Episode 1 

Fusion isn't just about food or music - wherever there are people, fusion is taking place. In the workplace, this can come in the form of organisational restructuring.

In this episode, our guest is Manoesjka Snijders, a Programme Director in a youth healthcare setting in the Netherlands. Manoesjka reflects on a time of structural change that took place within the organisation. She was asked to facilitate conversations with teams due to merge - to fuse. There was a moment in the process that resulted in it 'backfiring' (her words) - Manoesjka shares her insights about that moment and what this experience has strengthened in her. 

About Manoesjka

A solid project/program leader and neighborhood mediator, Manoesjka describes herself as an experienced and decisive manager who can handle a challenging work package. She thrives when she has the space to set a course, push boundaries and make decisions. To be creative. She believes in the power of people, in development and the potential of what can be. 

The feeling of being, or not being, in control as a manager, the legacy of making a difference, and curiosity about what a certain person will become. These are a few additional things Manoesjka Snijders talked about in her conversation with me that only just didn't make it into the main episode.  

Belinda (host): Chicken teriyaki tacos. Curry risotto. Kimchi quesadilla. Kung pao chicken wings. Sushi burrito. Fusion 'anything' exists everywhere. Think food, music, families, cultures. And fusion 'anything' has existed everywhere, forever. As people move, they instinctively take with them what they have, what they love, and what they know. As they are thrust into new circumstances, these people and what they bring with them must adapt in order to survive and thrive. The old and the new become a hybrid for a time, until they become mainstream or dissolve. What makes fusion 'anything' work is paying attention to inherent characteristics, what happens when these different characteristics come together and how to make this coming together work. Managers are people too. But it's convenient to make them the baddie in our own work life, and so we don't tend to be open to hearing from them about their unique spot in the world. This closes us off from learning and growing from their perspective. In this podcast, we pause to give managers and their peers the opportunity to reflect on a moment they encountered and the legacy they hoped to leave over time. This is The Manager's Moment, and I am your host, Belinda Brummer. In this episode, an innovation and change leader talks about the recent coming together of teams in her organisation. Spoiler alert:

Manoesjka: And it backfired.

Belinda (host): My guest today is

Manoesjka: Manoesjka Snijders tuning in from Nijmegen in the Netherlands, and.

Belinda (host): I'll let her introduce herself.

Manoesjka: It's a beautiful day here. It's been snowing. So Belinda and I, we met in South Sudan, where we both worked with, VSO. The first time I think we met was in Yei, the city where we both worked, at a little restaurant where the only thing that they served, I think, was chicken and fries. I'm originally a landscape planner. All the way through my working life, I worked at housing associations and nature conservation. And at the moment, my latest job is in youth healthcare, where I work as a Programme Director I've been working here now for, two years.

Belinda (host): To start things off, I asked Manoesjka what management means to her.

Manoesjka: Words make a big difference, right? So we talk about managing people. Shouldn't people manage themselves? So then I'm not really a people manager. I'm more the kind of person who facilitates the people or, who maybe helps them find their way or of course, sometimes holds them accountable, stuff like that. So it's very easy to talk about "you're a people manager", and then, so that's what you do. But actually, I think that's not what you do. I'm also not the kind of person "I want to be inspired". I think that can be a role of a, manager. But to motivate people is also, I, think you have to find the motivation within yourself. And sometimes you need to kind of talk with people around you to see if you still connect and if maybe you want some inspiration or because something, is not going well, and you need someone to talk to or for guidance or to just have some reflection. I think all those kind of things are important in not only the people manager, I think you can just as well maybe find that in the people you work with. So what is it that I do? What is it that I actually do as a people manager?

Belinda (host): Your focus is very strongly on change management in the context of innovation and organisation, direction, et cetera. What have you noticed most about how people make choices as you're taking them through a change process?

Manoesjka: That can be very different per person. But I think in general, cliches are true. People don't want to be changed. They want to change out of their own motivation, for instance, which is something, I think, which is one of the most challenging things. For instance, I see in the organisation I'm working at the moment. there is a lot of pressure, high pressure, high stress. Not enough people to do the work, not enough money to be paid for the work that you do. I work in the part focusing on mental health of youth, of children. I think the people who work here are highly motivated to do the work that they do. Everybody knows that things need to change to be able to do this work in the next ten years. But when this change means that they have to change the way they work or with who they work, and that comes from somewhere above, because someone says, "this cannot last, we have to change, that you have to change for us in order to still do our work in the next ten years", then that is ... I find one of the challenging things is people. There are people, they do this work daily. I think most of the people I work with, they understand, but changing means changing your day to day business. And if that, in some cases, for my colleagues, that means a heightened risk, personal risk, if they have to change the daily work they do, and that, even if you understand, then that could be a factor to say, "but I'm not going to change unless all these other conditions are then taken care of". As for me, things that I experience in life, the fears I have, the experiences I've had, they all color the way I fill my role. And of course, it's impossible for me. So on the youth side of my organisation, more than 1000 people work. I have never met all those people. I have no idea what's happening in the lives and the experience and day to day work of these thousands of people. And at the same time, it requires of most of them maybe to make some kind of change. And that has to be from the level of management all the way down to the people who do the actual day to day work. And leading by example means knowing where you go to what that means, but also how do you show up? how are you in connection and how do you talk and have conversations with the people in your teams? I think that's very important. And that is more my scope, because my scope is more the management of the organisations I work with to actually. So my scope is very limited. And, ah, I try to lead by example to have the conversations there about what is it that's difficult for you? Why is that? What do you need? How can we facilitate that? What are your fears? And I find also there sometimes has to be a limit if nobody wants to move. Sometimes you do have to ... you have to set course and people have to move or change. and I find that a very difficult kind of how do you do that to see the person and everything that happens there. And at the same time, you sometimes have to set boundaries. You say, but this is where we're going. Are you joining me or not? If you want to join, and it's terrifying, let me help you. If there's anything you need, let me help you. But if you don't want to, then maybe over time, maybe this is not the organisation to work. And that's a tough conversation and I.

Belinda (host): And I really want to bring this to life. and so I'd love us to really get into a situation of change management that you've navigated.

Belinda (host): You are listening to the manager's moment, and I am your host, Belinda Brummer.

Manoesjka: I'm a Programme Director; I work between the board of directors and the business units, you could say. And, the business units have their own director and management team where I actively worked one of these management teams that were actually two teams, one business unit, but geographically big. So there were two management teams. Halfway that year - my first year - those teams had to come together as one team, which also meant that there was going to be one director, not two anymore, one management team, not two teams. One year plan, one financial plan for the next year. So that process of bringing those together was the responsibility of the then interim director that had been appointed. The success of what I do within the organisation is in huge part dependent on these people, because they are the management, the leadership of this organisation and organisational change, the things that we want to achieve over the next five to ten years, they are partly mostly in charge. So I had high expectations. A, lot depended on it, at least to reach my goals. The director asked me if I wanted to facilitate the meetings between these two MTs - management teams - that had to come together. So there was going to be a structural change. But of course, there's also, let me just say, kind of a cultural change, because these management teams had different ways of working. Their interpretation of their role was different, the span of control was different, their content was different, and now they had to come together. And both these management teams had already come from a merger of two other organisations So they took almost different organisational cultures with them together. So these weren't actually two teams, but maybe actually four.

Belinda (host): Incredibly complex.

Manoesjka: Yes, very complex. So I set off with the director and the HR business advisor to facilitate these meetings. And I tried to do that in a way so that in these meetings, there would be space for the individual people to not only talk together about the new structure and how they wanted to reorganise things, for as far as that was something that they had their input on, because some things were already set, but beside that, to also bring to the table: who are you? What is important for you in this process? What do you want to share with other people? So we had a couple of these meetings, which were not bad, but it was also really difficult, because somehow the people at the table, at least some of them, could not leave their personal agenda behind and just look at what the organisation needed, but always brought their personal agenda along with them. So it was complex, and I've tried in these meetings to kind of address that, to say, "so what is actually going on here? Why is this on the table? Why ..." In a couple of meetings, I stepped back, I said, "I don't know what's going on, but this does not seem to be going forward together. This seems to be a, fight sometimes where you're not listening to each other, you are saying your thing, and then someone else is saying something else. We're not moving forward from what is said. We're not sharing whatever it is that's holding you back or what it is that you're anxious about". For me, that is also leading by example, by showing myself what it is that I found difficult, or what it is that I reflect on in hoping to help people, then also reflect, and that I was seeing this and that what it is that was happening there at the table is then also going to happen within the organisation, or maybe the other way around even. Is that what they're showing here at the table is something that is also happening in the organisation, and that is not the culture, the values that we want to cherish and the way we want to work together. So, yes, I addressed that. I found that that was my role in organising, not only organising these meetings, but also trying to bring this to another level. But it was difficult. And then what happened over time is that the director, who was responsible in the end, kind of pushed that element of talking about things happening emotionally, maybe what is not spoken, but very active in the group more and more to the side and focusing more and more on the structure and what had to be finished before the 1 January. Because on the 1 January, this new team had to work, as one team, and it backfired. Once it was the 1 January, everybody was kind of in position, you could say, or people had to kind of. Their, role would change a little bit, so they would have to kind of grow into that. But all these dynamics between the people and within this group, nothing was solved. It was one team, but, in the end, they were still two teams. Was no collaboration, and it was not set together. "This is the way we want to work in our meetings, or this is the way we want to be when we address each other".

Belinda (host): I would love to focus on you in this situation, because you were part of those conversations. They couldn't have been easy to facilitate, to see that not panning out in the way that was expected, and then to see what happens when it doesn't pan out. How did you get on in all of that? And where did it leave you, both in terms of your approach and where you went to from there?

Manoesjka: You went to from there? I was happy that she asked me to facilitate these meetings, and I think that because I wasn't part of the management team, it was easier for me to look at what was going on. And I think that is something that I am good at. It's something that I can add to the conversation. So it is something that I did to step back and to give back to the group what it is that I saw. It was a good role, so I felt honored and happy to have been invited to do this. I felt I should have done more seeing it not fall apart, but just not. It not coming together. This group not coming together, because I think we did not address enough what was going on. Under the surface, I didn't feel bad about it, but I felt, I don't know, maybe I should have pushed harder to keep this on the agenda

Belinda (host): with a looming deadline.

Manoesjka: Yeah, so it's true. A looming deadline. A director who understood that it was important not only to discuss the structure and the roles and stuff like that, but who understood that it was important to also work on a team, to do team building, to talk with each other about all these other things that come with. And you could say a new team, but eventually making the decision that what had to be there on the 1 January was maybe not necessarily a good team, a working, functioning team, but what should should be there is a team that in a certain structure with a certain responsibilities. Because on the 1 January that had to take off, I found that maybe I should have pushed harder. And at the same time, yes, there was a looming deadline.

Belinda (host): And perhaps the deadline, the milestone that was associated with that deadline, as you say, could have been slightly different, that allowed for this undercurrent. How does that experience change you and your approach in the future?

Manoesjka: Well, it strengthened my belief that it is important that this has to go hand in hand, maybe sometimes even the other way around, to first say together, okay, we have a task ahead of us. We need to talk about all kinds of subjects, but maybe it's a good idea to first go and do something fun together, or to get to know each other, or to go and do something sporty, and then to discover what your defaults are when something is stressful or challenging or whatever. To turn it around, to not start with structure or process or something, but to start with culture, you could say, to find time to talk and to ask questions and to try to understand where people are coming from and what kind of experiences have brought a person to this perspective. I sometimes really have to make time. I would make time to go for a walk for 2 hours with someone to try to understand where you're coming from, not only your cv, but what beliefs do you have? How do you position yourself here? What is that you bring to the table? What do you fear? Which is a very difficult question also for me to answer.

Belinda (host): Mhm.

Manoesjka: Because I think that it also guides us. So I don't have a playbook. I hopefully try to connect with people and that takes time. I mean, there are people who are open and who are reflective and are more willing to talk about these kind of subjects, but sometimes those things only. People only open up when something happens or when they trust you enough to feel safe. To feel safe is very different than saying to someone, you can talk to me, it will not leave this room, you can talk to me. It's okay. It's very different from someone having the feeling that they can actually talk to you in a safe environment.

Belinda (host): I think, in essence, what you're talking about here is trust. You trust the environment, trust that moment to share of themselves in whatever way that they need to. And yet that puts a lot of responsibility on you, the manager, who, is not only creating the safe space, but then holding that safe space for that person. In some cases facing your own fear, and in other cases realising personal risk. How do you do that? What does it take from you personally to hold the space? Not just to create the space, but to hold that space and the responsibility that is with you?

Manoesjka: Well, I can only hold so much. So a lot of this depends on how I'm doing. And, if I have people I can then talk to or rely on, or, It's very important to know who my peers are. I think what could easily happen is that it becomes a one way thing. So I ask questions, hoping that someone will share, and then that's it. But it doesn't work like that. It has to be, you're in a relationship. I believe things develop in relation to one another. Although the difficulty of some positions or roles is that I sometimes can't share things, or I have things that happen in my world that happen between me and my peers, or between me and my boss, for instance. That is not something that I find I can or should share with some other people, sometimes with people in my team, for instance. So I think it's very important that I have people I can talk to sometimes who can not hold it then for me, but who can kind of do some kind of containment or holding for me. I also try not to load things on my shoulders. I mean, being able to hold a space is very different from trying to take it all in and then carry it around with me.

Belinda (host): Mhm.

Manoesjka: That would be very unhealthy. But it's sometimes challenging, because sometimes holding or contain it means you need to hold on to it before you can pass it on or give it back.

Belinda (host): And that's what I was going to say. You can only hold something, whether it's a space or a physical thing that you hold. You can only hold it for so long before something needs to happen with that. And yet, that's not the understanding that people have when it comes to trust. They trust that you are going to hold that space indefinitely. And in the workplace, that can be very challenging when you've got so many other pressures and so many other demands and so many other spaces that you have to hold, and you're juggling it all. And in that centre is you and all the personal risks you are taking. And one of the things that strikes me as I listen to you is you use wonderful words that are so embracing, like conversation and talk and ask questions and understand and connection. That sounds beautiful, but it sounds very draining. How do you sustain yourself, Manoesjka?

Manoesjka: Well, not so good, as you know.

Belinda (host): Well before the concussion. Right. How do you sustain yourself when all of that sounds like you are listening, you're taking in? We've spoken about holding, and that is different. But there's a lot of you in the centre of all of that and a lot of your energy.

Belinda (host): The Manager's Moment is brought to you by Boost Learning, where management development is done differently. Our eight week programmes are designed to fit perfectly around your schedule, your experience, and your development needs, all delivered online and virtually. To find out more, go to www. boostlearning. online. I am speaking with Manoesjka Snijders who currently works as a Programme Director in youth healthcare in the Netherlands. Before the break, I asked Manoesjka how she takes care of herself when she finds she has to give so much of herself to others in the workplace.

Belinda (host): How do you sustain yourself, Manoesjka when all of that sounds like you are listening, you're taking in? We've spoken about holding, and that is different, but there's a lot of you in the centre of all of that and a lot of your energy.

Manoesjka: Yeah, so I think, that's true. I think this is one of my challenges in life, not only, in work, but yes. And I try to find my way by, as I said, not, there are different ways of holding. If you take everything in and carry it with you, that I could never do that. Sometimes when it's related to work, I can have a personal conversation with someone. When something personal comes along is different from when I have a conversation about someone relating to work or the work that we are doing. And maybe by listening and by sharing, I can see if with the input that I get, I can do something else with it. Sometimes I also have to then be kind of alert because sometimes people have the expectation that when they share with you, you are actually going to do something about it. I've learned over time to try to be a little bit more alert when that happens, because then holding becomes very difficult, because then everybody has these expectations of what you're going to do with the information that they've shared and that is undoable.

Belinda (host): It reminds me in my, earlier career as a HR manager, you would invariably get that knock on the door where somebody pops their head and says, do you have two minutes? It's never two minutes, but do you have two minutes? I just want to run something by you. And in that moment, all your instinct is kicking in, instinct being your experience of those kind of things. And you set out by saying things like, I can give you two minutes now, or we can put something in the diary. So that's about managing your time, but then a little bit more about what you're talking about is that being alert is to be able to set out right from the start to say, right now, all I'm doing is listening.

Manoesjka: Mhm.

Belinda (host): Unless there is something else you expect from me in relation to what we're talking about. And I would have been very explicit both before the conversation got started or as soon as I got a sense of where the conversation was going to try to anchor very quickly, what is it that we're hoping for from the conversation? And sometimes you would only do that towards the end, depending on the rhythm of the conversation or what it was about, but always kind of saying, so where are we now with this, and what are your next steps? What are my next steps? What are you expecting from me? Where should we go with this? Is that I would say, I am assuming all I'm doing is giving you a listening ear.

Manoesjka: That's all. Yeah. Sorry to interrupt, but it resonates because I think I could do that more than I'm doing m that I do in my life. I think it's also something that I have to learn to do more because I am the kind of person that then feels responsible. I have this sense of responsibility not to make things better, necessarily, or to solve something. But yeah, I've noticed what you say many times. People either. It's just nice to have someone who listens to you. It's nice to have someone to just ask you a question instead of to see you as a person, as a manager, you have to also have some boundaries. Sometimes you're still also someone's manager. I sometimes forget that because I also see people as people, not just as someone in my team. That that can be confusing for people.

Belinda (host): And when the connection is so strong that you've really invested in that connection, it's not just you that can lose sight of those boundaries and that role, but they can as well. And, there have been times, I think, when people might have left my office where they would say, oh, should I have said as much as I did? And you never want to have somebody regret telling you something.

Manoesjka: Yeah, that's true,

Belinda (host): because they've overshared. And so I think it's right to set those boundaries. What I found is, the better I got at it, and I'm not perfect at it, and I struggle with it still now. But the better I got at it, the more people, and I, realised that we didn't have to fix everything, as you say. Sometimes you just needed to talk something through. I didn't have to be the fixer in that moment. And managers and people expected, managers often to fix things, and managers expect themselves to fix things, whereas with a little bit of skill and a little bit of practise, I think you can hold that space slightly differently and offer a different space when people would be looking to HR to fix things. And I learned to try to create a different kind of a space because I couldn't fix everything and it wasn't right for me to try to.

Manoesjka: No. Yeah. I think it's also very important for people to fix their own things. not to go to someone else and then lay it out now you go and fix it. I think then the challenge would be how to bring something back to someone and say, but what is it that you need now to go and fix whatever is going on? There is not always time or space to have these kind of conversations. Sometimes we are going to be in a meeting and it's just good to set the course and the boundaries of that meeting and to say, listen, we can't always talk and chat and go everywhere we want to with our conversation. Sometimes we just need to get things done. Move and keep going. And time task territory go.

Belinda (host): As you look back on your career, in those moments where you've really grappled with your own skill set and your own abilities and capabilities and comfort with being a manager. What are the things that you think are important in becoming the professional and the manager and the leader that you are? What would you do again? Or what would you do instead as you move m through that journey of discovery?

Manoesjka: I think in my career, different elements have contributed to where I stand at the moment where I am. I think I mentioned before that, I was given the opportunity to become a manager for the first time in a small organisation. I had this group of other managers around me who helped me in this role. So they were my peers, you could say. They gave me opportunities to learn. So I think to have an environment where you're supported, I think, is something that you can't always choose. But I think that, at least for me, in my career has helped. I have also, then in other organisations have done the same where I have helped other first timers to come to grip with their role and what that would mean. That was a great pleasure to, be part of also. So that's a part, I think I've done some educational things. I did, foundations of management, course of a year, kind of a business administration training, you could say, very important, I found, not because I then had a little piece of paper that said, look, I did, some kind of education, but because it was a place where I could be away from my work, reflect, do assignments with other people or with a coach. And that, I think was very interesting. So it gave me time to reflect on my own role as I was a manager. So I found that very helpful. And through those things, I now, for instance, have two other people who are in not similar positions as I am, but are, managers or directors or people managers or something that I've met them at courses, I've met them in my work. We sometimes read a book together, or we have what we call intervision or supervision, something like that, where we share together examples from our workplace, have feedback, see how you can put things in a different perspective, how you can take that back to the workplace. So I find that is one of the things I still have. Of course, I have my peers within the organisation, which is really nice, because sometimes you also want to gossip, and sometimes you just want to share whatever it is that you want to share. And people in the organisation know the same people you do. So it's easy. But that's also, sometimes the downside, because sometimes you want to kind of share information or you want to talk about things happening in the organisation without it, maybe by accident, landing in a different with other people that you don't want. So it's then very relevant for me to find someone outside of the organisation I can have these kind of conversations with and have a fresh perspective or a different way of seeing things or asking, questions that I can take back into my work. So I would not be where I am today without, you could, say, help of others in all kinds of, ways.

End.