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How to Build Workplace Culture (with Victoria Mattingly)
Picture a Pittsburgh brewery on a summer night: live music, a courtyard in a city that's 25 percent Black, and a crowd that isn't. One Black man walks in, looks around, sits down, and leaves before anyone says a word to him. That's the six-dollar-beer story organizational psychologist Dr. Victoria Mattingly tells about a missed moment of allyship, and it's basically the whole blueprint for the workplace culture work she's built her career on. Dr. Mattingly has spent 15-plus years helping organizations become more equitable and human-centered, and she got there by way of a Portland bar, where two visiting industrial-organizational psychologists once described their entire job as "make the lives of employees better." She's since built a two-way model of allyship (imagine matching book covers, one for allies and one for the people they're supporting, each referencing the other), and she brings the same lived-in honesty to her own story: cancer, alopecia, and a mental health recovery she's been navigating since her early twenties. We get into why she'd rather call emotional intelligence a "power skill" than a soft one, how the DEI landscape quietly reshuffled after 2020, and the hard 5 p.m. boundary she holds as a working mom, even when the Zoom call is fun and nobody's making her leave. Watch this episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRJKZbMwclQ In this episode Why Dr. Mattingly calls emotional intelligence a "power skill," not a soft one, and how that reframe helped her work land with C-suite leaders The mirrored "act like an ally" / "work with an ally" book concept, and why real allyship only works as a two-way partnership A real missed-allyship moment (the six-dollar beer she didn't buy) and how to actually show up as a bystander next time How workplace culture language quietly shifted after 2020, and why some companies rebranded DEI work instead of dropping it Why she believes power skills like emotional intelligence can be trained, not just born with Her hard 5 p.m. boundary as a working mom, and why holding it, even at a fun networking event, matters more than it looks Timestamps (00:01) Welcome and meet organizational psychologist Dr. Victoria Mattingly (01:08) Two I-O psychologists walk into a bar: how she found her field (03:14) Why "soft skills" should really be called "power skills" (05:32) The mirrored "act like an ally" / "work with an ally" book concept (08:17) What allyship actually requires: a real difference, and no personal benefit (11:53) The bystander freeze, and the six-dollar beer she didn't buy (14:06) Cancer, alopecia, and living with mental health issues since her early 20s (19:45) Deciding how much of her own story to put in the book versus the keynote (22:11) From training and development into allyship: the internship that changed her path (25:58) How DEI language shifted after 2020, and why some companies just renamed the work (28:39) Her boundaries lesson: the hard 5 p.m. stop, and caretaking for a parent About Dr. Victoria Mattingly Dr. Victoria Mattingly is an organizational psychologist with more than 15 years of experience helping organizations build more equitable, human-centered workplace cultures. She blends research-backed insights with her own lived experience, including her journey through cancer, alopecia, and mental health recovery, and has served over one hundred companies through her consulting work, Mattingly Solutions. Learn more at Mattingly Solutions, or connect with her on LinkedIn. Favorite quotes "If I can make life at work just a little bit better for a lot of people, I consider that a big win." —Dr. Victoria Mattingly "Don't call yourself an ally. Let someone else call you their ally: that's how you're doing it right." —Dr. Victoria Mattingly "I need to set that precedent, not just for everyone else, which is still an important part of boundaries, but for myself. I need to stay true to that." —Dr. Victoria Mattingly Resources mentioned Mattingly Solutions: Dr. Mattingly's consulting practice Dr. Victoria Mattingly on LinkedIn Inclusalytics, Dr. Mattingly's first book on taking a data-driven approach to DEI Her allyship book, built around mirrored "act like an ally" / "work with an ally" covers, discussed throughout the episode Related episodes How Ego Is Sabotaging Your Leadership: another leadership conversation about what actually changes a company's culture from the inside. Why Neurodiversity Is Important in the Workplace: pairs naturally with Dr. Mattingly's allyship and inclusion work. Emotional Healing Laboratory: The Workplace: more on what makes a workplace genuinely human-centered. Subscribe & connect If this episode gave you something to sit with, follow Phoenix and Flame so you never miss an episode: all apps in one place, or jump straight to Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or YouTube. And if it moved you, leave a review; it's the easiest way to help another listener find the show. Learn more about Phoenix and Flame, connect with Dana, and listen to more episodes here. Curious where your own boundaries stand? Take my free Work Boundaries Quiz: danaskaggs.com/quiz
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