[Transcript]
Narrator (00:24):
Welcome to Love Your People, where we help you explore how people-first leadership transforms workplaces and drives real business impact. We're proud to bring you this show at ITA Group because helping people and brands thrive together is at the heart of everything we do, whether it's employee experience, customer loyalty, events, learning or beyond. We believe people are the key to performance. In today's episode, our host, John Duisberg, sits down with a truly inspiring leader, Bettina Deynes, Global Chief Human Resources Officer at Carnival Corporation. From her early days cleaning offices as a teenage immigrant to now leading HR strategy for over 160,000 employees worldwide, Bettina's journey is one of resilience, vision and authentic leadership that you won't want to miss. You'll hear how she helped shape culture across Carnival's eight cruise brands, what it means to lead with kindness and why emotional intelligence is such a critical skill for today's leaders. John, over to you.
John Duisberg (01:34):
So super excited just to learn from you, Bettina, but welcome to the show. So grateful to have you here today.
Bettina Deynes (01:40):
Thank you, John, for having me. It is my pleasure to join this group. And how do you say no to a podcast that has Love You in the title?
John Duisberg (01:50):
Love is a superpower. I agree.
Bettina Deynes (01:52):
Yes.
John Duisberg (01:52):
I agree. I agree. Yeah. Well, thank you again for joining and let's jump right in. I want to start by one, if you could give our audience just a little more detail in terms of the scope of your leadership at Carnival Corporation. I mentioned 160,000 plus employees, but a little more just around what you're leading today. But then would love for you to just share a little bit about your own personal journey, right from the humble beginnings to now an executive leader of one of the largest organizations in the world. So love to hear from you, but thank you again for joining and I'll pass it to you, Bettina.
Bettina Deynes (02:29):
Alright, so I am the Global Chief HR Officer for Carnival Corporation, which is eight brands under the corporation. We have Princess, Holland America, Seabourn, Carnival Cruise Line which is the largest and where I started when I first joined in 2019. We have Cunard and P&L cruises in the UK. We have Costa Cruises from Italy; we have AIDA in Germany, and,like you mentioned, is over 160,000 crew members. And we have about 30,000 shore site employees from 152 nationalities. And I oversee the HR function across the globe from talent management, from policy strategy, global compensation benefits, learning and development, our leadership framework, anything that you can imagine under the HR realm. And I'm also currently assisting with building our new world headquarters that is being built here in Miami, and where most of our North American brands will come together in three years time to be together and continue to enrich our culture.
John Duisberg (03:57):
Wow, that is awesome. Awesome. Bettina. Yeah, thank you so much for just the additional background. So maybe just to add on to that, tell us a little bit about your journey, so your personal story from starting to where you are today.
Bettina Deynes (04:11):
Okay, so if I was going to summarize, I'm originally from Uruguay, which is a very small country in South America between Argentina and Brazil. And I say that because a lot of people don’t know where we are. Only 3 million people, we’re very well known for soccer is there. And so I came to the states when I was 17 years old, immigrated with my mother. My brother had already been in the States for a few years. First job, as most immigrants, the only thing that I could do with the very little English that I spoke was to find a job as a janitor, cleaning offices at night.
(04:58):
Very difficult job, but one that allowed me the opportunity to dream, to dream and to manifest into what my future will be like. The biggest breakthrough that I can imagine was that one of the offices that I used to clean was a beautiful corner office in Washington, D.C., had an amazing view of the Capitol and I used to fantasize that that was my office. And I would sit in the chair, pick up the phone and pretend, really pretend that it was my office, it was my job. And I had really huge dreams and aspirations of what I was going to do. But 10 years later, after many different roles, eventually I went to work for the office at the office for the janitor cleaning company. I was the receptionist. And then I started doing payroll. And it was at the beginning of HR as a function.
(06:02):
It used to be personnel management. And somebody said, “Are you interested in leading the HR function?” And I joined SHRM earlier my career. I mean this is the early nineties (don't do the math to see how old I am). But I started self-learning, attending conferences, attending the SHRM chapter, every opportunity that I had to learn because I didn't know anything about HR. And eventually I became an HR manager and progressively I had more opportunities into bigger roles, bigger companies. And then about 10 years into it, I hit my first real break and I was going to join a multinational organization. They had their offices in D.C. It was a confidential search, so I had not physically been in the office yet, but somebody had said that I was going to love it and I was going to love the office because it had an amazing view.
(07:15):
And so here I am 10 years later, coming back to this building and I felt a sense of DeJa’Vu that I had been there before, but it didn't hit me until I came off of the elevator walking to the corner office and realizing that that was the same exact office that I had cleaned 10 years ago. And as you can imagine, I really broke down and I'm crying and the person that was bringing me there had no clue what was going on. But at that point I really knew that things were meant to be, that it wasn't a coincidence that I had worked really hard and I had earned my place. And eventually I had some really amazing opportunities. I was the head of HR for the Washington Nationals Baseball Club as they transitioned from Montreal into Washington, D.C. So building the team, not really knowing anything about baseball, but daring to learn and to put myself out there.
(08:22):
I worked for the city of Alexandria. Eventually I got the HR role at SHRM, which earlier in my career had been there to help me in my progression in my early career progression. So now I'm the head of HR at SHRM. Being a thought leader for HR gave me a tremendous opportunity to travel and to really advocate for the profession and the HR professional. Eventually I knew that I wanted to be a practitioner of HR, working for a company, being invested in building a team and building a culture. My husband, who's from Puerto Rico, had wanted to move into warmer weather for a long time. And so when the opportunity came in 2019 to relocate to Miami, we thought that it was amazing. So we did. And that was back in June of 2019, right before COVID, which if it wouldn't have happened maybe a few months later, I wouldn't be where I am today.
(09:35):
So again, I don't think it was a coincidence, but I came to lead Carnival Cruise Line, which is the largest of the brands with 50,000 crew members. And at that point I thought, ‘Oh my God, what am I going to do with 50,000?’ I have always been a positive thinker, convincing myself that I'm able to do things even though sometimes that's not always the case, but found myself in a very difficult industry. The cruise industry is probably the most difficult industry I have ever worked. It has maybe six industries within one industry between culinary, transportation, hospitality, entertainment, everything that we do and the scope of it. And managing these floating cities with thousands of crew members, I think are the newest generation of ships that we're building. They have over 8,000 passengers and 2000 crew members, so 10,000 people on a ship. And so I had the opportunity of working for Carnival Cruise Line for three years.
(10:53):
I was there through COVID as the cruise industry was probably the most impacted in many ways. Early on we carry the scarlet letter for COVID and we were on a total pause for 22 months. We had to pause our operations. And that was extremely challenging and difficult. And I went from early on my tenure with Carnival Cruise line feeling really irrelevant and inadequately ready to lead such a large scope and responsibility. But when we had to depatriate and we had to really respond to the crisis, everything became about HR. And usually in HR, we talk about the cliche that it's about having a seat at the table. And during those COVID months, it [was] about HRB and the table, the seats, everything. And because everything that we did had to do with our people; and after 22 months, we were the first ones to fully return in operations, which was quite remarkable.
(12:09):
And as difficult as it was to be on the pause, returning into full operations at the same time that the whole industry was returning, including hotels and hospitality, was incredibly challenging. And for us to be the first ones, that was quite remarkable. And eventually I was given the opportunity for this promotional opportunity to become the global chief HR officer for the entire corporation back in 2022. And so I've been now on this job for almost three years, total of six years. If you would have seen me three days ago before I color my hair, you would've seen a lot of gray that wasn't there six years ago.
John Duisberg (13:00):
I got the grays coming in. Don't worry, I'm doing 'em for you.
Bettina Deynes (13:03):
Yeah, six years ago, I think I looked a lot younger than I do today, but it's been really worth the journey and very rewarding in many ways. Not just professionally, but personally as well.
John Duisberg (13:20):
That is such an amazing inspiring journey. Congratulations. One of the things that, a couple things that just really struck me. One is through hardship, whether that be personal life or a professional beyond your control that all of a sudden you join this organization and you're now dealing with COVID, right? And so through these hardships actually can represent opportunity if you have that belief in yourself and the ability to keep moving and keep striving forward. And you mentioned a word that I just really want to home in on, and the word was “breakthrough.” So that moment where you're dreaming, you're fantasizing about that office and then realizing this is now your office, and you had this breakthrough of if you follow your dream, you can accomplish these amazing things that seem out of reach impossible. And so my question kind of going back to our audience and all the things we as leaders might be dealing with is how do you create a culture of breakthroughs? How do you create these breakthrough moments for employees so that they understand, “wow, they have a career path,” they have the ability to achieve amazing things within Carnival Corporation or our guests, our audience, their organization. So talk to us a little bit about that. What are your thoughts on that? How do you create the culture of breakthroughs?
Bettina Deynes (14:50):
Yeah, I think it also has a lot to do with perspective. I remember when I was cleaning the office and I thought, I came all the way to the United States, and here I am in this beautiful country, which in my mind, it all looked like Baywatch because that's what I watch on TV when I was in Norway. And here I am cleaning bathrooms. And I had a perspective of what I wanted it to be. And I love when I get to share with my crew members when I go on the ships, and we have people from all over the world, and some of them, they began their earlier careers, maybe as in the housekeeping department, in the galley of the kitchen. It is hard work. It is far away from home. And I tell them my story because I want them to relate to the fact that I was also an immigrant and I had a vision for my life and for what I wanted to achieve.
(15:52):
And I see it with them. And I see someone that started maybe as a galley steward and today's an executive chef maybe for a number of shifts and recognizing those moments that are critical. And sometimes it's usually in the bad moments where we build the most resilience and that grit that we will need to face the real challenges that come along the way. I don't know one successful person that hasn't struggled and hasn't suffered. And in many ways there is sweat, blood and tears that comes with achieving success. A lot of times people only see the end result and they don't see the journey, but it's in the journey that we learn and we acquire the skills that will later on be crucial for our success.
John Duisberg (16:49):
Yeah, no, I love that. So I'm a founder of a company that was acquired previously, and grit was actually one of our core values because there's so much struggle. And people say, when we hit a level of success, they'd say, well, you're like an overnight success story. I'm like, well, where were you the last 10 years with all the gray heroes coming in? But going back to grit and this culture, I know that at Carnival Corporation you've implemented the culture essentials. And so this is where you're defining your purpose, your mission, your values, which I think is foundational. And I think a lot of leaders in our audience today, they may have defined their core values and purpose, but I think part of the challenge with this is how do you bring it to life with 160,000 plus employees? How do you create consistency across these brands? So you've done this work for the culture essential. So now how do you reinforce it in a positive way? How do you bring it to life? Tell us a little bit more about that.
Bettina Deynes (17:57):
Yeah, so I am very proud of the fact that I work for a company that doesn't just focus on the what, but it's even more important how many years ago we determined that we needed some cultural essentials that were basically guiding principles that we wanted everyone to adapt and to embody. There were six essentials, listen and learn, which means that listen actively to understand, not to react, empowerment, communication, respect, and protect, not only each other, but the communities that we visit, the ocean improve. There is always a continuous improvement. And we determined that it wasn't just going to be a poster that we're going to publish and we were going to tell people, these are our culture essentials. No, we were going to embody them. And the way that we did is that we brought it in into all of our performance management, our talent management, our succession planning, everything that we do has a culture aspect.
(19:19):
We created environments and activities and initiatives on our ships. We created what we call the Better Together initiative where we model our culture based on inclusion and providing opportunities for any crew member to thrive. We also dealt with a lot of cultural differences. We were very diverse. If you can imagine 152 nationalities, does that translate into having an inclusive environment where people feel that they belong and they can thrive? And how do you really ensure that there is one vibrant culture regardless of where people come from, where they're coming their own unique identity and culture? So we put in a lot of work. We spent a lot of time on our ships. We also make sure that our shore side employees had a clear understanding and there was accountability from the leadership, from the highest level all the way to those in their earlier careers in terms of how we upheld these culture essentials and these values into everything that we do. And today, I am glad that it's not just about what we do, how we do it is actually more important. And I believe that anybody can come in with some level of competencies and skill sets to what they do and learn and grow from there. But it’s the culture piece, the how, the respect, how we treat our employees with dignity, with love, with kindness that matters the most.
John Duisberg (21:10):
Yeah, I love how you just with love, right, and kindness and not just about the what, but the how do you put it into action and spending time on the ships, meeting people where they are and all the different backgrounds. So that's really, really powerful. And so building on where you landed with that, with the kindness and the love, one of the things that we always try to do as we conclude an episode, which by the way, Bettina, thank you so much for sharing with us and just kind of your journey and lessons learned. But one of the things we always like to do is leave our audience with a key takeaway, a key insight that they might be able to bring into their own organization to help them on their own journey when it comes to loving their people and the employee experience. And so you mentioned this leading with kindness, you mentioned with loving people. So it would be great to just hear more about that. How do you lead with kindness? And I feel like how does that also mean expecting really high performance and creating a culture of winning and all of the things that matter to obviously your business, but how do you do it in a loving way that is going to support the culture that you're building and so on that, but also any other kind of key lesson learned that you'd be willing to leave our audience with today would be wonderful.
Bettina Deynes (22:47):
Well, I always said that the easiest part of my job is to be kind, that there shouldn't be any effort in being kind. I think that for a long time we have overemphasized intelligence and performance results and not so much on the emotional side of what we do and the connections that we create. At the end of the day, Carnival Corporation, its beauty and success is based on the people. It's not the beautiful ships. It's not the amazing entertainment. It's not the beautiful destinations that we visit. It is what you are made feel when you are on the ships that is delivered by our crew members. That is this special sauce behind our success. And if companies will realize that creating that human connection, that meaningful relationship and understanding of how valuable it is to connect with people in a real way, we will see a lot more in terms of success and things really getting done.
(24:08):
At a much higher level, we really, really focus on giving individuals the tools. We have very high standards for leadership, understanding that not everyone is meant to be a leader. There are many other organizations, and I worked in a few of them, that you rely on titles to reward maybe a high performer, but that person may not be ready to take on a leadership role. We do a lot of assessments. We actually use Hogan as a behavioral assessment tool that informs what are the values of this individual, what are the derailers, what are the things that when under a lot of stress, this person may a lead from reaching their goals. And why is this important? Because it gives our employees an opportunity to understand what is needed, the tools that they need to get to be excellent leaders and really live up and embody the culture that we stand for and is our identity and our DNA.
John Duisberg (25:25):
Love that Bettina. I am personally inspired. I'm going to be going out and carrying this torch of how to lead with love and kindness because this is how we're going to build up a culture of excellence and that people can have those breakthrough moments both personally and professionally. And so I'm so grateful for you just sharing your journey, sharing your lessons learned, and really just inspiring our community here. So subscribe to the Love Your People podcast. We're going to continue to have more amazing leaders like Bettina join to share their journey and their insights, but so grateful for you, Bettina. And then for all of our audience joining all around the world, as we wrap up today, remember this, the insights you've gained are only as valuable as the action you take leadership and culture transformation. Start with each of us at ITA Group. We help people and brands thrive together because creating a workplace where people feel seen, valued and inspired is how we drive meaningful change. For more strategies, tools, and insights to help you lead with purpose and build people first organizations, visit itagroup.com/insights. Thank you for joining us, and until next time, keep leading with your heart and making a difference as a people-first leader worth following.