Love What You Do, Grow As You Go

hello everyone and welcome to the oh you podcast hello everyone and welcome to the O you podcast today we are honored and privileged to have with us our Chief Human Resources officer Josh goddman who dresses like this every day just a regular Wednesday for me this is a regular Wednesday yes welcome thank you thank you for being here with us and thank you for giving us a chance uh to get to know you I I'm really excited to be here and you're probably asking about wondering about the sunglasses no no the lights are just really bright here exactly exactly the future is bright so you got to wear shades that's true that's true oh you swag right there oh you swag I like that that's good it's a pleasure to be on here thank you Josh um I have watched all of them thank you and you know true or false um that we already had a conversation and we're drafting a policy now that all future employees of the OU will be named Josh oh obviously yeah we'll accept middle names I think is what we decided on yeah um even a last name maybe maybe um but but yeah that that's obvious that's obviously true so Josh yes originally from skoki yes Chicago yes tell us a little bit about that growing up son of a rabbi a son of a rabbi yes my dad is always always been in education for basically my whole life my dad's always also a ra yeah um sometimes he did it full-time sometimes did it parttime on the weekend he still a SCH RAV in in skoki um and my mom has also always worked for Jewish nonprofits and you know growing up they always said Josh whatever you do don't go into education don't go into nonprofit work that's obviously why I work at theou now of course and I love growing up in Chicago yeah and it's it's interesting no matter where you live when you grow up you don't especially when I grew up you don't understand or realize the greater world out there I mean you saw it on TV you saw it on sports games that that would happen but you were just in your own little world of where you grew up was it all about Ken's Diner or Romanian or like obviously okay obviously okay so you grew up in Chicago parents both involved so you had sort of mother's milk was doing good and helping other people uh and so that was a part of your upbringing Family Life what was it like were you you know School where'd you go to school I went to H Tor then skoki yes and I actually had a really interesting I would say upbringing I'm the youngest of three boys and when I was growing up we were conservado right that's a term nowadays we we didn't call ourselves that back then that's just what is the term I think nowadays is kind of used we grew up conservadox because I was the youngest though my family was already moving over to become more Orthodox more modern Orthodoxy as I was growing up so I had a cool transition of I didn't have to be the leader of of the rituals or the leader of the spirituality kind of like my older brother you went to Yeshiva came back and brought more things into our family I kind of grew up with it all and I I just appreciate that now and you know where I am now I appreciate it because my uping upbringing I feel like I can't connect to a lot of different people in little different all the different sects of Judaism helpful for your job too for sure helpful for my job and I just appreciate it because I think as a family our growth was wholesome our growth was pure our growth was we love this like let's do more of it like let's just keep adding on more not because some necessarily a rabbi told us to do like we all wanted to do it and I really I've always appreciated that even now even now in life and as I said I went to sko sh went to Israel went to Wu right but I totally appreciate that upbringing of being able to experience all of that you know what though this is getting a little hot in here I should much better we we need to just dim the lights a little bit can I one second hold on second yeah now you need the sungasses just I can look at you a little bit now you need the sunglasses okay good thanks no but but in all honesty I think all of us in our family my dad's always used humor and as jussa when he was speaking from the pulpit funny guy guy and I've always found that one thing I love in life in general probably why I do HR is I love comforting people I love helping people and humor is one of those ways that you can comfort someone you can help someone by making them feel at ease making them build a personal connection with you you definitely use humor and some of that's personality and I've always found that I always try to use it in the right ways and definitely when I was younger you do the wrong way sometimes just to learn from those experiences you do a lot of trainings right that's part we haven't really talked about your job here yet but uh you do a lot of trainings have you ever given a training on how to be funny or how to use humor um no actually in my trainings I usually tell people don't use humor in email don't use humor at the workplace because it doesn't always go over well but I have been trained I I used to act when I was NYU as part of the right Yeshiva College dramatic Society I actually used to do standup comedy did you really yes I I won second place in a Stand Comedy competition humor jokes entertaining people it is a skill and it's a skill that that's important it's also a skill to know when you turn it off and you turn it on you can have fun and as I said I try to use it just to build connections to comfort people when to make that joke to to you feel the a let out of the room and people like okay like we can get through this obviously some of that has been helpful over the past year I for our employees family personal what we've all been experiencing and it is it's just a part of part of what I love doing so you used that to go to Yeshiva University and be in the Yeshiva College dramatic society as an actor right you used that but you also used it in your first bit of career here at the OU you use some of that personality and humor and connecting people right what was your first gig at the OU I I first worked in ncsy at the you and I'm very proud of it I really believe it I I worked eight years on ncsy and various different educational director programming director running GSU clubs running lante learnings FNL flying out all over the country in my eight-year span of ncui I counted one time I lost count I went on over 50 shabat tones over eight years 50 shabat tones wow because I I love doing that and I I have such a Caro for everything I learned before during after being married before I was married I was an ncsy summer program for eight years also I worked during the year and my last year I was on a some tjj plus which is what it was called back then and I was engaged that year and then after that is when I switched over to as I say I took a sabatical from the OU and then I came back in the HR you took a sabatical to get your Master's in Business Administration your MBA or you took it or you did that while you were still at ncsy no so I started that after ncsy um I I took a sabatical from the OU I was just trying to find a place that was closer to where I lived I lived in fairon at the time and I I worked at Krishna high school as the Student Activities director and I took a sabatical that year and I fell in love with HR when I was going to be MBA and but now I'm here and so now it's how many years that you've been at the at the OU all together uh 18 years 18 years yes should be a good life yes am me and you're now in your second year as the Chief Human Resources officer right yes and you had a mentor here who helped make sure that you would want to do that and that I would want you to be doing that as well right yes Lenny Bessler do you know where Lenny and I met ncsy ncsy yes you know where all right this is part of trivia I was on a summer program and Lenny was as the chro was visiting summer programs she was with Jonah learner's bus and Jonah who was a bus director and I was a bus director happened to mention alenny oh this other bus director is getting an MBA in HR and IO psychology so Lenny was like I want to meet this guy my bus and Jonah's bus was at Marat together so Lenny pulls me aside in front of the emod in the OT and says so you want to do HR I said yeah like that's what I'm getting May in gives me his card and he goes call me when you're ready I held on to that card for over a year wow over a year and then I called him up he goes I have no job for you right now come in you'll get a internship what we call Fellowship now right you'll work a little bit that summer I started in July by August I was offered a full-time position wow and I've been here ever since so my my relationship with Lenny is unique because I I had Lenny as a mentor as a coach as a guide as a person to help me understand the intricacies of not only HR which is huge as you can imagine but also the OU Lenny's experience at the OU in the OU for so many years has helped guide me through this organization and definitely benefited me that way it takes a rare Talent like a leny to be able to look and see somebody and find that talent and see what the future might be and be able to grow them and that's that's something we're trying to do right that you're trying to do as this you know in human resources and the team has grown over the years but also our investment uh in our our our people growing Talent the right way is so important not just because of where I am in my role but obviously it should be because I benefited from that I benefited from ncsy when I was a little college kids saying this guy has talent let's start bringing them out and training me I benefited from Lenny saying this guy has talent let's bring him in and see what he can do and then letting me letting me run with it letting me run with some of the programs that's why it's so important to because we do have hidden gems across this organization and some of them are not hidden gems some of them we all know we all know that they're talented question is what are we as an organization what am I doing in HR what are you doing right to actually help grow people that's why we rolled out the impact levs that's why we rolled out all these professional development trainings that's why we're so bought into love what you do here and grow in what you do here because the impact you make in New York in Florida in Kansas city in California is just impacted so much more when we're all connected as an organization we're all growing and you're a great example a role model of somebody who was able to grow your career here uh on ramps and off-ramps right like in other words be able to go as you say take a sabatical get a degree work somewhere else and bring some of those skills and talents and passions bring them back here and continue to grow uh it's a great uh it's a great model for for for so many to to pursue did did you ever think that you'd be sitting here wearing Joseph's Technicolor Dream Coat now I'm Josh Joseph okay so we got a lot yeah you know you live in you live in Hillside now you you have a life outside of here uh it's it's a 246 at least kind of job there's lots of different pieces to HR right that people don't even know what are there like five six expertises areas right that HR touches you know maybe you could share with everybody like what uh what what are the different pieces of HR we're working on this for the organization you should know that what we do we have many areas of HR because we've grown so much thank God the the people operations right the human resources of what we can and can offer we have so many different uh sub Department I don't know the right word for it but different initiatives that we have we have a growing Talent acquisition initiative where we're trying to recruit and attract the best talent that we can we have a new website a career site where we can track how many applicants come in we we have something like 39 open positions around there right uh how many applicants do we have in the pool the website's amazing and it's an applicant tracking system so now everyone who applies for a position at the OU we can track we hold the resume we can run keyword searches we've had over 500 people join what we're calling the talent Network wow for our positions and the benefit of that is when a new position comes up we can click a button and it'll email all the relevant resumés we could put keywords in so email everyone who has experience in marketing for this position and then they'll get an email from us saying hey you've applied in the past here's a brand new position that's open we think you'd be interesting that's when we get people applying that so that sounds like it's an app that tracks the apps of apps yes yes okay yes good so there's Technologies involved yes yes but there's there there's other there's other pieces right you have you have a a talent acquisition you have talent Market Place where're we're doing professional development there's benefits what am I missing data there's uh onboarding and offboarding it's its own yeah its own world within HR because people think onboarding really starts with someone's first stay here it's not true onboarding starts when they first visit our website right when they first have their phone screen that's really when the onboarding starts so we're we're trying to help that one way you might have noticed on our new career website is we have a whole page dedicated to the culture of the OU what is it like if you want to work in the and I know we recently rolled out our professional core values right that's going to be on the website soon right going to be uploaded so that's help so onboarding offboarding data I can't stress this enough data people always ask us for lists because they just want to know our data is so key some of what's helped us improve our data is that we have Employee Self-Service now so if you need a change your location because you moved houses you could just do that on Lely by yourself you don't have to email us you could do it by yourself if you got married you want to make a marital status if your benefits you can sign up on technology so we can run it it's really important well we do with the data is that we try to run analysis to be predictive and I'll give you example of something that came out of this data analysis last year we ran successfully four different early career professional programming for employees at the OU which culminated in the early career professional Summit which we did off site which was incredible American dream we had people fly in for it everyone really enjoyed it that came about because of our data because I was running turnover rate retention rate and all of a sudden sudden this new picture popped up that half our employees have only been with us for less than three years wow so we're sending messages to managers like what are you doing for your employees less than three years stay interviews are you talking to them are you asking where they want to grow how are you going to grow them it's really important and so that's why now we have not just an annual review performance review but we have five conversations a year right that's it's one of the initiatives that the people team has been pushing forward talk about goals talk about where you want to be in your career even if and sometimes this is comfortable even if it's not in staying in this department that I but like oh there's a place for you to grow here and there and stay within the the larger OU family uh so right so that so it it's a more constant and consistent conversation setting goals checking in on the goals right all of this is part of not just a retention policy but a growth policy for our people there's a lot that you do and yet you're somebody who makes time not only for your L but for your four kids right four four kids three boys three boys and then we got our little princess you got your little princess um you have uh several Hobbies as well right is that am I right about that yeah I don't know if these are Hobbies or a way of life you know um so clearly you've run a couple of marathons yeah so I have run marathons that's why I want to bring them I I see a Spartan in there too yes I've done a Spartan Race and I've done a tough mutter and I people ask me I'll tell you Spartan more tolling physically tough mutter is just fun like that's what tough mutter is the Spartan I did I would never do again I would do a different course it was just hard tuxedo Ridge on a on a ski mountain up and down the mountain it was really tough I've always loved running I've always loved Sports I played basketball when I was in high school I was the captain of the varsity team no big deal it's okay they're going to say you I'm surprised you're not wearing the Jersey yeah that's actually underneath my suit jacket that was G to be a big reveal right there exactly exactly but going back to your hobbies question yeah yeah yeah um now now I wish I run more I wish I could play sports more and I'm GNA try to get that but I do coach little league now my two kids two my my two older boys are on did that for a bunch of years yeah well we won the championship this past year congratulations we went 14 and0 and we won the championship it was great all about the coaching yeah by the way it was about the coaching no it is and that's what's fun I also I love to smoke meat people don't know that when are you bringing some of that that's what everyone tells me that's what everyone tells me you know you could prove it that you actually do that you know we'll all chip in we'll buy a piece of meat and then you'll bring it in by the way by the way that's fine with me okay um I love smoking meat and I make my own pickles wow delicious do you grow them you grow the Cucumbers or every time I tried they always di so that's not I can grow talented people by the way vegetables I can't do that my brother just grew some great tasting pickles oh cucumbers yeah that's they made to pickles yeah but you're into food a little bit right you like the the meat and the pickles yes yes barbecuing too or that's not of course of course of course let's get to some rapid fire questions yeah okay okay um so we were just talking about food yes what's a musthave dish for your chabis or yff table my wife makes the best bone chicken in the world I will tell everyone the recipe it is the easiest thing you can ever do and it comes out delicious every time okay step one first of all I always clarify bone chicken needs to be cooked for a long time for it to fall off the bone right recipes say 45 minutes an hour hour and a half no we cook our chicken for minimal three hours it doesn't burn step two this really key you get hungry while you're waiting for the three hours it's not only that I'm a huge Wings guy I love wings the wings never make it to shabas because the chicken pulled out on my way to scha I'm grabbing all the wings and doing it step two the best bone chicken ever is it is all about the baste cue the music for that it's all about the base and I'm serious I am I am I am neurotic about it if you don't base your chicken your white meat will be dry you got it to do it okay okay recipes so easy it's garlic powder onion powder maple syrup that's it o as a Canadian I appreciate the maple syrup yeah it it comes out delicious and we call it crispy skinned chicken almost every week we have it it's so good and it's so easy to make the kids love it the adults love it everyone always ask like what's your recipe like it's three ingredients they're like no way it is why because it's about the base got it it's all about the base what is your go-to safer as an almost Rabbi to pick up and learn o I love Persia stuff I'm a huge fan of persa what breaks my brain about persa right the T the weekly Torah portion is that you've been learning it ever since you're a child right like you can go ask my kids are in in a Yeshua Day School you can only ask kids they know something about it the story of Noah the story of Noah and the the flood and story of creation even as an adult even though I've read it so many times every time I week read it on a weekly basis and I'm not saying like people's commentary on it just the actual words that are there on new thing I learned and I'm like H how did I not see this the first million times I read it when you get to my age that's because you forgot what you read last year but yes yes I understand I agree The Continuous learning process is terrific so like when there's like a new partial safer out my wife knows we all knows like I buy it so I love I love paraa which of these fruits is not a berry oo banana okay strawberry grape cucumber I'm going to say grape Am I Wrong would you believe strawberry is not a berry not a berry what's the biggest lesson you've learned while working in Human Resources the biggest lesson that every HR professional learns the hard way how do I not react to what you're about to tell me how do I just sit and listen we're going to turn the tables yeah now you get to ask me question if you could give anyone advice in the organization but I'm only giving you three minutes to say something what would you tell them I would advise them at any stage of their career to be thinking about where do I want to be five years from down from now maybe 10 years depending and so what do I have to do today in order to build for and that could be somebody who is later in their career maybe thinking about retirement um or maybe not I once had in one of my careers I had somebody walk in to my office who is a senior member senior leader I don't want to say too much right um and said to me I heard you give you're helpful to people with career advice so I literally said which one of your grandchildren it wasn't even a havina thought that it would be one of his kids I said which one of your grandchildren can I help he said it's me I'm thinking about the next stage and this was somebody probably 70s on the early side thinking about where do I want to go and what do I want to do who do I want to be and so I think that that's always something that uh that can be helpful um it might also be who do I want to help you know I've been working in HR helping profession I there's something about Yad I'm working in ncsy there's something about HR that it's a big world at the OU right sometimes even outside the OU right who do I want to help who do I want to surround myself with that I want to be involved so I think if you're asking that question you you have a better chance of understanding what you're doing today as not just building and helping others but also building and helping yourself to grow right so one last question for you okay we like to ask our guests what braa would you give to your colleagues here to everybody at the OU to send them off into as we started the the New Year the BR I would give to everyone and and pay attention I'm a cohain and so it means something is that we never stop growing we never stop learning we never start pushing ourselves I found in my 18 years of working at the OU is sometimes we get so caught up in our day-to-day activities we forget about the larger world out there the larger U world out there and what we actually do and impact it because it doesn't matter if you work in an operations Department it marketing HR Finance legal when we are helping the people who are in the field and it doesn't matter if you work in yaka or JC we all represent each other we all Impact each other and I think it's sometimes important that the greater world of the OU is so impactful to so many Jewish lives out there to so many people out there so many people who are struggling were there were there to help and we all share in that that just because we work at the U just because we're here working we all get a share in that and that's my Braha don't forget that we can't forget that the impact that we make just by showing up to work thank you Josh thank you for your braa we wish you lots of bras back uh right back at you thank you for giving us perspective and thank you for reminding us to keep it light sometimes as well we appreciate you we appreciate everything you do for all of the people uh connected to the ow you and you should have a continued braa to go from K to K go from strength to strength amen