somebody asked him about education, and he said, hey, the usual answer about your education is you go back and tell the story of where you went to college or graduate school or high school or wherever. He said that would be like somebody asking you about your health and fitness, and you saying, "Well, I ran a marathon in 1990." It's not that relevant right now and somehow, we've created this binary system. I believe upskilling and reskilling and really focusing on these assignment based views of the world is part of the solution as we think about bridging that overall digital skills divide and it's certainly part of the solution when we think about bridging that opportunity divide that we've talked about, that's really come into focus in 2020. 

S: Yeah. How is Allegis responding to stay ahead? 

A: It's a great question. Allegis has been around for 37 years. Our hallmark has been that focus on people and culture and opportunity, but I would also tell you we've prided ourselves on being the best in the world at finding talent. I think there's been a clear awakening to the idea that finding talent is not enough right now and we need to be in the talent building business as well. Some of that comes from the way that we're partnering in the community. Each of our businesses is really focused on workforce development from a CSR perspective and it certainly makes sense in the community but it also makes sense from a long-term business projection to say, "How do we not just access talent but build it." We've also been incubating a business career circle, which I'm really, really excited about, and that business started really with a premise that we ought to be in this upskilling reskilling conversation and we need to be able to access talent that we're not finding today because the matching of the resume and the job description isn't working and there's a population that needs to bridge this divide. We're doing a whole lot there, and then each of our businesses is solving it in their own way for their unique markets. 

S: Yeah. No, that's great. I love that. What advice would you have for someone who's trying to reinvent themselves and has committed to a career change? 

Andy H: Yeah, it's a question I think I would answer differently now than I did a year ago. Some of that is... I've read a couple of different books and really started to embrace some of the ideas around habits, because the old conventional wisdom would be, you need motivation. You need a goal, start there and then work backwards and say, hey, I want to become a solution architect. I want to become a Java developer. I want to become a brain surgeon, whatever it is. Now what do I have to do to do that, and maybe with a lot of time not traveling this year, I've been able to dive in deeper on some topics, but habit forming has been one of them. There's a couple books, one called Atomic Habits by James Clear and another called Tiny Habits by BJ Fogg that have probably changed my perspective on this, and what they would say, what Clear would say is don't start with that goal or that motivation. Start with your identity. I'm the kind of person who is going to be a lifelong learner, and I'm the kind of person who's going to commit every day to getting a little bit better until I'm well-suited to take on a different role. So, anyone who's thinking about a career change, I think it starts with establishing that sense of identity. Here's the kind of person who I am, and then really focusing on that tiny habit. Every morning after I wake up, I'm going to read two pages. I'm going to commit to one class or five minutes of online training, whatever it is, and to me, that's the building block or the start towards really being a relentless learner. I know Carol Dweck's done all the work on fixed mindset versus growth mindset. A growth mindset wins every day, and we need relentless learners. That's what's going to win today and tomorrow. The other advice I'd say is one about perseverance. No means not yet. You're likely going to get frustrated. You're going to find that you feel like you're ready for that next job and it's not coming. That's okay. Look at that as a learning experience. Figure out how you're going to persevere through that, and good things will happen and lastly, take that assignment mentality. Everything is an assignment and if you really approach things, even the most arduous of tasks or roles as, hey, this is a chance to learn and get better and figure out how I can continue to grow, I think those are the building blocks that will allow somebody to do almost anything in terms of making a pivot and a shift in their career. 

S: Yeah. That's great. What about the people who maybe want to make a change, but they're not quite there yet from a skillset standpoint. What advice would you give them?  

Andy H: There's an old Sheryl Sandberg commencement speech. where she just challenged, I think it was a high school graduating class in California where she said, "Hey, what would you do today if you weren't afraid?" To me, it's take the risk. There's a lot of research about regrets people have and it's rarely about something that you did, it's about what you chose not to do. Somebody who's thrust into that situation, be it a student, approach it with a beginner's mind, read about it, ask smart people, watch videos, take a class, but immerse yourself in there and set yourself up to win. If we all waited until we were fully ready, I don't think a whole lot would happen. I think the world's filled with people who took some risks and figured it out and unfortunately back to some of those unconscious biases, I don't know that we've always encouraged people in equal ways to take risks. I think it's my responsibility and our responsibility on the other side of that to really tap people and push them to do things that maybe they're not comfortable with and I would encourage everyone to be a little bolder in taking that chance, and trust me things work out. 

S: Yeah. No, that's great advice and I completely agree. Without taking risks, there aren't... there are rewards that come after it, right? And it's so important to continue to push people out of their comfort zone. Being challenged, I feel is the best way to grow and to learn. Really, really good advice there. Thanks. What should companies do to address the opportunity divide? 

A: Yeah. I've probably touched on a little bit of this with some of the thoughts on unconscious bias, training and awareness, as well as how we need to rethink hiring process and approach, but maybe even before we get there I mentioned the gentleman who leads an inclusion movement in India. I had a chance to appear on a panel last year at this inclusion summit and I pulled together some of our smartest most thoughtful D and I leaders and asked their advice because I was going to represent the corporate perspective for folks. The first word and several people said it was, you have to be intentional. You have to be intentional. To me, intentionality is the start. From there, what do you have to be intentional about? Some of it is about ensuring that this opportunity divide and bridging this opportunity divide and focusing on things like bias are on the top of the agenda. I had a fear, have a fear that the conversation that started, and it was a conversation that was in motion, but really picked up a lot of steam after the George Floyd killing and video would run the risk of taking a back seat as the 24 hour news cycle and our attention span took us to whatever the next challenge is. You have to be intentional. You've got to be able to have tough courageous conversations. You've got to encourage people to speak their truth and speak truth to power. Some of it starts there. I go back to challenge your hiring criteria, figure out how you invest in people and recognize that your hierarchy is not your hierarchy. The reality is everyone is on an assignment. Everyone is on this journey to figure out how do I realize my potential, and how do you create a lattice work that allows people to take on those assignments, and how do you allow people to really learn average their strength? That intentionality could show up in building apprenticeship programs. It could show up in the way that you're thinking differently about accessing all talents, but in the end, you've got to have people be their authentic self and if you're not creating an environment where people can be their authentic self you're not going to bridge that opportunity divide. I feel so strongly that that is a baseline for everything that we do. You cannot be a leader in this company if you're not an inclusive leader, period, end of story. 

Sara B: I completely agree. All right, the last question I have for you today, are you optimistic about our ability as a nation and as a world to bridge the opportunity divide? 

Andy H: Yeah. This goes back to how I felt a few months ago when I was not optimistic. I was really struggling, as I said, with what felt like either no progress or very glacial progress. I've definitely turned a corner. There's a concept in biology called punctuated equilibrium and it's this idea that we think of evolution as this really gradual process and there's these mutations and over the course of millennium or centuries millennium there's this gradual change. What really happens is usually there's some event that interrupts stasis, so things are kind of moving in a fairly static way or not moving. They're pretty static, and suddenly there's a lot of change. You go back, I don't know how many years, but an asteroid hits the earth and it completely changes the role of mammals and dinosaurs and dinosaurs go away and all that stuff. I've started to look at this time as a time of punctuated equilibrium. Frankly, if we don't bridge this opportunity divide, I would have grave concerns about the future of our race, not to be too dramatic, but you talk about the digital skills. You talk about the common humanity that we all share and I just think, "Hey, it's the only way we both survive and thrive." Is we address these fundamental systemic issues that are really plaguing us and plaguing our future. I go back to that idea that we're still early in that journey and it's sad and frustrating that we're this early in the journey, but we've moved from that unconsciously unskilled to that consciously unskilled level. I choose to think of that in the Jim Collins flywheel sense that change really happens when you get the flywheel moving. With intentionality and with commitment that flywheel is going to get moving faster and we're going to make lots of mistakes. I'm going to make lots of mistakes but I love the Nelson Mandela quote, where he says, "Hey, I never lose. I either win or I learn." As long as we have that mindset, we're going to learn. We're going to get better and we're going to win. I know I have a lot of learning to do. We have a lot of learning to do, but we will bridge this divide and I put my head on the pillow feeling such confidence that we've got so many brilliant people out there who can lead this charge that we need to get out of the way, listen to, amplify their voices, connect with, and I'm incredibly optimistic about our future. 

S: Wow. That's great Andy. I do want to say I've learned a lot from you today. I really appreciate your time and sharing your stories and your vulnerability has been fantastic. Thanks for joining me today. 

AL Yeah. Thanks so much Sara. This was a lot of fun. I really appreciate it. 

S:Absolutely. 

A: Take care. 

S: Yep. You too. 

F: Thank you for listening today. We want to thank you Andy for joining us on Subject to Talent. If you would like to learn more about Allegis Group please visit allegisgroup.com If you have any questions for Andy or Sara free to tweet @allegisglobal or @allegis_group with the #SubjectToTalent. Also, you can email us at SubjectToTalent@allegisglobalsolutions.com If you enjoyed our podcast today subscribe, rate us, and leave a review. Until next time! Cheers!