Episode 14 | TOM MURPHY | Senior Communications Leader, Microsoft

Welcome to Face Forward, the Inspiring Change podcast on all things internal communications, engagement, leadership, and change. Hello and welcome to Face Forward, the Inspiring Change podcast on all things internal communications, engagement, leadership, and change. For those of you from Ireland or indeed further afield, you may well know the podcast series An Irishman Abroad. Well, today I'm picking up that mantle and challenge as I too speak to an Irishman abroad, and he's been abroad for some years. Tom Murphy, Director of Global Communications for Microsoft Services, who's based in Seattle. Hello, Tom.

Hey, good morning, Scott. How are you?

I'm well, thanks. I'm well, thanks. How's everything in Seattle?

Yes, yeah, Seattle's good. Summer's finished and autumn is rolling in, so a couple of months of grayness, but other than that, all good.

Lovely, lovely. So, You know, what we'll do is what we normally do at the start of these conversations is, is just kind of get you into your stride by just giving us a few minutes maybe about you and, and your background.

Sure. Yeah. So I've been working in the area of communications for over 20 years at this point. I started in Dublin back in the '90s working in a PR agency in Dublin at around the time that the technology boom started happening. So I got a huge opportunity to work with a lot of big brands like Microsoft and Intel and Gateway, if we remember them back in the day. Got a lot of experience, got a lot exposure, and then had the opportunity to move to work with a lot of Irish tech companies. So moved to Iona Technologies for a few years. Our paths crossed at Marrakesh back in the day, if you remember that long ago. And then ended up with Cape Clear Software, who was started by a load of ex-Iona employees and ultimately was bought by Workday. And so then around 2005, I kind of— I was thinking about my career. The one thing I was missing was working inside a large corporation. So in 2005, I joined Microsoft running PR and corporate social responsibility for Microsoft in Ireland. I had a great time there, learned an awful lot, and after about 3 years was approached to, to move to Seattle to headquarters. So moved here in 2009 and then spent a lot of time working across various public relations functions in Microsoft from issues management to corporate social responsibility and then into the product groups. So ran commercial PR for Windows and ended up running global PR for Office, Microsoft Office. And then about 4 years ago, I guess, I was thinking about what would I do next. I've done a lot of stuff around PR, obviously, around the world. Really wanted to think about doing something different. And at the time, started to see a lot more interest around internal communications. The global war for talent means companies are spending a lot more time thinking about their people and how they recruit and retain the best and brightest. And also the way our world of work is changing when you look at the impact of digital. Everyone is challenged with facing a lot more change these days than ever before. Businesses are changing. The pace of that change is increasing. And so internal communications seemed to me to be a very interesting place, and fortuitously Around that time, I was approached by an incoming executive who was taking over the Microsoft Services business and really saw communications as a core priority lever for driving large-scale change. And so I thought it was a great opportunity and I joined the team and I haven't looked back. It's been an amazing 4-year journey.

Okay, brilliant. And I guess that, that was an amazing snapshot of where you are today. When you talk about change, And I think for me, change has become the new black. And this whole idea of people being change-ready is almost kind of nearly irrelevant now. And the term that I've coined in Aspiring Change is change-active, that we want people to see change as something they can get involved in to their own benefit and the benefit of their organization.

I completely agree. I think if I look back to when I started working, the big social change then was, ooh, You're not going to work in the one company for the whole of your career. That was the big shift, seismic shift that was happening. Whereas today, you're not going to be doing the same job in 3 years' time. You're going to need new skills in 3 years' time. And so I think we all have to get comfortable. And I think as human beings, we're not comfortable with change. But we have to become more comfortable with change. And I think organizations have to help their people become more comfortable with change. And we're seeing that that's accelerating every single month.

Okay, interesting. And I had, I had Orla Hunt on episode 13 from Human Leadership, and she talked a lot— she works a lot in the space around digital, but actually helping leaders during times of digital transformation, digital change, and the whole realization that actually computers, yes, are going to take over some elements of our work, and particularly that repetitious type work, but there will still be areas in which human beings, um, are needed because there's a lot of work that computers can't do.

I think there's no question. I think when you look at AI and cloud-based computing, it is going to take a lot of the kind of humdrum, very low-level processing away, but the need for humans and human ingenuity and creativity is not going away anywhere. But what we do need to do is continue to develop new skills. And so that continuous professional development, that appetite for learning is critical. Absolutely critical. I see it every day. And even in the world of communications, you know, the way we did— while the basics of communications are pretty consistent, or certainly the basics of great communication, the way we— the tools we use, the techniques we use, how we think about, you know, the written word, video, audio, it's all evolving all the time.

I agree. When you mix into that all the new channels that are becoming available, and as you say, the digital world of work, people not necessarily being face-to-face anymore, certainly physically face-to-face, that brings a whole new element.

It does, and it drives culture change. It drives process change. It really has a huge impact on the daily lives of everybody. Okay.

Tell me a little bit. I mean, you work in an organization, Tom, that has 120,000 or 130,000 people across the world, across all the continents, in 40 countries. Tell me a little bit about the— maybe pick one of the change projects you've been involved in and bring me through that.

Yeah, well, Microsoft itself has been on a— excuse me— Microsoft itself has been on a huge cultural change for the last 3 or 4 years, and I think most people have started to have heard about that or read about that. And so the company really has been shifting since the new— our new CEO Satya Nadella joined, really has been looking to change the culture of Microsoft to react to the way the world is changing outside. And when I joined services Services does everything from— they're the people who answer your calls when you want to have a question about Xbox, through to consultants working in 140 countries helping customers build some of the biggest IT projects in the world. And there's about 25,000 people in that organization. So it's the largest people organization at Microsoft. And when I joined 4 years ago, one of the key things that the new leader wanted to do was actually transform the business. Due to competitive reasons, due to just the way the world was changing. And so that meant for about 15,000 of our 24,000, 25,000 people, their jobs were going to change, their manager was going to change, the business processes they used were going to change. So it was a huge multi-year change process. And it was fascinating. As you think about the various components of change, you know, I really kind of put it into 3 buckets. One, you've got to build a very clear case for change. People have got— people may have views on why you need to change, but there needs to be a consistent set of— a consistent framework for why we need to change as an organization. Then the second piece is where are we going? What's the vision? What's the end of this change process look like? With a view that change is turning into a constant, unfortunately. And so once you have the case for change, which— and the other thing about case for change is case for change is not just at the beginning of a change process. You need to bring that case for change all the way through. You know, I tell leaders when they start getting bored of the case for change, it means their people are just beginning to internalize it. And then the third piece is the piece between the case for change and the end vision is the hard work that happens in the middle. And that's really about giving people the information they need to move through the change process. It's about overcommunicating because if you leave a vacuum, people will fill it. And it's also about, you know, one of the big changes I see is that change in the past would have been a set of leaders going to a room, making decisions, and implementing change. What's changing now in the world of digital is it's a far more transparent process. Leaders, I think, have realized that the people doing the work are the people who have the best view of the processes, of the problems, of the challenges. They're the people who can give you context on whether a change you're suggesting is going to work or not. So bringing those people on the journey is critical. And listening is critical. And I think when we started our change process, I think there was a bit of skepticism that, oh, come on, you've already made the decisions, you don't really want our feedback. So we had to go through a process where we really made it clear we did need their feedback, where we used their feedback, where we implemented their feedback, and they helped shape the transition, which ultimately made for a successful transformation.

I think interestingly, that whole idea of bring it from me anyway, as a communicator like you, bringing people on the journey and seeing them as part of the solution and not part of the problem, not seeing them as a speed bump, is so critically important.

Well, it is, particularly when you look at, you know, industries where people are highly qualified, industries where people are very highly skilled. You know, it's not like building a Model T Ford where everyone just does their one bit of the widget on the line. Like, you're dealing with very, very skilled professionals. Who have a lot of value to bring and bring a lot of perspectives and good insight into the process. And so building distinct systems and giving people the opportunity to provide that input in a trusted way and demonstrating that you're using, you're listening, and that you're using those insights, that's critical.

Yeah, what I've often said, particularly from an employee engagement perspective, often actually the journey is as engaging as the outcome. And I think during change that can often be the case as well. You can actually, by bringing people into the tent, people all the way down through the organization, getting their input, getting their support for that change, it can actually make for a better outcome, but actually also a more engaged workforce as you're going through the process.

Oh, no question. No question. And if they're not engaged, then the transformation is not going to happen. You just can't do it without getting people on. And then, you know, the reality, Scott, is it's very rare you have an A to B transformation, right? It's typically a journey. The transformation continues. There isn't a distinct endpoint. There are phases and there are milestones, but the journey of change continues to go on. I mean, the world we're working in is changing and companies have got to react. Businesses have got to react. People have got to react. Individuals have got to react. That's where work-life is very, very different in the length of my career.

Yeah, I agree. I was chatting to a company yesterday, a potential client, and one of the things that they said was, you know, our people aren't very comfortable if they don't know really what's going on. You know, if they're not really comfortable with not really being able to see the exact endpoints. And I said to them, well, that's going to be— it's very tricky because, as you say, it's not simply an A to B process when you go through change. It does take a bit of winding around the lanes before you get there. So in a situation where people aren't comfortable with that type of approach, how do you handle that? How do you handle when somebody wants to know, well, just tell me exactly where we're going and I can go there. How do you do that?

Well, that's the process we went through. So people, you know, when we started this change process 4 years ago, and it's mostly completed this phase of it anyway at this point, people wanted exactly that. They wanted the answer. And we said, well, look, Here's the vision of where we're going, but how the specifics of how we get there and what it looks like in the end is going to have to be influenced by you. And I think there was a lot of skepticism at the time that actually management had all the answers and they just were going to drip feed them out over a period of time. But by engaging people, by demonstrating you were taking people's feedback and it was helping shape the journey, it helped people get on the— get into the process and embrace it and get on with it. So I think involving people, listening to them, validating their feedback, and being honest that, okay, they want A, but actually we're going to do B and here's why, and walking them through that process. So that transparency through the process will help. I think as humans we're inherently uncomfortable with change. So that's— I'm not sure it's ever going to go away. But I think the more you engage people and get people involved in the process, makes for both an easier process and a more effective outcome.

I think I absolutely agree, and I think, you know, from that perspective, I think we've both probably met leaders who aren't necessarily comfortable with going out to staff until they have all the answers. Well, sure, why would I go out to them and tell them that I don't know what we're doing exactly? What would you say to that?

I would say leaders are no different than you and me and the rank-and-file and everybody else. They have to evolve just as everyone else is evolving. And the reality is today, because plans change so quickly— there's that great saying about, you know, a battle plan is great until the first shot is fired, right? Plans change. You've got to be flexible. Leaders have got to be flexible. I think leaders need to set the right tone at the top. Leaders need to provide clarity on why we're changing and where we're going. And then they need to engage their people. And, you know, there is a process where people get comfortable that, okay, we don't have all the answers, but we're going to make the right answers by getting people involved and engaged and get their feedback. But that tone from the top is vital. And leaders have to evolve just like everyone else. So they have to get comfortable with it. Because it's a reality. Because you don't know what the business is going to look like in 12 months' time. That is the reality. You may have a good educated guess, but you don't actually know. And so that's something. And I would say, you know, the tone from the top is critical. And then the second critical thing I think is your people managers. Your people, your frontline people managers are the people who are getting those questions, who are dealing directly with people who have concerns or who are raising issues. And so enabling your people managers to do that is critical.

Yeah, I can and I couldn't agree more. I mean, I think that they are that layer of management in the organization. They're the ones that will make or break a change program or change initiative.

Absolutely, no question. And so investing time with your managers and your leaders is critical, as well as getting the leadership piece right.

I saw a stat from Gatehouse in the UK this year when they do their state of the survey, or state of the nation around communications, and one of the stats that came out this year was that 56% of companies said that lack of communication skills for line managers was their biggest barrier to success, but only worryingly only a third of them was actually doing anything about it in the next 12 months.

Yeah, we've started looking at doing workshops. We're at the early stages of it, but we've started doing communications workshops on a small scale with some managers to help with, you know, how do you communicate difficult news? How do you listen? How do you engage with people? And Microsoft does, in fairness, does a lot of development work for our leaders inside Microsoft. And we actually have, you know, 3 leadership principles that we expect our leaders to adhere to. Around clarity, energy, and delivering success. And so I think companies are investing a lot more in equipping managers with the skills they need to lead their teams through change.

Yeah, and I think they need to. You know, for me, they absolutely need to do that. You know, the analogy that I've often used is that, you know, just because you're a good lawyer or a good IT person or a good whatever, it doesn't make you a good people manager. We wouldn't take Usain Bolt and put him in a pool beside Ian Thorpe. Because Usain Bolt's not a swimmer, he's a runner. So why we think that somebody who's good at legal is suddenly going to be a good people manager, I have no idea, without the support and the training and the tools and the confidence to do that role.

And I think we've all worked, uh, for managers who have been absolutely brilliant at doing their job, and through that have been made into a people manager when clearly they were not people managers. And those people struggle. And their teams struggle. I absolutely agree. Everyone cannot be a manager. And you know, being a manager is a huge amount of work. It's a huge commitment. And you've got to be passionate about your people and delivering on results. So I agree. I think this— you know, and I do think in the past companies were guilty of just hiring people and then as you got more senior became a people manager rather than actually looking for your aptitude as being a people manager. And I think that's changing because, you know, If you want to keep the best talent, you've got to have amazing people managers.

Yeah, I agree. Tell me a little bit about when you're facing into a project which is multi-year, and of course there's a whole load of changing context running around that change program, which is probably shaping it as well. How do you plan a communications program in that kind of environment when you don't— you're not going from A to B to C to D to finish? How do you plan your communications strategy in an environment like that?

Well, you know, going back earlier, you start with your case for change, you have your vision of success, and then you know you're going to have to over-communicate in between. And you know, you work very closely with the change team in terms of what the major milestones are, so you'll be able to plan to the next milestone. Then when you get to that next milestone, obviously that's going to land well or it's going to have to change, or it's going to— so at that point the plan has to change. So you have to have that flexibility to change. But you know that throughout this process you're going to be overcommunicating, communicating a lot. So we spend a huge amount of time with the change management team in huge detail on the business process, on the people change. We work with HR. We work with all the groups around the company. And then you've just got to build flexibility into the system. If you get to milestone 2 and all of a sudden things have to change, then you've got to replan. So you're replanning all the time. But the important thing is you have the framework up front. You're clear why we're doing this and where we're going. And then that enables you to make the right decisions as you move through the process. But, you know, one of the things about being transparent and taking people's opinions and listening and engaging is that plan is going to change. The only way not to do that is to just land the plan on everyone. And that's, that's not going to work from a change perspective. People don't like it and it doesn't work.

And what's interesting, I think, that the fact that that plan changes based on the input and the thinking of the people you're involving shows that they've got a voice?

Well, that's where once you get into the change program, it becomes very apparent to people, and that's great. The challenge is up front because there may be a lack of trust there, but then once they start to see that their inputs are actually shaping where the transformation journey is going, it gets a lot easier. And then people are your greatest cheerleaders. Like, they're— the people get engaged, they help drive the process, and ultimately that's what makes it successful, particularly in, in service, the Microsoft service org. And I should say, I left the Microsoft Services org in July and moved to a new organization. But, you know, the people were what made that successful. That was a people business. The 25,000 people in services are all dealing directly with customers. It's not a product or a service business. It's a people business. So, you got to bring your people with you.

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. When you think about one of the things that I often talk to leaders about is the power of storytelling, and that quite often elicits people throwing their eyes to the ceiling. Because I think that it hasn't quite landed with people yet, that the power, that stories are so powerful, and particularly during change, can really help people to bring, could help leaders and organizations to bring people on that journey. I just wonder how you've found that and how you've harnessed the power of storytelling in Microsoft.

So I'm a bit conflicted on storytelling. So there's two perspectives.

Are you throwing your eyes to the heavens?

I virtually was throwing my eyes to heaven. No, not really. So I completely agree storytelling is the most powerful tool a communicator has to land the message and help people understand change and help educate, inform, and engage people. No question, storytelling is incredibly powerful. I do think unfortunately there's been a lot of hot air around storytelling where people are trying to make storytelling sound far more complex and scientific than storytelling is. I believe anyone can be a good storyteller. I believe if you make it to adulthood as a human being, you're well able to tell stories because you've had to tell stories to make it to adulthood. And I— so some of the science around storytelling, I do throw my eyes up to heaven on.

I think the—

where you do effective storytelling is by putting a focus on it and giving it the right attention. I think where storytelling falls down is people don't actually think about telling a story. They just try and share a load of random information. So I think storytelling is incredibly powerful, but I also believe anyone can do it. I don't think it's this dark art that only a few people can master. I think anyone could be a great storyteller, but it's like anything else, Scott. You've got to invest the time. Like if you want to engage your employees, you've got to invest the time. If you want to be a good storyteller, you've got to invest the time. But if I think about a tool, particularly in a time of change, the fact you can get Mary to share how this change is changing how she engages with her customers and tell a story around that, there is no better way of helping people understand why we're making this change. So storytelling is critical. I just don't buy into the high church of storytelling because I think it's a skill everyone has. I just don't think— I think it's something people don't invest time on necessarily. And I would recommend everyone does because I think it's critical. I think it's critical for a leader in a small setting. I think it's critical for broadcast communications. I think it's critical for large-scale all-hands. But I don't think it's as, you know, as sophisticated, as difficult as people say.

And I completely agree with everything you've just said. Um, I think that—

no, eye rolling on some of the hype and hyperbole I see around it.

Yeah, I agree, I agree completely. Um, and I think that hype and hyperbole and the scientificness and the high church and all that stuff you talked about is probably the reason that people do that, do do that bit of eye rolling. And when they do do that bit of eye rolling and I explain to them it's just about you getting Mary to explain how the new system is helping her serve her customers better. They go, oh, is that it? I'm like, yeah, yeah, that's it. It's literally nothing more complex than that.

If one more person in a meeting says, let me walk you through the hero's journey, I'm going to be very upset.

I'm going to quote you on that in the show notes.

I can see them building up to tell me about the hero's journey as if it's some kind of secret parable that they are going to share with me. And I'm like, are you going to use Star Wars as the example? Really? Okay.

Run away. Run away to the bar.

There you go.

Absolutely. Listen, tell me a little bit about who your leadership and communication role models are. There must be people that you look up to who are really good at this stuff that you perhaps try to emulate in some way.

I have had the huge privilege of working with some really, really great people throughout my career, and many of them have really impacted how I work. They're not all comms. I think one of the people who I definitely learned a lot from at an early stage was someone who actually you've interviewed before on the podcast, which was Tara O'Sullivan of Skillsoft. We worked together at Iona Technologies when we were a lot younger, and we just had an absolute ball. But I learned a lot from her around getting things done and cutting through red tape and obfuscation and just getting things done. So that's someone I learned an awful lot from. From a communications perspective, I think the person who had the greatest impact on my career and my professional development is a lady called Carmel Doyle, who's currently the CEO of the Jack and Jill Foundation in Dublin. She transformed— I grew up in a very traditional PR agency structure where everyone was expected to be able to do everything, where failure was something that you had to avoid at all costs. Carmel has this incredible philosophy about risk-taking, about experimenting, about being smart about, "Hey, there are people better than you at doing," for example, your finances. So it's not a sign of weakness to get them to do that. It's actually a better use of your time to be focused on things you can actually do. And so she completely transformed how I thought about work. And to this day, she's an absolute rock star. And then currently I work for a leader called Anand Eshwaran who runs our global enterprise business. And as a leader, he's the most remarkable leader I've worked with in terms of bringing together clearly intelligence and vision, but with empathy, with a focus on people. I've really learned a lot from him, and he's hugely passionate around communications, which obviously puts him up in my book because I'm a communications person. But to see how he operates at scale with large groups of people, driving change, driving for good outcomes, but putting people at the center, has been a phenomenal learning for me over the last 4 years. And, you know, learning is just something that's constant in, in, in our careers today. So, um, they're the 3 people I'd probably call out as the greatest influences.

Okay, interesting. Thank you. And very finally then, this is a question I ask to everybody that comes on the podcast. What one piece of leadership advice would you give to your 20-year-old self knowing what you know now?

You know, The single greatest thing that we all must embrace is learning. The world is changing so quickly. Having an aptitude and a commitment to constantly question the status quo and look at things differently and open yourself to new experiences and new perspectives is probably the single greatest attribute I think you need in the 21st century to stay working and be successful. And part of, you know, one of the things through Microsoft's cultural transformation has been this thing around, I don't know if you've heard about it, the growth mindset. And this has really transformed the company and transformed individuals. And it was coined by this lady, Professor Carol Dweck, and she came up with this thing that actually where traditionally we look at people based on their IQ or the fact that people have fixed intelligence, actually that's not true. And actually if you enable people to constantly learn and experiment and try different things, you actually see people's capabilities hockey stick in terms of growth and improvement. And so, and core part of that is learning. It's from our CEO, Satya Nadella, has this phrase that it's It's moving from a know-it-all culture to a learn-it-all culture, and I think that sums up where we are today and what we need to embrace.

Interesting. Thanks very much. That's a great point to finish on. Tom, listen, it's been really, really nice talking to you. Enjoy the rest of your day. We're about to go home for the day, but thanks a million for coming on and really, really appreciate the time.

Scott, absolutely delighted. Always great to talk to you, and thanks a million.

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