Cultivator Profile: The Importance of Knowing Your “Why”
Meet Justin
For Justin Schell, the Director of Decision and Capital Analysis at Highmark Health, everything starts and ends with “why.” His personal “why”, to “help people make decisions in the face of uncertainty,” is essential to how he lives and works. Justin believes that there are ways that we can understand uncertainty more clearly, be aware of how our minds can fool us, and learn to make better decisions as individuals, communities, and companies.
In these uncertain times, I’d say that Justin is a perfect leader for the Evolve for Finance community, a workplace community of over 3,000 finance professionals at Highmark.
A few years ago, Justin, who has now been at Highmark for 17 years, clicked on an internal email and responded “yes” to an event. This quick gesture set the wheels in motion that led us to today. With that quick yes, he became a member of the Mission & Vision Pack at Highmark, an initiative led by Cultivator Penny Schnarrs. The purpose of the MVP Pack, as it was called, was to “help everyday Highmark Health team members to feel like they are part of making strategy happen, rather than feel like strategy was just happening to them.” With a goal of employees bringing the Mission & Vision of the company to their meetings, smaller projects, and daily activities, Justin focused on education and development, helping his colleagues learn the skills they needed to speak up. This work caught the attention of Chief Investment Officer John Orner, who offered Justin the opportunity to act as program director for the Evolve community in his home organization, Finance.
If Evolve sounds familiar, you might recognize it from our article on the past steward, Dr. Elizabeth Carter, who ran the program for three years, and who Justin credits as having set an amazing framework for community growth and development. At Cultivate, we study the factors that help Cultivators be successful, so we knew we needed to talk to Justin and get more details on this program that has been connected to so many All-Star Cultivators!
Fresh off Evolve’s win of Workplace Community of the Year at CultivatorCon 2023, I spoke with Justin about navigating community leadership transitions, what Evolve is up to now, and the importance of knowing your “why.”
The Challenge:
As a Community Manager myself, I know that there are few things more dreaded among community leaders than a community leadership transition. These crucial change moments can make or break a community, either allowing them to enter a new phase or causing them to fizzle out quickly. It can be difficult to navigate learning the lay of the land whilst sustaining existing momentum.
Here’s where Justin’s “why” comes in…he thrives in uncertainty! When I asked him what was going through his head as he stepped into the role he said candidly, “I thought ‘Don’t ruin it, Justin!’” Acknowledging all of the incredible work done by Dr. Carter and other colleagues, Justin felt the responsibility to evolve (excuse my pun) the program in a way that honored the community’s history while moving it into the future.
The Idea:
Justin has experience as a community member, as both a member of the MVP and as a volunteer running and cycling coach for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. In reflecting on these experiences, he noticed a pattern. When leadership changes or sometimes just as time passes, the members who have been most engaged tend to move on to their next adventure. If this was a normal part of a community life cycle, Justin wondered if he could leverage it as he stepped into Evolve. In this way he made space for volunteers to step away if needed while making space for new folks to step in and pick up the reins; bringing fresh vision and excitement. He knew that engaged volunteers who cared about Evolve and could see its value would be crucial to the community’s next step.
The Outcome:
Justin credits Kim Berus, a member of Evolve’s leadership team, with creating their initial metrics. Right now, they are focused on two things:
How many Finance team members attend at least one event this year?
How many return attendees are coming back for more?
They’re in the process of kicking off a mentorship program focused on engaging a significant percentage of the finance organization in mentorship. Knowing leadership engagement is important, one of their success metrics will be the percentage of leaders actively mentoring team members.
In the realm of finance, data and metrics matter, so these benchmarks will continue to shift as they gather more information over time. As a guiding force, Justin points to the core questions of Evolve: Who am I? What do I do? What do I want to do? How do I get there? He says Evolve is successful when members feel increasing confidence in answering these questions. Indirectly, the effect of the team members who are confident in the core questions can be measured by metrics like internal promotions and the internal filling of open roles…improvements in these downstream metrics show a deepening of the Finance talent roster and act as a signal that Evolve is doing its job of supporting team member development.
And so far, Evolve’s focus on the core questions is working! Initial 2023 metrics are showing more return engagement from a larger segment of the finance organization!
What Worked?
Leadership support: When asked what made Evolve’s transition so smooth, Justin said it starts with your leaders, (in this case, outgoing program director, Dr. Elizabeth Carter, VP of Finance Chris Phillips, and Chief Investment Officer John Orner). Dr. Elizabeth’s foundational work meant that Justin took over a solid community, while Chris and John are engaged Executive Sponsors, frequently in communication with Justin about Evolve’s goals and focuses.
Let your members drive: Justin recalled a time when he suggested an event to volunteer leaders within Evolve and could immediately tell they weren’t into it. He used that moment to refocus on what was important to his volunteers. He says, “As a community leader, too often you are ready to push home your own thing that you want to do and not listen to your people. If you want people to be connected and passionate it has to be their thing.”
Be accountable: Evolve’s goals are tied to the “Finance 10”; the most important and central projects within the finance organization. By connecting Evolve to these core goals, Justin can keep the program central for key executive leaders and regularly report on the community’s progress and impact.
Center learning: Justin has experience in ensuring his colleagues have space to learn. The Decision and Capital Analysis team created a sixteen-week training program on uncertainty modeling, to help Finance professionals learn the skills to communicate and navigate effectively in uncertainty. To date, more than 18 students have been through the program which he has started to tie into the Evolve experience. He said Evolve must be an educational experience that leads to participants taking action in their careers or their workspaces.
Create diverse experiences to foster empathy and connection: While Finance can sound singular to an outsider, the department is full of diverse people with diverse focus areas, from real estate to supply chain to the Executive Assistant group. Because of this, Evolve needs to cater to many different needs and interests, using events like an end-of-year update on investment markets to the state of the supply chain in hospitals, to build empathy and understanding across Finance as a whole.
Justin’s Advice for Leaders:
Clearly define Executive Sponsor responsibilities: Justin says “Having a connection to the top of the organization is key for a community. You can’t bury these resource groups.” If you act as an Executive Sponsor, be clear about how you will be involved and how you will advocate for the community with your fellow leaders.
Invest in community: Many leaders are open to the value of community within their team or organization, but may not be willing to devote resources to it. Justin credits Highmark’s willingness to make Evolve a part of his job description with its success saying “If you want something to have real substance, you have to expend real employee time to invest in it.”
Turn volunteer opportunities into development opportunities: Volunteer work should be reciprocal. Asking volunteers where or how they want to grow and aligning their volunteer responsibilities with those areas turns internal initiatives into growth opportunities that invest in your people.
Justin’s Advice for Fellow Cultivators:
Have a strong “why”: Justin spoke to community experiences he’s had in the past where the shape and focus of the group can become diluted over time. Having a clear and singular “why” can help maintain focus and easy planning.
Pair your “why” with a digestible set of “whats”: How will you live your “why” as a community? Keep your focus by keeping your initiatives clear, impactful, and minimal in number.
Revisit your why: While it’s important to settle on a “why” that does not mean it can’t change over time. Justin recommends an annual review, even if the statement does not change, just to ensure you’re still on track.
Trust your people: When asked what is most supportive in his work with Evolve Justin is candid, “People who are willing to say when they don’t think I’m right.” He encourages community leaders to seek peers who will challenge their ideas and who are action-oriented. Sounds like a great community leader ethos to us!