From Rollout to Results: Elevating L&D to Drive Organizational Change | Joey Papania, Cox Media

Ken Babcock (00:00.921)
Hey everyone, welcome back to the Change Enablers podcast. I'm super pumped to have our dear friend Joey over at Cox Media joining us today. Joey's got an awesome perspective that he's gonna share, particularly focused on learning and development. He's a senior manager of L &D over at Cox. Was actually brought in to sort of found the department within Cox, created Cox Media University, which you can see in his background there.

you know, mainly the goal of that was to kind of improve internal performance metrics, employee engagement. And that was just the start of a lot of the technology initiatives that Joey's taken on within Cox Media. More recently, he's pioneered a few integrations in the realm of AI, driving a bunch of cost savings across the business. And he got there sort of in an unconventional way. That's a common thread that we see.

on the Change Enablers podcast, started out as an account consultant, worked in digital media sales, and then got his way over to L &D, and before Cox, was working with a few TV networks too. So we're gonna talk a little bit about that windy path and how it brought Joey to where he is today. But Joey, we're pumped to have you, man. Let's jump into the

Joey Papania (01:22.339)
I'm excited to be here, Ken. I'm shocked that somebody wants to dive inside my head and see what's banging around up there. if you're ready for it, I'm ready

Ken Babcock (01:32.587)
I think we're ready for it. I think there's a lot of good stuff up there. And for the listeners, Joey and I were talking a little bit about LSU football before this podcast started recording. Joey, you're in Baton Rouge, is that right?

Joey Papania (01:49.393)
Yeah, yeah, so I'm actually born raised in New Orleans. Baton Rouge is about an hour or so outside of New Orleans, but I went to LSU. I met my wife here. And I guess the story I say is I wasn't a good enough salesman then to get her to come to New Orleans. So I ended up sticking around in Baton Rouge.

Ken Babcock (02:07.423)
Yeah, well, we'll go Tigers. I mentioned a little bit about your career path, kind of how you got to where you are today. I know that was probably the 30 ,000 foot view, but I'd love for you to share with our audience, what got you to leading L &D today at Cox Media, some of the steps along the way and sort of how that helped you be an effective leader in your role.

Joey Papania (02:34.877)
Yeah, I mean, so to your point, I've got a 20 plus year background in sales and marketing. And I think for anyone out there that is a sales leader, you kind of do a little bit of training off the side of your desk. It sort of comes with the job. But we actually were running an onboarding program at our corporate offices.

And the facilitators said they were getting a lot of, I say more in -depth questions around the product portfolio. So they had asked if any of the digital sales managers in the company were willing to come to the new hire classes and sort of guide a little bit of the training and ask a little bit of the questions. So I raised my hand. I think I was the first one to raise my hand. We were supposed to take turns and I ended up doing like six in a row. I just kind of fell in love with it. And I look, I think

You know, for me, my wife and I always played that game, you know, if money wasn't an object, what would you do? And I always said I would love to coach or teach. I was always coaching my kids, you know, little league games, soccer, basketball. And I think it was the first time in my career where I felt like I liked what I did, but I really kind of fell in love with what I was doing. And so to be able to sort of scratch that itch and that passion and do it professionally, and it's been the best move of my career.

So yeah, I've had a lot of conversations about what's next and I would say my future stays in L &D. I really think I'm in the right spot.

Ken Babcock (03:58.688)
Awesome. That's great to hear. mean, I think as you know, co -founder and builder of a company, you know, we talk a lot about internally, how do you turn yourself into a learning organization, not just an execution organization? I think that's, that's some things that we're going to touch on today, but you know, the difference being executing within the bounds of the business and what you've set and the inertia of the way things have been done in the past versus

thinking about how could we do that better? How could we do something different? How could we grow and develop as an organization? So I'm excited to get your perspective. I know a lot of your initiatives at Cox Media have been centered around technology and how to enable the team. And a lot of that technology, we had mentioned a little bit of AI, software, obviously.

is something that you're pretty passionate about. And so, you know, what I'm curious about, and I think will be relevant to a lot of our listeners, is like, what role do you see L &D playing, you know, when you're deciding to kind of take on those new software initiatives? Why does L &D kind of need to have a seat at the table in those conversations, and what role do you play?

Joey Papania (05:19.345)
Yeah, I mean, they're just tools. I think we get enamored with the technology, but the reality of it is it's just a tool. And the tool was only as good as the user, if they can swing the hammer. So I think without a structured and defined training plan, the tool actually ends up becoming a waste of money because a nice, fancy, shiny tool that no one knows how to use becomes pretty useless pretty quick. So I think...

You know, I think for me, the opportunity for L &D to sort of be at the forefront of those conversations is important, mainly because usually at the beginning of the conversation is where the budget and the strategy get laid out. And if you're not there to influence it, either you're gonna be executing someone else's strategy without any opportunities to influence where that goes. And then if there are resources that you need to bring on to

this new transformation to life, if the money is already spent, it becomes almost an impossibility to execute against

Ken Babcock (06:35.211)
think we froze there. Danielle, did you see that on your end?

Joey Papania (06:36.691)
there we

Ken Babcock (06:50.74)
Okay.

Joey Papania (06:50.917)
If you want to just re ask re ask the question I can start over OK.

Ken Babcock (06:53.685)
Yeah, yeah, no, that's easy. Danielle, was it? Which side were you seeing it on, just

Okay. Yeah, yeah, okay.

Joey Papania (07:04.167)
Man, you know, and my company is the one who gives me the internet, so what a bad sign that is.

Ken Babcock (07:08.405)
Hey, no worries, man. This happens more often than you think. I just wanna make sure going forward. All right, I'll jump back into

Ken Babcock (07:19.229)
So, you know, know Joey, you've talked a lot about just the different technology initiatives that you've taken on. A lot of that takes the shape of software. know, some of it is these AI tools that I mentioned at the top. When you're making the decision on whether to buy, what to buy, you know, I think you've made a statement that it's really critical for L &D to have a seat at the table. Can you talk a little bit about, you know, why that is and what role you typically play?

Joey Papania (07:49.191)
Yeah, I mean, think specific to software, we've actually had a number of software upgrades in the last couple of years. They're just tools. I mean, at the end of the day, it's just a tool, but we have to be able to use the tool. And I think that's where L &D's part in the process is, is that you can have a really nice, big, shiny new tool, but if no one knows how to use it properly, then that tool loses its value pretty quick.

And I would say early on in the conversation or typically where those budget and strategy conversations happen. And if L &D is not early and doesn't have a seat at the table, I mean, typically you end up executing someone else's strategy without the opportunities to influence it. And then you miss out on opportunities for budget considerations because I do, and looking at your company, there are new and better ways to train instead of doing it the same old way.

but with that requires some of the resources. So I think it's important for us to be on the front of that conversation. And I also don't think it's the business's fault, but they're going to evaluate that based off of the technical applications and they aren't necessarily going to look at it through a learning lens. And so I think, and I think the word training gets thrown around a lot and it doesn't always mean training. And so I think sort of redefining what training is and being able to put a stamp on that at the beginning.

Ken Babcock (09:01.852)
Mm -hmm.

Joey Papania (09:15.889)
will really sort of shape where we go for the long -term strategy.

Ken Babcock (09:20.133)
Totally, and I appreciate that you called out that these pieces of software, they're tools, right? And as a builder of software, I believe that too. In fact, there's something inherently human about software and tooling. think I'm a bit of a history geek, but anthropologically, when you go back into the earliest days of man, the clearest evidence that humans

existed somewhere was actually their use of tools. And so it's amazing how, know, millenniums have advanced and it is, that is still the case. And, you know, I know you've got a great metaphor for this that I love around losing weight. Could you share, could you share that with the

Joey Papania (10:12.935)
Yeah, mean, I think too, part of the benefits of being on the front end too is also understanding what are we aiming for? mean, are we training for the sake of training or are we actually training to solve problems? And I don't mean creating training. I mean, actually solving business problems. And again, on the front end is where we figure out what those main pain points are and then how do we align training to it? And then within that, how do we track against it?

What are the metrics? What are the KPIs that I can point to to said that this training worked outside of a smile sheet, you know, at the end of a course. And I think the analogy I'd given was, you know, Ken, if you and I were working on a fitness plan, not that you need one, but you know, if we were going to help you lose a few pounds and get you into shape and, and look, we started doing it. We're three months in, you're feeling really, really good. And I put you on the scale.

Ken Babcock (11:00.171)
Yeah.

Joey Papania (11:10.705)
So what? Like if I didn't measure you on the front end, I have absolutely no idea what that measurement means three months from now. And so how do I show progress if I'm not tracking that from the front end? And how do I even know if weight loss is what you're aiming for? I mean, what if that's not what your ultimate goal was? And so now I've sort of set this marker for success down the road and I've been heading to the wrong destination. I mean, ultimately I need to know where we're going so that I can drive a training plan that gets to a destination.

And I think sometimes we just throw training because we know it needs to be part of the conversation, but we don't really think through it strategically about where it can drive

Ken Babcock (11:48.776)
Yeah, no, I love that. And I think you mentioned you're in the middle of a rollout now. I mean, we know, we know this very intimately at Tango. We're recording this in July. This launch is next month in August. By the time this podcast goes live, it might be August or later. So it'll be fun to come back and listen to this. But can you share a bit about that project, what you're launching, how you made that case, you know, for L &D to be brought

And then, know, coming back on this weight loss analogy, like, what is the KPI? Like, what's the hope and dream of this particular

Joey Papania (12:27.707)
Yeah, so the current project that we're working on is an upgrade of systems. It always starts with one system. It ends up becoming multiple systems, which then has downstream effects to all of the existing systems. So it always ends up snowballing. And then we're also introducing new roles to the organization. So I think the overarching strategy is not only are we onboarding a new system, but I also have to onboard new processes.

and how this new team is gonna work with the existing teams. And then I have to onboard new people as well. And so, you I think we lose that sometimes when systems training, we focus on the device and we forget about the person that actually has to use the device. And so our training program has been pretty extensive. We've soft rolled it in June. I'll be introducing the new team to the system in July.

And then the wider organization and the sales organization is going to get the full launch in August. So a lot of moving pieces, lot of different platforms and processes that we've been working up against. But we're excited. And I would say, I don't know. I mean, this is a shameless plug for you, but I don't know that we would be able to put a lot of what we were able to put in place at the timelines that we had without introducing a solution like Tango.

That just gives us a different way of approaching the training than we've done previously.

Ken Babcock (13:55.889)
I love that. That's great. And you remind me of an age old framework of just analyzing businesses, right? People, process and technology. And I think for a lot of organizations, particularly in the last, let's call it 25 years, technology has often been the band -aid solution for not keeping up with your people, not keeping up with your process. And I think people lose sight of the fact

you need to kind of do them all in conjunction. One is not going to overcompensate for the other. You can't introduce a bunch of tech hoping that people are going to catch up or processes will just fall into line. So I appreciate that you're doing that. A lot of people don't. You mentioned Tango, which I love. And obviously, at the risk of making this a Tango commercial, which I don't want to do, maybe let's take a step back.

before Tango, you know, let's think about why you brought on Tango, what were the goals and aims and what did you think about, okay, hey, we're looking at this brand new sort of systems and processes, you know, before you had Tango, even in your mind, what were you hoping to do? What were you hoping to bring

Joey Papania (15:18.523)
Yeah, I think probably the best way to start with that is to kind of go in reverse. A year ago, we went through a similar software rollout in the organization.

Now at the time, my team was more centrally located and it was at the beginning of last year, we were shifted to primarily focus with Cox Media. And when we were brought in, the project had already launched, they were already halfway through it. And so we were sort of brought in on the back end of it to more consult from a training perspective. And, you know, what I've learned was they had a training plan. But as I sort of dug into it a little bit more, what they really had was more of a rollout.

So the team that was going to be introducing the new software, the vendor that we were working with was on point to do onboarding training for the system. So several weeks of instructor led training, lots of demos, lots of Q &A, which is awesome. But I sort of raised my hand in the meeting and said, great, then what? What happens?

What happens in two months when I actually have to go apply the training and I forgot what you told me? Because that's reality. What happens when I was on PTO and I didn't make the training to begin with? And then I said, what about the person who's not here yet? So what happens in six months in a year when we hire someone new? I said, this is awesome from a rollout, but it's a lot like a circus. And it's great while it's here, but the circus is going to pack the tents up and they're going to leave.

And I don't know that we have a sustainable training strategy in the long term. And it was quiet. And again, this is not to their fault, but they were so focused on launch. And without training and development being at the table, there just wasn't the considerations for something on the external side of it. And the system launched and everything went well, but there are pain points in it. And there is some sustainable issues that we're having to come back in and solve for.

Joey Papania (17:21.795)
But the reality of it was that that sort of was the impetus for me getting at the table on the front end of this new project. I think that was, you know, early in my career someone told me that, you know, problems aren't, mistakes aren't a problem. You know, it's not correcting them that is the problem. And I maybe it's just my sales hat on me, but I was able to kind of go, hey,

Let's take and analyze the approach that we had here. Let's look at all the problems that we ran into. How might we be able to solve for those moving forward? And really the solution was we need to be on the front end of the conversation so we could really understand what it is that you're trying to aim for.

Ken Babcock (18:02.32)
Yeah, well, first off, Joey, you are winning the metaphors game. The traveling circus, I think we're gonna use that in a lot of our marketing. Because I mean, like you said, these vendor trainings, they can be great, but in my opinion, they lack a little bit of context around your org and how people operate. It's one thing to kind of come in and give.

the standard training that you give to every customer. But, you know, I think what you're doing and what we've tried to enable at Tango is there's an element of uniqueness, not to say that every company is its own special snowflake, but there is that element of uniqueness in terms of knowing kind of the skillsets of your people, knowing, you know, sort of the state of the world before this new tool came

and how people operated in that world and how much of a behavior change is gonna happen. so the vendor trainings are nice, it's a nice little perk, but it often lacks a of that context, in my opinion. Did you feel that way as well when, I mean, you guys are kind of brought in on the tail end of this, like how much of that were you trying to overcome?

Joey Papania (19:21.607)
Yeah, and would say to me it's not an or. It's not that vendor training and that onboarding or take this different approach. To me, it really feels like an and.

You know, and then we kind of talked about sort of being, if I'm in the learning space, you almost have to be a continuous learner. I transitioned out of a sales role and into the learning space. I wanted to understand a little bit more. kind of geek out on the science piece of it as well. And there's this concept of the forgetting curve. and I if you're familiar with it, but essentially, yeah. but I mean, for those who aren't, it's, it's, it's not, it's not great, you know, brain science. It's, it's, it's really easy to say that, without application of

new information, it's going to fall on the floor. And statistically, within an hour of you going through one of those onboarding trainings and those classroom sessions, 50 % of what you learned is going to fall out of your head if you don't reapply. And within 24 hours, it goes to 70%. And within a week, you only retain about 10 % of what you learn. And so I think there's tremendous value in that front end piece of it. But without a back end strategy, if we don't provide the application piece

it, that's where I think it misses. And to me, think what Tango was able to really sort of answer for us, I know you don't want this to be a commercial, but it really was, was what do we do then? And then the real solution for us was I hire an army full of trainers and we set up hands -on one -on -one keyboard training.

Honestly, that was the business case I made to get the approval and funding to move forward. Well, I asked for 50 heads to be able to onboard the entire organization. And they laughed at me. And I was like, all right, well, what if I could do it for a fraction of the cost?

Ken Babcock (21:05.941)
Wow.

Ken Babcock (21:10.005)
There we go. Yes.

Joey Papania (21:10.633)
Essentially, that's how I positioned Tango. I said, Tango to me is like, what if I was sitting next to you on the keyboard and pointed to the screen and telling you exactly what you wanted to do? And that was the position piece that ultimately got me past the gatekeepers and the hurdle to make the actual application for it. But all of it is sales call. I mean, that's the reality of it is in the L &D space, I sell more now than I ever did when I was in a sales role.

Ken Babcock (21:29.141)
Yeah. Sure.

Joey Papania (21:38.617)
I think Scales is a skill set. I don't necessarily think of it as a job title and I sell more internally probably than I ever did when I actually had a client list.

Ken Babcock (21:48.894)
Yeah, and I think it's such a critical skill. We could go deep on that. I'll share one quick anecdote. There's this awesome professor at Harvard Business School where myself and my co -founders met. His name's Mark Roberge. He teaches the only sales class at Harvard Business School. And he's like, all you people undervalue this. You think that there's all these

higher level, more intellectually stimulating roles that you can go after. But guess what? You're all gonna have to sell. You're all gonna have to sell. And that's something that's stuck with me because you're absolutely right. You're constantly having to think about, okay, how do I position this? How do I think about communicating value across my end user group, my executive leadership? And that's all selling.

Slight tangent, at the risk of making this a little bit of a Tango commercial, what have been the initial reactions? How have you seen people adopt Tango internally versus maybe the 50 heads that you might have had otherwise?

Joey Papania (23:02.557)
Yeah, so far it's been great. And I would say, again, kind of putting the marketing hat back on, we did a soft launch and I worked with the marketing team on this to sort of introduce what's come. Because here's the reality of it is, yeah, I'm introducing all of these new systems and tools for you to do process. Poltango is another new system.

In fact, I had a conversation yesterday with one of the new hires and she was like, all right, well, where does Tango fit into the whole process? And I was like, it doesn't. I was like, it's a training tool that's gonna help guide you through all of these. But without that context, it just feels like just another thing and another tool. we've actually done a series of sort of here it's coming, here's what you need to know about it. But ultimately, I think, you know, from the top down,

What really helped was me sort of going back and connecting that to the business metrics and what we were really trying to solve for. I give you, all right, you said you liked the analogy, so I'll give you another one. This one's one of my favorites. So I, I, this was a few years ago. I actually got in a car accident and I had,

I had some back and neck issues from the accident. My car was totaled. And I had gone to see a physical therapist. And my neck would get locked so badly that I couldn't turn. And during one of the sessions, the PT said, hey, would you like to be able to turn your neck when you walk out of here? And I was like, well, yeah, that's why I'm here. And he said, have you ever done dry needling? And I don't know, are you familiar with dry needling?

Ken Babcock (24:22.275)
no.

Ken Babcock (24:33.358)
Ha ha.

Ken Babcock (24:38.659)
yeah,

Joey Papania (24:39.227)
Yeah, so that was the first time I had ever been introduced to it. Yeah, I mean, it's what they, it's dry needling, they get needle, they go right at the trigger point. I mean, in the muscle spasms, but it instantly releases and I'm not, it hurts like hell. I mean, it really does. But as soon as it's done, I'm able to move my neck and

Ken Babcock (24:54.83)
Mm -hmm.

Joey Papania (25:00.091)
It was funny because I knew the PT. He was a friend of mine and I, I cursed him a little bit when he stuck me for the first time, but he said something to me and I was in my sales role, but I think it's still applicable now in the current role that I'm at. mean, and he said, look, he said, I came to the realization a long time ago that you don't want to be here. And he said, cause if you walk through my door, it means you're in pain. And he said, but you come find me because I can provide relief to the pain.

And I kind of thought about that and that really that whole, that concept changed the way that I even approached my sales job because the reality of it is my clients don't want to talk to me.

They don't, nobody wants to buy anything. But you buy things because you have problems that you're trying to solve. So it completely shifted the way that I approach those conversations in sales. And I would say, similarly in this space, no one wants to be trained. I mean, like who's raising their hand for the next compliance training? I mean, no one wants to sit through training.

Ken Babcock (25:42.391)
Hahaha.

Joey Papania (26:04.241)
But you do want to learn the tool. You do want to be able to do your job quicker. so when I'm asking questions at that level, that's what I'm looking for. What are the pain points that I can solve for? And for this particular project, it was we need standardization. We have too many processes that aren't in line across markets that doesn't allow us the ability to really

streamline and grow efficiently and then role specific training. So it's like we do one training and everybody in the organization comes to it you have to decipher what's applicable to you and what's not. And then maybe my favorite one is how do we train the entire organization without training them? Cause we don't have time for it. And so those are the three big things that we were attempting to solve for. And so when I position Tango, it's well,

We want standardization. Well, we'll have the ability to write the workflows that'll be consistent across the organization so that we don't have different markets doing different things. And with the ability to permission the workflows by role. Now, if I'm in sales, I'm only seeing sales workflows. If I'm in fulfillment, I'm only seeing fulfillment workflows. And yeah, I'm not going to take them too much out of the job to put them in classroom to train because they're literally going to train in the system while they're working. So we're eliminating that seat time.

Ken Babcock (27:14.344)
Hmm.

Joey Papania (27:26.545)
But that was the position piece of it. If I would have just said, hey, let's go throw a new system tool out at, I probably would have gotten pushed and rejected. Cause that's like asking me, Ken, do you want me to shove a needle in the back of your neck? No, I don't. But that's not how he positioned it to me. He asked me, do you want to be able to turn your neck when it's done? And so the focus on what the results and the benefits were.

instead of what I'm actually going to do and just reversing that conversation, change the way that I pitched everything when I went into sales and it's how I've sort of been able to pitch and provide some of these new solutions that we've never really had in the organization before, but they solve all of the things that we've been trying to

Ken Babcock (28:09.968)
Yeah, no, I love that. I think that that's, that reminds me of the classic sort of sales interview exercise of like, sell me this pen, right? You can sit there and you can be like, well, here's the pen. This is like the quality of the metal or the quality of the ink, but the best sale is like, hey, why don't you write your name right now? you don't have a pen? do you want this pen?

Joey Papania (28:19.933)
I'm dead.

Joey Papania (28:35.357)
Daniel, man, Ken, you broke up on me a little bit there. Daniel, did you see that?

Ken Babcock (28:41.129)
no worries, no worries. I think I got everything from you. Let me just redo my response. Sorry this is happening on this one. I'm glad you brought that up because it actually reminds me of the classic sort of sales interview question of like, sell me this pen. And you can talk about the attributes of the pen and the metal and the ink and all that. But the reality is,

Joey Papania (28:46.055)
Okay.

Joey Papania (28:52.317)
That's okay.

Ken Babcock (29:08.922)
You need a use case, you need a reason to exist, need, hey, why don't you try to write your name right now? you can't write your name? I think you need a pen. So I love that analogy. I might start thinking about positioning Tango as like the dry needling of software. I don't know if I missed, I might have misused the story a little bit there, but like, instant relief, could be a game changer for

Joey Papania (29:37.085)
Yeah.

Ken Babcock (29:39.183)
You know, and you've talked a lot about how you position these projects, how you position a lot of your initiatives, how you get that buy in. I think there are plenty of L and D leaders out there that struggle with that. You know, they kind of sit in this middle ground between business decisions and, you know, end users. And they are recipients downstream of business decisions and then they have to then try to implement

with end users, know, it's a little bit of, you know, they're removed from the decision making, but then they gotta go figure out how to make it work. What would you say to these folks or what advice would you give to help them be kinda closer to the business decisions in the way that you are? You know, it sounds like you've talked a lot about KPIs and business metrics. You're obviously close to that. How do you help people get closer to that who are in L &D?

Joey Papania (30:37.051)
Yeah, I mean, would say it's a process. mean,

It's like any sales call, you have to build a relationship. And I think that that's the problem is I think people look for sort of how do the quick fix, how do I just kind of get there? And the reality of it is it does take time to sort of be in a position where you can ask those questions and to probe and to get a little bit deeper. you know, like I've been on both sides of it, we have some functions inside that are support mechanisms for us on the training side, but they don't

in the business and it's harder for them to work with the stakeholders and ask those questions because you kind of have to earn the right to ask those questions. It's not just about asking the questions and diving a little bit deeper to understand the KPIs. If you don't earn the right to ask the questions, then you are sort of getting handed things. But I would say part of it too

make sure that perception is not reality, make sure we're not shoving needles into the back of necks and we're not pushing e -learnings and pushing training that we're actually trying to solve problems. And the more you do that and the more you deliver against that, then the more that you build the relationship and the more you sort of build that trust and then it just sort of snowballs. But yeah, it's like anything else, it takes time.

Ken Babcock (32:01.99)
Yeah, and I think what we see, there's a little bit of the inertia of, okay, we've always done trainings this way. Okay, we've always created videos for things like this. You know, we bring in these people or we have this cadence of, of kind of expecting that people complete some kind of LMS quiz, right? And, you know, I think a lot of that stuff can serve a purpose. But I think it is coming back to

first principles and asking, well, for this specific need, for this specific context, what do we need to do here? Does it need to be videos? Does it need to be a quiz? Does it need to be something like Tango? Does it need to be something entirely different? I mean, I think what you laid out, hey, we need standardization, we don't need to pull people into a room, that's sort of how you arrive at a solution like Tango, and that's really starting with first principles. So I appreciate

you know, that you're thinking that way. I want to get a little tactical. You know, we, talked about kind of making the business case key metrics, you know, the weight loss metaphor, which I love. I want to talk about like the ROI of a software purchase or a system upgrade. And so, you know, if we think about ROI, there's, there's the obvious cost side, and then there's kind of the promise, you know, the, impact on the other side.

So maybe let's start with costs. When you're thinking about software purchase, systems upgrade, what are those line items that come up in your mind when you're thinking of all the potential costs?

Joey Papania (33:49.905)
Yeah, I mean, when you're sort of digging in there, the responses don't usually come to cost. That's ultimately sort of like where it ends up, but it's why. So what are all those things that influence the cost? What I typically hear from feedback on those things is, well, reps are spending too much time in administrative work, or this process takes too long.

And actually it's funny because we actually in our sales training we train against this. I have learned nothing there.

And so we actually in the sales side of it and I do this on the L &D side of it is alright So we need to start quantifying what those what those words mean because I'm happy I'm sad it takes too long. It's not long enough. It costs too much It needs to cost less I have absolutely no idea what any of that stuff means if we can't quantify How much time are they spending now and how much time should they be spending and then what's the gap?

And then how much does your rep make? Like if I could give you that amount of time back. All right, now we're talking about quantifiable metrics that you can tie training to because if I just reduce the amount of administrative time that you're spending in this process by 50%, 40%, 30%, what does that time back to you mean? All right, so now I've just given you X amount of dollars back to the business. And so then, yeah, if I have to come back and make and ask for an investment on

training tool, I can tie it back to actual metrics that someone at the top can convert. But I mean, that's math. then it's like, you want to avoid math at all costs? It's a reality of it. Like, my kids are like, I'm never going to use math. I was like, I use math all day long. But I think it's us pushing a little bit. we use the strategy to sort of double click.

Joey Papania (35:42.717)
So if I ask questions like that and I get too much administrative time, we'll double click on too much. So tell me a little bit more about too much. How much is too much? How much time are they spending now? Where would you ideally like to see them? And then two, you can set up, is that even realistic? mean, can I realistically cut your administrative time by 80 %? Probably not, but I think that's where you can start to have some of those influencing conversations, those consultative conversations with the business about setting the expectations.

actually have something that you can go track back to from a success metrics.

Ken Babcock (36:18.496)
Yeah, I love that. mean, you know, getting getting super quantitative obviously helps you kind of make the investment case. When you see rollouts that get off track, maybe that that first example where you guys were brought in a little too late. When something gets off track, you know, what's typically happening? Is it an implementation issue? Is it maybe a data migration issue? Is it a process issue? Is it the employees?

not the point, not the pointy fingers, but like where do you see some of those things just go off the rails?

Joey Papania (36:57.121)
Probably everywhere. I mean, the reality of it is I don't know any situation where we've rolled anything where everything has happened smoothly. But yeah, I think to your point, like, and I, you know, I think we all have to catch ourselves by going, well, it's not my fault this screwed up or it wasn't trainings issue because the data migration didn't come through as smooth as we wanted to. But again, I think this goes back to, all right, so if I'm sitting in the CEO's seat, does he really care? I just want it to move forward. And

So yeah, I may not have been part of that, but could training help to alleviate some of the issues that we're having on the data migration side? Could we do better on this end to help, you know?

Create the lines of communication, find the information that you need. I mean, like, I think that's another thing too. We do all this training, we store it all, and it's like, I need it now. And so how do we put the user closer to the information they need so they can learn within the flow of work? And that's where I think it's not necessarily about trying to get it 100 % right, but how do we influence it to make it better? And I would say, honestly, has been criticism and feedback that I have taken as my development is this

this journey for perfection and I oftentimes let perfection get it in the way of good. And so I've been coached progress over perfection and that's really, think where L &D can kind of lean in a little bit because we can help with the progress piece of it.

Ken Babcock (38:26.38)
Totally. You talked a little bit about when you were making the investment case, hey, let's put some data behind this. I've had an experience or two where sometimes getting that data is pretty tough and people might be a little protective of it. If you're talking about, man, we're mired in administrative work, well, but I'm not gonna let you under the hood and actually show you how much administrative work I'm under right now.

Have you ever had a challenge with that? mean any advice for folks who are listening and in making sure that not just the spirit of yes, we want to quantify something but How do you how do you do

Joey Papania (39:09.745)
Yeah.

I would say not only do they not want to let you under the hood, what if they're not tracking it? And so we've run into situations like that. So before working specifically with media, our organization was a little bit more centrally located and so we worked. And that was a big push from our L &D teams at the corporate level was we've got to do a better job of aligning towards the business metrics. And it was almost a mandate from all the L &D managers to go out and ask the question about how are you tracking this to go get it?

learned is that maybe sometimes the metrics or the pieces aren't in place to track it and if you push at it at the wrong way you almost sort of call their baby ugly like hey well you're not doing your job and so how you position that and that goes back towards building the trust then you sort of become why are they asking all these questions and you sort of push yourself further and further away

as opposed to maybe positioning it from a standpoint of, we've seen a lot of success by tracking against this metric. Is that in place? Well, if not, maybe could we help put some of those metrics in place? Yeah, are you asking to step outside of the typical L and D roles? But also I need that data in order to justify the things that I'm doing.

I'm doing a service to the business if I can lean in and help put those pieces in place because ultimately that's the information I need. The other option is just to go, they're not tracking it and I can't get it so tough.

Joey Papania (40:35.709)
But that's sometimes why I end up sitting on the other side of it going why can't I get to the table? Sometimes if the door is not there you've got to create another door and that's part of I think having that business first mindset and sitting at the table with them. People don't want more problems they are looking for solutions and the more solutions you can offer the better opportunities you have.

Ken Babcock (40:57.46)
Yeah, that's great. So let's, let's come back a little bit to the present day. So, you know, July, we got this rollout coming in August. What's, you know, what's, what's the big KPI that, you know, Cox is hoping to move and I have a vested interest in this, obviously with Tango. You know, so, so are we feeling good? Are we feeling on track? Is the needle going to move?

Joey Papania (41:23.931)
Yeah, I mean, I will tell you that I would say more than anything without even literally being in the tool, the fact that they know it exists, there's a big sigh of relief. Like, I mean, I have the call I have today and I had a pre -call with someone that isn't going to be able to be in the session today. So she had reached out to me and we had this conversation before the launch.

And she is overwhelmed. I she's like, all right, she's not from Cox. She's coming in from outside. She's brand new. I mean, look, first day, I mean, trying to figure out where the bathroom is is hard enough, you know, let alone trying to immerse yourself into all of these new people, new systems and new tools. And so, you know, kind of the way I teed it up and says, look, you're going to go through a lot of this training. You're to get introduced to all of these new systems. And here's, I want you to feel good in knowing this. I don't expect you to remember any of it. Cause you won't.

Ken Babcock (41:53.525)
Yeah.

Joey Papania (42:14.299)
It's too much. It's overwhelming. so setting that expectation that I don't expect you to be, this is not the matrix. mean, I'd love to strap you into the chair and just download all the information you need. It feels like it sometimes. But I think what I'm at least hearing across the organization is, okay, so I don't have to memorize it. There's gonna be a tool that's gonna help guide me through this when I get there.

Ken Babcock (42:25.181)
It's not?

Joey Papania (42:43.805)
I think just gives them a little bit more, it relieves some of the angst, I think, and it gives them a little bit more confidence coming out of that training session that now they're not on an island all by themselves. And then there's a

Ken Babcock (42:55.462)
Yeah, and Tango will be there. That's great.

Joey Papania (42:57.885)
The little things too, mean, the fact that you can comment directly into it and that we can communicate back to you, that you actually now can influence the, if you see a process that's not working or something's not functioning properly, like you have an instant feedback mechanism that we can go in and make the updates and changes. So it does give them a little bit of control back in that too. So that, yeah, we're really excited about the full launch of this. I think I've already got 50 plus workflows built. But we wanted to also, I mean,

Ken Babcock (43:26.321)
Nice.

Joey Papania (43:27.839)
think you had asked sort of the soft launch on this. To me, it's like if you're going to shop for a car and I promise you all this inventory and you get there and there's nothing on the lot, this is a really poor first experience with the tool. We didn't want to introduce Tango and give people access to it without having the workflows ready for them. So we wanted to be really conscious about sort of filling up the library before they ever showed up so that they have something to sink their teeth into.

Ken Babcock (43:53.083)
That's awesome. I love hearing that. I know I've gotten a little anthropological before on this call, but I think there's almost like a human survival instinct, Like we, the forgetting curve and all that, you're only gonna remember the stuff that you absolutely need to remember and that you're applying daily. And the other stuff might go by the wayside, but in the way that we work,

in the modern age, not in anthropological terms, you do have to interact with all these systems and you do have to figure out how to use it and the feeling that, maybe I don't have to memorize that specific workflow that I'm gonna come back to maybe monthly or bi -weekly or weekly, but you still don't have to memorize it. mean, that's a huge, that gives you that brain space to focus on like, okay, here are the things that

truly need to spend my mental energy on, which I think is such an undersold value proposition of a tool like Tango. Well, Joey, I'm so grateful to have you on the podcast. It's awesome to have a customer like you that we can work so closely with. And I know there's a lot here for our audience to dig into. So thank you for making the time. And by the time this...

this podcast rolls out, maybe that software will be rolled out too. So it'd be fun to bring you back and see how it all went.

Joey Papania (45:26.043)
Yeah, I will tell you that I'm already being asked what else we could apply it to. I should have plenty of case studies for you. So I'm thrilled to have been invited in. appreciate it. Like I said at the beginning, I'm just curious when someone wants to know what's going on inside of my head. So this was great. I appreciate the invite.

Ken Babcock (45:31.63)
Nice.

Ken Babcock (45:46.177)
Awesome, well thanks Joey.