Monne Williams
Chief Impact Officer
Handshake
Episode 36
Stop Forcing Change: Remove Barriers, Ignite Employee Impact
Current chapter: Built by People podcast features insights from world's top HR leaders
Built By PeopleOctober 3, 2025 · 10:48
Thesis
“Effective organizational change and sustained employee engagement are achieved not by rigid directives, but by deeply understanding people's motivations, strategically linking initiatives like ERGs to business outcomes, and proactively removing barriers that prevent individuals from contributing positively.”
Show notes
Most people end up in HR by accident. Monne Williams ended up there on purpose — she just took a route that went through McKinsey, the Boston Red Sox, and a long-running obsession with why people do and don't do what organizations need them to do. At Handshake, she's the Chief Impact Officer, which is a title that reflects a genuine conviction: that people work, when done well, has measurable organizational impact. Not as a supporting function. As the thing itself.
Eleven years at McKinsey gave Monne a precise mental model for change management — and a healthy skepticism about the conventional approaches to it. Her core observation: people generally want to do the right thing. When they don't, the failure is usually systemic. You haven't made it easy enough. You haven't explained the "why" clearly enough. You haven't removed the barrier that's sitting between the employee and the behavior you need. Her framework for change is built around that insight: articulate the problem from an organizational perspective, provide role models, build the skills, and then — critically — get out of the way.
Her approach to ERGs is equally strategic. She's moved past thinking of them as culture programs and started treating them as business assets that need to be linked to measurable outcomes. ERGs that survive and thrive aren't the ones with the most enthusiastic volunteers. They're the ones that can show the connection between their work and the organization's goals.
What you'll learn:
- Why Monne believes people don't resist change — they resist systems that make change hard
- The change management framework built around removing barriers, not just communicating better
- How to link ERGs to measurable business outcomes rather than running them on volunteer energy alone
- What 11 years at McKinsey and a stint at the Red Sox teach about high-stakes organizational decisions
- Why long-term planning in dynamic environments requires built-in flexibility and "two-way doors"
- What a "Chief Impact Officer" does — and why the title matters
Built by People is presented by Previ — the free tool that helps HR teams boost internal communication engagement.
What you'll take away
- 1When facing high-stakes decisions that impact many, gather all concerns (financial, human) to make responsible, well-explained choices.
- 2Elevate Employee Resource Groups by helping them strategically connect their initiatives to measurable business impact, ensuring sustainability beyond volunteer efforts.
- 3Implement change by focusing on removing barriers: clearly articulate the 'why,' provide role models, facilitate skill development, and ensure changes align with individual self-interest.
- 4For long-term planning in dynamic environments, build in flexibility and iteration, creating 'two-way doors' to adapt and improve as new information emerges.
- 5Foster employee buy-in for unpopular but necessary changes by transparently explaining the 'problem' from a broader organizational perspective, even if employees don't initially perceive one.
What most organizations get wrong
- •"People generally want to do the right thing, and if they're not doing it, it's probably because you haven't made it easy for them to do it." (This challenges the assumption that resistance to change is due to unwillingness, shifting focus to systemic barriers.)
- •During her time at the Red Sox, she advocated for expanding the customer base beyond traditional fans, a potentially contrarian view in an organization often focused on its established loyal following.
In Monne's words
“I always describe myself as a people nerd, and I think that that has very much been the through line going back to when I was a kid in school.”
This quote defines her foundational passion for understanding people, which has guided her entire career path and leadership philosophy.
“The first thing I tried to do was listen to all the concerns. Like, I knew the financial concern, but how do I understand the other pieces to the puzzle so that when I'm making that a set of decisions, I really would understand all the different people who were at play and how to make a decision that, you know, I could, I could feel good about and I could explain to people and felt that, you know, it was the right direction for the company.”
Highlights a key principle for navigating high-stakes organizational change: comprehensive listening and empathy to ensure responsible, justifiable decisions.
“I was really bullish on expanding who the customer base was. And so just understanding the demographics of Boston and the area, understanding spending patterns and what the new opportunities were, and really, really encouraging people to think about new, um, aspects of the fan base and new customers that would help us, of course, expand revenue, but really build a stronger connection to the community and people that we wanted to follow us long-term.”
Illustrates how a people-centric approach can drive innovative revenue streams and foster deeper community connection for an organization.
“Oftentimes people are in volunteer roles when they're doing that, so they aren't thinking about it from a super strategic or this is how I would do this in a systematic way. And so helping those ERGs really connect what they want to do to the business impact that they want to see.”
Provides actionable advice on how to elevate Employee Resource Groups from mere voluntary efforts to strategic assets with measurable business impact.
“People generally want to do the right thing, and if they're not doing it, it's probably because you haven't made it easy for them to do it.”
Offers a powerful perspective on overcoming resistance to change by focusing on removing systemic barriers and enabling individuals, rather than blaming them.
The problems this episode addresses
- •Navigating high-stakes organizational changes that affect employee careers and organizational sustainability.
- •Overcoming credibility gaps when junior employees propose innovative or challenging ideas to senior leadership.
- •Managing employee resistance to changes when they don't perceive an existing problem or understand long-term organizational costs.
- •Ensuring Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) transition from voluntary efforts to strategically impactful initiatives with clear business connections.
- •HR leaders needing to create adaptable, flexible 5-year plans in an environment characterized by constant and rapid change.
- •Employees' financial well-being is a top concern, impacting engagement and retention (implied by podcast sponsor context).
In this episode
Built by People podcast features insights from world's top HR leaders
Built by People
Monet: Dave shares a little bit about his career journey
In the Elevator With Monet
After 11 years at McKinsey, you transitioned from consulting to being in-house
In the Elevator With McKinsey's Lead Person
Red Sox started thinking about new revenue streams during your time there
The Big Change at the Boston Red Sox
When have you had to make unpopular decisions for the long-term good of the organization
When have you had to make an unpopular decision for the long-
Think about employee resource groups, which can help manage culture and retention
What's a leadership move or initiative that you've repeated in more
Michael Krigsman says HR leaders need to prepare for major shifts
The Biggest Shift in HR Talent Demand
Topics covered
Organizations and entities mentioned
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