By Yvette Hunsicker, Vice President Human Resources & Inclusion and Diversity at Honda North America Inc.
I joined Honda three decades ago as a production associate in the weld department of our Marysville Auto Plant in rural Ohio. Honda had become the first Japanese automaker to build cars in America seven years earlier and as a woman of color in a predominately white and male environment, well, let’s just say being different and new made for some challenging days.
Today, I’m a vice president of Human Resources at Honda, and I lead our Office of Inclusion and Diversity. So, my job includes guiding the effort to bring younger versions of myself to the company and create an environment where young people of different backgrounds can contribute to Honda’s success.
Through business resource groups and a formal, year-long mentorship program we created to improve the readiness of high-potential associates to advance into leadership positions, Honda is making steady progress toward our commitment to maintain a diverse and inclusive environment in all areas of our business. But inclusion can’t rely only on special programs. We must create the conditions in the daily workplace that reinforce the company direction and truly serve to unlock the potential of every associate.
Reflecting on my experience starting out in the workplace at Honda, the key is an environment that not only allows but encourages people to be themselves and expand their knowledge as the foundation for personal and professional growth.
I worked hard during my early career, but there were leaders and workplace mentors who saw the potential in me… worked with me to recognize it in myself… and then encouraged me to act upon it. They challenged me to see things differently and forced me out of my comfort zone.
So, here are a few insights that have been critical to my success.
1. Ask questions
Working in the weld shop at the Marysville Auto Plant, my coordinator at the time always teased me about the number of questions I would ask. Well, it was mostly teasing, but I know that I was a bit of a pain in the butt because I was big on asking “why?” When there was an equipment issue, I didn’t want to have to call someone to fix it, I wanted to understand the root cause so that I could fix it myself. I became pretty proficient at recovering my equipment and handling manual changeovers between products.
There are two critical lessons here. By asking questions, I learned how to piece the puzzle together toward the long-term strategy. In every job, I always encourage people to ask questions as a means to look downstream at the broader strategy. I know this helped me understand the vision and how what I was doing lined up to achieve that long-term goal.
It also was critically important that people were patient with me. Asking questions can agitate people, but my leadership saw that I was taking ownership. They encouraged me to ask questions and, as a result, I was able to show them I could do things they may not have been aware of otherwise.
2. Be curious
A corollary to asking questions is the importance of being curious about your company and your responsibility as a means to learn and advance. Whenever there was an issue on the production line, we had to log in the problem and put our initials on the check sheet. In a manufacturing environment where people are focused on their jobs, it’s often a struggle to get them to do the check sheet.
But I was curious about why the company needed this information and I wondered what they did with it. My coordinator explained that the purpose was to study trends. I spoke up because I thought there was a more efficient way to do it, and it wasn’t long before I was recording the data, helping others record their data and looking at the reports and making recommendations.
My leadership could have just told me to quit asking questions and do my job. Instead, they encouraged me. Moreover, the reputation I earned served me well as I moved around the organization. When I came back to the plant in an administrative role, my responsibility included the weld shop. The people I had worked with in weld respected me as someone who had “learned the floor,” and it made it easier to get things done as a team.
3. Be a sponge
At every stop along my career path, I tried to absorb everything. I was like a sponge. This included the advice that I invest in myself through formal education, which led me to go to college at night. After I left the production line to join the Human Resources group, I was able to complete my schooling and received my college degree.
But my time in the manufacturing environment shaped the way I think. In production, the processes generally have a prescribed sequence in order to achieve the best outcome. For example, production associates will be instructed to shoot bolts in a certain order because the experts have identified this as the best way to strengthen the part and guarantee quality. This led me to become a systems thinker, even outside the production environment.
Today, my approach to problem-solving is the belief that following a process leads to good outcomes. When things don’t add up for me, I ask questions and attempt to get into the root cause as the means to fix the problem. You can learn from every aspect of your work. Be a sponge.
4. Get out of your comfort zone
After I had been in Human Resources for over 18 years serving our manufacturing operations in Ohio, I was asked to leave the department to take another responsibility. I had been in HR for a long period of time and was a subject matter expert, in that area. I knew the functions well and, importantly for me, I was doing well.
But a woman in leadership pulled me aside and said for my long-term development and career growth, it would be beneficial to move away from HR. It really rocked my world to think about leaving my comfort zone. But she was right because it taught me how to be a better leader. In HR, if someone wasn’t performing well I could simply do that job because I was an expert. My new role was more strategic, requiring me to learn to lead an area where I wasn’t the SME.
I needed this experience to understand the larger scope required to be a better leader. I would never have known to ask for this opportunity, but it really helped me grow as a leader of people.
5. Stay true to yourself
The one thing I have never changed is who I am as a person. I like helping people realize their full potential, whether through my involvement in the community or in the office. And I bring that same person to work every day. There is something unique about each of us. Our founder, Soichiro Honda valued diversity. He wanted everyone in the company to maintain a “global viewpoint.” He wasn’t just talking about geography. He was thinking about the importance of working with and valuing the perspective of different people. He said: “Work for yourself, not for the company. Remember that you will do well for society when you think of yourself.”
This philosophy is why I have remained at Honda for 31 years. My values have never changed.
