Hard-won advice and the trait all leaders need: The Valuable 500’s Caroline Casey

Meet The Leader / Linda Lacina Welcome to Meet the Leader, a podcast where top leaders share how they're tackling the world's toughest challenges.

Today's leader, Caroline Casey. She's the founder and self-described troublemaker behind disability inclusion group, The Valuable 500. She'll talk about how bridging the 'disability data gap' can create opportunities for millions worldwide. And she'll share the hard-won lessons that have helped her develop as a leader.

Subscribe to Meet the Leader on Apple, Spotify and wherever you get your favourite podcasts. And please take a moment to rate and review us. I'm Linda Lacina from the World Economic Forum and this is Meet the Leader.

Valuable 500 Founder Caroline Casey This is a cultural issue. This is a financial issue. This is a market issue, but it needs to be cracked open with data and leadership.

Meet The Leader / Linda Lacina

Businesses collect all manner of data points to track sales, profits and more recently -- inclusivity. But despite the strides made for inclusion in recent years, you’d likely still be shocked at how little disability data is collected and at how small a role disability plays even in tracking impact across things like ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) performance.

Caroline Casey knows this well, She’s the founder of the Valuable 500, an organization that represents 22 million workers across 64 sectors. It’s the largest global collective of its kind with 500 CEOSs and companies like IBM, Bank of America and Verizon, all working together to end disability exclusion world wide.

Key to bridging these gaps, Caroline knows, is aligning on a standard set of key performance indicators - or KPIs - that help companies make progress and help make 'apples to apples' comparisons between companies finally possible.

This January, in Davos, her organisation launched a special white paper, ESG and Disability Data: A Call for Inclusive Reporting, one that identifies 5 KPIs that can help create that baseline for things like workforce representation or digital accessibility.

Caroline talked to me at the Annual Meeting in January about how important it can be to bring disability metrics into a greater share of standard documents like annual reports and how businesses that make progress against these metrics can truly scale opportunity for millions.

She also talked to me about her journey in founding The Valuable 500: what she’s learned, what motivates her, how a mentor changed how she thinks about impact and why a leader’s self-awareness is critical to better managing people.

She’ll share all of that -- including why she thinks all CEOs should go to therapy -- but first, she’ll tell us more about the disability gap and how data can close it.

Valuable 500 Founder Caroline Casey: Imagine what it would look like by 2025 if every 500 company had disability performance in their annual report.

Currently 22% do but what would that look like if we had all of them? So what would they report on? And this is the big problem.

The issue around disability reporting is so complex and a lot of companies - it's one of our protected characteristics, right? So you don't have to report about it. So business cover, what do we report about? Or it's maybe too difficult and complex to do it.

But actually we can do it because we've now worked with our iconic companies and set literally into the hundreds of our Valuable 500 companies. And we've identified five key metrics that our companies could report on. An employee resource group. Do you have them? Do you have goals and do you have measurable targets? Is your technology and your digital presence accessible? What about our self-ID and of our organisations. Do we even know our workforce and how many people of disability exist? And lastly is: let's train and let's put money behind it.

So if we could imagine by 2025, every one of our 500 companies have an annual report and they're measuring against one or five of those, that's system change. That's game changing.

So to build a collective like we've done this and that was history making and we launched it here in Davos and everybody said that was insane. How how do we ever hope to create a collective of companies -- like we are the biggest companies in the world - that's all very well, but what are you going to do with it?

And what our very specific piece -- and this is where I get excited -- is because, my gosh, what would it look like if we could get our companies to harmoniously and in a synchronised way, put their all of their collective action against focused areas?

Then we stop having these sort of unjoined dots and therefore disability really gets diluted like anything else is so many priorities the business has.

So that's what makes us exciting to come back and do that. And that challenge to business, it goes out tomorrow, which is really big, but we don't expect our companies to do it immediately. You know, we have an ecosystem here to help, but go on the journey with us, come back on the 3rd of December in Tokyo in 2025, and let's report back on what this 500 has done. Let's hold ourselves accountable and help our companies have the metrics to which they can hold themselves accountable.

Meet The Leader / Linda Lacina: With the data, we've seen companies have been more open about releasing data. In some cases, they've been forced to release data about gender metrics and things like that. And in some sectors, it's still been sort of stubborn, some of these numbers haven't moved on. What needs to happen? Making sure that the companies are using it as a way to propel them for change. How can we make sure that that happens?

Valuable 500 Founder Caroline Casey: What are we going to do with the data and who reads the data and how and how are we looking at it to inform what we need? So I can only speak to the work we do with our Valuable 500, because, I mean, listen, as I repeat it, I mean, you think about 22 million employees and what it represents. So the data we get, it can be read lots of different ways. Now, how we use it, whether it's data we want to hear or not, and that's really hard. We hear what the businesses want. We hear where they have huge opportunities, where they're failing. And that helps us inform the focused areas of the collective action that we ask them to do.

Now, how we would encourage our companies...if you are collecting the data, but are you using that data to put resources behind, for example, training or goals or accessibility. Are you using that data to put accessibility right up the food chain, to where it is vitally important?

And then how do we, how does that happen? How can the CEOs or the C-suite do that when they have a million different priorities?

Well, look, let's be honest. If we want to change leadership behaviour, it has to be incentivised. You know, the shareholders of most of our businesses. I mean, that's the shareholders are like, you know, it's the bottom line. So we have got to start educating our shareholders in the longer game and their responsibility because let's be honest, they don't really want that - because that therefore incentivises or helps us incentivise our leaders at top to have behaviours that are not just about the bottom line. I mean, let's be honest, if you're in a position like that, you have to have good behaviour rewarded and whether that's around the environment or your people, we need that to be measured in salary and performance, not just the bottom line, which requires us to educate our shareholders.

Meet The Leader / Linda Lacina: What surprised you? Were there any metrics from your own white paper that deepened your understanding? What struck you?

Valuable 500 Founder Caroline Casey Well, look, I tell you the first thing that when we created The Valuable 500, we started as I was still amazed of the level of fear. Excuse making. 'Well, we don't know.' Right.

So then let's go back to what we're doing and intrusive reporting. Well, you don't know. That's how you got that data. Yeah, we don't know what to do. Well, let's show you who's out there. And the fear.

So this is terrifying results. So when we did a piece of work in 2021 on Tortoise Media. This is FTSE. So this is UK based and I understand I'm going to say that not one. Person disclosing having a disability was in senior leadership above. So let me just clearly say that nobody in leadership of our FTSE 100 companies claimed to disclose. Now, that cannot be true because 80% is invisible.

It also cannot be true because we did a piece of research with EY and it was saying 7% of our C-suite did. So there's the fear.

So when we look at then, for example, Self I.D., do you know that 16 of our Fortune 100 companies dare to ask or have self I.D. in 2021. Ok, it's 19 in 2022? But seriously, that's very low. Only 22% of our companies in The Valuable 500 were reporting on anything to do with disability. 78% are not.

Let's go to accessibility. A third, a third of FTSE 100 companies don't have accessible websites. So can you hear that we have crafted the data that we want to collect, the reporting we want to get because it's really reflective, not just anecdotally in the conversations you have, but it's also reflective of the fear that exists. And that fear is stopping companies beginning because they think they get better return on investment if they maybe focus their area on another area of inclusion. But what our challenge is today -- and we have to -- we talk about a fragmented world. Why are we fragmenting our humanity into silos? And I was really surprised to still see the silo effect of 'Gender 2023,' 'Race 2025' and disability was invisible.

So when you're collecting and informing what we want our companies to do, find out who is in your workforce, put the money behind the training, set your goals and your targets. See how many people are connected to disability in your business. You know, that's what we're asking our companies to do, because let's be honest, what I am more concerned about is 80% disability is invisible. We know that 12 to 16% of our current employees and in our Valuable 500 are at disability and they're not disclosing it. Why? Why are they not disclosing? This is a cultural issue. This is a financial issue. This is a market issue. But it needs to be cracked open with data and leadership.

Meet The Leader / Linda Lacina You're a founder of The Valuable 500. What was the turning point that kind of led you to be like, 'okay, somebody needs to do something and that's me.'

Valuable 500 Founder Caroline Casey Well, first of all, The Valuable 500 is personal. I've been in space now for 23 years as a disability activist and troublemaker. I have lived experience myself, which I hid. And I came out of the disability closet in the year 2000. So I don't want that to continue.

But there was a personal turning point to make The Valuable 500 happen, and it was the unexpected death of my father. And that does make you examine, 'well, what am I here for?' But the professional reason was when my father died, I'd been working in this space for 16 years, and still disability lay on the sidelines. Still, we saw companies who were 90% claiming to have a comprehensive view of inclusion, only 4% at disability. And you know what? When Dad - when Dad died, I went, 'Well, you know what? When I have to go, I hope that's got to change.' So I think a very interesting thing. The power of grief is is a great way to challenge you. And I really brought my heart into The Valuable 500 with a lot of strong evidence base. And I think that was the magic. It's bringing the head and the heart.

Meet The Leader / Linda Lacina: You mentioned you have lived experience in this space. How does that guide you when it comes to prioritising initiatives and where the resources go?

Valuable 500 Founder Caroline Casey: I have to be very careful as a person with a lived experience. I have a disability and I can't speak for anybody else. But what I can speak to is working, being part of our community and working collectively together to try to fundamentally change the business system.

And I know business always comes back and they have so many priorities and hope 'Not another thing.' I mean, you can usually see it in the back of there. Because they have short resources and it's tight. It's getting tighter and tighter.

You don't have to do more. You don't have to add another silo on it. Can we not integrate disability into the other inclusion programs that already exist - integrate it into your sustainability program? Ask accessibility questions. Make it part of. We're asking for interconnectedness and an intentionality behind it. It's not something else to add on because disability and all of the inclusion issues. It's there. And every single one of us at some point in our life is going to have a disability. Weave it in.

Meet The Leader / Linda Lacina In the creation of The Valuable 500, in the running of it, I'm sure there's many moments where you thought, 'Oh, gosh, like we're just hitting walls.' You're not entirely sure how you're going to get past it. You get through it, but there's a moment where you're like, 'Ay!' Can you tell me about a moment where that happened and how you got through it?

Valuable 500 Founder Caroline Casey My gosh, there's so many moments. Anybody who's an entrepreneur and anybody who's an activist and anybody who's trying to do something that hasn't been done before. Oh, my gosh. Many.

But I will tell you, when I roared on the main stage of One Young World in 2017 and saying, 'why can I not get one CEO, one leader. I hear you talking about everything else. But why aren't you not talking about disability?' I was just going, 'Oh, I'm going to give up on that.' This is going to be my swan song. And it was in Colombia, that Paul Polman stood on stage. I didn't -- you know -- he would have been the one that I had really wanted and today he's the chairman of The Valuable 500.

And then there was times that I wanted to launch The Valuable 500 on the main stage at the World Economic Forum in 2019. You know, disability had been in maybe special sessions, in the cultural session, but it never had taken main stage. And I honestly - to get it on the main stage. Yeah, that was hard.

And then making 500 companies come and and to work with you. No money, remortgaging houses. So what kept me going, I keep trying to develop myself as a leader. I keep trying not to take failure personally because that does not make me a good leader. I do exercise a lot and I have I have really, really good friends and people around me. But when I probably have the most scared that I'm not going to do it, I do have to go silent. I have to go into myself and go into that confidence and belief in yourself, that ball of passion. Maybe when only one or two other people believe in you and you just have to go, 'Is this the right thing to do?'

Meet The Leader / Linda Lacina: You mentioned that you continue to develop yourself as a leader. What are some things that you have been working on and developing and making better, faster, stronger?

Valuable 500 Founder Caroline Casey Oh, my gosh. That's such a good question. And this is like therapy. I would say the most important thing I've learned in myself is when I - this is going to sound maybe very fluffy, but it's very important - the better I am, the more aware I am of myself, the more I am accepting of who I am. I am a better leader.

And having done a lot of work on myself and I very keenly own it. Actually, if i had one thing in the world, I'd put every CEO through therapy. I mean, honestly, I would nearly make it a prerequisite to do your work because then you can lead. Because you're we're leading people. We're not just making markers. We're leading people. So if our leaders are not self-aware, have not done their work. Right. I mean, you don't make great decisions when you've not done your work. So the biggest thing, the three lessons I've learned as a kind of now an ageing entrepreneur in this space because I'm 51 and very proud, is you really need not to take failure personally. You have to try to see that as an opportunity and an open door. Your business is not your family and know that you need to have a very soft front but a strong heart.

We're here to deliver impact. We're here to deliver change. We're here to deliver. So it's really -- I've learned that -- because I wanted everybody to like us and it would be great. But it's moving as you scale the business from family into really impact, and that does not make you popular.

And the third thing I've learnt is make the big tough decisions fast and just pull off that bandage. Because in that gap of uncertainty, that lack of confidence I think can have a detrimental effect.

And I think last of all, go with your gut, your gut instinct. I have made the greatest mistakes in my life when I stopped having confidence in myself and I listened to other people. Listen to your gut, listen to your gut. And listen to your gut.

Meet The Leader / Linda Lacina: Is there a piece of advice that you have always been grateful for?

Valuable 500 Founder Caroline Casey: So many again. But I'm going to say one thing that was very uncomfortable advice given to me was by Bill Mitchell. He was one of the former CEOs of Arrow, which is a Fortune 200 company. And he was mentoring me. And he said, "Casey." He liked to call me Casey. He said, "yes, you're a system thinker. Yes. You have great vision and ambition. But remember, 80% is good enough."

I said "What? But it has to be perfect." And he just said, "If you want to scale change, if you want system change. 80% is good enough. Perfection is what gets in your way. Get out of your way. Get out of your own way.'

Meet The Leader / Linda Lacina: Is there a book that you recommend?

Valuable 500 Founder Caroline Casey Loads of books. I am a big lover of Brené Brown, and Rising Strong was actually one of the books I read in one of the moments. 'How will I ever get funding for The Valuable 500?' Thank you, Nippon Foundation, we finally did. Rising Strong, Brené Brown and Daring Greatly. The reason I think Brené Brown -- as like Susan Cain, whose book is called Quiet, they blend personal stories of themselves and of research with very compelling data. And I think to have personal change and when we're looking at cultural change in our business, we need that. The thing that I loved about Brené Brown's work is own your shame, be vulnerable. Be human in that, because that's your greatest strength. I'm starting to see CEOs do that. Because when we work with CEOs, we see CEOs telling their stories. And that very vulnerable place is the greatest strength, the impact of the teams around them. So Brené Brown, every CEO, Brené Brown.

Meet The Leader / Linda Lacina: We are in a polycrisis, we've got an economic crisis. We've got an energy crisis, a climate crisis. How can leaders prioritise in a time like this?

Valuable 500 founder Caroline Casey: First of all, we have to learn how to manage chaos and to deal with uncertainty, because the one thing we -- once again the cliche -- we're certain we're uncertain. This is a decade of disruption. It's deeply difficult. So the biggest thing before we tell our leaders to prioritise -- My thing is are we helping our leaders have the skills to do transformational change, managing uncertainty, managing people around them?

I think the big thing is if you want to talk about all of this place moving forward, we've got to do things differently. We have to see different leadership on boards. I'm sorry. And on our C-suite, because we can't see the same people in power. And those voices, I think we need to start seeing a very different approach to how we are building our cultures in these hybrid, very difficult new work setups that exist. And I think the biggest priority is, is not to silo our work around inclusion. Inclusion is all for everyone or not at all. So for me, it's not about continuing this sort of polarisation or silos, you know, which is very divisive. When we talk about inclusion, we need to have a universal approach to that. See where the overlap is. See where the the symmetries are and then focus.

Meet The Leader / Linda Lacina: We need resilient leaders in this time. What does resilient leadership need mean to you? And you know, how can leaders is put that into practice?

Valuable 500 founder Caroline Casey: The first thing is not to be hard on yourself. You know, it's hard. Leading is hard and it is really lonely. And if you're talking about your your resilience is, first of all, to know that. I think also to lead is not to be liked all the time. And I think that's hard. Some of us are people pleasers. I'm a recovering people pleaser.

But it's really to understand the competency of your business and to know this is not about popularity, but doing what is right and always doing what is right.

I think a big piece around resilience is owning when you didn't do so good and not being frightened about it and being accountable because that's what builds trust, not just with yourself, but with other people.

And I think a big part of resilience, you know, sometimes is getting a bit of context and putting what you do in the broader aspect of your life. We as people are not the roles that we sit in and here and come talk to you as a podcast or that you're CEO, you're a person. And it's how we live our lives and that we understand how we are turning up in our business needs to be very much about who we are and the values that we have as a human being. And never forget to give yourself that time and to take your eyes up and look around your family, your friends, the nature. Do not underestimate the balance of the joyful things in your life, whether it's dancing -- love a dance floor -- whether it's reading, whether it's photography, whether it's just, I don't know, putting a flamingo in your back garden, you know, let's bring in the joy of ourselves as human beings, because it can go like that. It can go like that. And honestly, we have this choice in a sort of disruptive moment to change the way our business culture can function, making sure it's human centred.

Meet The Leader / Linda Lacina That was Caroline Casey. Thanks to her and thanks so much to you for listening. A transcript of this episode and my colleagues' episodes, Radio Davos and the Book Club Podcast is available at wef.ch/podcasts.

If you liked that episode, check out episode 57 with Kearny's Alex Liu. He takes us through some research his consulting firm has done on joy at work: what's needed to make it happen and how we can all attain and protect it.

This episode of Meet the Leader was presented and produced by me with Juan Toran as studio engineer, Taz Kelleher as editor and Gareth Nolan driving studio production.

That's it for now. I'm Linda Lacina with the World Economic Forum. Have a great day.