From A People Perspective

Martin Hauck (01:34)
right, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of from a people perspective. I'm your host, Martin Hawk. And today we have Melissa Marcelluson, who is the chief operating people officer at certain. Welcome.

Melissa Marcelissen (01:49)
Thanks, Martin. Super excited to be here.

Martin Hauck (01:51)
Yeah, yeah, no, it's there's some interesting things to double click on today. I'm excited for today's episode. Before we dive in. ⁓ Let's let's let's handle some icebreakers. You've got one musician or album in the world to hold on to and listen to for the rest of your life. What are you listening to?

Melissa Marcelissen (01:59)
Me too.

Sure.

I'm probably going catch some heat over this, but I also know there's enough people that know me well enough that I can't lie. It would definitely be Taylor Swift.

Martin Hauck (02:22)
That's the second Swifty in,

in very popular right now. Her new thing just dropped, right?

Melissa Marcelissen (02:29)
Yeah,

yeah, life of a showgirl.

Martin Hauck (02:32)
Life of a show girl. I haven't listened to

it entirely. And the last guest we had on who's we haven't released the pod yet. But also said that I feel like there's a theme here. What? What? there a particular album? What is like this latest album like a mind blowing? Or do you have like ⁓ a sentimental?

Melissa Marcelissen (02:44)
Yeah.

I mean, I don't want to go too far into the lore, but there's like, there's a process that you go through and you listen to an album for the first time. And it's like so disappointing because it's not like anything that was before. you like her for whichever album it was that you loved. And, and then you listen again and again, and you're like, this is a bop. This is pretty good. It's not what I expected. ⁓ so I definitely have made that journey over the last couple of weeks. Yeah.

Martin Hauck (03:16)
Okay, okay. Now have you arrived at this is the best album ever or

Melissa Marcelissen (03:21)
No, I don't know that I'll get there this time. Like I'm a big folklore evermore ⁓ emo kind of. Yeah, that's my that was my jam, but it's still very good.

Martin Hauck (03:31)
Nice, nice. And what album would you recommend for a non-Swifty

to like dip there? Like what's Swifty 101? Like where do I gotta start to understand it?

Melissa Marcelissen (03:43)
I think you'd have to like, I would honestly start with reputation. That's probably my favorite album. Yeah, reputation. Yeah. Yeah. Get right into the grown up stuff. Like, yeah, I need to start at 16 year old in country. That's that was never really my I was a late kind of later adopter. Yeah.

Martin Hauck (03:48)
Reputation? Okay.

Hahaha

That's That's fair. No,

nice. Nice. All right. ⁓ Midnight snack time. ⁓ What are you going for?

Melissa Marcelissen (04:07)
Mmm.

It's gotta be candy. That's my my vice for sure. Whether it be like nibs or wine gums, something like that. Yeah.

Martin Hauck (04:12)
candy.

nips or wine gums. Have you

have you tried these new nerd gummies?

Melissa Marcelissen (04:22)
No. Yeah, good. Yeah.

Martin Hauck (04:24)
dangerous. If you like nibs and wine gums that like nibs and wine

gums have like a classic element to them. Like it's not like the new they're not like the tick tock of candy. It's more like it's like before social media candy, like they've been their staples and like, but in terms of like chewiness and texture and like flavor, especially on the wine gum side, nerd gummies are dangerous. Like

Melissa Marcelissen (04:33)
Yeah.

Right. Yes.

gummies.

Martin Hauck (04:53)
buy one pack and like take a couple out and then like freeze the pack or get it away from you because I have crushed so many bags of those nerd gums. It's insane. Yeah. ⁓ highly, highly dangerous. and, what would you say? And we're going to do a couple of hot takes just on.

Melissa Marcelissen (04:53)
to check it out.

Martin Hauck (05:15)
the market in the HR space and the recruitment space and operations space to which which you're no stranger to and I'm excited to dive into that. But for the listeners from a from a people perspective, ⁓ what what would you say is like the most important skill to have just in general if you're going to dive into this profession overall?

Melissa Marcelissen (05:17)
Mm-hmm.

What a great question. ⁓ I think now especially, but probably always is curiosity and to be a lifelong learner. Because I don't think anybody could accurately predict what this role is going to look like in 10 years. So you got to be ready and willing to take on whatever comes. ⁓

Martin Hauck (05:57)
Nice, nice. And did it take time for you to figure that out or see that as like the thing that sets people apart or sets yourself apart when it comes to roles or well, how did that how did that realization come about?

Melissa Marcelissen (06:11)
I

Yeah, I think so. I've always been that way. Like for my first part time job, like I was my first real part time job was at Canadian Tire and I happened to work in sight and sound and housewares. So like stocking shelves and helping customers, things like that. And I would like come in on my time off and I wanted to like learn how the warehouse worked. So I'd come in and I did receiving with the guys and I wanted someone to teach me cash and I wanted to and it just meant that no matter what, like I could jump in and help.

which also then made me more valuable, which also then, and that's not why I did it. I just always have kind of had this, if I'm gonna do something, I wanna know as much as I can about it and really understand how it works from front to back. And I've just kind of taken on every role I've had in that same way. And it's always opened opportunities I could have never expected. So.

I think in people and culture, especially, we're to have to continue to really rationalize the value we add. We're going to have to continue to think about how we think about productivity outside of just humans. We're going to have to start thinking about lots of things to be able to keep pace with the conversations our executive teams are having. And if you can't do that, that's how you become irrelevant and kind of sidelined as this cost center. But if you can stay in the conversation, then I think you can do anything from the people lens of a business.

Martin Hauck (07:19)
Hmm.

Right? No, that's interesting. And, you know, obviously highly relevant. ⁓ in terms of traps, professional traps that maybe you've fallen into in the past that you were not even traps, like bumps along the road that, that you've stumbled into that you, would say to somebody,

Melissa Marcelissen (07:41)
Mm-hmm.

Martin Hauck (07:56)
either just starting off or even midway through their career and maybe they've not like seen every scene seen as much as you have what what would you sort of like like you know when you're like hiking or something like that and then people are coming in and we go watch there's a big log with a like what version of that would you say what would what message would you pass along to the to the folks going forward?

Melissa Marcelissen (08:04)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah, yeah

I think there'll always be people trying to relegate you to what you've done or what they think you could do, especially in the people and culture or HR side of the business. And I think it's knowing that it's up to you to ask the right questions, to be curious, to get in the right conversations, to say, okay, if you're not ready to have that conversation with me, what would I need to do? Like, first thing I asked my CAO when I started the role is, what podcast are you listening to? What are you reading?

like, because I want to be reading those things, then I'm going to understand the challenges that you've got. I'm going to understand what you're looking at. I think, you know, don't feel like you have to follow anyone else's playbook. Don't feel so confined by you have to do this role, then this role, then this role, then this role. Like you should really lean into the things that keep you passionate, that keep you excited, because those are the things that will keep you performing really well. It's like when you take on challenges that really excite you, all of the stats show

people just perform better. When you do things because you think you have to, not so much. So don't let someone else decide which lines you got to color in. You get to pick. This is your career. And no one is going to be as invested ⁓ as you are. And they shouldn't be. So make sure that you're taking control when you can.

Martin Hauck (09:22)
Yeah.

Fair play.

Anything that's, ⁓ I'm sure you've been in a position or everybody kind of goes through a moment where like, this isn't energizing me. This particular role or this project is like not the thing that fills your cup. What, ⁓ and sometimes you just have to go through it or do the thing. Is there anything that comes to mind that's helped you out in those moments to sort of get, get through that moment and know

Melissa Marcelissen (09:47)
Mm-hmm.

Martin Hauck (10:06)
see the light at the end of the tunnel or, know, like, you know what, I'm going to break out of this tunnel entirely and find my own light kind of deal. there anything that comes to mind or advice you'd give folks?

Melissa Marcelissen (10:11)
Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, sometimes it's easier said than done. But I think like, along with that piece of advice that I just gave, you're right, sometimes you just got to do the thing. might not be the thing that charges you up. remembering that while you're finding other ways to develop the things that do make you passionate, whether ⁓ your role currently or whether your organization is investing you doing that, you can do that yourself. Remembering that you've got to give appropriate effort to the thing that you're being asked to do, because if that performance slips,

then you don't have the credibility or the influence to kind of call your next shot. So it's kind of keeping those two things in balance. And for me, was something my mom forced on me in grade nine. I've really struggled with language, ⁓ love math, struggled with language, always have. And I'm one of five girls, but she had a rule that we all had to take French to the end of high school, like to the end of grade 12, OAC for my oldest couple of sisters. And I...

Martin Hauck (10:56)
Yeah.

Melissa Marcelissen (11:12)
really really struck when I tell you I struggle with language for some reason it's thing my brain does not love to do and the French teacher even went towards like don't make her do this so it was like why do I have to do grade nine well you have to do grade nine in Ontario anyways to to complete high school so it became about that it became about okay like you're never gonna use this again but what my mom would say to me what do you need it for you need it to graduate high school and you can't do anything that comes after that unless you graduate high school so

Martin Hauck (11:21)
Hahaha

Melissa Marcelissen (11:40)
as much as yes, we're deciding you don't need to do this after, like you have to do this right now to get to the next part, right? And sometimes that's what you got to do is you got to kind of just decide that you're going to get through something as best you can put in the right amount of effort, but also know it's okay to reserve some to lean into the things that, you know, do really light you up and that you want to do so that you can deliver something of quality, keep you in the conversation for what's next. And also then come and say, Hey, this is what I've done on my own to build up this different skill set or

I'd like to propose could be a challenge that our team could take on, something like that.

Martin Hauck (12:12)
Nice. Now not going all the way back to grade nine, ⁓ but ⁓ to kind of get a sense of how you got to where you are. you introduce yourself and your background and how you got to where you are?

Melissa Marcelissen (12:23)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah, I often say I fell backwards into HR, which I think a lot of ⁓ executive HR folks did at some point in their career because there's so much value that comes from understanding different parts of the business when you're trying to, again, gain credibility ⁓ as a people executive. For me, what that looked like, ⁓ I did like one of those six months business college certificates to be a travel agent as a travel agent for five seconds.

And then I applied to an ad that was just about sales. And I ended up selling really crummy loans for quite a while. And you had to do all the parts of the business. So you had to solicit, which means I had to make 100 phone calls a day to try and get people to borrow money from us. I had to underwrite the loan. So I had to understand how financing worked. I had to close the loan. So I had to sell again at that moment. And then had to collect. And I think that was the game changer for me because that

the ripe age of 19, it gave me like a very different perspective on actions and consequences. So I can get this loan approved, but I've seen something that looks like this before and it put that family in a really crummy position. And so I, you know, I'm going to have a different conversation with them and maybe there's another way we could help instead of hurt. Right. So that like end to end work that I needed to do was really hard, but it gave me a lot of perspective again on, on accountability.

Martin Hauck (13:24)
you

Melissa Marcelissen (13:45)
actions having consequences and not being okay with just being dumb, your part of the job and going like, not mine anymore, right? Which we run into in organizations all the time, right? Like these silos that come into place. ⁓ So I'd say that that was really foundational for me in my career. And then there was a point where I ended up transitioning to banking, because that kind of lending was not fun at all. ⁓ I moved up fairly quickly into assistant branch manager, manager, I had a couple of really key leaders.

Martin Hauck (13:52)
Right.

Melissa Marcelissen (14:12)
They say inclusive leadership saved my life and I think it can change the world. That's my little plug. But that really, really sparked kind of my passion for leadership and for people and really, really got to see an action. You know, when you do put people first and when you understand their needs and how they contribute to your business success, you know, you can accomplish really great things together. So a couple of those key leaders come in and then just so happen to be kind of like the

⁓ regional career fairs. ⁓ My peers would tease me as being the training branch because people were always getting promoted and moved on. And then HR kind of came to me and said like, do you want to do this at a regional level? And I got to do a lot of branch manager development and coaching as ⁓ in my first HR VP role for kind of all of Southwestern Ontario with the bank I was working with at that time. And then it came this another pivotal conversation because I had just had that certificate. I'd never been

Martin Hauck (14:53)
Hmm.

Melissa Marcelissen (15:09)
really to a formal college or university, had a really great career conversation that was hard, but it was real. And I'm so lucky that the leader that had it with me was ready to be real because I'd made it to kind of that director level. And she said to me, she's like, you've made it here because you work really hard. You're bright. You pick things up quickly. And now you're competing for the next stage with people who work really hard, are really bright and pick things up quickly. And they've got something you don't. And that was some kind of undergrad or degree. So I did.

Martin Hauck (15:37)
Mm.

Melissa Marcelissen (15:38)
⁓ go to school and my first degree was my executive MBA. So I did a working ⁓ MBA with Ivy and it was a ton of work. It was hard being one of very few people in that room that didn't have an undergrad, ⁓ but it taught me so much and it expanded again what I knew. Like I knew a lot about finance, I knew a lot about banking and it just made it so much bigger. ⁓ And that's really kind of what has propelled the rest of my career the last five, six years.

Martin Hauck (16:00)
Hmm.

Melissa Marcelissen (16:07)
has been that moment, that network, the things I learned in that class, doing something really, really hard that not very many people do, because you can go, I can do anything for a reasonable amount of time, right? And it helps you get really disciplined around time management, around delegating, because you can't do everything yourself and do something like that. So that really kind of ⁓ even more of an interest in me in learning. I'm also a doctoral student now ⁓ pursuing ⁓

Martin Hauck (16:17)
Yeah. ⁓

Melissa Marcelissen (16:36)
degree in business with a focus on inclusive leadership. So I went out on my own for a couple of years consulting after I finished my degree and had some really great clients and I'd had some offer over the years or ask if I'd stay on, but I did a project for certain last fall, an OD project. And when they asked if I was interested in the vacant position, it was the first time I was really tempted. It was great because I got to have like a 90 day

Martin Hauck (17:02)
Hmm.

Melissa Marcelissen (17:06)
test run where they got to like see me and how I work. I got to do the same and then make a really informed decision. But like, I want to be a part of this. Like I want to, I want to be a part of what's next. So that's kind of brought me to where I am today. ⁓

Martin Hauck (17:14)
Nice.

That's awesome. Can we double click on,

and you talked about, ⁓ you've talked, you mentioned a couple times in terms of like includes inclusive leadership, save my career, save my life kind of And you mentioned one of the leaders like early in your career, like, is there, like, I'm sure there's a couple of moments that you can point to, but does anything stand out or what stands out as like the

Melissa Marcelissen (17:30)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Martin Hauck (17:48)
The quintessential story is like why you've brought this into your focus and why you think it's important.

Melissa Marcelissen (17:55)
Yeah, I had a really tough path to get where I am. Like I said, I came out of high school and I did that college certificate. I was married for 19 years at 19 years old and it was not great. I won't go too much further here. It wasn't healthy. It wasn't good. And it was interesting that when I...

found myself at the bank working for this leader. It was the first time, I think, in my adult life that someone looked at me like I had something good to offer. And that's everywhere, like home everywhere. So it was a big moment for me. And it's not something I think is fair to put on leaders, but I think it's important to understand that people have more interactions with their first level leader than anyone else in their life in many, many cases. ⁓ Research tells us that your first level leader has more of an impact on your mental health than your spouse.

Martin Hauck (18:26)
Hmm.

Melissa Marcelissen (18:48)
than your therapist, than your best friend. So like that is a big responsibility. ⁓ I don't think in general, we do a great job of equipping first time leaders with understanding what that means and what they could do with it. And I think the leader I had just happened to have what I call kind of like a disposition to lead. She was a great talent scout. ⁓ You know, I say that kind of like bashfully about myself, but I saw her do with other people too. And she really did. She just took

Martin Hauck (19:13)
Mm-hmm. ⁓

Melissa Marcelissen (19:16)
the time in kind of the first 90 days I was with the organization to understand what I brought at my best, you know, what I would struggle with. And then she put me in situations to do that thing I do best over and over and over and over again and built my confidence in a way that I don't think at, you know, 32, 33, 34 years old, I could have imagined that I needed. So it was really pivotal in so many ways. But a couple of the tangible things,

Martin Hauck (19:39)
Hmm.

Melissa Marcelissen (19:45)
I share the story sometimes with leaders when they get frustrated or ⁓ I think a lot of us, our first time leading can fall trap to like the best friend leader thing. ⁓ And I remember, yeah, right? Don't, we all do that. It's easy, right? It's easy to get people on your bus when you get them to like empathize with you and you can empathize with them or sympathize with them. Maybe it's probably a better word. ⁓ But, and it kind of becomes an us versus them thing, right?

Martin Hauck (19:57)
I've done it. Yeah.

It comes

from a good place, like many things, but yeah.

Melissa Marcelissen (20:14)
Yeah, yeah,

yeah, it's often want to be liked, it's wanting to protect people. But what it turns into is an us versus them as an us, the first level manager and the staff against the organization. Right. And I, yeah, the first time like I got frustrated in out in the open branch that we were closed, but it was in front of the tellers that reported to me. ⁓ I honestly can't remember what I said, but something about being frustrated about the direction that we've been given from

Martin Hauck (20:26)
Yeah. ⁓

Melissa Marcelissen (20:42)
head office and she pulled me into her office, closed the door and she's like, here, here is where you say that. You say that to me, you can cry to me, you can yell at me, you can scream at me. You don't say that to them, right? When you're, when you're talking to them, you're their stability, you're their confidence, you're there, you're all the things that you need me to be for you. And it's one of those things that is so simple, but not something that we think about and not something if no one says it to you, like you just inherently understand.

Martin Hauck (20:50)
Hmm.

Yeah.

No.

No, it's, it's, sorry, go ahead.

Melissa Marcelissen (21:13)
I think that was like huge for me.

So no, I was gonna say that was like, that's one of the conversations that we had that I will always remember and that I tell leaders about often.

Martin Hauck (21:24)
And in terms of, ⁓ yeah, so like going back to, to where we are today. So you're at certain and obviously in the intro, for those of you that picked up on it, not your standard title. ⁓ so you've just been promoted and you've been doing operations and the people side as well. That seems and feels like it's become, it's becoming more popular, right? As.

Melissa Marcelissen (21:31)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

right.

Martin Hauck (21:50)
as companies, there's a million things going on, you can say economic, you could say political, you could say, you know, with AI, all there's a million variables out there. But at the end of the day, people people are having to do more with less. And I'm, I'm curious, just like, to find out from from your perspective, what has this evolution of your role looked and felt like? What are you excited by? What's challenging about it?

Melissa Marcelissen (22:21)
think it is really exciting and I would hope most people are looking at this as like an opportunity and kind of shifting that just that way that we position it as being asked to do more. It's being given the opportunity to provide more of an impact, right? It's the recognition we've been begging for for decades that we know how to do some really important stuff in the business.

Martin Hauck (22:33)
Hmm.

Melissa Marcelissen (22:45)
Right. And I think there are a number of people, people leaders that have these skills that maybe they haven't thought about them. Maybe their, their executives haven't thought about them, but they're there. So for us in our operations team, you know, about half of our staff works in operations as in delivery operations, right? Some of it's still manual tasks. Some of it's oversight of automation and AI. It's getting involved when you need a person in the loop. run a very people oriented business.

So there's always lots of factors. It's never gonna be a thing that you just press one button and it's done by itself. So there's a lot of people behind the scenes making things happen. And so when we think about what that workforce takes to be engaged, like an operations workforce in general is your maybe lower graded employees, so lower compensated employees. They have repetitive tasks that aren't always the most engaging or inspiring. So when we think about solving an engagement,

crisis or needing to build a certain culture with an organization, when you start with operations, that's a really great way to start to win because there's so many people in those work groups that you can influence that when you've got your people person leading them, thinking about workforce management, thinking about engagement, thinking about priorities and goal setting, then you've got half your organization taken care of in some ways. And you can lead ⁓ as a people person.

not just by saying this is what you should do next, this is what you should do next, this is what you should do next. We can actually lead by example. And then when you start having those success metrics that we all know come with doing the right things over and over, setting clear goals and expectations, rewarding the right behaviors, I think as people, people, inherently know those things work. And sometimes to the rest of the executive team, those things sounds soft and fluffy, right? So then what an opportunity to take half the workforce.

Martin Hauck (24:32)
Hmm.

Melissa Marcelissen (24:36)
And hopefully in like six months time, be able to say, look at how the metrics have shifted. You can just do what we've been asking you to do and you'll see some of this stuff too, right? And you'll get the whole like turning a ship of 350 people is hard, but when now there's, you know, that many people being led with kind of the same philosophy and by the, by the same person, you know, I think we can turn that ship a little bit faster when we need to.

Martin Hauck (24:42)
Right.

Hmm.

It's ⁓ and in terms of like, how would you say like, getting into the, the nitty gritty of it, like, and there's oftentimes you've got like a CPO and that's people and then then the COO, or is your a mixture of both? And how would you say, how do you, how do you split up your like that for me, just like that makes my like,

Melissa Marcelissen (25:20)
Mm-hmm.

Martin Hauck (25:29)
context switching brain spin. And I'm just curious, like, how do you look at it in order to like, ⁓ stay organized and feel, feel like you're in control versus like, I've got two massive, like, I've always had that sort of curiosity around folks with that have like the dual title slash role.

Melissa Marcelissen (25:32)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. I think it's like figuring out where things aren't different because I think, you know, despite who's in the specific meetings I'm in and needing to be able to protect my calendar enough, ⁓ the initiatives don't change, right? The goals of the organization haven't changed. So the ways that I lead, whether it be how we have a weekly meeting, whether it be, you know, how I set expectations.

That doesn't change, right? That doesn't change depending on what the person is doing, right? So finding those things that stay the same instead of thinking you have to reinvent the wheel and just because it's a different part of the organization, there's so many things that are similar about good leadership. ⁓ I won't claim to have them all down right now. I think getting my feet back under me again, because it is always disruptive because you make one of these decisions and then there's enablers that have to come with that. So for us, that was a

great conversation that we had as an executive team back in July. And the enablers for us were we needed to hire a generalist. So we needed to hire kind of an entry level person on our P &C team. And I needed to hire a a ⁓ principal strategic operations person to help with some of the data, the workflow mapping, project management that I wasn't going to do as the head of operations. So you have to have those conversations about the enablers. We've just got to where those are in place. So now.

I have to kind of go back and go, okay, like what does my regular day to day look like? ⁓ But I really do believe there's more that's the same than is different. And by focusing on those things, like you can get everybody kind of going in the same direction. Now it's not gonna work all the time. ⁓ I'm very, very lucky. Like we have a small but mighty PNC team that has been here for quite some time. you know, they do what they do probably better than me a lot of days. And then my job is as a people.

Martin Hauck (27:26)
No.

Melissa Marcelissen (27:39)
officer is that representation at the executive ⁓ leadership table. But I know day to day, the PNC team ⁓ is going to have the things taken care of. They're going to be having their meetings with the executives and reporting back, things like that. Operations a little bit more fluid. Again, really lucky that we've got some stability in the management levels. ⁓ But you know, there is always turnover in those entry level roles. There's always a lot of moving pieces and lots of conversations to have across the business. So

It is definitely a calendar management issue, but getting really clear, I guess, on what your boundaries are, what time you need, try and protect some white space so you get work done every once in a while. And then what are the enablers? So if you're not hiring another executive, okay, I'm gonna need a little bit of that budget. Yes, we can do more with less, but we need to be realistic so that we don't set everybody up to fail.

Martin Hauck (28:30)
Fair, ⁓ Initially, when we were talking about it, ⁓ there's this idea of not this idea, but you were in the throes of consulting and you were working with a bunch of different clients. And I guess my curiosity is around, you know, this one, like working with certain was the first one that felt compelling or

Melissa Marcelissen (28:46)
Mm-hmm.

Martin Hauck (28:59)
of interest versus like, like really captivating, like, Hey, this would be worth me kind of, you know, winding down what I'm doing. Like having myself being, ⁓ having been a consultant for a couple of years. ⁓ and, and I think the bigger question or the question I'm asking on behalf of the, audience is like a lot of folks are having to either become consultants out of necessity because there's restructures and there's a lot of flux in the market right now.

Melissa Marcelissen (29:24)
Mm-hmm.

Martin Hauck (29:28)
And people that have been consultants, how did you, is there a framework or decision or, you know, decision matrix that you use to like come up with it? Or was it all like, walk, walk us through your decision making process. They're like, why does this make sense?

Melissa Marcelissen (29:43)
Yeah.

Right.

⁓ For me, like some of it was timing transparently, ⁓ you know, coming into December last year is when kind of made the decision and came on full time with certain ⁓ knowing where the market was going. ⁓ Most of the work I was doing was in the equity and inclusion space and doing some org design work, things like that. And just feeling that tension in the market of tightening budgets, uncertainty of like, will we or won't we ever have a formal recession? Like what's going to happen? So some of it was that some of it was like the time

was at my ⁓ youngest was getting ready to start college this year so like some stability was appealing. I had started my doctorate program again the stability was a bit more appealing than needing to be on the business development ⁓ wheel all of the time. I think I needed a little bit of a break from that and to reset like what is what is the highest value of what I do offer what does that need to look like going forward things like that so

It was also a moment in time. But I think more importantly than that, I had actually listed like some of my deal breakers ⁓ and I've never had any interest in being the people police. People have said that all the time. ⁓ So I had to know the conversations that I was having with the CEO, with the president at the time that I felt like I was going to be a part of the executive team and not just, you know, the people person that gets.

Martin Hauck (30:55)
you

We'll call you in when you

need your kind of deal. Yeah. Yeah.

Melissa Marcelissen (31:11)
Exactly. And then we'll ignore you most of the time, whatever that was going to

look like. I've definitely worked in those organizations and like that had no appeal to me because I had experienced kind of the freedom of being able to say to a nodal client that wasn't for me. Right. I'd been able to go like I hadn't really worked summers in almost three years, which was fantastic. This last summer was hard for that a suggestion, but like I'd had enough of that that I wasn't willing to compromise on a few things. So again, like

how did, what was my place in the team going to look like? What was the stage of the organization? I don't, I'm not a great status quo leader. Like I want to come in where there's some big problems to solve. So those things that presented themselves kind of over that first 60 days that I was working with the organization were really good signs and they've definitely followed through. Like I've been a part of every board meeting since.

⁓ which to me is like just a signal again that you know you're in the right rooms and the right conversations to be able to have the impact that you want to have. ⁓ And then the team, I got to work with the team ahead of time too and they're again just phenomenal. Like our whole PNC team is so dedicated and you know ⁓ ready to help, wanting to win, like all of the things that you could want from a team. So it wasn't that daunting of like

I don't have the talent to do it. We definitely had that. So those were the big things for me. Like what was my place going to be in the organization? What did the team look like? And were there some big fun problems to tackle? And those are the things that were there for me.

Martin Hauck (32:51)
There's it's funny cause this question is similar to like certain in the sense that like certain broke the paradigm when it came to like background checks, because up until a certain point, pun, not intended, but I guess up until a certain point there, there was like limited options and they were very mad. then when certain came along and like created this evolution,

Melissa Marcelissen (33:01)
.

Martin Hauck (33:18)
⁓ the paradigm shift of like, okay, this is the new bar for this particular task or this aspect of like the employee and candidate life cycle. at least from my perspective and I'm, know, by, by trade, I'm a recruiter. So like, kind of got like a front row seats to, comparables. Now, one thing that you mentioned was that you got a chance to kind of see what life at certain was like, as well as they got a chance to see.

Melissa Marcelissen (33:26)
So.

Yeah.

Martin Hauck (33:48)
what working with Melissa was like. And there was like that 90 day period of like, we're working together. We're in an engagement, your consultant, their client, da da da da. And like this idea popped into my mind, like, should that be the new paradigm for all executive hires just moving forward? I just wanted to like brainstorm that with you for a bit there. Like, is that even viable? Is that a better way? What was your experience? Like, what do think?

Melissa Marcelissen (33:49)
Mm-hmm.

I think that would be an ideal way. I don't know how realistic it is. think when you find someone in that exact situation where it's, you know, they're doing okay, they're consulting, there's no like, I have to stop doing this and do something else. ⁓ It is a way to find, I think, interesting talent that a ⁓ recruiter might not bring you. I...

joked with Andy and our CFO a few times when we went through the recurrent process for our new CTO and VP Marketing is like, they would have never, ever put my name in front of you. So it is a great way to kind of test and understand maybe unproven talent or someone that you're like, I think I'm gonna take a flyer on this one or like, I think we could get something really unique if we thought differently, then it gives you the time to know of like, could it work?

right? Like is it going to be a good fit? I'm not sure outside of people ⁓ what the market would withstand from that, to be honest. Like I think when I think of, you know, we have just hired a new CTO this year in VP Marketing and those roles, I think when you're trying to find the best person, there has to be a bit of a commitment from the organization, right, for them to buy in as well. Because

I think in the right circumstance, it would be super cool to do that with every rule. I think you'd lose some really great people that were not willing to take the risk, right? Because they'd have to have the first kind of 60, 90 days to put in first and make sure it was a good fit. I do think we should all be having conversations at 60, 90 days going like, you know, it's like, like, how's it feel? What's good? What's not? Do you feel like you belong here? And if you don't, like, what is a path? Like on both sides.

Like what is a path to say, let's transition to something different and just acknowledge those things a little bit earlier. Ideally when you're pulling those things out, like you're finding ways to work through them, of course. But if it really isn't to fit, like making it okay to have that conversation. You go like, how are we gonna get through this kind of thing and make it as least disruptive as possible. Because it happens.

Martin Hauck (36:02)
Hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. I guess going back to the, the thread and philosophy of inclusive leadership there, I've, least from my perspective, I've rarely do you see companies do a good job of that at any level, like the, first 90 days or the, know, the Canadian probationary period, a lot of times it has to be like, something has to be going very wrong.

Melissa Marcelissen (36:52)
right.

Martin Hauck (36:52)
for you

to make a call in that moment. like you, you know, I thinking the best of, you know, human nature, people want to see people succeed. You're like, they're going to turn the corner and you look at the environment and the circumstances. say, well, our onboarding wasn't that great. So, you know, we should give this person another chance. And then, you know, you go beyond the 90 day mark and you know, things change in the Canadian employment landscape when that happens, which is positive for the employee because they've got some stability and

Melissa Marcelissen (37:15)
Mm-hmm.

Martin Hauck (37:22)
some comfort in that circumstance. But I guess you're, I mean, of course, 1000 % right on the fact that you, you should have those conversations much sooner. How do you set that expectation upfront? make it easier so that you can sort of have that harder conversation in an inclusive leadership sort of way.

Melissa Marcelissen (37:35)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I think it's just being really clear. Like I'm sure you've heard the cheesy phrase like clear as kind, right? Like being really clear about what expectations should be even at kind of that executive or director senior, more senior level. Everyone needs to know kind of what what is your expectation in the first 30 days, the first 60 days, the first 90 days. And I don't know that in general, we do even a good job of that. So if we can't communicate that

Martin Hauck (37:53)
You

Melissa Marcelissen (38:13)
how are we starting to communicate about whether someone is or isn't meeting those expectations, right? Like if we're not clear, really transparent from the jump, what their initial focus should be. Because I think there's this tricky balance, can go back to kind of executive hiring, where like you want them to come in with a fresh perspective and bring what they bring. And you want to be open to kind of whatever they wanna do with it to make it theirs, to make that group theirs. But again, without some like really clear,

even high level 30, 60, 90 outcomes to focus on or like, how are they going to know not to fall in every trap that your last three executives have fallen into? Right? You got to give them, you got to balance not trying to diminish the value that they're bringing with that fresh perspective, but also give them enough guardrails or that. And then like at day 45, if they come to you and say, I know you said this was not an early, um, like priority, but here's why I think it is great. Like then have that conversation. Right. But.

Martin Hauck (39:11)
Yeah. ⁓

Melissa Marcelissen (39:12)
I think

we tend to go like one way or the other way too often. We're super prescriptive with someone you've just kind of paid a boatload of money to come and help you lead a function that you don't know how to lead. Or we go like completely hands off and go let them do what they're going to do. And everybody needs guidance. I don't care what your title is. Like a CEO needs guidance from the board. I need guidance from my leaders. Like, you know, we need those checks and balances and level setting to make sure we're all heading in the right direction in the same direction.

Martin Hauck (39:22)
Yeah.

What would you say is like a interesting vantage point and you have being both on the operation side as well as the people side? what's, what, what do you feel like you have sort of like an unfair advantage to?

Melissa Marcelissen (39:54)
Yeah,

that's a great question. think ⁓ seeing how easy it is at the kind of 500 foot level to make really big assumptions, especially again about our most entry level employees. ⁓ And then when you actually see the work that they do day to day and talk to their leaders, the amount of care and attention and like deep commitment to our customers that some of these folks have, I don't think some of our

very well paid, more senior people have day in day out. So I think there's always this broad assumption that, you know, if people on a employee pulse survey say are complaining about ⁓ salary, or if they're complaining about this or that, there's certain things that we say, that's probably this group. And like dig a little bit deeper, not just into the data, but actually into the stories, the things that are happening, how they run their day to day, like, and you'll often see sometimes it's the inverse, and you're focusing on the wrong thing.

Martin Hauck (40:51)
Hmm.

Melissa Marcelissen (40:51)
Right.

So I think that's a kind of a cool sneak peek. I think ⁓ the other thing that I've really kind of learned over the last 60 days anyways is ⁓ just how much ⁓ people are trying to solve their own problems in these quiet little, you know, echo chambers or silos instead of knowing that they can bring it forward and talk about it because there's somebody probably over in product that could solve that way faster.

⁓ or better or is already working on it and you're over here spinning your wheels trying to like you know make something work together that that doesn't work together that's not your expertise and all of those kinds of things so like how many conversations aren't happening at the broader level I think would be the other thing that I've I've learned the last 60 days for sure.

Martin Hauck (41:40)
Do you find yourself or your team being the connectors within the organization saying, why don't you just talk to so and so, or you should, you should, and by nature of doing that, they get ahead further or they solve the problem quicker kind of deal. that

Melissa Marcelissen (41:57)
Mm

hmm. Yeah. And I actually find those again, those two groups complement each other really well operations and people because I in our organization, like our our four or five people, people, you know, they know all 320 names almost off the top of their head where they work, where they live, like all of the things, something I'm not very good at. I can't I don't have the memory for that. But like, they're so great at knowing like

Martin Hauck (42:03)
Hmm.

Melissa Marcelissen (42:23)
whether it's one of our business partners say, I picked up in this conversation with this leader, but then when we were having our team meeting, it sounded like that was a gap over there. So then they'll kind of talk to each other and bring the right groups together because ⁓ the business partners are doing a great job of really becoming part of the team that they support. So then they pick up a lot of that, what might be getting disconnected and are able to act as the people that bring it back together. So I think having those business partners in the right meetings, like in your...

⁓ executive team calls when it's appropriate or your monthly business reviews, like those kinds of things, they can close a lot of gaps for your organization because they've like got their ear to the ground for lack of a better term, but they know what's going on. Good, or otherwise, they always know what's going on.

Martin Hauck (43:06)
Yeah, no, it's,

hard to, when you have an awesome HRBP, it's hard. Like you can, you can tell like they're connected. They're dialed in. They, they, they know which teams are struggling and, and like, you know, this one. And it's, it's always kind of cool to see like that they almost like reporters, like they just have the scoop and the beat on what's going on in that thing, ⁓ in an objective way that like.

Melissa Marcelissen (43:16)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Martin Hauck (43:36)
Like they want to help the organization. Like, I think, you know, kind of like an empathetic click. I think we need to do what can we do and how can there there's the, and does it, does it fall on sort of the HRBP to solve the problem or more to flag it? And then that becomes, you know, something that operations decides to tackle or not kind of

Melissa Marcelissen (43:38)
hallway.

Right.

Yeah,

ideally it's like flag it and then connect to the right groups, right? Connect the right people when they've come up with a disconnect, even whether it's operations or anybody else involved, and not be the people that solve it. I think that's something that have to, if I have to coach my team often on something, it's that, like that they can't do everything, which is, you know, one of those good problems to have, but it really should be to be like, okay, you two need to talk and, you know, whatever those two groups are. But it goes back to that, you know, kind of my advice.

Martin Hauck (44:13)
Yeah.

Melissa Marcelissen (44:25)
early in our conversation, it really is that curiosity is a superpower. So everyone on the team is just inherently ⁓ like wants to know how our business works. And that's the thing I think a lot of people teams miss or ones I've been a part of certainly have missed in the past is you get so focused on your process, your procedure, your cycle, whatever it is, that they don't take the time to really understand how the business works and then they can't catch those falling.

balls, right? Like they catch them because they understand the context of the conversation because they've actually put in the time to understand how our business works or at least how their groups work and how that connects with the rest of the business. I think that's like the defining, you know, asset of a really good people ⁓ group is really understanding how your business works.

Martin Hauck (45:15)
heard of those programs where like, everybody kind of shifts functions for a little bit internally and like much larger organizations, I think GE is the example that's that's coming to mind where if you want to get promoted, you kind of have to do a rotation of every department before you kind of it's harder to implement that in a scale up startup or in tech, so to speak, but ⁓ definitely still something worth worth doing.

Melissa Marcelissen (45:22)
Mm.

Yeah.

That's right.

Martin Hauck (45:44)
Have you, have you seen sort of like mini versions of that work or have you implemented stuff like that or yeah, what's your take on that?

Melissa Marcelissen (45:45)
Totally.

Yeah,

think certain actually a really good example. We have a number of folks who have moved within the organization. I would say these for the most part though do come down to again that advice gave at the beginning is like someone taking the initiative to lean into something they're interested in, whether it be off the side of their desk or even, you know,

⁓ as almost like a hobby, whatever it might be. But we had someone who worked in people with us for a long time and it was one of our most successful salespeople, which is great, right? Because for us, our ICP is an HR person. ⁓ So it's a great close tie and he understood the business again really, really well. One of the people on our ⁓ PNC team that's really critical has come up through our customer support ranks, right? So.

It is again about like really identifying what your superpowers are or where you add the most value and then being curious, leaning in, asking for those opportunities. I think that's where it works. To your point, it's really hard to run a structured program in an organization the size of most of the groups I think that you talk to.

Certainly for ours, I've been part of much bigger organizations that are 25,000 people nationwide, 100,000 globally, and you can have more structure. But the thing that I think that structure almost takes away is your ability to pick what's next.

Martin Hauck (47:12)
Right.

Melissa Marcelissen (47:12)
because then you got

Martin Hauck (47:13)
Right.

Melissa Marcelissen (47:13)
to fit in that box again, right? You're waiting for someone to come say, hey, here's your next rotation, right? Instead of saying, this thing really interests me and I've talked to so and so from this department several times, is there a project I could take on that would let me do a little bit of that work so that when an opportunity comes, I'm ready, right? Or is there a way I can lean into that? Or can I support that team as a business partner if you're kind of remapping your clients like.

those are things that you do have control of and hopefully can have that conversation with your leader and think about how you take a little bit of control over what you do next, right?

Martin Hauck (47:47)
What are you keeping an eye

on in terms of things that have and things you believe will have a massive impact on the future of the business from a people and operations perspective? And that is very a coy way. Like I know that the answer includes AI ⁓ and, and, and it's, we talk about it.

Melissa Marcelissen (47:58)
Mm.

Yeah.

Sure does. Yeah.

Martin Hauck (48:12)
And I've been joking about it for like 15 podcasts now, cause it's already, feels like we're talking about it all the time. So like, understand that there's a chunk of that, but I'm just curious, like what's piqued your interest? Like, what are you trying to stay ahead of personally so that you can bring it back to the organization and say, like, I've been paying attention to this. I've been paying attention to this. And I think these things are going to have material impacts on the business.

Melissa Marcelissen (48:22)
Yeah.

Yeah. So you're right. AI is definitely one of them and not in just all the ways that AI works within people, because there's lots of cool tools coming out that are better than they've ever been. They can get up and going quicker, whether it's leadership development, whether it's, know, talent acquisition, whatever it is, AI is kind of making things faster. I think what's even more important though is, is if people, people, people executives are thinking in themselves as ⁓ productivity executives. So knowing that like your future is going to include

both AI agents or bots and the people who manage them. Like that gets your, it starts to get your head around how you might need to change as a leader as well. Where are you getting, like how are you thinking about productivity? How are you measuring productivity? ⁓ And where do you need people in the loop? And how do you keep communicating that? Because some of our leaders, I think many of our leaders get really, really excited about the next big thing and are ready to run head first into it.

Martin Hauck (49:20)
Mmm.

Melissa Marcelissen (49:31)
And we need to, we need them to be, we need to be there going like, yes, that doesn't mean we don't need people. That means we need to evolve our people or start hiring for skills that we haven't looked for before ⁓ because there are still going to be humans in the loop in almost all of these places, especially with a business like ours where there is so much variability, there's personal, like human inputs from a candidate side. There will always need to be people. So it's more of like, how do we start to think about how are we developing our people?

what are we hiring for? That's going to mean we don't need to turn over all of our resources. We don't need to turn over all of our staff to be able to hire people that are going to be able to do the jobs of the future. For me, I think that's like the biggest challenge I've got right now. You can see what your current day looks like. I think I can envision what our future state looks like. It's like, how do we get from here to there? ⁓ Knowing that, you know, ideally we bring most of the people along with us and just train them, you know, teach them.

find those ones that are super curious, and how do we get people from here to there when we don't know exactly what that looks like yet. So I think that's the thing that I've tried to talk a lot about is how are we thinking about productivity? How are we thinking about where people will always fit in our business? And what can we do as a people group to make sure that we're clearing that path, so to make it as less turbulent as possible?

Martin Hauck (50:58)
One, one thing that came to that was a hard realization for me when I became my first like actual leader in a while was like that. wasn't the cool tool guy anymore that like other people were paying more attention because I was busy leading teams and I wasn't.

Melissa Marcelissen (51:12)
Mm.

Yeah.

Martin Hauck (51:18)
wasn't hands on tactical. And so I had like recruiters coming to me and being like, Oh, did you hear about this tool? And like, that was me, I was that guy. And so it's more of like, like an ego thing for me. You're like, Oh, that's, like, once I realized like, Oh, you know, so and so is my, my tool person. And so and so she's awesome with this or whatever the case might've been. Um, how, like my, my journey in leadership kind of like,

Melissa Marcelissen (51:40)
Mm-hmm.

Martin Hauck (51:47)
that's that's peaked or I had like eight recruiters reporting into me and, and like, I didn't go beyond that. I had a couple of like, folks that had people under them, but it wasn't like a crazy amount. Well, like I was leading massive divisions, I guess, like from from your perspective, like, how crucial is like a letting go of that need, like whatever that might be, maybe it's not like identifying being the tool person or whatever, but

Melissa Marcelissen (52:11)
Mm-hmm.

Martin Hauck (52:14)
It's like some aspect of like the role you used to do and letting go of that. then, and then empowering other people to become that thing. Cause it's needed. I think you it's a roundabout question, but I think you could probably tease out something from it.

Melissa Marcelissen (52:18)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

And I think it's so critical. So we talked a little bit before, but I feel like the doing the executive MBA, doing a working MBA really, really, really helped me with this, like understanding where to delegate, understand what to let go of, could be a bit of a control freak, for sure perfectionist, all of the things. Yes, it can be those things. And you can't do that when you're when you're trying to lead at this level.

Martin Hauck (52:42)
Yeah.

Melissa Marcelissen (52:51)
It's not possible. I've talked to people about this for years and that's like really the idea too of like what got you here won't get you there. I'm forget the name of the author, but there is, you you get recognized for being across all those things for being, you know, being that person, being the tool guy, being whatever for so long in your career, it's what got you here. And then all of a sudden you have to let go of that thing that you've been recognized for. ⁓ But how I look at it is like, don't be afraid to be vulnerable with your people.

I feel like I'm pretty transparent about what I know, what I don't know, what I do, what I don't do, and what I need my team for, right? Especially coming into this operations role, like who's this head of PNC, like coming in to be our leader. I think I was really clear, like these are the things I do, these are the things I don't do. It's been super fun to get back into some of the analytics. There's people analytics for sure, but you know, the, in-depth analytics and operations, cause I love that stuff, but I could get lost too, and then not get my job done. But really it's about like,

how do you stop doing the things that got you to where you are? Let other people do it. Recognize the heck out of them for it and let it be the thing that's going to develop them. Will you develop this new kind of strategic thinking, this higher level ⁓ contribution that you've got to offer? Like that's what I usually try and get people to think about is, but it's hard because it's the thing you've been recognized for, right? It's what got you here. So it's very human to go, I should keep doing this thing because it's worked so far. And it's like, it is the thing that's going to get in your way.

Martin Hauck (53:56)
Hmm.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Melissa Marcelissen (54:19)
at some level which is so tricky. It's very very hard. Yes.

Martin Hauck (54:19)
Yeah, yeah. It's a very weird, weird dynamic. And that felt like when I started

letting go and what was nice is like seeing then there was joy, like I no longer got joy or couldn't get joy from the fact or whatever it was from the fact that like, hey, I'm being recognized for this, but also seeing people grow. I'm like, wow, they're just so next level. And then then once I found like, ⁓ leadership is like, being

Melissa Marcelissen (54:41)
Right. Right.

Martin Hauck (54:48)
There there's the joy that you get or the dopamine hits of like success are coming from seeing your team succeed and seeing the company succeed. And as a result of like you putting the right people together and matching up teams, I guess high level, ⁓ just sort of like, well, we'll close it off here and really enjoyed the conversation. Any, any kind of like final thoughts that you have for listeners and

Melissa Marcelissen (54:55)
That's right.

Yeah. Yeah.

what a big question. ⁓ I think maybe just like the theme, I think that what's been the theme of my career, and I think the best advice that I can always give anyone is just to not let someone else define you. ⁓ You get to decide where to lean in, in certain parts of your career. And you get to decide if you're just going to be kind of on the sidelines and waiting for someone to tap you on the shoulder. Right? So lean in, like figure out what a cliche thing to say, but like,

Martin Hauck (55:27)
Hmm.

Melissa Marcelissen (55:42)
lean into the things that do excite you and energize you because that is where you'll find success and those are the places that you'll be able to like carve out a space that people remember you for, people value you for and will just lead to more success.

Martin Hauck (55:56)
Amazing. No, Melissa. Thanks so much for being on the podcast today. I really appreciate it. Awesome.

Melissa Marcelissen (55:59)
Thank you. Thanks, this is

All right.

Martin Hauck (56:03)
Cool.