Creating a Culture of Courage: Adriana Vaccaro On How to Create a Culture Where People Feel Safe to be Authentic & Why That Helps the Bottom Line

An Interview With Vanessa Ogle

Civility is one of the principles we encourage in our work to create inclusive cultures where ALL employees can thrive. Often, we confuse civility with politeness or niceness. Being polite is not that difficult, however, politeness often means smiling when you hear a microaggression, or staying silent when someone is being mistreated. Politeness is external and focuses on social norms. It is easy and accessible.

In today’s social media filled, fast-paced world, authenticity in the workplace and in our personal lives has become more difficult to come by. Business leaders must focus on the bottom line of profits and corporate success, but does that have to be at the expense of the authenticity of their employees? I believe it is quite the opposite. I know from my own experience that a culture of authenticity allows the hiring of a team that will bring their all to the workplace. That fosters innovation, creativity and a level of success that few companies dream of. Yet, fostering an environment where individuals feel secure enough to express their true selves remains a challenge. The importance of authenticity cannot be overstated — it is the foundation of trust, innovation, and strong relationships. However, creating such a culture requires intention, understanding, and actionable strategies. As part of this series, we had the pleasure of interviewing Adriana Vaccaro.

Adriana is the CEO and Founder of Culture Redesigned. She specializes in helping companies amplify diversity, equity, and inclusion through organizational culture. Rather than traditional consulting and training techniques, her company uses Behavioral Science Data to align Human Capital with Business Results. Adriana is a bilingual, bicultural, and experienced Human Resources leader. Her areas of expertise include employee engagement, DEI strategy, change management, and training and development.

Born in Colombia and a naturalized citizen of the United States, Adriana earned a Bachelor of Science in Marketing and Advertising and a Master of Business Administration. Adriana is a Senior Certified Professional by the Society of HR Management, Certified Executive Coach, Six Sigma Black Belt, Certified PI Partner, and a Delta Mu Delta Honor Society of International Business member.

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series. Before we dive into our discussion our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you share with us the backstory about what brought you to your specific career path?

I worked 14 years in Human Resources and learned first-hand how culture requires a collective commitment. That old saying “people don’t leave their companies; they leave their boss” is accurate. While we sometimes think of culture as a “Company Responsibility” and it is. There is also an individual responsibility from each leader to cultivate and develop their people. When I got started my objective was and still is to be a strong execution partner for people-first organizations that want to take their culture beyond a poster on the wall and into a reality.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career?

When I started my company, I had a clear vision of what I wanted to accomplish, however, I remember the first time I noticed that the results of the work I was doing were greater than my expectations. I was leading a cohort of emergent leaders and on the last session they spoke about the impact of the lessons learned, while they shared how they were greatly contributing to the organization, they also shared their individual personal development leaps and how the safe container we created to learn about trust, confidence, credibility, and inclusion was positively impacting multiple aspects of their life.

You are a successful individual. Which three-character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?

1. I am an immigrant from Colombia. It is difficult to build trust as a business owner when you always look like an outsider. Authenticity is a character trait that I had to embrace because I had no other choice. I couldn’t change the way I look; I learned English as an adult and while I can communicate effectively, I have an accent, so being “authentic” was my only choice. Like anything else in life, I had to learn to be comfortable with who I am and execute from a place of strength and desire to add value, and not from a place of comparison and doubt.
2. Curiosity is another character trait that has shaped my journey. Both working in the Human Resources field, and most recently as a small business owner, embracing curiosity has allowed me to connect with different people with an open mind. In the field of organizational culture, curiosity can be used as a tool to mitigate biases and avoid quick judgments.
3. Resilience, which I define as our personal coping capacity, is another character trait that I consider instrumental in my journey. When it comes to resiliency, not only you can learn it, but you can expand your speed and capacity to bounce back after failure or stress. Resiliency gives us elasticity of character and demystifies failure.

Ok, thank you for that. Let’s now jump to the primary focus of our interview. Can you share a pivotal moment in your career or personal life when being authentic made a significant impact on your success or well-being?

Absolutely! During my corporate career I was what you might call a “worker bee”. The one that would jump on any project. I didn’t care much about the credit, but I did care about the outcome, and the bigger picture. I was the busy person you would call when you needed to get something done. I was known for being reliable however, at times my eagerness to help was met with the popular “stay in your lane” or “You are HR not Operations”. In retrospective, I was just being authentic. There were parts of situations and challenges that I could see clearly while others couldn’t. Authenticity allows people to connect genuinely and add value and perspective in multiple ways. That confining feeling of a corporate function and an authentic desire for positive culture change were the propellers to my entrepreneurial journey.

What strategies have you found most effective in fostering an environment where employees or team members feel safe to express their true selves, including their ideas, concerns, and aspirations?

One of my most repeated sentences is “Data over Drama”. I am a big proponent of the use of people analytics and scientifically validated behavioral assessments to create inclusive cultures. Some of these assessments are quick, take 5 minutes or less, and they remove all the guess work. While what we see in the workplace is behavior. Behavior is the result of the needs and drives of an individual. When we only see behavior, we have to guess the rest and we become really good at believing our own narrative and stories about others.

The use of validated assessments allows us to demystify behavior. For instance, an individual that might appear to me as unengaged or distant might be a teammate with a great need for introspection and reflection. We tend to see others from our own lenses.

I have a high need for driving initiatives. To someone with a low need for dominance I could appear intense or too direct. Behavioral data is a relevant source of information to learn about our own behavioral drives and those around us. It also reveals what we need in the workplace to thrive. For example, some people have high needs for collaboration while others prefer independence. Some need specificity of rules and structure while others prefer loose environments.

How do you navigate the challenges that come with encouraging authenticity in a diverse workplace, where different backgrounds and perspectives may sometimes lead to conflict?

The most interesting part of authenticity is that at the surface level, it makes things harder instead of easier. When you first join a team and suppress parts of your personality to fit the culture, you might experience an instant but temporary sense of belonging. As time goes by, the amount of mental energy involved in suppressing your identity is greater and it impacts performance and team dynamics. In perspective, if you join a team with the mindset to “add” to the culture, instead of “fit” the culture, you are developing true relationships across differences which support trust, psychological safety, and accountability in high performing teams.

Based on your experience and research, can you please share “5 Ways to Create a Culture Where People Feel Safe to be Authentic?”

1 . Shift belonging from something you get from a group to something you create for others.

The most common misconception is that to improve culture and promote authenticity you need to hire a couple of new employees that check off the “underrepresented” box.

Having diversity in the workplace only adds value if the employees feel safe and comfortable enough to share their perspective.

Belonging can be created by understanding how our actions, words, behaviors, and attitudes have an impact on others. Instead of focusing energy on how others are making us feel we can collectively commit to create spaces where everyone can develop a sense of belonging.

One of the practices we embrace when we are working with organizations to improve their culture is to find diversity of thought. We can have a group that “looks” homogeneous, but through facilitated conversations we intentionally discover major differences, in the same way, we can take highly diverse teams and facilitate conversations where they can find similarities and connect beyond differences. This type of exercise is a reminder of our right to be our own individual and to work collectively to create a sense of belonging because we are all different but hopefully connected by the mission of an organization.

2 . Understanding employee identity holistically and what it means when we say “bring your whole self to work”

According to behavioral science and scientific validation by The Predictive Index, there are 3 elements of the individual. However, I firmly believe it should be 4.

Elements of Identity:

1. Behavioral Drives: We can measure these drives through assessments like Predictive Index, Gallup Strengths and others. When we measure behavioral drives, we can understand the needs and to an extent predict the behaviors of an employee. We are also able to identify what each employee requires to thrive in the workplace not only in terms of workload but in terms of supervision. In other words, we can really position them to thrive!
2. Values: These are connected to our individual story, principles, interest, passions, etc. The things that move us. Ideally for an employee to thrive there should be some level of alignment between individual values and organizational core values.
3. Skills. We are talking about everything that goes on the resume: education, accomplishments, prior successes, certifications, work experience, etc.
4. Invisible backpack. While this factor is my own addition, I firmly believe in the relevance of its importance. We are referring to any prior trauma, deep loss, systemic oppression, or impactful event and its effect in an individual’s experience at work.

While in the traditional workplace most decisions were based on the third element. Skills. In the Modern Workplace we are welcoming the entire individual to be part of a culture. It doesn’t mean we need to know absolutely every detail about somebody’s life. It means that we treat each person with the awareness that they are more than a collection of skills. They are human beings with their own unique history and ideals for the future.

We go from Culture-fit to Culture-add

3 . The three-legged stool — Optimizing the collective.

Please note we are referring to a “collective” and not just an “environment”. The Modern Workplace is not exclusively attached to a physical location. When we talk about the collective we are referring to the combined efforts of a group of individuals regardless of their location or style of work. This concept is relevant to organizations working in the same space and all the other variations including dispersed workforces, asynchronous teams, hybrid teams, fully remote teams, and any other version.

There are 3 basic Principles to Optimize the collective, or in my stool metaphor 3 legs:

Accountability

Accountability ensures that employees take ownership of their actions and responsibilities, leading to increased productivity, trust, and overall effectiveness.

Trust

Trust in the modern workplace culture is the foundation of a collective where individuals have faith in the organization’s values, ethics, and the people within it. We cover trust in detail at the beginning of this guide but to recap once again. Trust = competence + character

Psychological Safety

Psychological safety encourages open and honest communication. Team members are more willing to collaborate, share their expertise, and provide constructive feedback, leading to better teamwork and problem-solving.

In psychologically safe workplaces, employees are less afraid of making mistakes. They understand that errors are opportunities for learning and improvement, rather than reasons for blame or punishment.

The interesting part about these 3 principles is the fact that they are deeply intertwined. While each has a different meaning, you can’t fully achieve one of them without the presence of the other two.

Think of it as a three-legged stool. If one leg breaks the stool is no longer functional.

4 . Having a framework to manage conflict. Label and Fix the issue or situation not the person.

Conflict is inevitable in the workplace. We shouldn’t be focusing on conflict avoidance. Instead, we should have a clear framework, centered around the organizational core values, to manage conflict effectively.

Conflict leads to growth, reflection, discovery, ownership, and ultimately improvement.

There are basic parameters we need to be aware of when addressing conflict but for this article I want to focus on one: labeling the challenge, the issue, or the problem and not the person.

This is an accessible tool to improve and sustain safe spaces.

When a challenge arises, we identify and attempt to fix the individual. Which feels like a personal attack. Our approach should be to identify and correct the issue or the situation and not the person. This simple reframe cultivates psychological safety, empathy, and normalizes failure. Three elements that lead to innovation in the workplace.

5 . Encouraging civility over politeness

Civility is one of the principles we encourage in our work to create inclusive cultures where ALL employees can thrive. Often, we confuse civility with politeness or niceness. Being polite is not that difficult, however, politeness often means smiling when you hear a microaggression, or staying silent when someone is being mistreated. Politeness is external and focuses on social norms. It is easy and accessible.

In contrast, civility is internal. It is our compass of character to act in congruency with our principles. Exercising civility takes courage. Civility might look like a confrontation to those who are used to get away with microaggressions. Civility might put you on the receiving end of the well-meaning line “you are too sensitive” however, civility is a respectful and direct response that honors inclusion and psychological safety for a group. We can simply say “that is racist” instead of smiling at a tasteless joke about someone’s race. We are not suggesting you flip the table in the lunchroom! Civility can be executed with empathy and kindness, and a neutral and professional approach, by simply labeling a behavior that is not in alignment with a culture of inclusion.

In your opinion, how does authenticity within an organization influence its relationship with customers, clients, or the broader community?

Authenticity is directly connected to client satisfaction and client loyalty. When employees don’t have to spend energy suppressing their identity they can perform at higher levels. Employees who experience psychological safety also tend to stay longer in a job which improves retention rates, promotion rates, and allows clients to develop long lasting relationships with an organization. In terms of the broader community, research supports that authenticity facilitates longevity of community engagement programs, and employee-owned initiatives, which ultimately support positive lasting change.

You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. :-)

I would like to start a movement that exposes elementary and middle school children of all socio-economic backgrounds to concepts, frameworks, and safe spaces to practice civility and truly understand the fundamental principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Creating confidence and competence around these concepts at an early age could change our society and bring more kindness and empathy to the future workplace.

How can our readers further follow you online?

I am very active on LinkedIn

https://www.linkedin.com/in/adrianavaccaro/

Here is also my website

https://cultureredesigned.com/

And our Redesigning Culture for the Modern Workplace eBook

http://bit.ly/redefine-culture

Thank you for the time you spent sharing these fantastic insights. We wish you only continued success in your great work!

About The Interviewer: Vanessa Ogle is a mom, entrepreneur, inventor, writer, and singer/songwriter. Vanessa’s talent in building world-class leadership teams focused on diversity, a culture of service, and innovation through inclusion allowed her to be one of the most acclaimed Latina CEO’s in the last 30 years. She collaborated with the world’s leading technology and content companies such as Netflix, Amazon, HBO, and Broadcom to bring innovative solutions to travelers and hotels around the world. Vanessa is the lead inventor on 120+ U.S. Patents. Accolades include: FAST 100, Entrepreneur 360 Best Companies, Inc. 500 and then another six times on the Inc. 5000. Vanessa was personally honored with Inc. 100 Female Founder’s Award, Ernst and Young’s Entrepreneur of the Year Award, and Enterprising Women of the Year among others. Vanessa now spends her time sharing stories to inspire and give hope through articles, speaking engagements and music. In her spare time she writes and plays music in the Amazon best selling new band HigherHill, teaches surfing clinics, trains dogs, and cheers on her children.

Please connect with Vanessa here on linkedin and subscribe to her newsletter Unplugged as well as follow her on Substack, Instagram, Facebook, and X and of course on her website VanessaOgle.