Ep.37. Finding Meaning at Work – How to Manifest Your Way to Deeper Connections

Heather Walker: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Lead with Levity podcast. I’m your Host, Dr. Heather Walker, and I have forgotten how to dress myself. It’s true.

It’s very true. This year has a really done a number on style. I don’t know that I was fashionable all that fashionable before, but I’m definitely not fashionable these days. And that is not the best news. I mean, this month has been bananas and honestly, who am I kidding this whole year has been bananas. And I want to take a moment just to thank you for tuning in. We all want a little bit more levity in our lives. And this podcast is designed to help you build a foundation that supports a fun work environment, where your people know that they’re valued. And I hope that you’re getting some value yourself from our guests. And if you are, please let us know by sharing a quick review. That kind of thing lets me and my team knows that we’re on the right track. So, we really do appreciate that. Today’s guest is Briana Hawkins. She’s young, ambitious, and full of great ideas for bringing the fun back to your function.

She is to lead the happy crew at zoom and now graces the finance tech startup Built with her expertise. Here’s a highlight from today’s conversation.  

Briana Hawkins: [00:01:26] Take time to yourself, to you know, figure things out for yourself. That was the first point in my life. That I realized I wanted to support a happy, healthy workplace because I don’t just want to be a part of the fun times. I want to be able to be there for colleagues and employees during not the best times as well, because work is like our second home. We’re there eight hours of the day. The thing is after experiencing the workplace that was not so happy or healthy that kind of a wake-up call for me. I know personally felt a feeling of being drained and undervalued and that feeling transferred into you know, the amount of passion that I had for the work, what I was doing and I’m observing. So, I also listened to how it impacted other employees and, you know, just through conversation and just by talking to others, there was a lot of burnout, lack of trust and a very high turnover rate. And then even a step further, I started to understand that creating a happy and healthy workplace is not rocket science.

Heather Walker: [00:02:57] Welcome back to the Lead with Levity Podcast, I’m your host Dr. Heather Walker, and I’m happy to have Briana Hawkins with me today. Briana is the executive partner to the CEO, as well as some other leaders at Built Technologies in Nashville, Tennessee. So, you’re about to hear some super Southern accents from both of us, which is going to be super fun. Briana, welcome to the show.

Briana Hawkins: [00:03:23]Thank you for having me here. I’m so excited for this.

Heather Walker: [00:03:26] Awesome. Can you tell me a little bit about Built Technologies? I’ve really, until I connected with you. I hadn’t heard of y’all. So, what is Built Technologies all about?

Briana Hawkins: [00:03:36] Yeah, for sure. So, Built is based in Nashville, Tennessee, and it is the leading provider of construction, finance technology. And we focused on using technology to improve the flow of money throughout the construction industry. We work with lender owners and construction companies to help them with capital planning, payments and making sure that money goes into the job site as planned.

Heather Walker: [00:03:59] Cool. How do people get started with you?

Briana Hawkins: [00:04:02] If you follow our social media page, that’s a really big way because, we post tons of updates. We share how to sign up for demos and signing up for a demo would be the first step, that way you can see how the technology works. You can kind of get a visual representation of how the product can actually help your industry or your company. So, if you go to our LinkedIn page, you can go to our, about section or you can also just go to our posts, click on a demo, and somebody will reach out to you and we’ll be happy to help.

 Heather Walker: [00:04:33] Okay, then how big do you have to be for someone to work with Built?

Briana Hawkins: [00:04:40] Built is for anyone that needs help with getting that money, move to where it needs to go. Oh, you don’t have to be a certain size. You don’t have to be, have a certain amount of employees, you don’t have to have a certain amount of sites, it’s for anyone that needs help or management with that capital planning or those payments.

Heather Walker: [00:05:00] Do y’all hear that they want to help you move that money to where it needs to go.

Briana Hawkins: [00:05:04] For sure.

Heather Walker: [00:05:05] We know where it needs to go. Y’all so, okay, that’s really helpful. And, do, y’all lend money.

Briana Hawkins: [00:05:15] We do not, we do not lend money; we just help the lenders, make sure their money. Gets moved where it’s supposed to be, so we’re if I can put an example to it or if I can put a visual towards it, we don’t lend the money. We don’t allow people to borrow money for us. We’re just the ones that manage on where it needs to go. So, we make sure, it gets to the person on time; we make sure we reduce the amount of time that it takes for projects to get done, if that makes sense but, we don’t touch any money. We don’t land any money and we’re not the source of where people can get the money from for those projects.

Heather Walker: [00:06:00] Okay. So, do you do more project management services? Is that more accurate?

Briana Hawkins: [00:06:06] Yes, that’s a lot more accurate. It’s a system that allows all parties to see where the project is going. So, if you are a lender or if you are a contractor, you will be able to go into this plat form, see where the project lies, see where the money is going as well as for those that need liens. You will be able to send those liens off faster. You’ll be able to send those payments off faster, rather than waiting for that typical process without technology

Heather Walker: [00:06:38] Interesting. Okay. Thank you. I just learned something new. Thank you. How did you get into this?

Briana Hawkins: [00:06:45] So, I really truly enjoy working for technology startups and I was at zoom video communications first. And then, after they went public and they make their big deputy to the world, I went over to Build Technologies, because I just truly believed in their product. I loved their mission. I love what they stand for. And since I do really, truly enjoy working for startups, that kind of was just the cherry on the cake, and I wasn’t in the city at first one, are there, recruiters had reached out to me on LinkedIn actually, and after I interviewed with everyone, I loved it, relocated to Nashville and I’ve been happy ever since.

Heather Walker: [00:07:22] Wow. Yeah. I don’t know how old you are, you seem very young to me, and I don’t know if it’s because you’re young at heart or you’re literally young. I’m just wondering how did you get into the place where now I’m executive partner to the CEO, because honestly you’re like in your twenties or something, did you do that.

Briana Hawkins: [00:07:47] I’m 27 years old, so you’re right. I’m very young, and I am a person that believes in following your spirit. And honestly how all of this happened, it kind of just molded. So, it was a part of my journey, but when I went to zone, I was the office manager and executive partner there, and that’s where I learned that I honestly love assisting different types of executives. And then I kind of just made goes to get to a certain point. I believe in manifestation, and when I was working on relocating to Nashville, I made a manifestation board in manifestation board. I had to be an executive partner to a CEO of a tech star a month later. This is when Ashley, which is the recruiter from Built reached out to me and everything kind of just aligned perfectly. And then I did study, communications and undergrad, and I’m working on a brand communications and communications leadership degree for my master’s at Drake. So, I just kind of it was placed in my lap. I would like to say, or it was meant for me before I even knew it, and then I just continued to take small steps and small goals to get to the end goal that I wanted for myself. So, that’s how I ended up being an executive partner to the CEO of Built.

Heather Walker: [00:09:00] So, and how big is Built?

Briana Hawkins: [00:09:03]We have 130 employees right now, so we’re still very small.

Heather Walker: [00:09:06] Yeah. Yeah. And tell me about this manifestation board. What does that look like? Are you cause you’re like, I set it up. I went into, I went home, I made my manifestation board and then a month later it happened. So, we all would like in, on this magic that you have, can you please share.

Briana Hawkins: [00:09:27] So, I make a manifestation, but every single of a year, and if there’s something, if I have a big vision for myself and it’s not around the time where I do make that bore, I’ll just make another one. But basically, I put everything that I would like to see for myself on, that board I’ll put financial goals, career goals, personal goals, small goals from how I would like my fashion to look all the way down to the type of car that I would like to have. And I believe in everything that I put on that board. They say that what you think you are, so as I’m making the book, I’m saying positive affirmations, I’m telling myself this will happen, and I am believing that it’s not the impossible, and as long as I keep that positivity, keep that mindset about myself and my board. I find myself being guided and directed towards things on that board, as long as I believe in the board and myself.

Heather Walker: [00:10:22] I love that you live your life with intentionality and it seems like, you would even take that intentionality into the roles that you play at zoom, or even now, working at Built Technology. So, when you come into an organization, you start a new job and you’re like, okay, I’m here. I manifested this, this is for me, I’m here, I got my office, I’m ready to go. How do you start to think about how you’re going to make an impact? Where do you start?

Briana Hawkins: [00:10:58] Yes, that’s a great question. I love it. I first learned the company from front to back, I take time to meet everyone, learn what the roles are, learn the product, learn the brand, their communication style, everything you can possibly think of. I don’t just learn the specifics in my role, I learned a company I would like to say as an entire book. So, I want to know every single chapter of Built or at any company that I would, that I joined then after I get a feel of the company’s culture and skeleton, I then study the corporate structure, because that corporate structure will show me who the decision makers are, the type of behaviors that are encourage, it just shows me how things move with that structure. Then after I gather all that, I put it into this ball and I then study myself, What are my talents? What are my strengths? What are my skills? And, how can I apply that to how this company is?

[00:12:00] Because, once I go to a company, I have to adapt to that company’s culture. And once I saw that out, I make a plan. What do I want to do? Who do I want to work with? Who do I want to help? And then, I communicate with my manager, so that way my manager knows these are my talents, these are the areas that I will love to help in. And I go from there and that’s why I love working for startups because going to a startup they’re improving every day. They’re changing every day. They’re not; they’re not willing to stick with the status quo. They want to be innovative. So when I go to startups, there’s going to be so many areas that I can touch on that I can play with and use my talents to strengthen that area.

Heather Walker: [00:12:45] Oh, I love that. And one thing that I caught on is I have to adapt to that culture. And here, on our podcast, on the Lead, what Levity podcast, and by our, I mean like me, myself, all my feelings, all my listeners.

[00:13:00] where we care about creating a happy, healthy, and fun culture. So, I kind of, you know, little spoiler alert y’all this is really cool. Briana used to be on the happy crew, for zoom, and we’re recording this on zoom right now so, we’re geeking out on zoom. But my question to you, Briana, is what do you think contributes to a happy, healthy, fun culture?

Briana Hawkins: [00:13:26] That’s a great question and it’s odd or not necessarily odd, but the reason why I love the question so much is because, that is not things that people usually think of, and, sometimes people think that happy, healthy, fun culture involves ping pong tables or decorations in an office or a coffee machine, and you know, that most definitely plays a part in it. But, you have to really look at the core of a happy, healthy, fun culture.  You have to look at the core of the company, which are the employees, so I would say that.  A few things that will contribute to a happy, healthy culture is a sense of understanding.  That way you can understand who you’re working with, how employees feel, what they would like to see, how do they even see what a fun, happy culture is because of fun, happy culture? I Built our employees may see a definitely then what your employees see it, so just understand or employees and understanding what they would like to see.

Second thing, I would say is open-mindedness and I say that because you have to be willing to take suggestions and advice from employees, they will tell you exactly what the company needs. Exactly what will make them have a fun time, we just have to be willing to take that advice and apply it.

Apparently, trust and loyalty, there is no way that you can have a happy, healthy, fun culture without trust and loyalty. Trust and loyalty will take anything basic to, just amazing ball of amazingness, trust and loyalty that’s what we’ll, help those employees who are comfortable with sharing with people, what we want, what we like to see. And then, that loyalty piece goes into people, working to bring the happy and healthy, and fun culture to the company. It takes more than one person. It takes more than leadership. It takes more than head of people and culture. It takes the company as a whole, so that loyalty piece will help everyone drive a healthy, happy, fun culture in the workplace.

And then lastly, celebrating wins, and when I say celebrating wins, I’m not just referring to closing your quarterly numbers or, getting a number one client that we’ve worked hard for, or, you know, hitting all of our KPIs, celebrating wins as individuals. If somebody gets married and someone has a baby, as someone graduates from school, but also wins outside of business things like, “Hey, we finished our office build out” or “We have a new C-suite leader” let’s celebrate this, just celebrating and creating that family dynamic within the company.

Heather Walker: [00:16:13] I’ve been toying around with all of these different concepts and crowd sourcing. The fun is something I completely believe in because if you leave it up to one person, they’ll Built. Put something together, but it might not be the something that anyone else wants to participate in, so I’ve seen that happen and you’re right. Your employees know exactly what it is that’s going to help them in this particular case and so being able to kind of go back and be willing to listen and take that advice and take the feedback is really important.  You’ve been able to work at some tech, startups and tech startups are known for really just out there odd, strange, but also very fun and different kinds of activities and things like that. What are maybe some different ideas that you’ve just kind of picked up over the years that maybe you can share with our listeners?

Briana Hawkins: [00:17:17] Yes, of course. So, I’m going to touch on virtual events first, because I know during COVID and these crazy times we’ve been in 2020. I know it is a challenge to think of, well, how can we still drive employee engagement during this time? How can we prevent zoom, fatigue? How can we still keep people, you know, feeling like that we’re all in the same space, so some ideas or some things that we’ve done on Built Strong. We’ve had a virtual spirit week. Well, you know, Monday may have been sports Jersey day. Tuesday may have been beach day. Wednesday was, Built Brand Day. And what we’ve done is we’ve all come together, take a photo, share a fun fact about each other so that we can still feel like we’re a part of a team we’ve done virtual escape rooms. We’re doing a virtual Categories game in October, and we’ve even done virtual lunches where we’ve allowed people to just join the zoom meeting from 12 to 12, from 12 to one, and during that time, you can eat lunch with your coworkers, talk, have conversation and get your mind off work for a little bit.

[00:19:00] So, the virtual events are the most challenging, but they’re also the. They’re very hard to do. They’re very hard to lead, host everything in the sun, but I’ve saw in learned that they’re the most appreciated, especially during this time. So, for anyone that can just think of a virtual happy hour or virtual hangman, think of anything that you can possibly do, bring it to zoom, or any type of virtual tool that you use and still try to create that teamwork team building dynamic. It’s my favorite thing to do, and its most definitely made a difference at Built and then some things outside of virtual events and bring your parents to work day. Everyone’s heard of it, bring it to Workday, but rarely I’ve ever heard of finger parents to Workday, which is simply awesome.

Of course, you have your typical holiday parties, holiday happy hours, celebrating, starting types of causes, breast cancer awareness , we have the blood drives, we do some community initiatives, and then one of my other favorite things I would say is cultural events. We love to do our eyelid to do events that teaches people about different culture.

So, to Wylie black history month, you know, we may celebrate, Hanukkah or different types of things just to start out showing employees what is like to be in someone else’s shoes and give them a taste of someone else’s culture, which overall will contribute to the company’s culture.

Heather Walker: [00:19:50] That’s really good examples, I’ve never heard bring your parents to Workday, I’ve never heard of that. Never heard of that at all, but it, it makes a lot of sense if you’re able to like, maybe if you live with your parents or if they’re interested in. You know what, I keep forgetting that we live in a virtual world now and they could just log in, they don’t have to come to your house. Yeah, then bring your parents to work day was probably one of my most favorite events to plan, that was something that zoom introduced me to, but it was simply amazing to see how happy people’s parents were to see where their kids worked, give them a taste of the product they got the chance to hear leadership’s plans for Zoom. It was amazing and we actually did it a neck the second year in a row, we did it two years in a row and I’m pretty sure they probably still do it now, not currently because of COVID, but it was such a lovely event that it became a tradition for Zoom to continue to do that.

[00:21:00] Interesting. So, are you finding opportunities to bring that same kind of energy and, different ideas to Built Strong or Built Technologies?

Briana Hawkins: [00:20:59] Yes. Most definitely, the thing I love about Built is they’re always open for something different. They’re always open to ideas and being creative and, it’s a great, it kind of what kind of bombarded on it a little bit is the COVID happened because Built Strong was just launched in May of this year. So, right now we’re having to adapt to what , we’re currently experiencing, but we’re hoping that once all this is over, we can pick up our in person events back up, but I’m first  for sure able to take what I learned from other companies to Built and then, I have a colleague, Alicia, she used to be pretty amazing.

[00:22:00]She also has her own experience that she brings, and with both of us together, we’re able to create an amazing dynamic, it most definitely wouldn’t be where it is, which is to me or just her. We both bring different experiences, different culture, experiences, different thoughts, views, and perceptions, and bring that together to Built Strong.

 Heather Walker: [00:22:01] I can’t even imagine, what has it been like opening in the midst of the pandemic?

Briana Hawkins: [00:22:08] It’s been very interesting. I also say it was most definitely something that wasn’t expected, but I will say that it’s caused Alicia and I to think more creative. We’ve, being able to, you know, where we’ve been forced to kind of think outside of the box, because we didn’t want Built Strong to go on pause just because we’re not in an office. And then, we also realized that this is actually the time where employees need Built Strong. The most, this is where, we made me a group of people, to plan events and, to bring us together, so, it’s most definitely been challenging, but having a team of people to work with, like our executive sponsor for is the head of people in culture, which , he has a lot of experience in other areas that Alicia and I may not even touch on, but we all kind of work together, to figure out what is best for us at this time.

[00:23:00]What is the event unexpected time? You know, what are people saying? How can we solve certain problems that people would like to see and use to Built Strong for them? But, it’s probably been one of my most favorite experiences awesome it’s teaching me how to adapt to things that are unexpected and different.

Heather Walker: [00:23:19] So, just to clarify, for our listeners cause, I think I got confused and maybe someone else’s confused at some point, so there’s Built technologies, which is the company and then Built Strong is a committee inside the company that’s dedicated to putting on awesome events for employees.

Briana Hawkins: [00:23:38] Right.

Heather Walker: [00:23:39] Okay, cool. When did you come to the realization that you want to support or that you wanted to support happy, healthy workplaces?

Briana Hawkins: [00:23:48] That is a great question, I don’t think people really often sit, or at least me, I haven’t really ever sat and thought about what caused me to want to do what I do.

[00:24:00]  But ,I will say there’s been two main things that have that I’ve experienced, that’s caused me to realize that this is, what I want to take part in, and the first thing is when I saw how much of an impact I was able to make when my colleagues are not going through the best of times. And when I say that, you know, everyone, we’re human, there’s things come up in our life, in our personal lives that can become a distraction. It can be hard for us to come to work in our 100% best.

It can be hard for us to focus when our mind is so full of personal situations. No, one’s perfect. No, one’s life is perfect, so, being able to be that person that still can put a smile on colleague’s face when they’re going through tough times at home. And, we had a program where we send flowers or baked goods, or just a token of support if someone has a family loss or if they’re hospitalized or if there’s a natural disaster.

[00:25:00] And, some of our employees were involved in that seeing how much my colleagues appreciate it. A simple note, a card, a cupcake delivered to their door with on the behalf of the entire company, just letting them know we’re here for you, we support you. Don’t worry about work, we have everything under control. Take time to yourself, to, you know, figure things out for yourself. That was the first point in my life that I realized I wanted to support a happy, healthy workplace because, I don’t just want to be a part of the fun times. I want to be able to be there for colleagues and employees during “not the best times” as well, because work is like our second home. We’re there, eight hours of the day.

The second thing is, after experiencing the workplace that was not so happy or healthy those, kind of a wake up call for me. I know personally felt a feeling of being drained and undervalued and that feeling transferred into, the amount of passion that I had for the work, what I was doing and I’m observing.

[00:26:00] So, I also listened to how it impacted other employees and, you know, just through conversation and just by talking to others, there was a lot of burnout, lack of trust and a very high turnover rate. And then even a step further, I started to understand that creating a happy and healthy workplace is not rocket science.

It may be a that type of environment, you know, that is a skill so I realized that, you know, feeling what it feels like hearing, how others feel, but also knowing that there may be people who want to create that environment, but just don’t know how I realized that this is the place that I want to be this is for me.

Heather Walker: [00:26:39]You found your passion?

Briana Hawkins: [00:26:40] I did. I most definitely did. I love it a lot.

Heather Walker: [00:26:43]That’s awesome. Is there anything else that you want to share with our listeners today? You’ve already dropped a lot. I feel like I am going to have to transcribe and kind of list out all of the different strategies and tips that they can try.

Briana Hawkins: [00:26:59] Yeah. I would end it with saying, if you’re someone that’s trying to build a happy culture or trying to prove a culture or, you know, just even trying to take the steps to get there. I will always recommend that people become empathetic and try your best. I know, this is really for leaders. I know it’s really challenging, to step outside of business strategies and plans and initiatives and KPIs and numbers, especially during the times that you’re in. But ,sometimes even if it’s just once a month, take some time out of your day and just to think about how does the people at the company feel, how can I empathize with them?

How can I feel for them? What can we do better to create some type of action to where they feel comfortable here and want to be here every single day. And if you can, you know, put a lot into your employees, put a lot into the people of the organization, it will have a long-term benefit that [00:28:00] you very, very proud and impressed of

Heather Walker: [00:28:04] Oh wise words! Briana, you make me proud and hopeful for the next generation. You really do. I want to thank you. I want to thank you for coming onto the show, and for sharing your wisdom, sharing your experiences with us. And if anyone is interested in learning more about Built Technologies or getting in touch with Briana directly, you can access the links in the show notes. Have a great day!