Jenny Dempsey

163: Jenny Dempsey: I took on this superwoman role

Intro:  Welcome to the Fast Leader podcast where we explore convenient yet effective shortcuts that will help you get ahead and move forward faster by becoming a better leader. And now here’s your host customer and employee engagement expert and certified emotional intelligence practitioner, Jim Rembach.

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Jim Rembach   Okay, Fast Leader legion, today I’m excited because I have somebody on the show today that’s going to help us with something that it’s just way too easy to neglect. Jenny Dempsey is a Southern California gal. She was born in Covina right outside of Los Angeles but did the majority of her growing up in a little country town Norco. At 18, she left for college to attend San Diego State University to major in English. She had a brief stint living on the East Coast in 

Philadelphia and New York City but returned back to California because that winter thing was pretty rough for her. Her family is small and dysfunctional but whose family isn’t, right? Her mom had at-home animal rescue—think exotic reptiles, emus, cows, chinchillas and her father managed a successful campground for over 30 years. 

Her parents split up when she was in third grade. She has one younger, tougher and much cooler sister Jackie who founded her own commercial cleaning business. Jenny is also the proud auntie of a one-year-old niece Bailey Sue, that’s quite southern that’s Southern California. From extra work on movies the TV to sing in lead with a kid’s band program through the Fender guitar museum to being president of the Norco Junior Horsemen’s Association. Jennie learned early on that through hard work, practice, and creativity you really can do anything you set your mind to and don’t have to stay within one limited box.

Jenny’s first job at 13, was babysitting during PTA meetings. It went on from there to a variety of positions, file clerk at a law office, selling chocolates, a barista to call center support with a web hosting domain registrar moving her way up the ladder as a customer service manager in telecom. She left to make the DMV a friendlier place as a customer care manager. Now she’s social media and customer experience manager with number barn where she uses her writing and customer service skills to help showcase the brand. Jenny is also the co-founder and regular contributor to www.customerservice life.com, customer service focus blog which she writes with her former boss and board member of call center coach, Jeremy Watkin. Shining a light on her passion for health and wellness as well as the continuation of helping people. She’s currently in school to become an integrative nutrition health coach. She recently founded Dempsey Wellness.org with the focus to inspire a non-diet, work/life balance approach with her clients.

Whether it’s cooking an organic vegan gluten-free meal for others to resolving an issue for a frustrated customer whose phone number doesn’t work, Jenny wants to point out that nourishment comes in many forms and we all have the opportunity every day to nourish ourselves as well as others. Jenny currently lives in sunny San Diego, California with her boyfriend and their two cats, Taquito and Chompers. Jenny Dempsey are you ready to help us get over the hump?

Jenny Dempsey:   I am so ready.

Jim Rembach:   I’m glad you’re here. Now I’ve given our listeners a little bit about you but can you tell us what your current passion is so that we can get to know you even better. 

Jenny Dempsey:   Absolutely. Just as you mentioned earlier one thing that is my current passion that is too easy to neglect and this is wellness in the workplace. 

Jim Rembach:   So when you say wellness, I could take on a lot of different forms and I see people under that type of umbrella which can be quite broad talk about and focus on different things. So, from your perspective when you think about wellness and especially for us coming from the contact center environment there’s a lot of things that we can address as far as wellness is concerned. What’s in your mind?

Jenny Dempsey:   Absolutely. Our typical idea of wellness is nutrition and eating all the good stuff and green stuff and exercising and making sure we’re at the certain weight on the scale but there’s so much more to it so I’m taking a more holistic approach to it a whole person. So, every customer service agent sitting at their desk, what is going to make them be the best person that they’re going to be that day? And it’s more than just what they eat and how much they exercise.

Jim Rembach:   You bring up a really interesting point. I just had the opportunity this week to be at customer contact week and there was someone there from a United Way Contact Center in South Carolina she was the president of the United Way. She was talking about—she showed a video and talked about the types of callers that are calling in our contact center for me I immediately started thinking about the agents who are having to help people all day long with some very unfortunate circumstances and you start hearing about people just going through some pains of life that is just so hard to bear it endure that they are seeking out and needing help. One of the things that they do at the United Way in South Carolina which is really cool is there’s so many different agencies that are out is they help people find those agencies and that assistance much faster than trying to do it on their own which is great. But I started thinking about those agents really all day long hearing all of those things and trying to help people that burden has just got to be huge on their mind.

Jenny Dempsey:   Yeah, absolutely. And then they carry that with them when they leave work a lot of us you can’t just leave work at work especially when you’re dealing with the emotional aspect of it you carry that with you and then it becomes part of everything you do. Then if you don’t have a way to express that, let’s say, the teams aren’t talking about it then it just builds up inside and that can cause someone to be sick all the time that can cause someone to have fatigue all the time and they may think, oh my gosh, it’s just because I’m not eating right—no, it’s more than that. And so yeah, that’s a great point, Jim, absolutely.

Jim Rembach:   So when you start talking about effects or symptoms that people start seeing in regards to this holistic wellness, what are some of the common ones that we may not be recognizing the symptoms, because everybody else is having those problems too?

Jenny Dempsey:   Absolutely. And I would say one of the first ones is, look at the agents that make it look like everything’s perfect and they’re so happy and doing great jobs and they’re not talking to you about the problems. Those are the agents that, it’s quite possible that they just want to have that perception that everything’s great and they’re not going to and they’re going to stifle the feelings. And the reason I know that because I’ve been there I’ve done that I’ve been that person and that is where the problems come into play. There’s also the other things for me, maybe someone’s falling asleep at their desk all the time. Could not be that they haven’t had enough sleep it’s just that maybe they’re just heavy with all the weight of the stuff that they’re dealing with the customers, maybe it’s just too much.

Jenny Dempsey:   So when you start talking about that, I started thinking about some of the different types of personalities. And when you start thinking about screening people for particular jobs a lot of times we test for their skills but we don’t necessarily test for their personalities. So when you start thinking about this from a holistic perspective would you recommend that an organization do more of that type of evaluating to make sure that they’re getting agents who can actually weather the job?

Jim Rembach:   Absolutely. There’s a whole being trend right now hiring for culture fit and making sure that the person not only can do the job, in fact, sometimes hiring them not based on skills and based on the fact that there’s such a great culture fit and then training them to make sure they can do the day-to-day job. It’s way more effective for the long run less turnover than just hiring someone who is going to be great at actually doing the busy work, the job. 

Jenny Dempsey:   I just had the opportunity to look at Laurie Bachmann’s report on 2018 Priorities in the Contact Center which was just released and one of the things that people are struggling with which is been a chronic problem and it’s always a problem when we start having times of economic, let’s just say wellness, is that, ever having problems with turnover and it’s a major issue. What you’re saying is that if I do that additional set of screening I may not be able to fill positions that I have vacant right now because I’ve put that extra filter in the process. So, what would you tell a company about that?

Jim Rembach:   Exactly. Well, it’s one of those quality over quantity. You may have to struggle for a little bit you may have open desks you may have to hop on phones because you haven’t found the right person to take over that role yet but ultimately in the long run it will pay off. If you’re looking for support system with your team that’s going to surpass time and stay together and gosh not have to deal with the turnover, it’s such a mess when people don’t show up and they just—you’re losing people left and right this is going to help. It’s not going to solve all the world’s problems but it’s going to help with those basic things of just keeping people on your team.

Jenny Dempsey:   So if I start thinking about a particular approach that you would take to an organization that says, hey we want to  be more aware and mindful go through a change process and implement more of these wellness types of activities and mindset in organization, how would they go about approaching that?

Jim Rembach:   Alright, there are five core components that you’re going to need to focus on. Number one, hiring, onboarding, selecting the right people. Number two, we got coaching with the team, peer enablement, feedback gathering an organizational enablement. We’ve already talked a little bit about hiring and onboarding what I want to jump into is coaching with the team. This could look like something whether it’s a weekly coaching program with leadership, monthly, daily whatever it looks like for your company it has to stay consistent. Peer enablement this is where the magic happens having your team be able to select accountability partners and work together. They’re in the trenches together they’re going to be able to get it and more success comes out of those experiences than most other things. Feedback gathering and what I mean by this is staying consistent and surveying the team at least a couple times a year and this is simply because you’re never going to know what you need unless you ask. This survey doesn’t have to necessarily be an email that you sent out with a link to a form this could be something that’s collaborative where everyone’s sitting in a room together and talking about what could improve the call center and then the end really just comes to organizational enablement. If you’re going to do all this work you might as well actually make these changes happen. And so with the leadership team having a system in place giving a platform for that feedback to actually live for it to be born and to become a part of the call center.

Jenny Dempsey:   Well that’s a good framework. For me I had the opportunity to interview Kendall Lyman who’s been a change consultant for many years and he wrote a book about the most effective managers a change and he talks about that a lot of people refer to change and they talk about top-down and bottom-up and he says but the fact is that the only way it works is when you have both. You talked about the organization and helping with the transformation process and then you also have the peer activities where they’re working amongst themselves in order to create that internal change for one another so you got to change the person and you got to change the environment so that’s a good approach. When you start talking about things that—I mean, for me I see contact centers going through some very habits, I’ve been there myself and I even watched a video of a celebration at a contact center and they’re handing around doughnuts and all this stuff and I’m like, gosh—even for me working in an office most of my life now, I’ve gotten into some habits to break the cycle of just being there in the same place for so long I have to get up and I take more breaks it could be kind of hard in the contact center. When you start talking about some of the tactics to break up some of the habits that we’ve had what have you seen to be successful?

Jim Rembach:   What I’ve seen be successful is literally—it has to start with someone that the team looks up to whether their manager or whatever whether it’s someone in the group it starts with one person. Have you ever seen that video on leadership where there’s one guy doing a crazy dance by himself and then all of a sudden another person comes over and then suddenly there’s a huge group dancing and it was just started with one crazy guy doing this crazy dance and everyone thought he was nuts until they joined in. It really starts with someone the team can trust that is walking the walk and if they can do that then it’s easy and everyone’s like, oh, what maybe I comment something for myself and habits slowly start to shift. It’s gradual it’s not going to happen overnight it’s those things that take a while to shift but it has to start with someone the team, trust.

Jenny Dempsey:   That’s a really good point. One of the most successful programs need to find their champions and support their champions and enable their champions, that’s a good point. Okay, with all of this and just change process as a whole we need a lot of energy to keep us going and one of the things that we look at on the show are quotes to help us do that. Is there a quote or two that you like that you can share?

There is. There’s something that I say all the time and it’s something that means a lot to me, In order to take the best care of others you must first take the best care of yourself. 

Jim Rembach:   I think that whole self-reflection thing when I heard you say that I started thinking of some people that are close to me. One particular person she says that all the time however I want to flip it back it’s like, you have to do that to you. Are you saying it just to me or are you saying it to yourself because I need you to do some things so that you’re still around and healthy for many years. Okay, I know talking about your growing up and doing the different jobs and finding your way into the contact center and now working in wellness I know there’s pumps that you’ve had to get over those things teach us a lot. Is there a story that you can tell so that we can actually get over the hump faster?

Jenny Dempsey:   Oh, absolutely. I took on this superwoman role kind of in my call center career and I think I stand guilty of it but I’ve learned a lot from that. It’s not necessarily realistic but when I was working as a customer service manager in Telecom years ago I also managed a separate department required a high attention to detail I was working about 50 hours a week. I rarely take my breaks rarely taking vacations, in fact, they had the highest amount of vacation time in the entire company and I was kind of in that role where it’s forcing the smile on my face even when I was so burned out. But I didn’t acknowledge that I felt that way I kept pushing through it I was stuffing my feelings down to get through the day that’s kind of the customer service way we have to be happy and positive. And then I’d leave work and I’d go home and work more because there was more to do. When I was with my friends all I talked about was work because that’s all I ever did and I loved my job it’s not that I didn’t love I had a great job and I loved my team but I knew that something was off. 

One day it hit me I had an anxiety attack right there at work in my office my team was right around me so it’s quite a moment of I felt very ashamed very embarrassed I felt like I was weak. I tried to shake it off by hiding in the bathroom for a little bit but you can’t really shake something off like that and you think you would learn from that moment. Flash forward a couple years later and working in a different role in another contact center role and I had another anxiety attack and it was like, oh my gosh, this is happening again what am I ignoring what am I not saying or doing? And this time I had to push that superwoman pride down into the side and I had to get some help. I did a lot of internal work I went to therapy I saw a naturopathic doctor I started working with my own health coach at that time but then I also knew that there were some big things that I had to pay attention to like maybe I needed to find a different job that was more aligned with my values. It’s not just all about meditation and yoga and all of these types of things I had to make a big shift and that was really hard because I had built up my career so high. So shift change my job found a job that actually aligns with my values and continue to make changes on a daily basis that are lifestyle changes as opposed to just something that’s going to get me by till the next anxiety attack, so huge learnings do that. I don’t know if anyone else can relate Superman/Superwoman type role but it’s great until it’s not great. 

Jim Rembach:   I also know some people personally who kind of play that superwoman role and again it comes down to that self-reflection component. You went through it twice, thanks for sharing a story by the way, because it’s hard to come and actually share something like you were saying—I felt weak I was embarrassed it takes time to get over that to be able to share it. There’s other people who are going through it right now, I know I’ve had my stints in moments of that and I try to keep myself out of it by doing some of the things that I was talking about  taking some of those breaks and I try to take a mid-day exercise break to kind of clear my mind. Sometimes when I’m doing that exercise I find my mind just running a hundred miles an hour it’s like, whoa, whoa, whoa I have to call myself bring myself down off of the edge. When you start talking about that second time when you went through and you started getting some support, was it quite immediately? Did you come to that realization or was there still another time span or period before you started saying, oh I got it now. 

Jenny Dempsey:   There was still another time period. It was less than the last time—the last time was probably a couple years between that but this maybe was a few months simply because I just did not feel good. Anyone who’s had anxiety attacks it’s mental but it also takes such a physical part of you—fatigue and all of these other things like gesturing issues and I was like this is not how I want to live my life. So within a few months I was starting to make some big shifts and the shifts felt rather challenging but I knew that I had to do it I don’t want to say it was easy but it was easy to make those shifts because I was in that mindset that I had to make the changes that make sense.

Jim Rembach:   If you’re talking about one thing that was the biggest impact for you as far as—I did this and I felt some immediate impact to me what was it?

Jenny Dempsey:   The biggest thing was quitting my job and then not having a job. I know that it sounds crazy and for someone who has anxiety attacks it’s like, oh what, no you’re wild you’re out of control but it hardest most scariest thing I have done but it was the best thing. I did not have a job for a month so it was a very short period of time, I found one shortly after, but taking that month off and I had not taken breaks or vacations before was like, whew, but it woke me up because it was like there is more out there and you can kind of mold things to be what you want them to be but you have to really be in the right mindset. And that was the biggest wake-up call that I had and they were all my choices, totally my choices.

Jim Rembach:   It’s interesting that you say that. I met some guy, a couple of months ago who basically that’s the way that he works he does sabbaticals. And the way that he does it is he finds a job intentionally tries to find one where he’s only going to do it from anywhere from a year to two years and then he takes a couple months off and finds another job.

Jenny Dempsey:   That’s so awesome. 

Jim Rembach:   Yes, it’s become a lifestyle for him, so that’s interesting to say that. Alright, so have a lot of things going on, we talked about of course the cats and the boyfriend and the jobs and the wellness but when you start looking at one thing that would be a goal, just one, what would it be? 

Jenny Dempsey:   I want to really find a way to bridge the gap between customer service and wellness. I know that there’s so many elements to it and I really want to—my goal is to get a really solid structure around those two and how they’re going to interact together and how I can help participate in them interacting together. 

Jim Rembach:   The Fast Leader legion wishes you the very best. Now before we move on let’s get a quick word from our sponsor.

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Jim Rembach:   Alright here we go Fast Leader legion it’s time for the Hump Day Hoedown. Okay, Jenny the hump day hoedown is the part of our show where you give us good insights fast. So I’m going to ask you several questions and your job is to give us robust yet rapid responses that are going to help us move onward and upward faster. Jenny Dempsey are you ready to hoedown? 

Jenny Dempsey:   I’m so ready,

Jim Rembach:   Alright. What do you think is holding you back from being an even better leader today? 

Jenny Dempsey:   Impostor syndrome. I believe that I’m sometimes inadequate. 

Jim Rembach:   What is the best leadership advice you have ever received? 

Jenny Dempsey:   From my former boss, Jeremy Watkin, customer service is just people helping people.

Jim Rembach:   What is one of your secrets that you believe contributes to your success?

Jenny Dempsey:   Being authentic even if it means being slightly awkward.

Jim Rembach:   What do you feel is one of your best tools that helps you lead in business or life?

Jenny Dempsey:   Keeping and sticking to a schedule. I can’t live without my Google calendar.

Jim Rembach:   What would be one book that you’d recommend to our listeners and it can be from any genre?

Jenny Dempsey:   Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert.

Jim Rembach:   Okay, Fast Leader listeners you can find links to that and other bonus information from today’s show by going to www.fastleader.net/jennydempsey. Okay, Jenny, this is my last Hump Day Hoedown question. Imagine you were given the opportunity to back to the age of 25. And you’ve been given the opportunity to take the knowledge and skills that you have now back with you but you can’t take everything back you can only choose one. What skill or piece of knowledge would you take back with you and why?

Jenny Dempsey:   Don’t care so much what other people think about you and stop comparing. Because people who actually want to be around you will love you for being authentic and those are the people that you want in your life in your tribe surrounding yourself with them and that’s what’s going to make the biggest difference and impact. 

Jim Rembach:   Jenny it was an honor to spend time with you today can you please share with the Fast Leader Legion how they can connect with you?

Jenny Dempsey:   Absolutely. You can find me on Twitter @jennysuedempsey or you can visit me over at www.customerservicelife.com or hop over to www.dempseywellness.org. 

Jim Rembach:   Jenny Dempsey thank you thank sharing your knowledge and wisdom the Fast Leader Legion honors you and thanks you for helping us get over the hump. Woot! Woot! 

Thank you for joining me on the Fast Leader show today. For recaps links from every show special offers and access to download and subscribe, if you haven’t already, head on over the www.fastleader.net so we can help you move onward and upward faster. 

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