Jen Hamilton (00:21)
Okay, today my guest is Camille. Camille, I'm so excited to have you on our show today. Welcome!
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (00:28)
Thank you, I'm excited to be here, Jen.
Jen Hamilton (00:30)
This is gonna be good, it's gonna be fun. All right, let's start with some playful conversation around getting to know you. And I have some questions that I wanna find out about your own superpowers. So the first thing is, if we pull back your cape, what's something unexpected we learn about?
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (00:47)
Well, you'd have to go back a few years, but I used to be a new wave addict. So I had my nose pierced, my hair was purple, I had a mohawk at one point. So I bring a little diversity and appearance to my history. Now I'm all conservative
Jen Hamilton (01:04)
you
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (01:05)
and stuff, which is no fun. But hey, you know, you've got to have a past. You've got to have a colored history of some sort.
Jen Hamilton (01:10)
I love it.
Jen Hamilton (01:11)
I love it. What was your favorite band?
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (01:14)
I went all over the place, but I love David Bowie.
Jen Hamilton (01:17)
yeah, hard to go wrong with them. How fun, I would not have guessed that. I love that little fun fact about you. All right, let's talk about those, we're sidekicks, right? Who are our visionary heroes? So for you in particular, what type of visionary heroes do you like to be a sidekick to and that you just love to work with?
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (01:38)
I love working with people that see the value in their people. Somebody that really takes everybody at the expertise they bring. Everybody from the first face you see in an organization, whether that's a receptionist or somebody on the phone, but they take that person as an expert, just like they take the doctor as an expert or themselves as an expert. And they treat them with that respect and they treat them with the fact that they have ideas and thoughts and they're really invested in everybody.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (02:06)
So they want the organization to succeed by taking care of the people, by valuing the people, by really getting in there and appreciating what they do, and being able to bring that mission forward by their commitment to the people.
Jen Hamilton (02:19)
I've never heard it said that treat your team like an expert. It's such a beautiful way of treating them differently. Like you said, with the same level of respect you would with a doctor, because if we hire right, everyone is hired to be an expert in their area and their role. That's so beautiful. I appreciate that.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (02:36)
Yeah.
Jen Hamilton (02:37)
You talked a little bit about mission, which are the type of organizations? Is there a certain kind of mission or mission-based? Talk about where those visionary.
Jen Hamilton (02:47)
heroes live. What kind of business are they in?
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (02:49)
I have a soft spot for nonprofits and people who support nonprofits because they have usually clear visions of who they serve and a real passion for it. The other piece I like to do is small businesses. I worked for a behavioral health group for 11 years. And so that concept of being in service to someone and having a passion for being in service to someone. And I recognize that that can look so different.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (03:17)
and it can be beyond nonprofits and it can be beyond health organizations. If you have something you love to do, like you do, you love what you do and you can see it, then I like working with those groups because it's, I wanna help steer the ship towards their passion. I wanna give their ship that balance that's gonna allow them to go towards their passion really well and really seamlessly. So that's who I'm looking for is.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (03:46)
a passion-based organization that wants business behind it.
Jen Hamilton (03:49)
Yeah, very cool. I love too that you talked about nonprofits too and I have a passion for nonprofits and mission-based businesses as well. A lot of times there is some thinking that you're not supposed to act like a business within a nonprofit and a mission-based organization and yet I think you and I can both have plenty of examples of when your organization runs more like a business, you actually can make a greater impact.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (04:17)
Absolutely. And that involves access to your business, it involves efficiency. Even as a nonprofit, you're being able to bring your mission to people by doing it efficiently. I mean, you think about you have $100 to serve somebody, but if you're all over the place and spend that $100 by wavering around, you're not going to be able to focus it to take care of the people in the way you want to. So it's really about bringing healthy business behind you so you can proceed to your passion.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (04:44)
versus having your passion and hoping your business will follow.
Jen Hamilton (04:47)
it usually doesn't.
Jen Hamilton (04:49)
You've got to intention in building that healthy business. It
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (04:53)
Yeah.
Jen Hamilton (04:54)
just doesn't happen. I kind of think of it like marriage. mean, unless you work at it, it's not going to be the best ever. Just like our business.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (05:02)
Right.
Jen Hamilton (05:03)
don't know.
Jen Hamilton (05:04)
Let's move on from there.
Jen Hamilton (05:08)
start to get into the topic. So you and I had this great conversation before and I am really excited to hear more from you. We're gonna dig in today about something that happens in organizations, not just mission-based organizations, but certainly it's a bigger heartbreak to me when I do see this happen in organizations that are mission-based is when they have silos. People have their little fiefdoms.
Jen Hamilton (05:35)
And so I wanna get into this a little bit more. before we really get into it, I wanna have you share what are some of those warning signs so that an organization or business can know I've got silos that are not helping my organization.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (05:50)
Right? The biggest thing you can do is listen because you're going to hear all sorts of stuff. You're going to hear stuff like, we, you know, we always do it that way and don't even ask her because that's her stuff. And they're not going to tell you because that's in their department. And those disconnect words that, or you feel like you have two different teams in terms of us versus them.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (06:17)
You have to have therapy sessions to get anything done together.
Jen Hamilton (06:20)
You
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (06:21)
But a lot of times there's words there that come up as fear or disconnect. Where, oh don't, you know, I was told one time, oh you're gonna need to really think that through before you go to that person. And I was like, okay, I love collaborating. And if there's a warning sign on somebody's door,
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (06:41)
where you can't go into that door and talk to them about something, then that's a sign to me that something's going on that's challenging for the organization. And it can be really damaging.
Jen Hamilton (06:52)
Let's talk about the damaging and why it's worth fixing it. What is that damage? What breaks in a business if they ignore the silos?
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (07:00)
I like saying it breaks their heart, right? If you're passion-driven and you've got silos, then you're breaking your own heart in a way.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (07:08)
I think of it as walking through.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (07:10)
If you're walking through a forest but you're only allowed to see one tree, you're not going to see the forest. So you're not going to see the mission that's going forward. If people, and what you see with Silo's is people getting uninvested. You know, I can't do that because she's going to control it anyway, or he's going to control it anyway, or they're going to control it
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (07:29)
I don't, I can't approach them to problem solve because they're going to yell at me. You can't touch that. And what you find is people disconnect. Instead of being the expert in their field that can work well with other people, they're going to say, I'm just going to show up to work, do my job, keep my head down. And you break that heart. You break that expertise. You break that pursuit of the mission.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (07:54)
that you really want to see in your people. You want them to want to go where you go. So, and there's bullying that happens and high turnover. The high turnover is horrible because if people don't feel like they can contribute to a job, that engagement is something that gives people value. And especially these new generations, they want to know that they can bring value to the organization. They don't want to just show up for a job. So I say it breaks your heart.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (08:22)
and it's high turnover and it's disengagement and a lot of many inefficient things, Things
Jen Hamilton (08:28)
Yeah.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (08:28)
that you don't want to see.
Jen Hamilton (08:29)
It breaks heart. breaks trust and it breaks the wallet when the day is done because all
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (08:33)
Hello.
Jen Hamilton (08:34)
of that is super expensive. The
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (08:35)
Mm-hmm.
Jen Hamilton (08:36)
thing that I'm hearing and what you're saying to that I think is so important is that a lot of times what we're talking about, you say heart and people things that a lot of times people will put that aside. That's not business or that's not important, but it probably heard.
Jen Hamilton (08:52)
the culture, what is it, culture each strategy for breakfast. I think it was Peter Drucker,
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (08:56)
Have fun.
Jen Hamilton (08:57)
but this is all about your culture. And with a healthy, strong, productive culture, you're going to have those efficiencies, like you said, but some of the things you were saying, I think is really important. I want to highlight it is they're not going to be innovative. They're not going to be creative. They're not going to want to try new things, which means you're going to keep doing things that don't work or
Jen Hamilton (09:20)
They're not gonna problem solve, so they're not gonna try and fix things. And
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (09:24)
Thank
Jen Hamilton (09:24)
what will happen especially now these days is you're going to be left behind and you're gonna be left behind fast. Someone else who has a great team that's excited to problem solve together, that trusts each other, that's willing to challenge each other with new ideas, they're gonna get there first. They're gonna make the impact first and people are gonna turn to them, whether it's funders, if it's in a nonprofit.
Jen Hamilton (09:49)
whether it's customers or clients and a for-profit. People will walk
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (09:52)
Right.
Jen Hamilton (09:53)
with their feet, especially nowadays around speed, and can you actually deliver what you promise?
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (09:59)
Yep, that's it. That's it. And it's fun to
Jen Hamilton (10:01)
Well, go ahead.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (10:03)
see what people can do. That innovative piece is so exciting. And when you have a high functioning team that really focused on where you're going, they can do amazing things. And things that you can't... I love handing a team a problem and saying, okay, we need to figure out how to get customers in the door faster and more efficiently.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (10:23)
and you turn around and they're like, okay, we think we can do this, we've tried this, we wanna experiment with this, can we have 60 days to try this? Yeah. It's like, of course. Because they've thought through it, they've invested in it, and they're going for it, and they're keeping the customer in sight. All of that is true. And you
Jen Hamilton (10:45)
Yeah.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (10:45)
can just see the customer service oozing off them, which is great. So yeah, seeing that.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (10:52)
Seeing the teams engage like that is fabulous and seeing the retention that you're going to get from that is extraordinary. They may leave to go back to school, they may leave because they move, but they're going to want to be there and they're going to miss you when they're gone. That's fun.
Jen Hamilton (11:06)
And they're going to talk well about you to others.
Jen Hamilton (11:09)
Because one of the things is when we have amazing team members who are engaged, they feel excited, they're innovative, they may know others when you're trying to hire. We tend to hang out with the people like us.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (11:19)
Yes, absolutely.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (11:23)
Right, right, and they're attracted to other people that are engaged and interested and want to make a difference. That making a difference is a big thing, yeah.
Jen Hamilton (11:32)
Absolutely.
Jen Hamilton (11:33)
So when we get back into these silos, let's talk about what can happen on the other side, where they're disengaged and even to what we're talking about. Sometimes you can retain them, but you're not wanting to retain them. So let's talk a little bit, and I'm just gonna say the word, the toxicity around
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (11:50)
yeah.
Jen Hamilton (11:51)
the silos. Maybe you can talk about some of the things you've seen and what you've done to turn that ship around like you're saying.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (12:00)
Sure. The toxicity, one of the things that I warn people about is those higher performers that people are scared of. They are super duper performers. They will get the job done to the nth degree. They will show up every day. They are committed and everybody's terrified of them.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (12:19)
They do not collaborate. They do not want to engage with other people to problem solve because they know what to do. They have a manual written for it and they're gonna do it their way. So that toxicity is, can be really devastating. And I've seen a team taken down by that. I've seen the high turnover that happens. And just going through that, it just feels.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (12:43)
I mean, as a technical term, right? It just feels nasty.
Jen Hamilton (12:46)
Yes. Yes.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (12:50)
But things that you can do is really looking at how do you put that vision forward of what you want? Do you even know what culture you want to bring? What culture is going to advance your mission and vision? Are you living your mission and vision?
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (13:07)
Thinking about that piece and really taking time as a leader to think about where you're going, where you're headed, where you want to be. Then communicating that to your team. What does collaboration look like? What does following rules look like? What does being brilliant about what you do look like? All of those cool things, but being able to define that for somebody so you're not just saying don't do that. You're saying do this too. If you're looking for that positive
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (13:35)
of peace for somebody to move towards. And then a big piece for me is holding people accountable for the good and the bad, right? Of being able to say to somebody, you knocked that out of the park by the way that you interacted with that person in that conflict. You did a great job by putting down your toys and going over and saying, let's play the toys together. Let's create these toys together.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (14:00)
Or, you know, when you did that, you made this person feel horrible. Or when you did this, the outcome was they disengaged from the conversation. The outcome was you guys didn't get this project done on time. What was the impact of what they did and calling that out? It can make toxicity not fun for those people at work. And maybe they can identify it. Maybe they can't. Maybe they're the wrong person.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (14:23)
And I hate to say that, that sounds so cold blooded, but if you have a culture that you're pretty clear on, you want to make that culture advance, some people aren't gonna be the right fit. Even if they're a positive person, they might not be the right fit. And that's okay. You have to be okay with being mission focused and driven in a positive way.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (14:43)
with the right people on the ship going with you. I mean, you think about a sailboat, if you don't have everybody in their role, you're not gonna head where you need to head. You're gonna flounder. The whale's gonna go out of your sails. The sails gonna go out, the whale's gonna go out of your sails. I know I can do this. So that's kind of what I think about of.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (15:05)
holding people accountable, and hire for emotional intelligence. I think you mentioned that. Of hiring, you can always teach skills, but hiring for emotional intelligence. When people don't have that piece, they can't acknowledge it. They can't go, hey, I'm sorry I made a mistake, or yeah, screwed that one up, or I need help. All of those things are so important to be able to say, and if you have people who are toxic, they tend not to say those words.
Jen Hamilton (15:32)
Yeah.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (15:33)
So.
Jen Hamilton (15:34)
It's very self-focused versus other focused.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (15:36)
Yes.
Jen Hamilton (15:38)
I appreciate there's so much in what you said that is amazing. Part of what I'm hearing is we can break it down in so many ways. I'll talk about a bunch of different things I'm hearing. It's a leadership problem. I also hear it's an alignment problem and it's a hiring and firing problem and an accountability. So there's just so
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (15:58)
Thank
Jen Hamilton (15:59)
many.
Jen Hamilton (15:59)
juicy things. So let's talk about first with the leadership. A lot of times I think that especially in organizations who do have leaders that are committed to their mission and committed to their team, they think they're doing the right thing by their team by not letting go of people in general. And the high performers are, I'll say, the hardest to let go when they're
Jen Hamilton (16:26)
Also toxic right because it is hard to be like, they're giving us all these results But let's talk through what a leader is Missing when they see I'm gonna hurt that person by letting them go. I'm curious what you would Tell that leader who would be like but but I you know, I want to I want to give him a shot I want to try their try it. They're doing such good work. What would you tell them?
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (16:51)
I'd say that and give them a framework of give them clear expectations. you know, being able to say you're doing a great job, you're doing a great technical job, but you're disconnecting from your team, right? And we need the whole team to do this. You know, most groups aren't so big that they can ignore somebody in a closet, right? They have to interact with somebody. So.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (17:13)
That to me, setting up that clear expectation and giving them a chance and document the heck out of it, whether it works or not. Give them that chance and say, this is where we're headed, this is how to get there. These are the things I'm seeing that might stand in your way. And give them that chance to step up. If they don't step up, then you have to hold them accountable and say at some point, this is not the right spot for you right now.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (17:40)
You know, this is what I can do for you. This is what I can't do for you. But this is not the right spot for you. And a lot of times they'll select out. you're clear on expectations, they'll say, this is uncomfortable. I don't like it. You keep writing me up for doing my job. mean, you can hear people
Jen Hamilton (17:58)
Yeah, they think so.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (17:59)
saying that. And I talked to a friend recently about the split personality of letting somebody go.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (18:07)
of having compassion for them as a human being and the impact that it'll have on them. I mean, they're going to be without a job. That's hard for anybody. And your business hat, which is saying, this is healthy for the organization. I need to be in my role.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (18:23)
protecting the health of the organization and this is the right thing to do. So there's a little bit of a split personality. You have to acknowledge your compassion and you have to acknowledge your business hat. And both are true at the same moment. It's like,
Jen Hamilton (18:38)
Yeah.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (18:38)
what do do? Be split personality and it works.
Jen Hamilton (18:42)
It is feeling like they're at odds with each other and I think that's what makes people err to the side of what they think is the compassionate thing to do. Because it does feel a little cold and corporaty to let someone go and especially in organizations that are so committed to their people, committed to their mission. I think that they see that the humane thing to do is to keep them.
Jen Hamilton (19:07)
And I think it's important. love that you're saying this whole split personality. It's important to really dive into the compassion that you have for the other team members and their families and the people that you serve that they are working with. No one likes to work with a grumpy guest, right? And if it's occasional, okay, that's fine. But if it's constantly like you described earlier, they're
Jen Hamilton (19:33)
Fighting back. No one wants to talk to them. They're scared to bring it up. They know they're going to be shut down. That feeling ripples throughout any team member. Like you said, even if they aren't necessarily working together, even if they were in a closet, you're going to feel that resistance.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (19:47)
pain.
Jen Hamilton (19:49)
Think about how those other team members who could be greater are not. So you're taking and essentially dimming their light.
Jen Hamilton (20:00)
dimming their ability
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (20:01)
Thank
Jen Hamilton (20:01)
to do what they're gifted to do by saying yes to someone who isn't giving their fellow coworker the best experience of being at work. And then what's gonna happen? They're gonna go home. As team members, they're gonna take that sadness or that distrust or that disrespect home and it ripples into their families. Because it's really hard to change from not feeling honored to, okay,
Jen Hamilton (20:29)
Let's be in a loving environment, right? And then of course
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (20:30)
Thank
Jen Hamilton (20:33)
it's hard for them to give their best to whoever you're serving. So I think that the compassionate thing is to look at all of the other lives that are impacted by keeping them. And then the other compassionate thing to look at is what is their life like after they get through that initial pain? Oftentimes,
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (20:54)
Mm-hmm.
Jen Hamilton (20:56)
more often than not,
Jen Hamilton (20:57)
people that I have had to let go or help my clients let go, I find out stories later where they will say, gosh, the best thing you could have done is fire me. It was hard to see in the moment, but
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (21:08)
you
Jen Hamilton (21:09)
man, it opened up this whole new opportunity and this is where I love and this is where I belong. And you said it before, they're not bad people. They're just a bad fit. That means the more we keep them where they're not happy and they're clearly not happy if they're resisting.
Jen Hamilton (21:24)
the less we're giving them the freedom to go find where they can be.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (21:30)
That's it. That's it. My stepbrother who's very wise said something along those lines of let people choose. And you let people choose by being clear and you let people choose by getting uncomfortable and you let people choose by letting them go. I mean all of that, they can either step up or step out and that's okay. And you're right that people will find other places to be happy which is fabulous. Yeah.
Jen Hamilton (21:52)
Yeah, that's what we want. My mentor
Jen Hamilton (21:55)
likes to say, release them back into the wild.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (21:58)
Yes.
Jen Hamilton (22:01)
It's their journey. It's not something that is a horrible thing to do. I also
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (22:06)
Yeah.
Jen Hamilton (22:07)
find that sometimes there's resistance about making these changes because this how we've been doing it. It's been so long and there's a concern about maybe the ripple effect. if especially if it's us versus them, I'm dealing with this with a client right now. We're a little worried about if we let that one person go who's leading that team.
Jen Hamilton (22:30)
Will the entire team quit?
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (22:31)
Thank
Jen Hamilton (22:33)
Are they gonna be upset? And so there is a dance, and that's why it's so important to have someone like you to think through the implications. How do we roll this out? How do we communicate this? How do we encourage people to stay? It's a delicate dance.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (23:05)
It is a delicate dance. And to be able to say to people, value people and we've let them go is hard to explain. And in that whole, I'm invested in the health of the organization. I'm invested in your success. I'm invested in everything we're doing here. And sometimes it doesn't work.
Jen Hamilton (23:25)
Yeah.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (23:26)
It just happened to be able to say that, but it is about communication with the team. And most people say, I knew that was coming or thank God that happened. Or,
Jen Hamilton (23:34)
Right.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (23:36)
I mean, it's really wild, the relief that people feel even when you have dedication to someone. We've, I've experienced that recently where somebody was let go and people, very beloved and people said, and I can see where we're going from here.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (23:51)
And it was a neat experience in terms of you can value somebody and still be okay with moving forward without them.
Jen Hamilton (23:59)
Very powerful. We don't want to make it sound like the only way to fix silos is firing people. What would
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (24:05)
No, not at all. No way.
Jen Hamilton (24:08)
be another way, maybe something you've seen or tried, what would be another way that if an organization and leaders are seeing silos coming up, what are some other ways that they can start to address this?
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (24:20)
Some of it is highlighting what different teams do. Because sometimes
Jen Hamilton (24:22)
Mm.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (24:23)
you don't see how you fit.
Jen Hamilton (24:25)
Yeah.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (24:25)
If you don't see how you fit and how you can work with this team, or you never work with that team, so you don't see what they do, you may not value them.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (24:34)
Getting to know the other team and the other team members can be really helpful. I like to say fun is the magic bullet, right? There's something about bringing fun into the workplace where you learn about each other in a positive way and you learn. We had this one time that was a blast, which was everybody chose a spirit dog. It was hysterical and.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (24:57)
you had to say why it was a spirit dog. And some people don't want to play and that's fine. You know, you can't force fun and you shouldn't force fun. But to watch people pick their spirit dogs and what they look like and why they chose them was a kick and a half. And it gets you a chance to get to know people and laugh with people and celebrate with people. There's a connection there that's really neat. taking time to learn about what their department does, because I'm going to make a
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (25:27)
about your department or your role if I don't know. So taking time to celebrate wins of a department? You know, did you know the fundraising partner just brought in four grants and that grant is gonna allow you to do this and it's gonna allow us to do this? I mean, what does a fundraiser do? They just go to lunches with people. No, that's what they do. I mean, how do you connect?
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (25:51)
what they're doing with how it fits with the mission and what they're doing to celebrate each other. You know? And then when I hear what you do, I can say, man, I'm taking care of this person over here. They might be a good person for you to put on your fundraising video because look at the success of what they do. Yeah. I mean, so that by learning what you do, can collaborate and we can move the ship forward together because I know what you do now. So I think that
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (26:18)
I think connection through fun and that interpersonal connection is really important. And I think knowing what you do professionally is really important because then I can treat you like that expert.
Jen Hamilton (26:27)
I think this is so important. What I'm hearing you say is there's a lot of dot connecting that wouldn't happen if you're not intentional about it and causing it to happen. Part of that dot connecting I heard in Sharing the Winds, but you also said so beautifully, how does their win impact others within the organization? And how does that then impact the overall mission and goals of the organization? So it really,
Jen Hamilton (26:54)
allows everyone to see we all are on the same team. We're not you versus me or they versus them. It's really all about we each hold a very critical part that brings it together. There's a couple pieces too that I've seen that work really well and it's often missed and it goes to the level of even their job description. Having each
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (27:16)
Yes.
Jen Hamilton (27:17)
person understand how their role directly impacts the mission and goals.
Jen Hamilton (27:22)
And then they start to speak that way. we, like you said, communicate through wins, we talk about how they impact what we're ultimately about. And everyone starts to see their importance, their expertise, as you keep saying, how their expertise is moving the ship forward. And we're all rowing in the same direction. So I love how you were able to connect those dots for people. It's really powerful.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (27:47)
Nice, thank you.
Jen Hamilton (27:49)
You're
Jen Hamilton (27:49)
welcome. There's some other pieces that I think are really important and you started to talk about it too. One other thing that I've seen that helps break down the silos is having cross functional teams have a project together. One of the favorite things I read out of, I think it was Predictable Success, great book about what you can do to break down some of these things that cause the teams to break down. And one of the ideas in there is what is a project that impacts the entire organization?
Jen Hamilton (28:18)
that people from different teams who wouldn't normally work together can work together on this project. So those can be things like a part of the website. Like maybe we have to put that together and who are the different people? Well, you would think, okay, that's only marketing, but no, we want to have sales check it to make sure. We want to have HR check it to make sure that, you know, the page about how we hire is okay. You like you can have things where everyone brings their expertise.
Jen Hamilton (28:45)
Another great one that's pretty universal is onboarding. We each have to bring on a new person and how can we create something that feels universal but also feels personal to our department? Because then you have to learn what are you teaching? What are you doing? So it gets another way for them to start to understand what did the other departments do? So looking for cross-functional projects they can do together can be a very powerful way to break down those silos because the people that are on that team
Jen Hamilton (29:13)
go back into their team and start to communicate with each other. And of course, those are great wins to share, this team, they were working on it. Here's how they've gotten done so far. This is what they learned about each other. having those opportunities, not just in fun, which I think is brilliant, but in actual productivity to move things forward can be really powerful. Because otherwise, it's so easy just to be like, these are my people. This is who I work with. And don't look up and see anyone else.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (29:41)
I love that, because those cross-functional teams of moving together to do it well together, and everybody being invested in it seeing that is exciting. And seeing the success of it, seeing that website go up, seeing that project go forward, yeah, you're
Jen Hamilton (29:54)
Yeah.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (29:56)
exactly right, Jen. That's a great way to say it. Another thing that I ran into, which
Jen Hamilton (29:59)
Yeah, well, go ahead. Yeah, please.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (30:04)
I really, really liked, was having a lead team. When in my last job, we pulled together,
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (30:11)
a lead from each department. And these were tiny departments. These were like two and three person departments. But we met once a month to talk about what was going on. the pieces that we pulled out from that were different projects that people were involved in. We're redoing the website. did you know that we have this going on? Can we look at a patient portal for that? Can we do this with that? So even though they were unrelated projects, they all could identify their own piece in it just by reporting out.
Jen Hamilton (30:40)
So powerful.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (30:41)
There's something about having cross-functional meetings, God knows nobody wants more meetings, but there can be ways of communicating like that, of just sharing that kind of information with a group of team that gets to know each other. So when something's going on, they know to contact Cindy in that department and she's gonna help you get that taken care of, right? It's neat to have them see that in other people in other departments.
Jen Hamilton (31:07)
Yeah, that's a great idea.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (31:07)
And the grad school team that
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (31:09)
you're talking about does that too. Does it so well. It's really fun to see.
Jen Hamilton (31:14)
I love this. think we could talk about this for about three more hours. There's so many things we could do to enhance culture and avoid it breaking down because I do think it's almost more natural that people will get into their silos. You truly do need to be intentional about breaking those silos. So what even if you don't have a silo or you don't think you have silos or maybe you know you do.
Jen Hamilton (31:38)
What would you say is maybe the first step our listeners could take to start to move forward with breaking down some of these silo type behaviors or avoiding them in the first place?
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (31:49)
I think, I really think knowing what culture you want first makes a lot of sense.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (31:54)
How do you tie your culture and your mission together? If that's what's important to you and that's where you wanna head, how do you make sure that that's what's going on? Because if you don't think about your culture at all, nobody else is gonna, right? So you really need to put that in the forefront. I think hiring for emotional intelligence. So when you next hire, think about who you're hiring, not just what you're hiring for, and listen to your people. That's the thing you can do
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (32:23)
tomorrow is just start listening. Because everybody gets so busy we stop listening to one another. Just listen, what's going on? Because you can identify very quickly that fear and siloing. And it gives you a chance to talk to people. Tell me what's going on, how is that going for you, what's going on with it? So I think that listening is one of the best places to start with and it's such a simple thing. In a busy day, right? We have extra time, just go listen.
Jen Hamilton (32:52)
Yeah,
Jen Hamilton (32:52)
I know it is hard, but asking
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (32:52)
hard to do, but it's worth doing.
Jen Hamilton (32:55)
one question and hearing someone can take as little as two minutes.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (32:59)
Yeah, that's a good stat. That's a great stat.
Jen Hamilton (33:01)
I made it up, so I hope it's true. I mean, I've done it many times.
Jen Hamilton (33:04)
We all have, right? You'll ask a question and be really curious and be like, my gosh, that's amazing. One of my favorite questions that I ask in teams and outside of teams when I'm just getting to know someone from a different networking group even, let alone within a team is just, what's your win that you had since the last time we spoke? So it could be a very quick question, but man, it's so fun to celebrate together. It just brings the energy up right away.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (33:30)
It's exciting and it's fun to get behind people and see people succeed. And watching teams do that with one another to say, mean, who's gonna celebrate? I'm not gonna celebrate that. You wanna celebrate, you wanna have
Jen Hamilton (33:45)
Great.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (33:46)
balloons and stuff. So yeah, I think you're exactly right. That's a great question to ask and it's a nice way to pull everybody together.
Jen Hamilton (33:54)
Absolutely. It's a great way to kick off meetings. I like to do
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (33:58)
Yeah.
Jen Hamilton (33:58)
that, especially if it's, we got something serious to talk about, or maybe the meeting has always dragged. It's a great way to bring some energy to the meeting and the team before.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (34:08)
Absolutely.
Jen Hamilton (34:09)
Okay, now it's time to flip the mic and you get to ask me any question that you want to ask.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (34:16)
So I was thinking about asking you what superhero you wanted to be a kid, but I don't think I want to know that. I think I want to know what superhero you want to be now. What would your superpower be? If you could have any superpower that's unimaginable, what would you be?
Jen Hamilton (34:30)
That's a good
Jen Hamilton (34:30)
question. I love that you turned the superhero back on me. that's such a good one. I think that if I had to pick a power, because there's all kinds of good things, like you could be fast, I would love to be in two places at once, but I think the thing that I would love to be, and this might sound a little bit creepy, but I'm gonna give it a shot. Hopefully it's not too much, but I would love to be able to listen to people
Jen Hamilton (35:00)
their true heart. So not you know reading their mind because there's a lot that goes on in there but to really understand because sometimes we just don't know like what is it that they're coming from whether they're complaining whether they are you know they got really excited and sometimes you don't even know but like to truly be able to look in and know what is it that they are loving and excited and joyful by so that we can really connect from that place.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (35:27)
That is lovely, Jen. Talk about seeing people from their best. Of being able to see that beauty in people. Yes, that would be fabulous. A little invasive, but fabulous.
Jen Hamilton (35:39)
And I do believe we all have it. I know, it's a little creepy. I do
Jen Hamilton (35:45)
believe it's all in us. And I think that's one of the things that it starts, especially as you're talking about emotional intelligence, as we're talking about silos, that we're talking about people who maybe feel toxic, even the folks that we would say are.
Jen Hamilton (35:59)
bad people, criminals, whatever it is. I do believe if you look deep down inside, there's elements of love and joy that they want for others and that's part of what is fueling their actions. They may not have the best way to express it, but if we can get to that place and agree, you and I want the same thing, something better for this world or this team, that's.
Jen Hamilton (36:23)
part of why you and I love this mission base, right? Because that's the same thing. We're getting to the heart, like you said, when we have silos, it breaks the organization's heart. So how can we build the heart is seeing where we all connect around the heart of the organization.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (36:38)
That's fabulous. Yes. Nice analogy.
Jen Hamilton (36:39)
Thanks. Thanks for asking me. And I had no idea. I had no idea. I even wanted that till you asked. So it's fun for me to think about it.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (36:49)
That's excellent.
Jen Hamilton (36:51)
Well, Camille, what if an organization says, oh man, I
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (36:53)
Yeah.
Jen Hamilton (36:55)
just really align with you. I would love to know how to work with you. I know they can find you through us, but how can they find you directly? What's the best way to reach out and find out more about you and see if they can even work with you?
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (37:08)
The easy way is to go to my LinkedIn profile. So that's an easy way, just an
Jen Hamilton (37:11)
Okay, great. Yes.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (37:13)
easy search and you can find me. And that gets you to my email, my phone number and everything else. So
Jen Hamilton (37:20)
Wonderful.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (37:20)
that's probably the best place to go. And it has a little bit about my background and some testimonials. So you can hear that I'm not as crazy as I present. But that's probably the best way right now.
Jen Hamilton (37:34)
Wonderful. Well, we will make sure we put your LinkedIn profile. We'll even make it a little easier. We'll put your email and phone number into the show notes so they can find you as well. And if you really want... yeah, yeah, go ahead.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (37:43)
I Can
Jen Hamilton (37:51)
No,
Jen Hamilton (37:59)
Yes. Yes.
Jen Hamilton (38:05)
I love it. And you truly are about bringing that light from within for these organizations by each individual. And so thank you for sharing that. I can see that alignment
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (38:13)
Thank you.
Jen Hamilton (38:14)
to who you naturally are and as part of your name, but also a part of the work that you do. So thank you so much for being here today.
Camille Soleil (She/hers) (38:23)
thank you, Jen, for having me. I love what you do and I appreciate what you do, bringing us all together. So thank you.
Jen Hamilton (38:28)
Thank you.
Jen Hamilton (38:30)
Well, it's easy when I have such brilliant people around me that I get to learn from as well. So thank you for teaching me today too.
Jen Hamilton (38:38)
Thanks for listening to Fractional COOs to the Rescue. Don't forget, follow the show and share it with fellow visionary leaders or fractional COOs. And if you're ready to move from an owner run to a team run business, visit Hamilton COOs to learn more.
