How much of what you measure actually tells you whether you're making a difference?

Most senior leaders can point to a dashboard full of healthy-looking numbers. Attendance is up, participation is steady, the reports come back green. And underneath it all sits a question that's easy to avoid: is any of this the thing that actually matters? Grant Yonge took a job with that exact question built into the title.

When Grant said yes to becoming Executive Director, Organisational Impact at the Y, his honest answer was that he didn't yet know what impact meant. What he knew was what it wasn't. This conversation follows what happened next: the shift away from counting participation towards real evidence about whether young people are flourishing, and the discovery that a 180-year-old story could anchor purpose better than any strategy document. What if the most useful thing you measured was also the hardest thing to count? Let's explore what changes when a leader stops settling for the easy version.

Grant Yonge is Executive Director, Organisational Impact at the Y in Western Australia. He arrived there by an unusual route, starting out in hotel and resort management before spending the past fifteen years in the not-for-profit sector. He brings corporate rigour and a genuine sense of purpose to the work, and he thinks about leadership the way he thinks about playing in a band. In this episode, you'll hear:

• How to move an organisation from counting participation to evidencing real impact
• Why "getting to what's real" matters as much in corporate and government as it does in the social sector
• How a story from 1844 becomes a living tool for shaping culture today
• Why knowing your part, and resisting the urge to play every part, makes the whole team stronger
• How stepping back can create more impact than stepping in
• Why naming each person's "spikiness" leads to better decisions
• How to help people find their place in the work, even on their hardest day
• Why deep conviction and real vulnerability can live in the same leader

Timestamps:

(08:27) - The Journey to Defining Impact

(19:09) - Gathering and Sharing Stories of Impact

(26:31) - The Metaphor of Music in Leadership

(30:34) - Understanding Your Unique Contribution

(35:36) - Navigating Leadership Challenges

(39:13) - Connecting to Purpose and Legacy

Other References

• Y.M.C.A Song
• Y.M.C.A Boy George re-recording
• How Great Leaders Inspire Action | Simon Sinek TED Talk
• How to Make of a Life | Jim Collins
• The Gifts of Imperfection | Brené Brown
• The Art of Possibility | Ben Zander
• Keith Richards

You can find Grant at:

Website: https://theywa.org.au/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/grant-yonge-b6a30924/

Check out my services and offerings https://www.digbyscott.com/

Subscribe to my newsletter https://www.digbyscott.com/subscribe

Follow me on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/digbyscott/

Really literal answer when I said yes was this big breath in and go, We actually don't know what that means yet, but I'm committed to finding out. What I knew was what it wasn't.

Everything measuring as impact isn't actually impact at all. And what if the most honest thing a leader can say, especially one whose entire role is called organisational impact, is, I don't even know what that means yet, but I'm committed to finding out. Well today I'm joined by Grant Yonge. He's from YMCA Western Australia, or as they're known now as the Y.

And we get into what impact really looks like when the noise is stripped away. Why knowing your part matters more than trying to play every part? And what it takes to step back when stepping back is the hardest thing to do. Hi, I'm Digby Scott, and this is Dig Deeper, a podcast where I have conversations with depth that'll change the way you lead.

Grant, welcome to the show. Your title, Executive Director, Organisational Impact. One of the reasons I wanted to ask to have a conversation, record it, was when I saw that on your LinkedIn profile, I thought, all right, that's a fascinating title. I think it's a rare title. I wonder why he's doing that job. So at YMCA for Western Australia, what was the draw for you to take that role on?

Thanks for having me.

There's two parts to that for me, Digby. I've been here at the YNWA, formerly the YMCA. So we call ourselves the Y. We can get into that in detail later. When I first joined the organisation 10 years, first exec role for me, portfolio covered strategy governance administration, did quite well. And then after the pandemic, a bit of a change of perspective as many organisations do. For us, though or for me, the organisational impact bit really signifies an opportunity to step into

As most not-for-profits, we all know that we're here to make a difference and be purposeful in what we do. Many not-for-profits perhaps still a little bit guilty, we were at that time, of tracking participation data, not real impact. So the change in title for me and the change in focus was absolutely about some principles and some opportunities to be really rigorous in what we're doing, be evidence informed in the impact that we're creating for young people, because we're a young people focused organisation, and be really purposeful.

in how we talk about that. So the role, and what I love about the role, it's evolved a couple of times since that point. But it just absolutely puts myself and my team who work really hard on this stuff to be really, really connected to purpose and connected to being better than just volume, you know, actually getting to what's real. So that's fundamentally what it is.

I love that getting to what's real. Where does that come from for you? Cause I'm just listening to your energy and your voice, right? There's this clear conviction for this work. What's the route for that for you? Like you know, from back in your early days? How might you draw a line between the work you do now and where that comes from for you personally?

This might sound a little bit crazy. My backstory, if you go all the way back, is in hotel and resort management, customer experience one one at a time where delivering a great experience matters. So if you really press me on it, what you'd say is that the value set that I learnt and built working in a, you know, a tourism and hospitality environment way back when still sticks with me as we look at this work now. You know, the context might be different.

But if you apply that experience lens, experience management as we call it in this modern age, and then apply the impact layer, what really connects for me. And I've been on my own family journey, you know, two young boys who have grown into men, watch them develop, watch them flourish, watch them turn into exceptional humans. What connects for me is the ability to connect all of those things together. My family and community journey, that deep background that's really about just deliver great experiences for people.

And, you know, probably in this organisation, do that because you can really see the evidence and the impact and the uplift in young people if we focus on what we do best.

I've just written that down, delivering a great experience. And yeah, that can cross any leadership role, right? And any system really needs to be designed to do that well. My mind was going to when you've been on the other side of a really rubbish experience and how that has fuels how you think about creating those now.

Gee, wow, I can probably give you a really recent one, Digby. I don't know how much of my community is listening to this podcast, but maybe we're about to find out in the comments later. We'll see how we go. As a fitness kind of where am I at in terms of what do I do for fitness and how do I keep active? Part of what I do is about being a member of a CrossFit gym. I've been a member for about three or four years now in a little community-led gym, not far from home, not far from work. Perfect. And an amazing community and very different to some of those big gyms.

The owner of the gym's been in situation where he's been booted out of the premise, he can't find anything else, and he's just had to shut it all down. It's actually been quite traumatic for several members of the gym, myself included, probably less so than some of the guys that are much more hardcore than me when it comes to pursuing CrossFit as a career. But like I said, it seems like a big step sideways. But the experience, just in terms of how are the people that are receiving this messaging, how are the people that are having their community, let alone their

their well-being, you know, the fitness side of their flourishing perspective ripped out from under them without much input. That's the stuff where I sit back and I reflect on it and go, hmm, I didn't enjoy that, you know, and that's not about having a crack at the owner of the gym. It's about reflecting on that from a leadership perspective and go, what do we learn from that experience? And how are we, in a reflective practice way, drawing that into the way we deliver experiences and services for our customers, young people, participants?

How do you keep that front of mind for you?

I don't know if I've got a strong answer to that. It just feels like it's always there. Remember sitting with a colleague a few years ago at a strategic planning session, and you know, we were dealing with something quite complex. And I remember saying to that colleague at the time, you know, sometimes you just got to trust your gut. It feels like this is one of these times. And I'll never forget this. It's clear as day, like it was yesterday. They looked at me and went, but that's the problem, Grant. You've got a gut. I don't have one. I've got to overthink stuff. Like for me.

The answer to your question is that it's front of mind because it just feels natural. It's just the way I go about it. But I still remember that day and go, I just thought everybody did that.

At the moment, I just started reading Jim Collins' new book. You know, he wrote Good to Great and Built to Last and that. And he's got another one called What to Make of a Life. He's studied all these different people who have had, you know, done in lived incredible lives and had real impact. And one of the things he talks about is this idea of channeling the inner fire.

What's the real fire there for you? And if you can tap into that something that you just can't not focus on or you can't not care about, that's fundamental. That's a critical ingredient, all these people. And that's what I'm hearing from you. Well, this is just what you think about, right? Because it matters too much. Is that a fair call?

I reckon that's absolutely it. You know, like Jim, he always frames things really well, but that fundamentally is what they're and I I think that's why I'm what, fifteen years of not for profits now. But that's as much a value set as it is a mindset. And I think this industry, you know, listeners from other not for profits be nodding their head furiously right now. This industry does a great job of attracting people who've got that set of values already. And that makes a difference. It's a really good foundation, a good starting point.

And we'll probably get into it later, you know, but when it comes to what does real impact mean for us, it's how you approach that in an organisation that makes the difference.

I reckon we go there now actually, because it's an unusual title. I don't see it very often, this idea of executive director organisation impact. When you first said yes to that role, what did you believe impact to be about? How do you did you find that when you said yes to that?

The really literal answer when I said yes was this big breath in and go, we actually don't know what that means yet, but I'm committed to finding out. What I knew was what it wasn't, you know. So if you think contextually about what was going on for us at the time, doesn't necessarily matter that we were coming out of the pandemic. But I think like most organisations, we're coming out going, What's our renewal? You know, how do we recover from this? And what's our a change of leadership as well. We had a change over as CEO at that time. And

If there was a couple of things going on, very different perspective and a change of strategic direction from our CEO, starting to move towards an aspiration to deliver flourishing outcomes. We can come back to flourishing a bit later. But then also interpreting the noise, if you like, from inside the organisation when it came to how we were trying to measure impact under our own strategic platform, or our old one, I should say, really looking at participations.

And if we were trying to get past participations, we're probably getting to asking young people how they felt about, you know, did you feel safe today? Or probably a poor example. But the feedback that was coming from our teams is we don't know why we're asking these questions. It doesn't mean anything to the young people that we're here to support. And I don't see how it's helping us be better. So when I said yes to this role, again, those principles that I mentioned earlier, what I was saying yes to was applying principles to say,

We've got a real desire to be more rigorous in how we design and deliver programs. We've got a an incredible desire to be evidence informed. So what we're doing should be informed by literature, by academia, by absolute results. And then if we do those things really well, then we'll get to a point that our continuous improvement cycle, if you like, our ability to be more and more impactful as we go will be fed by those two things. Good data, good insight.

fed by our teams who are telling us what we're doing is work not working. Okay, let's find something better. Well, don't know what that is, but let's go on that journey. That's what I signed up for. You know, that large unknown of going, not really sure where this is going, but it feels good. It feels like the right thing to be doing. So that's what was going on for me personally at the time. And I, you know, times like this you get the luxury to reflect back. We've still got a long way to go, but you reflect back on how far we've come and some of the things that have happened that have really underpinned and validated what we're doing.

Are incredible.

Tell us about that. What have you seen?

Go back to the teams, you know, probably a little anecdote and then I'll get into more of a structure of how we've got there. The conversations we were having with the teams there, we're going, I don't know why we're doing this stuff, I don't know why we're collecting this, it doesn't mean anything to us. If I fast forward to today, when we sit down and we talk to our operational teams about the data that we're collecting, what we hear is, I'm really curious about that. That's fascinating. I want to do something with that. So that's a really clear marker of positive impact for us. That sets the stage. But

Absolutely.

Probably what will be really good for your your listeners to hear is how we got there. So that change in strategic direction for us, we were moving away from a social enterprise model. Our positioning was all about being that not-for-profit that didn't want to be uber reliant on government funding. We wanted to stand on our own two feet. We wanted to run organisations that still had some mission attached to them, but we could deliver good surpluses out of them. And the surpluses that we generate get invested back into our mission-based activity.

You know, so if you want to be really blunt about that in this organisation, we were looking at childcare and saying there's a good reason to be delivering childcare, but we also know if we run that business well, we can deliver a surplus. And the surpluses that we create are what we invest into our youth services. So for our teams, that did two things. For our early learning centre people, it made them feel like they were just money generators. And for our youth teams, it made them felt beholden to, I've got to put my hand up and I've got to ask for money from these ELC guys every time I want to do something different.

So that was a good strategy in terms of us being self sufficient. And then the change of positioning for us was about saying, well, okay, if we want to be something other than that, using those principles, where do we start? One of the great luxuries we've got is the YMCA is over a hundred and eighty years old globally. And here in WA we've been around since nineteen eight. So there's lots of history and lots of legacy that we could draw back on. Do you know much of the history of the Y Digby is it?

I don't I'd love to hear a little bit about that and also how knowing that an organisation's been around since nineteen eight and you know, globally even longer than that, how does that inform how you think? Because you're playing one part for a short amount of time for a while, you know, and then you'll be handing over and this stuff, this impact, this story will carry on for generations after you. How does that inform how you think and make decisions and shape culture?

I think the way you do that is that the you and again I don't think we're different to other not-for-profits in this regard, but you respect the legacy. The legacy matters. And you bake that in, you know. So again, for us to get down to the brass tacks of how we did that to explain that point, we started by taking our board all the way back to 1844 in London, when a young man called George Williams was living in squalor in London. He was a drapery assistant.

The Industrial Revolution was happening around him and around lots of young men. And he was seeing them fall into disrepute. They were ending up in gin houses and whorehouses and their jobs were being taken away from them through the Industrial Revolution. And there was no future for them. What we celebrate about what George did next is the fact that he just accepted or he pointed out that's not acceptable. And his next point was to say, I need to do something. So see something for what it is.

And then take action and take action in the context of we need to do something for these young men at the time to make sure that there's some balance in their life, that they can see a purpose, they can see a future. We need to do something with that. What that means for back then is he and eleven of his best mates got together and said, we need to start running prayer meetings. You know, like the and the C is about men and Christian. That reflects a generation and an age more than it does who we are as a contemporary organisation today. But the detail matters.

Including here in in Australia, in Adelaide was our first YMCA in eighteen fifty-five. What's super cool about that is that every single one of those presents or the presence that had now started to aventurate around the globe were focused on the same thing. They were focused on what is it that is important to young men again, probably still in that age, and what are we going to do about it? So that's a really long explanation. But the way we bake that in now, that conversation that started with our board.

It's the same conversation we have with all of our teams. It's in every one of our inductions. It's talking about the importance of that still being current.

You know, if I stand back and I look at how you bake something in and you put purpose at the centre, it's through story. Right. So the story you've told, very clear, very you're very fluent in it. And I can imagine I could come to everyone at the why and they'd be able to tell me a really similar version of that story. And there's some key ideas here. See something for what it is and then take action.

Absolutely.

You know, that's something that anyone at any in any role can take on. So there's not just a good story, but there's also an invitation to behave in certain ways from the story. And I can imagine that really makes the culture what it is. It anchors back to something that's not just interesting, but actually actionable as well.

There's two other things that I'd add to that. We need to contemporarise it for today's modern world and contextualise it, you know? So a lot of our people, when they consider joining the Y, they look at it and go, I don't know if I want to be part of a strong Christian organisation. Is that me? I'm not sure. And the other one we get in a funny sense is how do people embrace the song? Is the village people song a good thing or a bad thing? That's probably another story. But but the context for us and the way we manage that matters. So we say,

And we've been more specific about it and we've anchored into human flourishing as a concept that comes out of positive psychology and a few other bits and pieces. So for us, we talk about it now to say universal human needs like belonging, competence, independence, and a sense of connection are the four things that our services should feel like and we should be focused on. So that's the contemporisation. We can still be who George and his 11 mates were, but we're doing it in a very contemporary way. We're using contemporary language.

And then it's just about the context of and what are the challenges that young people are facing today. So the ones that people think of first is social media and this, that, and other. We don't take carriage for fixing those. What we take carriage of is how a young person feels about that world that they're living in at the moment. What's their competence like? Are they feeling confident? Are they feeling safe? You know, and we've got some language around belonging, saying if people feel like they belong somewhere, they will feel safe and they'll feel valued. That's the underpinning and starting point for us. If they learn new skills.

They'll build competence and they'll see that they have talent. And when they have talent, they have power. When they have power, they can be independent, they can take control of their life. And if we've got those fundamental concepts right in the way we deliver services, then those young people will be in a much stronger position to go and connect to their world. And that's the essence of what we do. It's the same stuff that George was doing. He might have talked about it differently, but that's how we contemporise and contextualise it for what we do and how our people experience work.

How do you gather and use the stories of impact? Because the story is a powerful mechanism, right? So the impact that you're having must be evidenced through stories, right? So how do you go about finding out those stories, sharing those stories, and what happens when that happens?

We do it in a couple of ways. I I think before we get to stories, the evidence informed data matters for us. So again, particularly for our youth cohort, for our twelve to twenty five age group, with rigour we'll apply a positive youth development framework. There's a a validated instrument called the five Cs. So we use a seventeen point rated scale that gives a bit of a sense of how young people are at, but their confidence. This is where the C's come in. Confidence, competence, caring, character, and community connection.

So we can point to evidence and data, which isn't your question, but that matters. What also matters is that as part of that, we also take, you know, like from an impact measurement approach, we we use concepts like what's most meaningful change been for you, how have you felt about, you know, the engagement that you've had with us, and we get richness that comes out of that. We've got data that backs it up and then we get some amazing stories that come from the voices of young people themselves in our services that we can collate, you know, and I have the luxury of having a pretty awesome

marketing team that have got some AV skills, we can throw that together and we celebrate it wherever we can.

Yeah, it's the combo of both left brain and right brain stuff here, isn't it? You know, it's Brené Brown, I think, says stories are data with a soul. So it's another data point, right? And that's what you're doing. I'm thinking about listeners who don't work in the not-for-profit world. Maybe they're in corporate, maybe they're in government. Now, impact matters there too, because you've worked across a whole lot of sectors in your career. And you might want to enlighten us on some of those, but there's

What are the transferable principles? So if you're trying to be an organisation or even a function that is going to be creating impact that lasts, that makes a difference and links to the purpose of what you're there to do, from a leadership perspective, particularly, what's the transferable stuff that you can take from your experience?

Leadership would be the right way for me to answer it because that's where I'd naturally go. One of them we've talked about already, I I just think that, you know, I mean, Simon Sinek is the one we all think about that was the original of Find Your Why. What I've just done is described that for us. We probably wouldn't reference Simon as much as others might, but that's okay. But that first point from a leadership perspective is that we need to know why we're doing what we're doing. And that doesn't just apply for not-for-profits, you know, like in the corporates that I've worked for, that still matters as well, you know, like a

In an internet or a Wi-Fi sense, that might be about the delivering the best reliability and the best coverage. But being really, really clear on why we do what we do matters. You know, in a previous not-for-profit that I've worked for, that might be about making sure that elderly people get the best quality of care at home, whether that's home support, whether that's nursing care or what have you. Every organisation that I've worked in, I've always looked for that and hunted for that. Whether I'm leading that or or leading a team as part of that organisation or just working for it, it's important to understand what that is.

I think the next part is to find your place in it. So I think again for our team, and you've heard me say that already, for our youth team in particular, picking up on the fact that actually hang on a minute, this organisation's heard me. They've heard me say that the data we're collecting doesn't help and it doesn't matter and it's not doing anything meaningful for these young people. They heard me when I said that. And now they're coming and asking me to engage in well, what will make a difference? Go on this journey with us.

We're not changing why we do what we do. That's absolutely not up for discussion. And nobody wants to argue against that anyway. But get really clear about what it is that we will change and be involved in. So I think from a leadership perspective, that's I've always said, you know, like and this applies. I've worked in corporates where for a whole bunch of operational reasons, I've needed to let a whole team of people go as an example. The same principle applies there. If you're going through a a forced redundancy process, the most powerful thing I learned.

is that you can help people feel like they're part of the process and they've got some control over what's a pretty terrible situation. You can flip that into what we're doing in a not-for-profit and say, have control over the amazing stuff that we're doing and be on the journey with us, help us build it, you know. So that principle of being able to find my place in it really matters. And I think about that from a leadership perspective as a lot.

About what are the questions or things you say to them that invite them into that? Because I reckon a lot of leaders have a good intent that they want to engage and have people be part of the solution and find their place. I love that. Yet they struggle for various reasons. It might be because the why's not defined. But assuming it is, if I was to follow you around, what would I observe you doing or saying? What would be the conversations?

I think the the thing you would hear, the statement rather than the question that you'd hear from me most often, and hopefully the teams would say the same thing, one of the great outcomes that we've got on going on this journey is that our organisational theory of change is so strong now. And probably back to the point. We've talked about our youth teams a lot, but now in context I can also talk about the other parts of our business who remember under our old strategic position, who probably felt like they were just a moneymaker or encouraged just to be a moneymaker and didn't have any purpose.

So our starting point now when I go and talk to teams is I can say we're all here because we deliver flourishing outcomes for young people. That's what sits behind our organisational theory of change. And then to simplify and ensure consistency across the whole organisation, my opening statement will always be there's a way that we go about delivering our services here. And there are three key ingredients that we would talk about that are consistent, whether it's an early learning centre.

Whether it's an alternative education model school that we run, whether it's one of our more traditional youth drop-in centres or what have you, each one of those service lines, if you like, starts with a conversation around where is our opportunity for a positive and sustained relationship with a trusted adult? Point number one. The second point is where is the opportunity for the young people in this service to learn new skills? And the third key ingredient is, and where are their opportunities to contribute to something larger than themselves?

So our conversations always start from there.

I want to rewind slightly the word feel, you've used it a couple of times, the way things should feel. I'm struck by that as an unusual word, right? That it's not what they should look like or what should they should do, but how they should feel. Why that word?

For me, it's the simplicity and consistency bit again. So if you go and talk to one of our early year educators in a childcare centre and you talk to them at the level or qualification of what they're doing, we'll hear their version of that. And that'll be a really good version. They do amazing work, but we need to be able to talk to them in the same principled way that we're talking to a teacher in one of our schools and a youth worker in one of our youth services. So the feel bit to your point and those three key ingredients are the way we can

Normalise that. You know, again if I go back to corporate world, maybe it's a poor analogy, Digby, but you know, the theory behind net promoter score was about CEOs from really different industries being able to compare themselves to each other with those differences in mind. So it's our version of that is probably the poor analogy, but

Just talking about finding a place and finding your part to play. Slight left turn, but actually very relevant, that you're a musician, as am I. And I suspect you're way more adept than me. I'm a hack, shall we say.

I think we're both daping at Digby. Let's go.

I feel it, man. I feel the music. And I know when we talked leading up to this conversation, you were, you know, your eyes lit up when you talk about playing. But there's a real metaphor here or analogy for the work. Tell me about how you think about the idea of playing in a band.

Remembering the conversation we had over a coffee, great coffee it was, by the way, it did relate to leadership, you know, like and I think the reflection for me, I've played music all my life from a very young age. Not very well, to be honest, you know, you and I probably were in similar ballparks. But if I think about that journey for me personally, there were phases when I was really active in playing bands. And then there's a big phase in the early to mid adult part of my life through to having kids or what have you wear. It was a solo thing. It was something that I did for myself. It wasn't a team sport, if you like, for a long version.

And then for a couple of reasons, you know, with an amazing group of friends now that I've connected through my my son's schooling and his passion and interest for music, we find ourselves in this team environment where we get together because we love it. We do things together because it's fun to do. The deep reflection we were having was around, you know, if for us, when we get together, everyone can play our version of our song. And if you take my positioning from that middle part of my career, if everyone just rocks up.

And plays their version of the right thing will feel good, but it'll probably sound terrible to the audience. So the leadership reflection that we were talking about is that sometimes it's about restraint, sometimes it's about knowing the role that you play. So if I play guitar and sing, one of the things I love about the connection I've got to several of our band members, but to the other guitarists in the band.

We can sit down and talk about a new song that we're going to do and we'll just look at each other and instantly know, okay, I'm doing that bit and you're doing that bit. And then we're just shaking the edges. So even if you want to draw that back to the experience point, we know we've done that well when we can see the faces on the audience that we don't often get in front of. There's a real indicator of success there because we're just doing enough, but we're bringing our expertise to it.

And the feel word, right? The faces are are showing a feeling.

Absolutely. And I think the other thing we might have talked about at the time, we're all busy professionals, you know, like most of the other guys that I play with, the teachers, you know, some of them are outdoor eds, so they're away a lot. I've obviously got a lot that I'm dealing with here. So when we get together matters, but we can't always all get together. And if you think about the performance, even in rehearsal, if somebody's missing, it doesn't feel right. You know, like so maybe the bass player can't make it next week. And you'll get together and everyone's still doing what we always do.

But everybody's got a part to play. And if one piece is missing, then not that things start to fall apart, but you're not delivering to your full capability. And there's a really interesting lesson in that when I talk to teams. A lot of people still want to work in isolation. I do my bit, you do your bit. No, no, no. Everyone working together and playing their part, knowing what your part is, knowing what your Do you want to get to books for us? We have an executive book club. A little while ago, we read Buckingham and Goodall, Nine Lies about Work.

So one of the chapters in there talks about finding your spikiness. So not about the sameness. What is everybody good at? And what are the things that we look like from a leadership or a teamwork capability? That it narrows in on this point of know what your spikiness is, emphasise it and highlight it. So for me it might be just doing the chugger chuggers. And if that's what I'm really good at and really what is that? Sorry, rhythm guitar, you know, the chugga chuggers on the yes. Bit of rhythm. We know that the other guitarist is gonna do the little

I mean.

tasty bits that fill in that spot. There might have been a time in my life where I beat myself up in the fact that I can't do those tasty bits. But in this context I know my spikiness now. My spikiness is to provide the rhythm and provide the vocal section where it needs to.

It's Keith Richards, man. You are just channeling Keith Richards. That's his superpower, right?

I like to think I live a bit cleaner than Keith, but I'll take it, digby.

You know that's a myth, right? Well, yeah, he's been off everything since I think the early eighties, you know. He he's just got the slur and the the look. Yeah, the swagger, that's it. Yeah, this whole thing, I mean, it speaks to dialing down your ego. What does it take to do that? Because I'm curious about you said the middle part of your career might have been where you're a bit more like solo grant, right? And what does it take to shift beyond I've got to be able to do it my way?

But the swagger.

I think for me, just to clarify Digby that was about my musical career.

Yeah, 'cause I don't see you as a person who's a solo player in as long as I've known you, right? You're not that sort of person in in organisational life.

Yeah, and that was probably just more about what did music mean to me, you know. So that was something that I was using as a a personal release and something to keep me grounded when things around aren't going great or what have you. But it's become much more of a team sport, the musical side of life. For me though, ever feel like I've been a massively ego driven person. And again to that point for me, it's always been well, the perspective I always take with that, whether it's the band, whether it's work or what have you, is that we'll always do more together than we'll do working in isolation. So I

I feel like I've always felt that, believed that, led in that way. You know, for me that's about drawing people in. You know, like even at the most prickly points, even at the times where it hurts the most to do it, the leadership choice for me is to say we're better with more people in the room and dealing with disagreement because we'll get spikiness out of it. We might disagree, but if somebody's spikiness is not in the room, we won't make as good a decision.

So let's be clear what we mean by spikiness. It's kind of like your unique take or your unique skills or perspective or stuff like that, right?

What's the one thing about you that's different that stands out that, you know, so my colleagues might say, well, first of all, it's your dad jokes, Grant, and you really should give those up. But in another context, amongst my colleagues at the exec table, I would hope that they would say that, you know, my spikiness will always be the first to go, hey, listen, I think we've got down in the weeds too much. Can we just come back a few steps and think about it from a broader perspective?

For anyone listening, I call that your superpowers. And there's a little I'll put a link in the show notes in ask people five questions about you. You know, what's the first thing you think of when you think of me? You know, when have you seen me at my best? And and questions like that, I reckon, we often don't see what our spikiness is until later in our career. You know, it's like to be able to go, this is what I bring to the mix. This is the secret sauce. If you're not aware of that, then you can't contribute fully.

You know, you might contribute, but it won't be as potent. It won't be as powerful. So, you know, know what they are. And, you know, it's good to have other people around you to say, yeah, this is what it is. 'Cause sometimes you don't see it.

That's right. But also, maybe the way to answer the ego question is don't take the dent to your ego if you don't have the superpower that that guy over there does. You know, like so have confidence in the superpower that you bring.

Like the fiddly bits on the guitar, right?

Yeah, that's right. Allow them to have that. Don't feel like you are a lesser person because you don't have that. Because again, that performance is what matters. You know, like so if we all bring our superpowers to your point, then the quality of outcome is better for everybody. Not just those that are listening, but for those on stage as well, using the the analogy that we're going with. That's when we feel most alive. On stages where and we pick songs on that basis now. Sorry, we're getting a bit nerdy on the music stuff, Digby, but

We'll look for songs now that give us that opportunity because we understand that's when we deliver our best outcome.

That's cool. And there's another piece here, which is you know what I call the host role, which is that you know you can play the hero bit when playing your superpowers, your spikiness, right? But there's this host role which is looking for others' spikiness and bringing that out. And it doesn't have to be the nominated leader. Anyone can do that. You know, Ben Zander wrote a book called The Art of Possibility. He talks about this idea of leading from any chair. And when you're leading in that way, you're in any chair in the orchestra, because he's a conductor. He goes, Yeah, but anyone can.

encourage others to step up and play. And I think that's my imagining is you're the sort of person at work who also encourages that, like others to bring out their own spikiness.

Absolutely. And again, that was probably one of our lessons through the pandemic was you learn to acknowledge the expert in the room. And the expert in the room is not always the person with the most perceived power, you know, like so the voice with the most expertise is what is what drives power in that moment, you know, like and I I think that's been a positive outcome for our leadership since then that really rings true.

Ask you a little bit about some people call it your growth edge, your learning edge. Like what are you finding you're bumping up against in your own leadership capabilities? You maybe there's some stuff that's being challenged in terms of how you used to do things that you're finding maybe I need to evolve. Where are you at? What's your growth edge right now?

I think in a really transactional sense, my title is still my title, Digby, but in the last six months, nine months, maybe time flies, I've taken over a real operational context as well. So, you know, stepping into much more overtly into management of contracts and stakeholder management and being out and being it's ironic when you hear my background or you acknowledge my background, but being a lot more customer facing and a lot more operational, that's been a stretch for me.

I've been an enabling function for, you know, probably the best part of twenty years in terms of the career I've been with the Y, my contact centre career in the midpoint, that's really been about enabling others to be successful. So to be out there on the front line has been a a healthy personal learning journey for me.

What's the stretchy bit about that for you?

The stretchy bit is you're more involved more often, if that makes sense. As an enabling function, you sporting analogy, but you can be that coach on the sidelines. You can bump, you can provide that perspective, you can guide, shape, do what have you. So now I'm out on the field. So that's exercising a different group of muscles. They're there. They're probably a little bit sore when I get home some days, because they haven't been exercised sometimes in that way.

Yeah, gotcha.

How is it good for you, do you reckon?

I think it's good because you develop and you learn, you know. And again, I I think that's a really bland thing to say. But in the context of this org impact journey for me personally as a leader, it crosses me over. Yeah. So it's fine for me to sit here and say, look at the wonderful impact that we're having. And now I'm down in the weeds with the teams going and let's talk about how we're doing that, why we're doing that, where are the challenges and how can we fray that up more and there's just more involvement, you know, and walking alongside more actively.

That's how I think about it.

This really interesting, you know, gets me thinking about you when we say down the weeds. It sounds like what you need to be able to do well is hold the context and the purpose while being in the weeds right now. How do you get that space or time or whatever you need to be able to hold both of those things at the same time?

I think maybe this is getting to a really deep personal learning for me Digby, but I actually think it's my superpower that gets me out of that. So what my colleagues recognise in me and that ability to draw us out and to think broader, I think what I've learned about myself is that's my coping mechanism. So when I start getting overwhelmed down there and I'm getting too hands-on and there's too much going on, what I think what I've learned is that I naturally my coping mechanisms go, stop now, not avoid it.

Not completely remove yourself, but make a conscious choice to go, now's the time where you need to pull back and get some perspective so that you can be effective when you step back in. So I'm recognised for that, for how I can help and guide and shape conversation and teams and direction and what have you. But if I'm really selfish about it, that's all for me. You know, it's actually about me being overwhelmed and getting out of that and going, hang on a minute, this isn't working for me. So if it's not working for me, it's probably working for others. I've got to come out. I've got to come out and look broader.

I really admire that because I think a lot of people find themselves maybe going down that alleyway into that hole for far too long and there's a I can't get out of it. I've just got to keep going. And you're saying, hang on, hang on, no, this is not going to serve anyone by being here and bound to do it. It doesn't even sound courageous, it just sounds sensible.

And that's what it feels on my personal journey, it's taken a long time to not reconcile. I don't think that's the right term, but just to acknowledge that that's actually a really healthy thing that's going on here and that's important and it's of value and it's actually recognised, which is a a nice thing as well.

As we start to bring things to a close, I'm curious about what haven't we talked about that he'd hoped we would have? What do we need to explore a bit more?

I don't know, maybe we should talk about you some more, Digby. I don't know. I say that facetiously. You know, let's come back to you in a moment. But I think if I reflected on, you know, perhaps what were those takeaways that we needed to see. As a way of double checking on that, I think the takeaways that I'd want your listeners to hear is that my journey is very much felt about connecting to purpose. What's the fundamental reason that we're doing what we're doing? And using legacy, you know, we have the luxury in this organisation being able to connect to a really deep and rich legacy.

Far away, mate.

That's still relevant, you know? So I think the power of going, we've been around a long time and what we're doing is relevant is a really great start. So there'll be different versions of that in different organisations. But as a leadership kind of message, search for that, get to that level of clarity around

You've got a mind for gold right there. You if you don't have it, you've got to be able to have a story.

Absolutely. So that matters. And then I think that theme number two is about people being able to find themselves in it, find themselves in the work. Whether it's their worst day, this organisation's forcing a redundancy, allow them to find themselves in the work and have some degree of participation. Feel like they've got control of something on that level. And then in a positive construct in terms of what we're doing here, acknowledge their feedback, hear their feedback and get them involved in what's better than that. Don't spoon feed, take them on the journey, learn, listen.

Acknowledge their spikiness, dive into that and use their expertise to help build something that's going to be powerful and long lasting and longer term. And the third part, you know, is probably interrelated, but it's about that spikiness, that superpower as you call it, you know. Acknowledge specifically what people's contribution to it is and how that's making a difference. Though they would be the three key things that I'd want to talk about.

Gotta ask a facetious question, Backy. So do you play YMCA when you're in the band?

Not in the band, no, we probably haven't gone there yet. We might have gone close for a gig we've got coming up. We haven't got there yet. There are some non-negotiables, you know, songs like Chumbawamba or other things come up where we just go hard no. We'll tape most things on. But I think the analogy there again is it's about what's relevant for the audience. So we'll make our decision about what we're doing based on the type of gig it is, who we're playing in front of, and what they want to experience. Is it embracing the organisation? Absolutely. I remember being really surprised by it when I joined us on a

I'm pleased to hear that.

This is going to be a bit cheesy. They're going to be like, no, don't even talk about it. But it really is embraced. And perhaps as an Easter egg for your listeners, part of our name change from the YMCA to the Y, we wanted to do something that was going to stand out. That was just before the pandemic. So we had an opportunity to go and reimagine the song. We were looking for talent in the country who could do that at the time. The voice was getting recorded. Boy George was here. He said yes to doing it. If you go and look him up, Boy George singing the YMCA.

It's a cool thing to experience, but for your listeners, what I'd want them to really hear is the lyrics of the song. Go and actually listen to what the lyrics have got to say. And for our teams, and maybe coincidental, I don't think it was intentional. There's as much in those lyrics as there was in the story I told about George Williams and how we started. It's a actually a really important artifact for us historically because it connects to all of this stuff that we've talked about. It connects to purpose.

Love that. We've been talking for 45 minutes. Yeah, time flies. I always like to think these are learning conversations for both of us. I'm wondering what what you've learned through our chat.

Are we really?

I think what I learned we did have a coffee over it, but there's been a validation or a or a deepening of this understanding of the interplay between what I do musically and how I lead. Yeah. So it surprises me every time I do that that it connects stronger in what I've learned. I've had more validation in terms of why we do what we do. You know, like and again I think that matters for our teams. If it gets more purposeful every time we talk about it, that's your point about storytelling. The more you tell stories, the more powerful they become.

And there's a beautiful analogy. We in some respects in the country I'm in right now, we're a little bit behind perhaps the country you're in in terms of acknowledging the stories of our indigenous cultures. So there's a really nice takeaway in there for us to think about. And there's crossover across all of that as well. So that strengthens for me as well. You know, like I live in this environment, where we have to acknowledge that those stories matter and that is part of our future.

My take on you, just in our conversation, is that you think about this stuff all day, every day. And when we sat down for a coffee a few months ago, there was like clearly this is you live and breathe this stuff. So you have a deep fluency, yet you're also open to learning and growing and improving every day as well. I think that's a very powerful combination that you bring, that you don't have all the answers. And if there's a better way, let's find it.

And there's this lovely humility that comes with that. So I just wanted to shine a light on that. It's really lovely to experience. I suspect people that you work with really they would get that glow as well.

I would hope so. I think vulnerability matters. I think there's another little, you know, trail in there of the whole way through. Be courageous enough to be vulnerable and call stuff out. You know, like for me that's just a really authentic way of doing things. But that's what opens conversation up, you know, not having the answers and willingness to learn from others. Powerful part of the journey.

Where can people find you if they wanted to track you down and learn more?

I'm on LinkedIn. I've got a hard name to spell but an easy name to say. So yonge, if you're looking for me there is Y-O-N-G-E. And then obviously here at the Y, we've actually just in the last week or so launched a brand new website that looks really fresh and really current. So if you go to the Y W A dot org.au, you'll see not just what we're doing, but if you go and dig for us, you'll find me some links to me there if you want to reach out.

So much grant.

Pleasure. Thanks, Digby. Great to spend time with you as always.

One of the things that Grant said right near the start was this idea of getting to what's real. And I reckon so many organisations are measuring stuff that's easy to count, but it's not really what matters. And Grant's whole career is really about being refusing to settle for that. And I really like that. I think there's a lot of courage in that. And maybe like me, I really love Grant's combination of deep conviction and real openness.

And almost vulnerability, and it was such a privilege to dig into that with him. So, to everyone listening, if this landed for you, go and share it with someone else who needs to hear it. And as always, thank you to my team, Gabby White, for making all this happen and to Kane Power for making this sound great. This is Dig Deeper, I'm Digby Scott. Until next time, go well.