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“The work that we do as a team, no matter where you are, has an impact. Our job as leaders is to help people find and connect with that impact.” – Andy Freed

From a hospital nursery to the hallways of Virtual, Andy explores how every role contributes to something bigger — and why it’s a leader’s job to help people see that connection.

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Andy shares:

• The number one thing that keeps employees engaged — and why leaders must lean into it.
• A quiet moment that helped him see the impact of Virtual’s work in a new light.
• How leaders can help every team member understand the value of their contributions.

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Hi. Welcome to Five Minutes With Andy. My name is Andy Freed. I'm the CEO of Virtual, Incorporated. For the last 25 years, Virtual has been helping associations, standards bodies, and consortia as they're making their mark on the world. You know as CEO, I often get to be out front. I'm often the one who gets to talk about things on stage, talk about things at the big staff meetings.

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But the reality is so much of the work of leadership and so much of the work of communication doesn't take place on stage. It takes place in quiet little moments. And the impact that we have as an organization isn't always obvious from looking on the outside. Sometimes it's the little things that we do that are going to have their biggest mark in the world.

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Now, I found out and kind of understood the quiet moments of leadership in one of the quietest places that I've been in a while, and that was in the special care nursery of MelroseWakefield Hospital. Now, I am honored to be the chairman of the board of that hospital. It's a small community hospital, of about 190 beds, just outside of Boston, Massachusetts.

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And I've served as their chair for the last year. And every now and again, I like to get there and walk around the place. Well, one of the best stops on the place is the special care nursery. It's an incredible place. We've got some nurses there who are taking care of little tiny babies who need help and need care.

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And as I was standing there, I was thinking about how we've helped make that possible in a way. And there's a lot of ways that we've done that. You know, we've helped with our team that does regulatory certification. We've helped make sure that nurses get certified. We've helped make sure things like NFC communication and wireless communication with that. So many of the devices that are in the hospital, that's what makes them interoperable. We've worked on cybersecurity standards to make sure that we're protecting the data. When that nurse wants to take a break and go downstairs and get a cup of coffee because she's been working a long shift. She's going downstairs and the payments that she's making are kept secure by standards we create.

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And just the fact that I could be there as chair meant that other people at Virtual were doing things and covering things that were enabling me to be more outward facing those moments. And that impact isn't always readily visible to people. But our job as leaders is also to help connect people to that. The number one thing that keeps employees engaged is a connection to mission.

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Sometimes that can be really apparent. Sometimes it can take a little bit more of a connection being made by the leader to make it apparent to folks. Everyone by now has heard the story of when JFK toured the Space Center in the 1960s. And he talked to somebody who was sweeping the floor and asked them what they were doing. He said, “I'm helping put a man on the moon.” That person was connected to their mission. That person understood the bigger picture.

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But it's not always readily apparent. It's those quiet moments, those moments that you need to make sure that somebody understands how it all connects and how it all comes together. We have people at Virtual who are out and client facing every day and who are out on the road going to client meetings, and we have people who would never leave the office or never leave their home office, but they're all very important to what our clients are accomplishing.

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Whether it's helping organize professionals who are researching things like eating disorders, the work that we do as a team, no matter where you are, has an impact. Our job as leaders is to help people connect with and find that impact, no matter where they are, whether that moment is loud and onstage or quiet, no matter where it might be.

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So, I challenge you. Can you help your organization find that connection to leadership? Can you help find the ways that what you're doing right now is making your mark on the world? And find the ways and help your team stay engaged by making that connection for them.

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Thanks for connecting with me over the last five minutes. If you've enjoyed this, make sure you like or subscribe by clicking the buttons below.