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Heightened employee stress is a part of any growing startup journey. Operating off tight funds, limited resources, and a lack of extra hands can leave startup employees in any company overwhelmed, overworked, and unappreciated. This can lead to low morale, decreased performance, and high turnover. In fact, replacing an employee costs anywhere between 90%-200% of an employee’s annual salary.
Studies show that employees who feel safe, empowered, and part of a team don’t just function optimally; they save companies billions of dollars daily. Much of that starts with the investment employers are willing to put into their employees. In fact, The WHO has found that for every dollar put into treating common mental health disorders, there’s an ROI of four dollars in improved health and productivity.
Image via Christina Morillo
So what steps can entrepreneurs take to build safe, supportive workplace spaces? In this article, we interview digitalundivided interim CEO Brittany Hale to learn more about emergent strategy, its role in regulating the nervous system of a company, and how Latina and Black women founders can implement this tool to build healthy, safe, and productive company cultures.
digitalundivided: We know that a founder’s mental health is incredibly important in the longevity and success of a startup. But what about the mental health of employees? Why is it important for startups to invest in employees’ mental health?
Brittany S. Hale: How you do anything is how you do everything. So, if a founder needs to prioritize her mental health to position her startup as a beacon of disruption and innovation in her industry, she should expect similar employee needs. Startups need to invest in their employees’ mental health because making systemic shifts to improve organizational culture becomes more challenging as the company grows. Start with good habits, and they’ll become easier to maintain.
digitalundivided: How can investing in employee mental health shape the productivity and success of a company?
Brittany S. Hale: A Deloitte study estimated that poor employee mental health costs companies about $6B. If a company fails to support its employees, this can lead to increased costs due to prolonged and short-term disability, employee turnover, absenteeism, and other costs that inevitably impede a company’s success.
digitalundivided: What is emergent strategy? How does it apply to the business space?
Brittany S. Hale: Emergent strategy honors the development of complex systems through simple interactions. Living organisms are complex because they are developed through a scaled network of cells, sinew, nerves, etc. As applied to business, how you are at the small scale (how you make decisions, communicate, and what is considered necessary) reflects how you perform at a larger scale. Emergent strategy is the belief that our systems have an evolutionary purpose and contribute to the organization as a living being.
digitalundivided: As the COO and Interim CEO of digitalundivided, what are your three favorite principles of emergent strategy, and how do you apply them at digitalundivided?
Brittany S. Hale: I love emergent strategy because it examines the framework of decision-making (also known as “company culture”) within an organization. As applied through the lens of emergent strategy, your company’s culture is your organization’s “nervous system” and determines where you focus your time, talent, and resources. My favorite principles are:
Embracing Change: I constantly tell our team that change is something we’re working to embrace rather than endure. It’s the only constant and represents an opportunity to grow with purpose as an organization.
Letting Go of Status Quo: I have the least patience for doing things because “that’s the way we’ve always done it.” I encourage us to examine the value of operating one way vs. another. Ours is a culture of never-ending curiosity and striving for operational excellence.
Collaboration: I’m a gamer, so I think of “The Last of Us” when I think of collaboration. Why? Because the premise presents a powerful example of collaboration. In the game (and HBO show), a simple fungus nearly drives humanity to extinction because it develops an intelligent and collaborative network. Our ability to collaborate directly reflects our ability to embrace change and assess the value of certain practices.
digitalundivided: How can emergent strategy shape the success of Latina and Black women-owned startups?
Brittany S. Hale: Latina and Black women naturally align with emergent strategy because we tend to come from deeply connected and collaborative communities. Much of how we learn is informed through metaphor, so conceiving of their business as a living organism adds dynamism and opportunity to explore their potential in a more relatable way.
digitalundivided: Are there other resources (within emergent strategy or outside of it) that influence your methodologies regarding fostering a team environment?
Brittany S. Hale: Science fiction, actually. My favorite author is Octavia Butler. When speaking of the usefulness of science fiction to Black people, she writes, “What good is its examination of the possible effects of science and technology, or social organization and political direction? At its best, science fiction stimulates imagination and creativity.” As a leader, I try my best to expand my teams’ belief in what’s possible- in our organization, my leadership, and most importantly, how they conceive of themselves as professionals.
digitalundivided: Where can our readers find more resources on emergent strategy or other forms of inspiration and knowledge to foster mental health best practices on their team?
Brittany S. Hale: I encourage everyone to read Adrienne Maree Brown’s Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds and Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower. Joy Harden’s Therapy for Black Girls podcast also shares valuable mental health best practices for women of color.