TRANSCRIPT - Shifting Culture with Everyday Actions

Speaker: [00:00:00] How can we create workplaces where our people are empowered? They are given autonomy and choice. Well, it all starts with culture. Now that might sound overly simple, but at the grassroots of it, it's the everyday actions that leaders can take that will shift and create culture in their teams. And across the organization.

And it really is the simple things that make the difference. And as today's guest, Meredith Wilson has written the book on it. You too can then use grass in your workplace to shift your culture. Meredith makes culture simple and actionable. Working with executives, CEOs, and leadership teams to shape, shift, strengthen, and lead cultures.

Having led culture at the executive and board level for more than 15 years with ASX10 and global teams, Meredith is a published author and recognized culture expert. Meredith works as a culture strategist, speaker, and mentor on Building cultures that work in today's episode, Meredith shares with us her grass model and the simple ways that we can start to rethink culture and how we can then take action every day.

The impact of hope and safety and how this is foundational in building any culture. The four things that you will then need to build a culture worth belonging to. [00:02:00] And the importance of symbols and rituals and how they show up in your workplace. As you're going to hear when Meredith explains her GRASS model, we both have a very shared passion for building communities and thriving cultures.

With much of our work and language overlapping in the various different areas of workplace design, organizational leadership, and culture. So it was an absolute privilege to have the opportunity to explore ideas of what makes work work more deeply in this episode and you get to tune in.

So let me introduce you to Meredith.

Melissa: Now today I am joined by the lovely Meredith Wilson. Thank you so much for joining me today.

Meredith: Oh, my pleasure. I'm really looking forward to our conversation, Mel.

Melissa: Now, you and I connected a couple of years ago, you actually jumped in and joined one of my Live a Life by Design masterclasses, which was really lovely. And we've been following each other's work ever since., You've also written a book recently, , called Shift Everyday Actions Leaders Can Take to Shift Culture.

And I was very honored to have got a very special mention in there. So thank you very much for doing that for me.

Meredith: Oh, my pleasure. I think you, you have a really unique voice. , Mel And I think the role of place in culture is so important and sometimes overlooked by people who specialize in culture. And I really wanted to kind of bring in the power of space and how much that kind of influences the way people interact.

So I I'm really looking forward to our conversation today, because I think we have so much to Kind of adjacent and lots in common. And I noticed even some of the language that we use, you know, it's similar. We apply it in slightly different ways, but yeah, a lot in common.

I think

Melissa: I completely agree. And that's a beautiful segue into what's going to be a deep dive in our conversation today. So I'm excited to get started, but I want to start with your book and understand what inspired you to write this book. And if [00:04:00] you could give us a little bit more of a deep dive into it, because you've got a brilliant model that sits in there.

And there, as you've just said, there is so much content that overlaps with the work that I do and how I think about space. And when I wrote my book, The Next Workplace, I wrote it for people and culture leaders because I felt that there wasn't enough gravitas given to what place can do for culture.

So the fact that we're kind of overlapping there, I'm really excited about. So yeah, just give us a bit of an overview of the book and what inspired you to write it.

Meredith: yeah, look, I was in an executive role for many years and sat around the board table for a long time. And I've had conversations at that level. But I've also worked in service industries as well as kind of more professional services.

so I've had conversations about culture with all kinds of people and all kinds of leaders. And I've also had a bunch of experts and consultants try and sell me culture a lot. Over that time as well, as you can imagine. And I guess as a leader, I was really frustrated by how opaque experts, , made culture.

It, it seemed to be something kind of other that only people who had master's degrees could understand. And because it was intangible, it allowed them to kind of play that game. And. I'm really passionate about making things really simple and actionable for leaders. I think leaders particularly today now, you know, now more than ever have got so much on their plate.

They're expected to know such a broad range of topics well enough to be dangerous, right? But you know, I thought it was really unfair that we hold leaders accountable for culture and yet we cannot explain it simply to them. If you Google culture and define culture, I mean, you come up with more than a million definitions.

More than a million. And for a leader who's busy, it's like, what am I meant to do with that? And even though you know, most leaders I speak [00:06:00] with understand and agree that culture is really important. When you get to that next piece about, okay, so what do I need to do about that? That's where it starts to get a bit more hazy.

So, when I wrote this book, I was trying to make culture really simple and actionable. And I came up with a model that I had used, literally at the coalface with coal miners when I was trying to describe what is culture and, you know, how it means we're different from the mob over the road,

Melissa: Yep.

Meredith: even though we both do the same work and what, you know, we have the same kind of regulations.

What makes us different is our culture. Right through to kind of being able to debate the merits of various cultures around the board table. And what I don't do is say what kind of culture you should have. I mean, I could, if you ask me, but I really believe that each organization needs to develop their own unique culture.

And so the book was really trying to help. Leaders focus on what matters most.

Melissa: Yeah, and I think you're right there. Like culture is such a difficult thing to define. And then like you said, okay, that's great. Now what, what do I actually need to do to go and put this into action? Like, what do I, what's the tangible steps that I need to be taking and how can I actually shift this? And, what will enhance my culture?

Meredith: And where do I start? Yeah, that's all very well, but where do I start? What can I do today? So the model I came up with and I actually use it in keynotes. Before I put it into a book. But it's, I wanted something simple that people could remember, you know, both of my children's names are five letters because, you know, with a name like Meredith, I had to spell it growing up all the time.

And so I like things that kind of really simple. So, both of their names are five letters long. And so my model is a five letter acronym. And it's GRASS. So GRASS stands for Gatherings, Rituals, Actions, Symbols and Stories. And, you know, when I looked at all of the work out there around culture and kind of went, okay, Where can leaders focus that is going to make a difference, but is also within their remit.

You know, these are things that [00:08:00] leaders can do every day. They don't have to wait for HR. They don't have to wait for the board or the executive team to

get started You know, most of these things you can actually do without any spend. And so, gatherings is really anytime you're You bring people together, rituals, and I know you talk a lot about this, Mel, but rituals is, you know, how do you elevate or lift up a simple task or daily routine to give it some meaning actions is really understanding kind of what you say and what you don't say, and the consequences of that symbols is interesting and I'm keen to talk with you about that, Mel, because I don't think we really have a good understanding of symbols and that kind of non written, non verbal language that our brains absorb.

So symbols, and then the last S is stories and storytelling. So, you know, all of those things are things that leaders can do each day.

Melissa: It's interesting you bring up symbols because since reading your book it's something I've been much more focused on and much more aware of, and particularly with my clients, because, the examples that you gave in the book there are around, well, what is the message that you're sending with each of those physical symbols?

So the things that I can control within the workplace environment are who gets an office. And that is such a big status symbol within a workplace. And it's like, Oh, well, the executive directors all get offices, but nobody else. And then we're also going to put those executive directors, offices in the best corner of the building with the best view or car parks, those sorts of things are all very much. These status symbols that are communicating these messages to the rest of the organization about, well, what do we value? What is important? Now there's some of the more probably controversial examples, but the other ones that I think about, and this comes back to the work that I do in terms of zoning and the spaces and the flow of spaces, but what are we giving people as tools to be able to do their job?

Are we just putting in rows and rows and workstations and saying, well, that's how we want you to work? Or are we giving [00:10:00] them collaboration spaces or quiet spaces? And then what is the ratio of that? And these are conversations that I'm now. thinking about much more broadly and having better conversations with my clients about, because it's like, well, when you want people to come into the workplace, what do you want them to do?

And the types of furniture and settings and spatial tools that we're giving them is all communicating to them what we want them to do. And I think the fact that you've put this label on it and that symbols and trying to get people to think about it from a cultural perspective, I think it's really interesting.

Meredith: Look, when we do we go in and assess cultures to try and understand current state. You know, whether we call that a culture review or a culture audit depends on the culture of the organization we're going into and what they're looking for. And look, we do surveys and, you know, we do focus groups and have conversations, all the things you would normally expect.

But I often find looking in the fridge. Looking on the back of toilet doors and the messages there, you know, what's on the notice boards. These are all the little things that give us a real sense of how much control or the way that people speak with each other in a culture really gives us good insight as to what's going on and the level of respect that people give each other, the level of choice that people are given in the way that they work and how they use the bathroom, for example it's these little everyday things that often are overlooked by leaders.

You know, they focus on kind of the big things and we understand why, but sometimes it's just those little moments, those little symbols that actually are undermining all of the great work that you're doing in terms of communicating what you want from a workplace.

Melissa: Yeah. And I often see that that is because there are different departments doing different things and it could be that, that all staff email is sent out and the language that goes into that. And there's so many touch points that we can be reconsidering, but not every leader has got control over that.

But I suppose it's, how do I as an individual leader in a large organization, when some of these other [00:12:00] messages are coming at my team, how can I start to kind of counteract that?

Meredith: you just said something there Mel that reminded me of, you know, one of my kind of personal missions if you like, and that is to remove the word staff from our vocabulary. Now a staff is a stick. It is a rod that we use to beat slaves with. Okay. So it is right. , when you think of it that way, it's like, Oh my gosh.

And the, the amount of amazing leaders that because of culturally or because of, you know, legacy reasons are using that word and just to try and shift the word to kind of our people or our team know, it's something I'm really passionate about. And there's so many words like that in our language and words again, are symbols.

And we use them quite carelessly sometimes without, without knowing. And staff is one of those words. It is everywhere. It is everywhere. you know, we've been using that word for hundreds of years in the English language, but how do we start to remove some of those language habits, and shift to I guess a more modern way of thinking about our people.

I mean, even your use of the word community, Mel, I love because it's how do we think about our people differently than a staff?

Melissa: Yeah. All right. This resource. Hence the human resources. I'm glad that we're moving away from HR and we're moving more towards people and culture. But I know that you're, you know, extremely passionate about culture, which is very, very obvious. And, you know, you mentioned the fact there that I work with the terms community.

I'd love to know how you think of community and culture. how would you define the two? Because I think they're very separate, but there is a very big overlap that sort of sits in the middle. And I would love to know how would you define culture and how would you define community?

Meredith: Yeah. I knew you were going to ask me this.

Melissa: All the hard questions.

Meredith: That's right. I wrestled with it over the weekend and I was like, but they've got so much in common and you know, the language is used interchangeably when we describe them and you know, what makes [00:14:00] a community. And then I had this moment of breakthrough.

It was like, well, actually communities have cultures. I don't know that you would ever say that cultures have communities. And so, um, I think for me that was kind of one of the differentiators to help start to tease them apart. But I also think it's okay if we use those words interchangeably because, it's the application that matters.

And, If you're trying to build a community, you should be focusing on the culture that makes it a community. You end up in the same place, and I think you don't want to get caught up in semantics. You want to focus on what matters most.

And that is. What brings people together? What do they have in common? I mean, I like to think that great cultures, so cultures worth belonging to, and I'm kind of toying with this for my next book cultures worth belonging to have, Six senses, right? So, you need to create a sense of hope and safety.

If you don't, if you don't have those two things, then don't bother focusing on anything else. You know, if you're under threat, if you have a community or a group of people or a team or an organization, whatever we want to call it under threat, safety's first. If you're not clear on where you're going, even just having a sense of hope that there's a future.

they're the two most important things. And then once you've got those sorted or they're sufficient to be able to look up and out, then it's focusing on the four things of sense of purpose, which I know you talk a lot about Mel, the sense of purpose, sense of belonging again, really central to your work, a sense of autonomy and a sense of mastery.

And, The whole feeling that you create in a community, I think if you ever kind of dissected a successful community, you would find those things present. And similarly, if you go in and understand successful cultures, you would find those things present.

Melissa: Yeah, I, I tend to agree and one of the things that we've been [00:16:00] noticing in the work that we've been doing is that, this idea of place is still really important and it has a role to play in our workplaces, forcing and mandating these return to the offices and things I just don't think is really the right way to do this.

If we focus more on empowering our people and giving them autonomy and then that choice. And that's, that's where it all comes back to is giving them the tools, educating them, giving them the mastery, ensuring that they then can make the right decisions, giving them that choice. That's what's going to then lead to loyalty.

And that's where we're going to see people then wanting to buy into our cultures, wanting to buy into our communities, wanting to be part of it. And I think, yeah, there's so many similarities in the work that you're doing in the models and the language. I agree. It's just. it's really fascinating. And I think one of the things that I really liked in that and some of the earlier work you've done is about rituals, because I think rituals are really important to creating spaces as well.

Because if we just go and create a box, but there's no soul that goes into it, then we've really just created a shell.

Meredith: Yeah, I think rituals are really underutilized tool and as you raised before, and for those leaders that are working in organizations where you are a bit kind of cost conscious or, you know, budget is constrained, a ritual costs you nothing, but actually could be the thing that really makes a difference in terms of people feeling that sense of purpose, belonging.

And Again, ritual is one of those words that it's got a lot of mystery around it. You know, we associate it with ancient traditions and,

Melissa: Witchcraft. Yeah.

Meredith: right. There's, you know, there's all these kinds of things. And for good reason, they use ritual because they understood the power of it.

But, In very simple terms, you know, if we think about the power goes out, it's dark, we light a candle that has a functional [00:18:00] use, right? With this, there's light coming from the candle. That's not a ritual. That's just like, we want, we're doing a task because we want the outcome. And it's very clear when the task is complete, we've got light, you know, we've got the outcome that we're seeking.

But when you light a a candle on a birthday cake. Or you light a candle as an act of remembrance. That's where all of a sudden we're adding meaning. And for me, the very simple definition of ritual or, you know, what differentiates a task or a habit or a routine from a ritual is adding meaning.

And so, when you light a candle and make a Wish. For example, you have just taken a very simple daily action and a made it mean something. And so for leaders, the opportunity is to kind of reflect on your every week the things that you do regularly. And sometimes a ritual is like event triggered.

So a birthday's a good example. It happens once a year. But what are the rituals that you could adopt or what are the rituals you're actually already doing, but you didn't realize when you bring your people together or for yourself, you know, a ritual can also just be a solo practice. What are the things you're already doing that you could just.

add some meaning to, and that then add meaning to someone's day. And if we think about the role of community, the role of cultures over time for humans often is a place where they seek meaning. They also seek purpose, right? You know, something to be striving for but.

I think that sense of meaning is what people are really craving at the moment. And as more and more institutions fail us, and places where communities used to gather are no longer available. I mean, now it's a shopping center, right? It's pretty devoid of meaning, really. Um,

Melissa: either. And there's no community

Meredith: So,

Melissa: that. And

Meredith: So, you know, they're craving that.

[00:20:00] So then it really means people are looking to the workplace for that. And we need to shift how we think about workplace to address that need, if we're going to kind of engage our people,

Melissa: I think that's a really big mindset shift for business leaders and organizations because previously, I think many organizations have considered themselves nothing more than the employer is that you come here. We've got a job to perform and I'll pay you to do. You're part in that, what you're talking about there is so much bigger.

It becomes a much bigger responsibility for humanity in the role that they play in the lives of their people.

Meredith: as an executive, I was always concerned about. You know, where the line of corporate responsibility and personal responsibility was, and that's been blurred over time. And I think it, it actually just makes it more complex for leaders to navigate. And I don't know that organizations, need to set out to strive to be a place of meaning.

I think. Or it's about leaders recognizing that their people are looking for that. And so if they're able to create that, even if it's only in the island of their team, or if they're able to unlock that across their whole organization, that they will be more successful. But that doesn't mean that you have to strive to be a place of meaning and take on the responsibility of that.

That can sometimes feel a bit overwhelming, but know that if you do it well, Then your people will stay and strive and all those things that we know make a difference in terms of outcomes, performance, productivity, et cetera. But I think, again, this is a bit of an interesting wrestle for a modern leader to kind of go, what is my role?

What are my people expecting of me? And expectations have certainly shifted of leaders in the community at large. You know, in terms of what what the standards that we expect people to live by, but also the expectations of their team [00:22:00] members. They just, you know, people expect more and not everyone has made that shift.

Some people are aware of it, but they're not really sure what they need to do. And actually, that's where a lot of my work is. And I'm thinking. First time I've said this out loud. Now I'm thinking my next book is actually Leadershift because of exactly that reason. That there does seem to be where leaders are wrestling at the moment is what is my role?

What, what's expected of me now?

Melissa: That individual responsibility. circling back to your, your six senses that people needed, that purpose, that belonging, that autonomy and mastery, how can leaders start to support and influence that? Because often that center purpose, that Can come from an organizational level, but we then can define one that's more at a team level that we can all feel much more connected to.

And then, you know, how do we find that sense of belonging and how can they build that level of [00:24:00] autonomy and mastery? And I think the bit that overlays , that I find in the teams that I'm engaging with is that there are these organizational. overlays and these expectations of around, you know, what level of autonomy can we actually afford to give to our people?

But then there's the wiggle room at the individual leader. And I think that comes down to the, the leadership capability and there's so many little nuances in there. I'd love to know what your experience of this is.

Meredith: Yeah, look, I think purpose is interesting. I mean, mostly there's an organization spend a lot of time thinking about vision and strategy. And so for me, helping someone see how the work they do contributes to that. Helps them feel that sense of purpose and with some work that's harder than others, right?

You know, if you're in a, if you're in an organization that kind of does good, is full purpose, that's so much easier. But I think also those organizations, attract people who want a deep sense of purpose. And so they almost have a higher expectation or demand for you to meet. But every leader's role really, I think in conversation is to work out what's important for that person and how they can connect it with the work that they do and what it contributes to a bigger picture.

And belonging is really, you know, helping people feel safe and feel seen and heard. There's so much work out there about, Psychological safety, and now we're getting into the kind of the risk factors there around psychosocial safety. And there's a lot of people and a lot of resources out there for you to tap into that.

If that's something that you want to work on. I think Brene Brown is one of my favorite thinkers when it comes to belonging, and she has both kind of an individual and a team or, you know, organizational perspective, which is really useful for leaders who want to explore that a bit more. Autonomy is interesting.

It's often one of the challenges that I give leadership teams when I'm working with them. It's how much choice do you genuinely provide your people and, you know, [00:26:00] policies, policy, quick policy review is a really good place to start to just get a sense of how much choice you allow. You mentioned wiggle room.

Mel, you know, , the discretion that a leader can apply when it comes to policy is always a really good place for us to start. So, my team at the People Game, you know, we would go in when we're assessing culture, we'll always do as part of our desktop review, a sweep of, of policy. And, um, Yes, we're looking to understand, you know, kind of where your guardrails and gates are, and how, you know, how much of a playing field you give your teams, but I'm also looking for how much discretion we allow leaders.

And how much choice? Now, I know Mel, you mentioned you have young children. And I remember when my little girl was young and I was debating and negotiating with her about what she was going to wear in the morning, trying to get out the door. But I used kind of bounded choice, right? Or forced choice where it was like, okay, well, do you want to, do you want to wear the pink shorts or the blue skirt?

Yeah. And often organizations and leaders unwittingly are using that same strategy is like, I want to control. It's much easier if you're controlled and in this kind of narrow playing field, because I don't have to think about it quite so much. I don't have to risk quite so much. And so you can have, you know, the red or the blue

Melissa: Yep.

Meredith: That's not really a choice.

Like if we really want to respect the people in our teams and we want to treat them like grownups, we need to allow much more scope and we will achieve much greater outcomes. If we allow people to kind of work the way that suits them best towards this kind of common shared goal or purpose. So I think, Shifting from rules to guides , is a really kind of useful language shift to start looking for. And look, there are some organizations that work in environments that are much more heavily regulated. I came out of, you know, blue collar and industrial spaces where, you know, safety first, right? But even within a safety [00:28:00] culture, there are different safety cultures where we allow people choice.

because we want them to actually think about what they're doing and not be on automatic pilot because that's when accidents occur or when incidents occur. So I think getting real with yourself about how much choice you are actually allowing your people is a good place to start. And even just pushing the boundaries of discretion within the current kind of framework of rules and policies that you as a leader work in is interesting and for our people and culture colleagues who are listening, Melissa the opportunity to review your policies and, and I'm going to use HR Advisorly here.

Many organizations are still running with HR policies that were written pre 2020. We said before that expectations have shifted. If your way of doing things and way of shaping work is the same as it was in the nineties, and so often I see policies that are then it's time to actually go back to foundational pieces and just dust them up, refresh them for the new century.

And in fact, we're into it, we're into the, we're well into the 2020s now. And so , how do you. Revise those policy sets to be more reflective of the work today, the way people want to work, where they want to work, how they want to work.

Melissa: Yeah. And I think where organizations get challenged by that is that somebody doesn't want to take responsibility for updating that, or I made that change and then now this is how it's going to operate. That's the pushback that I do see. It's like, Oh, but do I have to put my

signature on this?

Meredith: That's right. But I think to, you know, trials, experiments, pilots are your friends. You know, if you're trying to make a shift and it's something that is well outside your comfort zone, baby steps you know, talk to someone who not, who's done this before, learn from them and just, you know, [00:30:00]run some pilots find where there's some energy in your organization, where people are passionate about them, give them some scope. Check back in and just try it on for size.

Melissa: Yeah, I think that's a great advice and, you know, picking out those teams that are, you know, potentially challenged with recruitment or other operational issues , let's use them as our test case and see what we can do to co create a solution that's going to work for them. And then, , take the learnings and start to roll it out across the rest of the organization.

Meredith: Yeah, that's right. And I think am. I joke about, you know, one size fits all is actually one size fits the boss. And, you know, or one size fits none. We really need to shift away from these one size fits all policies and allow much more scope for people to personalize and tailor their experience in the workplace.

Our team members out in their kind of the real world and in their every day are experiencing this hyper personalization, you know, whether they're on Spotify or Netflix or, wherever they

are,

even their emails, they are getting hyper personalized emails that recognize, their shopping patterns or their interest patterns, you know, And curating what is being fed to them.

And then they get to the workplace and they get the same employment contract and they get the same employment policies and they get the same onboarding experiences, everybody else alongside. And it stands out. Our brain is wired to notice kind of what's wrong, what's different, what doesn't feel right.

Well, people who are coming into the workplace now, we talk about kind of five generations in the workplace, but people are coming in now, no matter their generation, right? Because remember, Baby boomers are also using Netflix and Spotify. This isn't like you only do it for the new entrants. Everyone has shifted their expectations of what good looks like.

And employment workplace needs to keep [00:32:00] pace.

Melissa: Yeah. And that's a really good point and I'm looking forward to diving into that conversation with another guest in a couple of weeks, they look at how to actually really tailor and personalize that employee experience in the workplace.

Yeah, but you're right. Like we are constantly being able to curate everything around us.

I mean, if you go into your Netflix profile versus your husband's Netflix profile, and no doubt they were very, very different. I know my husband's is, there's no way I like watching his profile, but that gives you an idea of how different everybody in every individual is and what you're looking for.

Meredith: It kind of comes back to symbols, Mel. Like, , our brains are so wired to this, we just, it's just normal now. And We notice when our child, teenager, 20 something, Has been watching something on our Netflix blog on because all of a sudden it's like, how did that get there?

our brains are so sophisticated when it comes to scanning the environment, they notice when something is incongruent or out of place, right? There's some kind of. You know, I think the fancy term is cognitive dissonance, but you know, they noticed there's something going on. Hang on.

That's kind of out of place. And our eye is drawn to it. I'm sure you'd find that in your work, , the importance of like, you kind of cover all of these things and then someone will, you know, bring something over from the old office and you're like, how did that find its way back in here?

Melissa: Or they change the color on something and it's like, Ooh, that doesn't quite work.

Meredith: Yeah.

Melissa: Yes, absolutely. Oh, look, Meredith, it has been an absolute joy having a chat to you today. Thank you for sharing all of your insights and I'm, um, I'm really excited to see more of this next book that's coming out. I love

that.

I love the title, Leadership and , you've shared a lot today that is very much in the same vein of thought as the work that I'm doing. And as we said, the language that we're using, but I think there's so much importance that we can be putting on these things as we move forward now. You know, post 2020, we've got a [00:34:00] completely different environment that we're now needing to create , for our employees in our workplaces.

So thank you for sharing that with us. If anyone would like to get in touch with you, learn out, learn more about what you're doing, read your book, where is the best place for them to head to, to do that?

Meredith: Mel, I wish that was a simple answer. There's two, right? So I kind of, you know, Tale of Two Cities. If you would like to talk with me about mentoring or masterclasses come to meredithwilson. com. au. If you would like to work with my team and I, in terms of shifting culture or shifting your leaders, then come to the people game.

So that's, uh, the people game. com, and learn a bit more about what we do. And of course, you know, I'm on LinkedIn in both guys's. So you can find me on LinkedIn. And I also have a bit of fun hanging out on Instagram. Yeah. If that's your

Melissa: Fantastic. And look, I understand the Tale of Two Cities. I have the same deal going on over here. So it's a good way to be. You get to do all that really lovely personal one to one retreat type work and explore all those other interests that you have as an individual. But then you've got the corporate delivery on the other hand as well, which is fantastic.

Meredith: Absolutely. Best of

Melissa: That's it. It's great. Well, look, thank you so much, Meredith. I've really enjoyed our conversation and thank you for coming along today.

Meredith: Thanks so much for having me, Mel. It's been such a pleasure and long overdue.

Melissa: Absolutely. Thanks Meredith.