Watch or listen to this episode below.

Brief summary:

In this episode, we hear from Dr. Amy Grubb, the Digital Transformation Advisor to the CIO at the FBI. You’ll hear from Amy how much of what would be deemed successes in her career were either serendipity or part of a derailment that she had to overcome.

Key insights in this episode:

• AG: (at 3:56) What I realized is we can get all the talent in the world, and some of the best talent in the world --and we do, but that’s not going to make them work together better. That’s not going to make them understand each other better, and that’s not going to make them better leaders in the future.

• AG: (at 6:37) Everybody who comes to work has a story. They’re there for a reason, right? They have a journey that took them to where they are now. Even if that person is horrible to work with, even if that person is grumpy or mean or whatever, they have a dignity that should be respected.

• AG: (at 17:22) Amy talks about how long it really took her to come back from ‘falling off the pedestal’ at work.

• AG: (at 19:08) I don’t want to be the person who screamed and cried. I don’t want to be that person. Look, I don’t want to be pushed around, but I don’t want my reaction to be the story. I want my work to be the story.

• (at 29:08) Amy shares the 3 people that she’d love to have a sit-down conversation with and why.

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Transcript:

FUEL Podcast hosted by Leila Ansart
EPISODE 1: Interview with the FBI’s Dr. Amy Grubb, Digital Transformation Advisor to the CIO

Leila Ansart, Host

INTRO: Welcome to FUEL podcast!  On today’s episode, we hear from Dr. Amy Grubb, the Digital Transformation Advisor to the CIO at the FBI.  You’ll hear from Amy how much of what would be deemed successes in her career were either serendipity or part of a derailment that she had to overcome.  No stranger to upheaval and change, Amy was responsible for the implementation of numerous change initiatives within the FBI for over 20 years.  She’s a Fellow in SIOP (Society for Industrial/Organizational Psychology) and an advisor to the C-suite, having won numerous awards for her contributions to the “people side” of work.  

Dr. Amy Grubb is also an internationally acclaimed speaker who presents on topics such as organizational change, working with others, leadership, storytelling, organizational culture and engagement.  In addition to all her accomplishments, Amy is the proud mother of 5 children.  In her own words, she is fascinated by people and how they think. I’m so thrilled to introduce her to you today on our first episode of FUEL podcast.
Well welcome Amy to the podcast - to FUEL. We are so excited to have you joining today.

Amy Grubb
Oh, I'm so excited to be here. Thank you for inviting.
Leila Ansart, Host
Of course. Amy, tell us about the path that you've been on professionally, ending up in your current position with the FBI and some of the ‘fuel sources’ as I like to call them, that helped you push through the challenging times that you experienced along this path.
Amy Grubb
Yeah, it's so interesting, cause when I think back on my career and how I ended up where I am. Right now, I'm the Advisor to the CIO on Digital Transformation in the FBI and specifically the interaction of people in technology.

If you asked 21 year old me, what do you want to do when you grow up? Being the advisor to the CIO on digital transformation was like, that was not on my list of things to do. When I look back, it's all a lot of serendipity. I'm a very organized and driven person, and I'm like, this is where I want to go, and this is how I'm going to get there.  

Most of my choices and most of the things that have happened to me that were the cool things were serendipity and part of a derailment at some point.

I ended up at the Bureau accidentally. I was moving back to the East coast from the West coast where my husband has stationed in the Marine Corps and a friend of a friend said, you should come work with us at the Bureau. I've seen you at conferences. I think you're kind of fun, and it'd be good for a little while. I had seen the job posting a number of times and didn't even occur to me to apply. And I was like, yeah, sure. I'll try that for a little bit.

And, and so I mostly worked in assessing people, assessing undercovers and making sure that they're playing for the right team, and designing the assessments for special agents. How do you know that they have what it takes to do the job? That's where I spent a lot of my time.

What I realized is we can get all the talent in the world, and some of the best talent in the world --and we do, but that's not going to make them work together better, and that's not going to make them understand each other better, and that's not going to make them better leaders in the future.

I really was interested in why do people work together? Who works together better or not --in the team concept. I've always been really interested in sports. So I've always been fascinated by that.

I kind of took a turn and really started focusing the team that I was working with on the more organizational development side of things.

We've done a really good job of finding awesome gears. How do we help people with the oil in the gears and make them run really well?

In my career, what happened was I got introduced to a lot of executives at a very young age. As people have grown up in the organization, I've been their partner. That has fueled them and fueled me to want to help these people be successful and see how I'm an asset. The things that drives me a lot, and are at the core of what I do are two main things:

One is, it is so awesome when you are working with somebody, especially somebody who has a lot of responsibility or has a really important role, not in terms of like hierarchy in the organization, but what they're doing and you can help them get over that one little hurdle. Their eyes light up and they're like, Oh, that's how I do it? We used to joke --we called it crack --like that aha moment where people are like, “Oh, I get that now. This is how I can go forward.”

Because most people I work with are awesome at what they do. Their tradecraft is great - they are the best at what they do. I can't help them in that space, but over and over, no matter what organization you work in, that people part is usually what gets in the way.

It's not that people don't know what the right thing to do is. It's not that people don't know technically what all the amazing things are that they should do. It's just that person has a different agenda or that person has a different motivation, or that person is super hard to work with.

And so I have this thing and it's awesome, but nobody wants to do it, or I can't get over the goal line. How do It? And when you give them tools and you translate things that are easy for you, (easy for me), but complex for them into a super simple way. It's just so awesome to watch their eyes light up. That's something that really fuels me.

The other thing is that I think that everybody who comes to work has a story. They're there for a reason, right? They have a journey that took them to where they are now. Even if that person is horrible to work with, even if that person is grumpy or mean or whatever, they have a dignity that should be respected.

Leila Ansart, Host
You always come up with these amazing metaphors. You said the people are the gears. How can we make the oil to get those gears to work well together?

Additionally, you said everyone has a story and dignity that should be respected. That's really something that I think can give us all pause at times and is a great tool to use. I'm thinking about myself and someone that irritates me because we all have them. To stop and be objective for a moment and to say, hold on, this individual has a story, and, I love the way you put it “and a dignity that should be respected”.

You mentioned you've gotten derailed several times and you've had to go through a self-reflection on what your dignity and story were. Would you be willing to share one of those stories with us and explain to us you got to that aha-moment and came out with that answer?

Amy Grubb
In working in that space, one of the things that kind of came to fruition is that there were a lot of very powerful people in my organization who came to me for counsel. Being a psychologist, I had confidentiality and all of those sorts of things, but my boss didn't like that, and in a lot of ways was threatened by that.

That really surprised me because my boss was somebody that had been essentially a client of mine for a long time. I had felt that we had built a very trusting relationship and that I had proven that like, I keep things very separate, and I have my own little role off to the side and things like that. I had a team that I ran, who did similar work and things like that. My boss and one of my peers also did not like that people were coming to me as opposed to coming to him.

They came to me and said, you are no longer going to run this team. And you are no longer going to do this work. You have to go figure out what else you're going to do, but it's not this.

I kind of saw it coming for a while and I'm sure there are other reasons why that happened, but that was the writing on the wall, and what some people in the know had told me behind the scenes. And it was everything to me. Like that was what I did. That's who I was, I was the consigliere to people.

So I took a step back and I thought to myself, what is it that I really love about that? And I really do love advising people. I really do love being that motor, a guy behind the guy sort-of thing. I really enjoy that.

I really enjoy the speaking part too. I was very good at speaking, and I don't mean to sound arrogant. I'm not very good at a lot, but what I am good at, I'm really good at. I’m really good at public speaking, which is a great way to get to the masses.

I took that and I went to a couple entities in the organization. I was like, Hey, we could look really good if you had somebody going out there and speaking about how we take care of our people and things like that. Some of the programs that we've put into play. I went over to, we had a big change initiative going on. I went over to those folks, and I was like, Hey, a couple of my assignments have been reallocated and we've worked together in the past. If you would like, maybe we can make an arrangement and I can help you with this major change initiative that's going on, where we are really disrupting people's lives and we can work through some of those things.

I kind of just went out there and was like an internal consultant for people. Just decided that being the head of blah-blah-blah, maybe that wasn't really what I loved anyway. What I really liked was that people interaction and all of these sorts of things. I was like, let me look at the work and focus on the work and maybe rebrand the work and see where that goes.

What that led to was an executive who had been a client of mine for a long time. He was a little irreverent. He was leading that major change initiative. He's like, you know what? Just come work for me, just come over. I'm going to, we had to real allocate resources and all that kind of stuff. He's like, I'm going to bring you over and you're going to work for me and you're going to go do whatever it is that you used to do, cause that's awesome. As long as you also do this for me, that's great.

It was kind of one of those things where I saw where people's relationships and the oil piece of it can really make a difference. I appreciated him recognizing the dignity in me, right? Because I was sort of damaged goods when somebody says, nope, you're not going to be in charge of something anymore. That really hurts. That becomes a story in the organization, and it was very hurtful.

But for that person to be like, hey, you've always been fine with me. I think it's good for the organization. I'll take the risk and I'll take the responsibility. And so come on over. It was good for me to get that validation. Not everybody does.

I have a new opportunity. I have a way to do what I'm good at and add value to the organization and who cares about the title. It actually has led to, when people are asking me about my title, I'm like, I don’t know, call me ‘Contessa’, like, I don't really care what my title is. I don't even care who I report to. We'll figure that out. Like it doesn't matter. I'm here to do a job and to make you look good and help your work be successful. And so let's just do that.

It was really humbling to be told, you know, “I personally, as your boss, don't find that valuable. And I am going to remove you and cut off all ties.” That was extremely scary, but I still did have some control over some things. That wasn't like an overnight thing.

That took weeks of sulking and being sorry for myself. To have that realization of, I actually do have control in this situation. My career is not defined by other people. My career needs to be defined by me. I need to start making choices for me and not worry about any of this other stuff.

My good friend, Sasha, actually, she was the one who kind of slapped me out of it. Cause she's like, what would Amy Grubb tell you to do? Cause the same thing had happened to her a couple of months before and she had sought my counsel on it. She's like, let me tell you what Amy Grubb told me to do. It was basically those things and I'm like, yeah, I need to do that.

Leila Ansart, Host
I really like to give the real real, like you did. I find so many times when you're reading a book about overcoming a trauma or some horrific circumstance, due to brevity, they shorten up the story in the part where the person is really down in the dumps, like in a funk.

So I really appreciate that you said that it didn't happen right away. Let me just dive into that for one more quick minute, if you would, Amy. When you say didn't happen right away, I mean, what are we talking? Are we talking three to four weeks? Are we talking 12 weeks?

I know for me when I'm in my funk, first of all, there's just that initial stage where you're just like, Blehh, everything sucks! And then you move forward and you start to say, okay, I want to feel better, but I really have no idea how to do that.

That takes time and all the emotions that you're feeling in the middle of that end up skewing how you come across, and you're not coming across as your best self, which ends up making that change, and that progression even more challenging because you aren't your best self in that moment. If you would, give us the real real on what this actually looked like for you.
Amy Grubb
I would say that I was almost completely unproductive for solid three weeks.

Even though I kind of saw it coming, just not like this. I did have still some work to do, but not to the level that I had before. I would say it was a solid three weeks of woe is me. Just, almost trying to like climb back up the cliff and try to get it undone.

And I would say there was like another three or four weeks of like, Oh my God, what am I going to do? And how is this going to impact my career? And so that was like, not trying to bargain anymore, but like, okay, well I have to do something, but I wasn't at the stage of like, Oh, I can do this.

It was more like, how do I survive? How do I not get bored out of my mind, lose my skills, but also like not damage my reputation further given this is a legend now that a couple of people have decided to create about me.

What I did was everything that I did those next couple of weeks I made sure was amazing. Everything was crisp, perfect, exactly right, engaging. I made sure that all of my conversations had pre-work done for hours beforehand, as opposed to like the usual 45 minute prep session that I can pull off. It's not appropriate, but I can.

I made sure everything was pristine and really trying to sharpen my skills so that I wouldn't lose them. In those moments I would just ask people, “now what kind of follow up can we do on this? Or how can I help you differently than just this?” Like there's other things.

Again, I'm not a really good marketer. I want to be, I hope to be someday, but just like making sure that everything was awesome and that people wanted more, and knew that there was time and space for more -- to occupy myself and to prove to myself that I could do these sorts of things.

I don't think it was an intentional decision. I think it was something that I was looking for. So I just naturally sought it out. I would also say that because I had my colleague who was going through something similar, and was just ahead of the scale on me. She was the one who, after asking, like what would Amy Grubb do, said “I do not want my story to be one of indignity”, which is where my idea of indignity, using that word came into play.

I don't want to be the person who screamed and cried. I don't want to be that person. Look, I don't want to be pushed around, but I don't want my reaction to be the story. I want my work to be the story.

I had to make a decision. I did explore outside opportunities to the organization and actually had some offers. At the time we weren't in a virtual world. At the time I had children just about to enter high school and that was not a good mix. I had to make a decision for my family as opposed to my career. I think that really helped because like, look, I just have to do this for them. Like I have to make this decision. It is not a decision that five years ago or five years from now that I would make, but I need them to be content because if they're content, then I can do and figure out my stuff.

So that's kind of how it went.

I would say it was a full six to eight months till I really got my group back. It is hard to get knocked down, and I got knocked down from a really high pedestal.

You said something really powerful. We do, when we like talk about these sorts of things, we do this retrospective categorization like nostalgia, right? Like we're like, Oh, I remember in the eighties when all this, it wasn't great back then.

The same thing with this, like it was hard. It was awful. It was painful. I would never wish it on anybody else. I'm super in love with where I am today. Like when people are like “If that didn't happen..” No, it didn't have to happen that way. I didn't have to have my story be what it was for me to still end up in a good place later on.

It was really miserable and hard. It was just a matter of me just reminding myself. The one thing I have control over is my story. I need to take every step I can. If other people decide to tell a different story, that's fine, but I need to do what I can to have at least these be the tenants of what my story was.

Leila Ansart, Host
I want to write this on a post-it note or maybe engrave it somewhere because it's such a fresh way of saying that we can choose to focus on what we can control. After such a challenging and frustrating experience that you went through, that's what you came to --was that there was a story here and you were going to be the one to write it.

I love what you said, you rebranded the work that you were doing. After rebranding, you said, okay, now let's see where this goes. Those are very specific and actionable steps that we can take away from this conversation.

When we go through a challenge, we can go through our moan and groan stage and feel what we feel. I'm definitely a hundred percent on board with that.

But then, when we're ready to take action, to be able to stop and say, there is a story here, and what is the story that I want to tell?

I think so many times, depending on the stage that we are in life, we are more concerned about the story that others have of us. We're afraid of where that may develop or where that may go or even how we may be hindered by that in the future.  

I really appreciate that you said that in that moment, you said, I don't want my story here to be my reaction. I want the story to be the quality of my work. I am truly appreciative of you sharing that and think it was a key point that anyone could use during a time of challenge or of upheaval.

Amy, what would you say was your self-talk when you started to feel a little bit of momentum? If there was anything more than what you shared already, what was the self-talk around that when you started to feel like you could move forward and come out?

Amy Grubb
I mean, I think part of it was because it was such a big fall and it was so painful, no matter what happened, it wasn't going to get worse. It almost kind of freed me up to be more risky and more adventurous with what I did.

I noticed also, that I had been very pure about what I did and how I did it, and things like that. I realized there's a whole bunch of people out there who are completely faking it until they make it. And even they don't make it. They just keep faking it.

So like to be like more bold in the words that I chose and how I labeled myself. I mean, I had spent an entire career telling people words matter. Like, okay, so like use different words and rebrand it differently. It can't get much worse than it already is.

In this instance I still technically had a job. I was still getting paid. Which other people don't have that luxury with some of the falls that they have. And so take advantage of it.

It can't get worse and just, try this and try that. Like, what's the worst that can happen. You're not the head of whatever anymore. Oh, you already aren't. Just keep moving forward and keep that story, being your story. People are still going to tell it differently, and they've already told the worst story that they could, so it can’t get worse.

It’s not necessarily terribly uplifting, but at the same time, it was incredibly empowering to be like, what do I have to lose? I really don't. People say that like, when you really don't have anything to lose, you do approach things differently. You do.

It also made me realize that maybe I didn't have that much to lose before, so as I move forward, what are the things that I'm going to definitively not step into? And what are the things that I'm going to kind of shore up before I do. I didn't do a whole lot of other self-talk. I just need to go and do, keep my brain occupied.

Leila Ansart, Host
Focus on action, it sounds like.

Amy Grubb
Yeah, definitely.

Leila Ansart, Host
I know with a lot of the clients that I work with, there is oftentimes an issue of clarity or a desire for clarity. One of the things that is always helpful is taking action. When there's a question of, should I do this, or which way should I go? It's much more productive to take action and move forward. Then that is when the clarity clicks in. The clarity is either, hey, this is great, or oh my goodness, this is not at all what I thought it would be, and I need to shift again. There's really not much benefit in just simply stewing in our uncertainty.

Amy Grubb
Well, there's very few things in life and in your career that can't be undone or that you can't take in a different direction. I mean, sometimes people who are very driven or who are very focused, get so caught on that piece and look, you can't be like running all over with your journey and like every shiny object running towards, but try it. It may not work. You may find out that you like part of that, like you thought that this is what you liked, but it's actually like this part of it. How do you expand that? And it's just a matter of each thing is like a step forward and then open the aperture and then another step forward and open that aperture.

I think sometimes people see success as achievement or accomplishment. I think that those are things that happen along the way. I did not think that a couple of years ago, but I do think that now.

The goal is not the accomplishment part, the goal is like, what does that open up for me? That is a means to something else. It's not the end. It is a means to another thing. That always keeps you moving forward for me anyway.

Leila Ansart, Host
That's great. Really thank you for sharing Amy. All right. So let's just totally switch gears here. What is something that not many people know about you?

Amy Grubb
Well, you didn't know that I had five kids, but that is actually that a lot of people know about me.

I wanted to be a football coach when I was growing up. Although a lot of people do know because I'm just like, so into sports, that was the thing about me. I wanted to be a football coach. Now I'd rather be a GM just because I would love like bringing all the personnel in and trying to make it work and stuff like that. I just didn't think that would be fun. I love sports and I love the idea of competition and all of that kind of stuff.

I'm a pretty good cook, which a lot of people know. My kids know that, but not a lot of people know that.

And I love ghost stories. I love those stupid, ghost hunting shows. They're so fun. I mean, I don't know, actually, if there's ever such thing as ghost, but I love the history of it. I love the fun aspect of it. I live in the Northeast. We have a lot of old buildings around here and stuff. I don't know what I actually think about that stuff, but it's so fun. I don't know why. I don't like Halloween and I don't like that sort-of stuff, but I love ghost stories.
Leila Ansart, Host
So the stories and the hunting, But not the gore of Halloween.

Amy Grubb
And again, like I said, I don't actually believe in any of that stuff. It's just fun.

Leila Ansart, Host
If there would be someone with whom you would love to have a conversation, someone alive currently, who would that person be?

Amy Grubb
I'd really be interested in talking to Bill Gates -- and not really about his stuff, like his technology stuff or his vaccines or any of those sorts of things. He has such a unique perspective on life that I don't always share that I'd really be interested in hearing how his brain works.

I'm only saying that because he's somebody that like recently I've seen and I'm like, Oh, I wonder how he got there in his thought process, I'm always interested in how people get to what they're thinking. I don't always agree, but it's really interesting that somebody who's has the history that he has, how he ended up where he is and what he's thinking about for the future. I think people who are thinking about the future are really interesting in terms of why is that what's on your horizon as compared to other people? I think that would be really interesting.

I would love to sit down with Jacinda, the prime minister down in New Zealand, because she just seems to have such a fun attitude about things and be like, yo, this is how it is. Like she had a baby while she was prime minister. That is cool! Like, what is your secret? Like what are those sorts of things?

And I just, I also, so this is a weird one, but I have a neighbor, she's two, and everything is so joyful for her. I would love to just sit down and be like, girl, get me back to that stage in life. Like, help me understand, like, why we're skipping today? Like, why are we skipping today? That's so cool. Like, just get a little centered on that. It would be fun to just sit down with her for an hour.
Leila Ansart, Host
I love though how you just went from Bill Gates to the prime minister, to your two-year-old neighbor. It's just so much fun to hear how your brain works. I love how you could see that there would be value in each of those conversations.

Amy Grubb
People have cool perspectives on things. It's just so interesting to hear like people who see the world differently than me. How'd you come to that? And then, is that something I want to adopt or not?

So like, maybe I don't like your content, but I like your process. That's kind of cool for me to think about, Oh, what if I saw things that way instead, In general, I think people are so fascinating - just so fascinating.

Leila Ansart, Host
Well that wraps it up. Amy, thank you so much for sharing your time with us today. I absolutely loved having you on the podcast and it was an awesome and fascinating conversation. Here's to you and to a wonderful day ahead.

Learn more about Amy through her LinkedIn profile.