TO BE BETTER THAN DISNEY

It is Summer vacation time. Time to reflect. How did I do this year? What did I do right and where should I improve myself? That is what I do during my summer vacation while I have fun with my kids.

Family-wise, I'm judged by my children, and they think I'm the best mother in the world. I see it differently. I see a lot of things that I want to do better to improve myself to become a mother as good for my children as my dad was for me. 

Business-wise, I've seen we had a hard time surviving the crisis. But we're still here although working on half capacity. Employees are sitting home and I'm doing a lot of things, I shouldn't do, but during a crisis, you must tackle whatever comes on your path. I've learned a lot and it brought me a lot of insights that are surely useful for my future career. Let me share one thing I really learned and has changed me. People who know me know that I always looked up to companies like Disney, Universal Studios, Efteling, and many more. Since I was a little kid I dreamed to work for them and I even said; "one day I will own Disneyland Paris". A silly dream of course but to be honest I chased that dream I was actually a shareholder, buying DLP shares every month until my divorce in 2014. I was the lucky one to may work on projects for those companies. But due to my divorce, I lost everything and I had to start over my career. 

And look at me now, I'm a general manager, working myself back to the top again, thanks to a bunch of experiences I did not have before. These experiences made me a better leader. I've learned most from my mistakes in life. And while I'm strolling with my kids through the branding of the ocean, I realize, I've gotten a second chance, and I will do better than I ever did. My kids are not numbers, also our employees aren't. So why do we work with recruiters that use AI to select candidates or simply reject candidates based on their resume, name, or profile? I was blindfolded because Disney and many other companies which I look up to, do it that way. Last week I attended the woman hack event. I met real people, had short conversations with them and they didn't judge me on my resume that they didn't have seen yet. 

My resume contains gaps because I became a mother and had a divorce that destroyed my career. Being judged, based on the person I am, my competencies, my passion, my love for the industry felt like a warm welcome at companies I even not work for yet. Even more important was that I did speak with the people who do the job, and not only the recruiters. Instead of looking for an open position, did I met companies I've never heard of before, but they showed me that they don't see their employees like numbers, but as talents who are welcome in their teams. And that is exactly how it should go. AI doesn't know what empathy, passion, love, devotion, and field education is. It sees only your name, education, and inconsistencies in your resume. AI determines your race based on your name and selects on gender and age because it is based on who was hired before (evidence-based) . It sees career dropouts and inconsistencies. It doesn't ask why are you missing years of work experience? AI doesn't see that those years are probably the years you had the hardest lessons of life and learned the importance of empathy and seeing the person behind the file. And I truly believe that those people are definitely the most valuable persons for your company. They know how to handle setbacks, empower others, building a team, and survive crises. Like the best entrepreneurs always say; "You're only a real entrepreneur after you went through at least one bankruptcy", do I say; "You can only be a good leader when you survived a real crisis in your life". So after my summer vacation, I will cut off all contracts with recruiters who use AI for pre-selecting candidates, or who reject candidates based on their resumes only without have spoken with them. Our employees are not numbers, we value them. They are the basis of our successes, so why treat them as numbers at the front door? There are always things that can be improved. Recruiting is one of them! 

#improve #judged #dobetter #Business #surviving #crisis #Employees #learning #insights #future #career #change #Disney The Walt Disney Company #Universalstudios Universal Studios Hollywood #Efteling Efteling #dreamed Disneyland Paris #disneylandparis #dream #shareholder #DLP #shares

#generalmanager #experiences #better #leader #leadership #mistakes #secondchance #recruiters #hr #hradvice #AI #ml #candidates #resume #womanhack #event #competencies #passion #love #industry #talents #empathy #devotion #fieldeducation #leadershipdevelopment #team #education #race #gender #hire #evidencebased #lessons #valuable #setbacks #buildingateam #survive #crises #entrepreneurs #entrepreneur #bankruptcy #leader #contracts #recruiters #value #successes #improved Disney Media et Partenariats The Walt Disney Company France - Expérience Employé Walt Disney Imagineering Disney Institute Walt Disney Imagineering Universal Creative Warner Bros. Animation Warner Bros. Entertainment Pixar Animation Studios Universal Studios Florida Production Group Disneyland Paris Disneyland Resort