In a special episode of The People Purpose Podcast, introducing the first rendition of the "E-Series" or Executive Series. Join Chas and Julie as they sit down with Chris Todd to hear about his journey to become Chief Executive Officer of UKG. He also discusses his approach to leadership, and they share a few laughs along the way.
In a special episode of The People Purpose Podcast, introducing the first rendition of the "E-Series" or Executive Series. Join Chas and Julie as they sit down with Chris Todd to hear about his journey to become Chief Executive Officer of UKG. He also discusses his approach to leadership, and they share a few laughs along the way.
Hey, Chas here. Just wanted to let you know this is going to be a little bit different of an episode. In fact, it is our first official guest on the people purpose podcast. We wanted to make it special for you, as Julie and I prepared and have worked countless with multiple teams in the background. I think you'll be really excited as we approach this new series, our E-series or executive series, where we have a roll up your sleeves conversation, to get to know executives, not for their title or not for their leadership, specifically within their business. But for you to understand the human side of what it takes, and more importantly, the lessons that these individuals learned along the way in their career journey. We hope you enjoy Have a listen to our wonderful first guest, a dear friend of both Juli and I, CEO of UKG, Mr. Chris Todd.
Julie Develin:Anyway, so hey, hey, thanks for being here. I know that, you know, when Chas and I started this podcast, this was one of our dreams, to be able to interview folks like yourself and welcome. Yeah.
Chas Fields:Welcome, Chris. It's really cool. Yeah, it's really cool. Because we've talked about this for two years approach about two years ago. And you're like, Sure, let's do it.
Chris Todd:To us, you got me? Yeah.
Chas Fields:By the way, getting on your calendar is about impossible. I don't know if you're running a big company, about like, give me a freaking break. You know, but what we want to do and just make this special, and we call it an E series, not executive series. But for our listeners, you know, a lot of times what we've witnessed over the course of however long we've been doing a show, you can choose different, right, like UKG is different. And I remember us talking in London, I told you actually, I think it was after, when you talk to the interns and I followed up after you right, I said, we need more of that, right? Like the roll up your sleeves. You know, Chris Todd, the CEO, but there's more to Chris Todd than being a CEO. So talk to us a little bit about your upbringing. Tell us a little bit about like, you know, how did you go from? Well, I know your story, or at least a little bit of it. But you know, the who, the where, the surroundings maybe a memorable moment that you're like, maybe one day I can be a CEO? What was that like really from talk through that?
Chris Todd:Yeah, I? Well, I'll tell you the story. What did disappoint you at the end of the story? I didn't know I didn't know what a CEO was. So there's like, No, there's no point at that phase in my life. I'm like, well, I could maybe be a CEO and sort of tell you why as we go. But I grew up in a town called Marion, Marion, Ohio, which was a small sort of small town in Ohio, but an hour north of Columbus still small.
Chas Fields:So it's Yes, still small.
Chris Todd:And, you know, I'm of a certain age that I grew up there in the late 70s, into the 80s. Class of 88, high strung kid. And, you know, there was a time and a place for everybody. It was a time replaced with for TV channels. Like you had a choice. Right, right. And no social media, no one no one keeping track and you have and all that nonsense that you see on you know, Instagram these days. Yeah. You know, these 10 things, if you remember these things, your driver ladies, right, those things.
Julie Develin:I remember, we
Chris Todd:paid attention to it. And you know, you just had to be home in time for dinner. Like it's getting dark and. But in hindsight, and I think this is why people people, you know, tend to reminisce about those days. But in hindsight, it was a great way to grow up. It was a great way to grow. It was a small town. And that comes with a certain lack of worldliness and a certain lack of perspective. Like, I don't want to see your was. But there were plenty of activities. And everybody in the town knew everyone. And which for me, meant that i i For sure it felt cared for. I for sure had relationships with adults. I was for sure connected to teachers and coaches and my friend's parents. Yeah. It was it sort of tight community for me that way. And it was for many, it was for many and it wasn't, it wasn't. You don't want to sugarcoat that wasn't perfect for everybody. But it was it was it was great for me. Yeah, it was great for me. And I was I was sort of blessed in many ways that we didn't have a ton of money. But I do know that I was I was blessed in the sense that I came from a family and my parents were married. Right as we all know, that's a huge About, we didn't have food insecurity . That's a huge step up, which means, you know, we were able to focus on things like school and sports and friendships. And so it was very emotionally and psychologically healthy. It was it was a great way to go.
Julie Develin:What sports did you play?
Chris Todd:I played. I played soccer all the way through high school. I played baseball all the way through high school. And I played basketball through my sophomore year in high school where upon my parents let me quit. If I promised I would find another activity. Yeah, cuz I wasn't sitting around in my
Chas Fields:it's so funny because you mentioned several memorable moments there. So you and I've actually talked about this. I come from a background. But I'm Marion, Indiana, right, Marion, Indiana. But what I find so interesting about those memorable moments between us is, there were so many people to hold us accountable. Because, you know, somebody says, Oh, you know, Chris may be out there doing something he's not supposed to is a high school kid. Yeah. Your dad already knows about it before you walk in the door. Right? And that's what's so interesting about it. Because you've go through all of these different phases of life, or, you know, you grew up in a small town as we both did. And I'm kind of with you, I didn't really ever think Oh, CEO, or podcast host or future leader of whatever. It was just hey, go do your schoolwork. Yeah, you know, make sure you're a good human being and treat others and yeah, oh, my god, don't do that. Right. Right. So Jules, what are you really
Chris Todd:knew my dad ran the local YMCA. Okay. And so he if it wasn't a school activity, all the activities in town or YMCA activities? Yeah, so he really didn't know. And so I've said this before between to my dad, the high school principal in the chief of police. Right? They knew everything.
Julie Develin:Here, let's bring that full circle. You'll love this. Just a few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to speak to all of the CHR OHS of YMCAs No, she did. Yeah. And their customer, our customers, our customers and those who are not, we would love for them to be. But um, yeah, it was that full circle for you. So yeah, I was in front of all of them. It was fantastic.
Chris Todd:I've been following that implementation closely. Yeah. Yeah, they're great. I mean, different topic different day, but the YMCA and their mission is incredibly powerful and how they've adjusted the church and the organization over time and I love tying
Julie Develin:it back to the customer to your story, right that's so cool. Ready
Chas Fields:to I implemented one when I started in services. Yeah, when I started services, yeah.
Julie Develin:So what was your first job ever?
Chris Todd:My first job ever I was a lifeguard
Chas Fields:awesome. Like had to show up schedule and yeah,
Chris Todd:Fair Park community pool. Okay, $2.50 anhour you couldn't eat the snacks for free. But if the snacks were broken, you could eat them for free and so we looked for the most popular snack was the pretzel dipped in cheese.
Chas Fields:Oh yeah. Hello
Chris Todd:looking for broken pretzels the bar
Chas Fields:cheese though the ballpark cheese?
Chris Todd:Yes, sir. Yes. Yeah.$2.50 an hours sitting and sitting a carpark cool. And the splits big and small town you know who ran the you know, ran the Fair Park pool in the summer was the guy who was the one of the guidance counselor's Oh, wrestling coach.
Chas Fields:Yeah. All teachers always have Yeah, teachers. Yeah. How's
Chris Todd:he going to staff this pool? Yeah, he's gonna walk around the hallway.
Chas Fields:Who do I trust to save a young person's life? I
Chris Todd:saw some spectacular future seeing myself. One kid fell down run around the pool and coach macro courses, gym coach. He was going to save that tooth and so he grabbed it and grabbed that tooth and rinse it off and jammed right back into his mouth and off to the hospital. Left us all horrified. But he saved the tooth.
Chas Fields:Did you ever go like try and cut off an end of a hot dog so you can get like the Okay. When you're when you're hungry, high school student playing three sports, I'm telling ya.
Julie Develin:What are things that I places I never thought this conversation would go? Yeah. So okay, so, you know, I guess we want to kind of get into just a little bit regarding your career path. In a nutshell, where did it go from there? So you started as the lifeguard $2. 50 An hour and then off? Yeah.
Chris Todd:So it was the a few things happened to me along the way that were extraordinarily lucky. One of them was that because of this community, yep. Because this community, I absolutely had teachers who were looking out for me, and my end started in middle school, but really throughout high school who pushed me encouraged me to go in different directions, who, who sort of promoted certain activities just and really, really sort of pushed me and I remember you mentioned at the beginning, like other specific moments, like I remember, specific conversations I have a specific teachers who told me to do X and I went and did x and then that had outcome y, right. And then at the end of high school, I was lucky enough to get into Harvard. And that was, that was life changing for me? Sure. It was life changing, and all that sort of obvious reasons that come with it school with that sort of name. But beyond that, it was just, it was, I'd never really been to a city, I'd never been overseas. I never lived in a place like that. I never met kids like that. And so it was incredibly,
Chas Fields:it's a culture shock a little bit, too,
Chris Todd:It was a complete culture shock. And so that was, that was like one big step. And so that's when you get, that's when you're exposed to a whole variety of different possibilities. So to go back, Chas said earlier, when did you want to be CEO? I didn't know a CEO from a hot rock, right? Still, you don't start hanging around people place like that, and you start to figure it out, you start to figure it out.
Chas Fields:That's great. And that process like were that was there anybody who stuck out that you felt was a really good mentor along the way? Like we know the mentor story for you? And you know, for hear that, and you can share about that? That's okay. But like along the way from high school, and obviously, getting into Harvard is not an easy feat, which, by the way, our producer Cecily, also went.. But who was like the pivotal teacher, the mentor along the way that was like, that's the person that made the difference. Does that make sense? Oh, for sure.
Chris Todd:Yeah, for sure. There were there were a bunch. right. There were a bunch. There was Mr. Gatchell who taught me how to write and Mrs. Kaiser who taught me how to read and write, let's go. And Mr. Rap who put it who really pushed me in math in ways that I hadn't been pushed before. you know, oh, no, no, no, wrong. they were, they were sort of extraordinary teachers. And I had some extraordinary coaches, beyond way be I had very, very limited athletic abilities. But despite that, there were coaches who sort of pushed me and taught me the power of discipline and taught me not to talk back and taught me the power of working hard and taught me that if I did all those things, despite my wildly limited abilities, I get to play. And sometimes I get to start, and you through that learn the value of hard work. Right. Part of the reason I stopped basketball after a second your sophomore year was I was horrible. I was horrible.
Chas Fields:Some self awareness.
Chris Todd:But I played a lot of it because I just worked. I just worked as hard as anyone on the team despite those deficiencies.
Chas Fields:Yeah. Well, this is I mean, I think, I think probably similar for Julie, because we all played sports. Right? And, Julie, I mean, you still play to this day. You still play this? Election? Yeah. It's the discipline, right? Well,
Julie Develin:for me, it's, I see a lot of similarities with work and with sports, with the teamwork with the being humble with knowing your role. I mean, there's lots of different things. I think, for me personally, that's that prepared me for leadership roles in HR and to really be part of a team and that's how I feel here at I UKG. I feel like it's a big team. And, you know, it's great. So
Chris Todd:I think you're right by what I still despite the fact that you know, my athletic career ended 35 years ago, despite some wildly successful intramurals all the time. The the I still I still like you do I draw on lessons? I think about it. I dream about it more than I should believe it or not, and I those are still the things that are in your just in your your makeup
Chas Fields:completely off script here. Do you talk to any of the high school friends that you played with still to this day? To this day?
Chris Todd:To this day? I was texting with them this morning. Yeah.I did a I did a Midwestern football road trip with my brother and my two best friends from high school. Let's
Chas Fields:go. play football in the Midwest. Who do you go watch play football in the Midwest? Well, so you had him for new Ohio State? Yeah, yeah.
Chris Todd:So we went to Notre Dame for the Ohio State Notre Dame game. And as an appetizer the night before we went to watch the Wisconsin Purdue game. And then to polish it off, because we got to fly home. You gotta go somewhere on Sunday. We went to Detroit and watch the Falcons play the lions before. We went on a bender. Yeah. I wish I wish. No beer.
Julie Develin:I wish we could. I wish we could talk about sports the entire time. But no, no. Well, I'm not saying that out loud. But I do want to ask just a couple of questions regarding your leadership today and your role. UKG obviously, regarding some of the biggest challenges that you faced as a leader in your position today, you know, maybe just, you know, what have you learned in the past year or so that you didn't expect to have to, you know, handle in this position? Is there anything that you can share?
Chris Todd:Yeah, there are a couple things. The couple of things the hardest thing about this role is balancing you Employees should, and the customers and the shareholders. Yeah, right, getting all three of those and keeping all three of those in balance. It's hard. It's hard. It's a lot of work. It's a lot of work it takes in, it's not just labor, it takes a lot of emotional energy. Sure. And it takes a lot of working with a team and takes a lot of talking with the team, to make sure that we're all sort of aligned and coordinated. And we've got the balance, right? Because we need to do an exceptional job on all three of those areas. And if anyone gets out of whack you, you feel, you feel it. And so I'd say that's the day to day That's the hardest thing to make sure to stays in balance.
Chas Fields:One of my great mentors, Barb Vlacich, here at UKG. You know, she, she gives me great advice on things like rise above it, like how, in these types of scenarios, and the weight that you clearly must carry for these, like, how do you rise above some of the noise or balanced those three things? Right? That's it. I mean, that's a big responsibility, obviously. But if you're feeling the weight, and I know your heart and where you're at with all of this, like, how do you rise above it? But how do you rise above the noise?
Chris Todd:What I know is that it's not? Well, sometimes it can feel personal. Sure. It's not personal. It's not personal, I have an obligation to UKG and have an obligation to this organization on behalf of you and everyone else who works here and the end those other two, sort of super important constituencies to balance those the best that I can, as you go along that path, you make decisions that any one of those three aren't going to lie. Yeah, that's the job. That's the job description. And it's actually not. It's well, it feels personal. And people at times will personalize. It's not personal. Yeah. It's not personal. And when, and I think we may have an opportunity to communicate, people have said that they understand that.
Julie Develin:Yeah, people. What do you like to do to de stress?
Chris Todd:I do. So one thing that sort of maybe surprising to people, given the nature of this job, I'm an introvert. And I'm a I'm a relationship that Yeah, yeah. And so well, this is, this is enormously fun for me, sure. I'm having a ball. But it's also easier than normal, because I've known you both for a long time. We're old friends, right? And so it's, but despite that, this takes energy. And so I've become really, as I go through my career, I've become better and better and better. And in the last year and a half in this in this role, I become very good, and very thoughtful about when and how I need to unwind. And when I need to be quiet, and how I'm quiet, and I structure my event, I structure my weekend around being quiet, that's great. I structure my free time each day around activities that that sort of refill my cup that way. And so a lot of that's my reading a lot of that's by puzzles. It's like typical introvert, quiet person. Activities. That's,
Julie Develin:that's awesome. That's, I think that's great advice for some of our listeners, too, to make sure that you're finding things I've talked about that before, with HR, you know, with the conversations I have with customers and potential customers every day. It's HR folks are feeling that pressure, you know, that kind of taking care of everyone else, you know, it's focusing on yourself and how important that becomes. I think that's fantastic advice. You're
Chris Todd:right. It's okay to know who you are sure, right.
Julie Develin:And it's okay to take time for yourself. It's so much so many of us think that that's a selfish thing, right? But yes, it is selfish. And that's okay to be selfish. Because to be the best version of you. You need to be a little bit selfish. Yeah, absolutely.
Chas Fields:How do you how do you feel? How do you you know, keep your cup filled? If you're constantly pouring out, right. And for you, it's quiet, right? It's whatever it is at home. For me. It's this right? Like, I fill my cup with people. That's just the way that Yeah, yeah. And that's right. Yeah. It kind of thinking about career and tough decisions. You know, can you talk about, you know, for people that may be going through a difficult time, or just lack of understanding and career or, you know, have a potential tough decision that they need to make whether it's their job, right, what advice would you give, right? I think people always want that to say, okay, like from the leader, what would they say in this scenario, when you have a difficult decision and work? What would you say to him? Yeah.
Chris Todd:I try to make sure if I have a difficult decision, I know something's gonna be a difficult decision. One of the first thoughts I always have is who, who's a trusted adviser to me on this issue? Who can I talk to about? So that's always a calculus I'll go through to try to figure out who am I going to talk to about this? So the first step, my second step is, I'm actually a big list maker. Pros and cons and draw pictures. You like to write the list or diagram. Oh, no, I like to write it. Me too. I like to write it too. And then then you then you will rewrite it later.
Julie Develin:Yes. Yes to you, too. Yeah. I like to write. It does and I'd like to cross things off. No matter how mundane it is
Chris Todd:it's a list and I also one of the, one of the skills I actually I have, which I've tried to try to actually to develop over time is the word I use it, I ruminate a lot. Okay, and so I try not to make quick rash decisions. I do give myself a deadline to make sure I'm not slowing people down and slowing the organization down. But I'm I think I'm tend to be good at like, taking different inputs I sort of students to assume and think about it, make my less work on it that way.
Chas Fields:Talk to your mentors, talk to people you trust
Chris Todd:the advisor, and then make a decision, then you have to work with the team to say, Okay, next, we've decided to do this. We're all gonna shake hands. We're all gonna lock hands. We're all and then we're gonna go, No, looking back.
Chas Fields:I will I will say and this is unscripted to where I had been through several m&a's before. Yeah. And the company, you know, ended up growing and growing. And I will tell you, you all have handled the merger. phenomenally. Thank you. So you may not hear that often. But I will tell you, it's been done very well. So.
Julie Develin:And for the rumination, you're not alone. Of the 122 informed decisions we make on a day to day basis, we second guess, 87% of them. And that's essentially I do a presentation on decision making. Yeah, in HR.
Chas Fields:I'll tell you, in
Julie Develin:terms of unconscious decisions per day, we make over 35,000. So the rumination is a thing it happens. A lot of people do it. And you know, it's
Chris Todd:the reason you need your list is so you don't lose your rumination. Right. No, right. But those four or five or six things Oh, absolutely, absolutely. So yeah,
Chas Fields:yeah, we're getting close. But you had mentioned some skills. What are the skills? You're talking like you're sharpening right now? Like what you're working on? Or just you know, hey, maybe there's a skill in the future that you want to focus on to develop? Is there one that sticks out right now?
Unknown:For me, it's about it's always about team building. Right. I'm, that's an it's something I'm thinking a lot about right now. I'm trying to work on right now. I'm actually in with our team. So trying new techniques and new tactic. Sure. See, sure. Because I'm always trying to think about, like, how do we make the most effective team on behalf of UKG to push everything forward? And that's, that's a big one right now.
Chas Fields:Yeah, Julie, and I talk a lot about how much you know, kind of the business world, and the weight that managers carry, because we expect a lot of our managers, right. And if it weren't for our managers, we'd have a really hard time. If it wasn't for our frontline employees, we have a really hard time executing business. What do you expect for your people, leaders? Like the people who report to you? Yeah, execute?
Chris Todd:Well, there's a there's a, they're like, they need to be in line with the UKG norms. Right? We talked a lot about we have united kind and growing. Those aren't just good words, because they haven't have a you when it came in the gym. That's actually who we are. And we have to we have to live that. Yeah. And, one, it's the sort of place I think the three of us want to work? Sure. Is it a better place to work? Right. By the way, I think it helps us provide better solutions, and products to our customers. Okay, underneath that what I want out of leaders out of managers is to be able to make those hard decisions. right. I do want them to be high energy. I want them to be able to energize others. I do want them to have edge not an unkind edge, right with with our norm but the edge to say, You know what, I gotta make this this hard call, right? And then do you. And then the last point, then execute, right, then do it. And so those are the four doing those four things well, within the the United kind of growing umbrella, then we've got a great set of managers,
Chas Fields:right. It's something that I've learned at this company that I've been six years, you've been almost five and a half Yeah, about to celebrate 10. And when we came over, or when I came over, it's been instilled in us from day one, right? Like the culture, what we believe how you should operate, you know, don't be rude, like just simple human beings. Because what we've learned is that when we treat our people better, and we treat them like humans, obviously, we treat our customers better we treat those
Chris Todd:related is a virtuous cycle.
Julie Develin:It is and yeah, it's hard to describe. There's so many folks who want to join UKG I get, I get asked all the time, hey, can you find a job? I wish that I could, you know, you can apply here, but, you know, what we've built and what you've built, you know, has been really remarkable and, you know, not without its challenges, but it's the way that we overcome those challenges and the solutions that we you know, put into place and the customers that we help, right that really make it make it all all worthwhile. Yeah.
Chas Fields:So we'll finish with This last question before we take off. We appreciate it two years, like 12 conversations finally doing. Finish on a high note, if you had a day to yourself, how would you spend
Chris Todd:a day to myself? No work
Chas Fields:can't open your email, you got to turn your notifications off. Like how would you spend it?
Chris Todd:Can I choose the day of the year? Whatever? Sure. Well, Thanksgiving, my family. Yeah. That's pretty your favorite day of the year?
Chas Fields:Is it? Is it the family and the food?
Chris Todd:It's the family and it's the process. It's the process. You start to talk about a weeks ahead of time. I look forward to everyone being there. It's a it's a friend that I got. I'm blessed. I have a wonderful, wonderful family. And yeah, that's the what's the best day I can imagine. What's
Julie Develin:the best food on the Thanksgiving table?
Chris Todd:Your best food? Thanksgiving table.
Chas Fields:Just be careful how you answer. This is a tricky one. Yeah. It's a tricky. It's not an approved question. No,
Chris Todd:I think the garlic chive mashed potatoes are big hit. Oh, okay. The homemade cranberry sauce is more popular than you think it is.
Julie Develin:Yeah. I know. I like jelly. Cranberry Sauce. I love it. Like from back when I was a kid. I would Yes. When when we had Thanksgiving, I would have my own camp. Yeah, they would give me my own camp because I eat the whole thing. If I did my own camp.
Chris Todd:I do all of the I do all the Thanksgiving prep. I do all the cooking. Okay. It goes a little bit to the introvert thing.
Chas Fields:So are you deep fried turkey?
Chris Todd:Are you not?
Chas Fields:Right turkey? i
Chris Todd:And I'm interested in roasted turkey. But there is there's a artery clogging amount of butter.
Chas Fields:Well, Chris, as we do on every episode, you and I like to finish out with, you know, what did you find your purpose in today? So I'm going to start with you because we didn't ask you first, Jules, what do you find your purpose? Oh,
Julie Develin:my gosh, putting me on the spot. What did I find my purpose and I found my purpose in. You know, I think that it's just so nice to be able to have this conversation with you. And to get to know you on a little bit of a different level. And that's definitely my purpose. You know, my purpose is is always to, to learn as much as I can from others, you know, and I learned so much from him. So thank you so
Chris Todd:much for doing this. Yeah, this was a lie. Like I've been looking forward to this for months. Yeah, super fun. I have I have enormous respect and gratitude for what the two of you do. Thank you, and how you do it, and how you make UKG show up every single day. We wouldn't be who we are without you. Thank you. And this podcast is so cool. And I'm happy to be here and I'm just trying to win a repeat visit.
Chas Fields:2027
Julie Develin:careful what you wish for.
Chas Fields:Third commentator Yeah,
Julie Develin:no, you know, you're obviously welcome on workforce Institute, you know, anytime, and we'll definitely have you back. And thank you so much. Yeah,
Chas Fields:I found my purpose in you know, conversations like this are and we talked about this at length conversations like this, where we have accessibility to the C suite, which is so not normal for most companies is a true culture differentiator, and to be able to have the privilege of sitting down with people like you, Pat, by the way should we list off we got our chief people officers coming, Brian Reaves our DEI&B leader. We have so many cool guests coming up to do exactly this. Yeah, it's not normal. Yeah,
Chris Todd:we will we have a great team. And
Julie Develin:you know, speaking at team, I'd also like to finish out by thanking all of the folks who have helped to make this happen. While we have it, it takes a village. It takes a team and we appreciate everyone from from our team human insights, also, social media, folks, PR folks, everybody. So thank you so much, Chris, appreciate it. Thanks, Chris.
Chris Todd:Great to see you soon. Cheers. That's great.