Barry-Wehmiller's Chief People Officer, Rhonda Spencer, was recently recognized by the St. Louis Business Journal in their 2025 HR Awards for Innovation in HR. This was a long overdue recognition of Rhonda’s leadership, but also the work of the BW Global People Team and everthing they've done to help all of our people, all over the world, feel like they matter.

Rhonda has been with Barry-Wehmiller since before the development of our Guiding Principles of Leadership and was one of the major voices in its creation. She was our first Chief People Officer and it’s her primary responsibility to be the steward of our values and make sure that light shines to the furthest reaches of our organization.

Recently, Rhonda took part in a webinar discussion with Mike Budden, one of the partners in our Chapman & Co. Leadership Institute, Barry-Wehmiller’s consulting arm that specializes in helping other organizations unleash the extraordinary in their businesses and their people. They do this by helping those organizations identify, develop and equip their leaders. You can learn more about them at ccoleadership.com.

On this week’s podcast, we want to showcase an edited version of that discussion. It’s an interesting conversation as Mike and Rhonda discuss what it means to scale a Truly Human Leadership culture globally. They talk about the processes and systems we’ve developed to try to make that happen and there's a lot of insight to apply to your own organization.

True leaders create space for individuals to be passionate about their work and feel a sense of ownership. Nobody wants to be managed, bossed or supervised. We must inspire creativity in our people. Those ideas are the backbone of a culture of continuous improvement and a culture where people feel like they matter.

Michael Gelb is the author of books such as How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci and Innovate Like Edison. He has been applying the principles of genius thinking to personal, leadership and organizational development for more than 40 years. He has worked to inspire creativity in the workplace and his journey led him to our friend and Everybody Matters co-author, Raj Sisodia. Together, they wrote The Healing Organization: Awakening the Conscience of Business to Help Save the World.

On this podcast, Michael talks about inspiration, creativity and how that leads to helping people in organizations feel like they matter.

BW CEO Bob Chapman often tells a story about meeting Steve Jones, who was formerly a high school football coach who led his teams to five consecutive state titles from 2013-2017 with an incredible run of 70 consecutive victories, a Wisconsin state record. With those impressive credentials, Bob asked Steve what he taught his players about winning and losing. Steve said they didn’t. He said that they teach them to play their position well for their fellow team members. Do it as an act of respect for their fellow team members.

He said, “When people truly care for one another, it’s amazing how hard they will work for each other.”

To Bob, it begged the question: if you create an environment of unconditional care, wouldn’t the people there want to “play their position well” for their teammates?

Our friend, Shawn Murphy, has written a book about teams, team building and team performance: Work Tribes: The Surprising Secret to Breakthrough Performance, Astonishing Results and Keeping Teams Together. To Shawn, one of the key aspects of an environment of unconditional care is belonging. As he wrote in a guest post on our Truly Human Leadership blog:

"As human beings, we are wired to belong. Some researchers say that belonging is what bonds people together. It’s the bond that is either life-giving or life-depleting... Of course, the reverse is true when you don’t feel a sense of belonging. You protect your thinking. You become hyper-focused on yourself. You limit pro-social behaviors. You close yourself off to relationships. Your potential is limited. Yet, when a leader can help someone feel like they belong to the team, the team benefits. Ultimately the company benefits. Human potential is unleashed. Mediocrity is diminished."

As we often say, everyone wants to know that who they are what what they do matter. That is important for every leader to remember. On this podcast, you'll hear a discussion with Shawn as he talks about Work Tribes and the idea of helping your people feel like they belong.