Most companies hand out a training budget and hope for the best. Ina Atanassova has seen where that goes: some people never spend it while others burn it on whatever looks good, and very little of it sticks. A former Bulgarian schoolteacher turned talent development manager, she now runs learning and development at Maltego, and she's rebuilt the whole approach around one idea, that training should start with the company's goals, not a number in a budget line.
In this HR Expert Series episode of the Team Check-In, Ina tells host Emre Ok how she reversed her training process, cascading company goals down to each person's real skill gaps so every program has a point. She talks through leading in uncertainty by being transparent without oversharing, and why she runs motivation through managers rather than trying to reach 300 people herself. She's refreshingly honest, too, about the limits: you can't please everyone, and if a session upskills three people out of ten, it still did its job.
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Emre (00:00.11)
record entire episodes and call people on the show again, especially the first time I was doing that. First time I was doing an episode of the show, it wasn't actually with someone outside. It was with one of our customers. So just imagine my horror when I had to call this paying customer of our product and say, Hi, do you remember the podcast episode we did?
Ina Atanassova (00:03.538)
Thank
Emre (00:27.31)
I would love to do it again, you know, take time out of your schedule and please don't stop using our product in the meantime. was horrendous. But either way, how's everything? Is everything all right with you?
Ina Atanassova (00:33.661)
Thank
Ina Atanassova (00:45.076)
Yeah, everything good. I'm doing fine. I hope that I'm not gonna cough too much during the recording. No, we don't know what it is. I need to go to the hospital for bronchoscopy. So yeah, let's see. Yeah.
Emre (00:53.53)
no, do you have a cold?
Emre (00:58.286)
shucks.
my god, I'm so sorry.
Ina Atanassova (01:07.296)
but it's not there all the time. So I hope that it's not gonna bother you or the listeners.
Emre (01:07.308)
I don't I-
Emre (01:13.772)
No, I don't think it's fine. Who cares about that as long as you're fine. That's perfectly fine. So yeah, mean, the questions I already sent to you and we're just going to have like a casual conversation about your career and again, stories from your career as well along about the questions we've highlighted and
Ina Atanassova (01:39.616)
Mm-hmm.
Emre (01:42.882)
Yeah, it's going to be perfect. So I'll start things off if you're ready. But before we do, how do I pronounce your last name?
Ina Atanassova (01:49.012)
Yeah.
Atta Nasuva!
Emre (01:53.654)
Atanasova. By the way, where are you from?
Ina Atanassova (01:57.012)
Bulgarian.
Emre (01:57.838)
Bulgaria. All right. I got it. Got it. Okay. All right. With that said, all right. Hi everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Team Check-In. With me today, our guest at this time is Ina Atanasova. Now, this is the second part of our brand new series, HR Experts, where we interview professionals from the world of HR and ask them about stories.
Ina Atanassova (02:01.332)
Yeah.
Emre (02:26.936)
from their careers, stories that can teach us some good, some bad, and stories that we can learn things from and be inspired by. With that said, know, welcome to the show.
Ina Atanassova (02:39.391)
Thank you very much. I'm happy to be here.
Emre (02:42.094)
It is so nice to have you here. And before we start things off and before I bombard you with questions about your career, would you like to tell the audience a bit about yourself and where you're currently working and your role?
Ina Atanassova (03:00.351)
Yeah, sure. So at the moment, I'm a senior talent development manager at a company called Maltego Technologies. We are a Munich-based company and we actually have super interesting products. We have a software that helps investigators around the world find out truths and catch the bad guys as quickly as possible as they can.
So I have the feeling that why Maltego is unique is really the purpose. It's not just the next software as a service company. It's something more meaningful and the clients that we are working with are super interesting, government agency, law enforcement agencies and so on. So yeah, pretty cool stuff.
Emre (03:44.238)
Okay, that is pretty cool. And I know what you mean when you say not just another SaaS company, because those are a dime a dozen. Yeah, especially I can derail this conversation all day talking about all the quote unquote digital nomads I ran into in Bali who were just reskinning chat GPT on multiple different apps and calling it a different tool and calling themselves a SaaS company. But that is not what we're here.
to talk about today. And our conversation topic today is dealing with change and dealing with times of uncertainty. As HR, how do we communicate this uncertainty to employees, to everyone, and how do we navigate through this? And I think that is just something that is more increasingly getting more and more relevant. In fact, a quick question. When was the last time
that there was no uncertainty whatsoever in like your work life overall.
Ina Atanassova (04:51.125)
I have the feeling that that was the moment when I was a teacher. I was a teacher back then in Bulgaria between 2017 and 2019 in high school. I was teaching Bulgarian language and literature. you know, being a teacher is pretty comfortable, especially if you are not working for a private school, but for, you know, normal public school. That was probably the last time when changes were not expected or at least not as much on the workplace.
Emre (04:57.4)
Uh-huh.
Ina Atanassova (05:19.829)
everything is running as it was 50 years ago. So yeah, I think 2019 was the last time.
Emre (05:27.042)
Yeah. I mean, when it comes to education, I don't know if it's such a good thing that everything was, is running the same as it did all those years ago. And which is, I understand you completely. I've been through the exact same thing. I was about to say the last time I felt no uncertainty and everything going, okay, tomorrow and the next week and the next month is going to be the same is when I used to be a teacher. So I fully get that. I fully get that. So, but.
Yeah, uncertainty is such a huge part of the world of work right now. There are tons of big changes, some good, some bad, coming our way all the time. even if it's not, even sometimes when those changes and just factors are, even if they're not external, companies are going through things internally that have to be communicated with their employees. So, you know,
What are some times in your career where you've faced just uncertainty about the future and about strategy? yeah, okay, let me rephrase this again for the sake of the clip. You what are some of the times in your career where you've just experienced uncertainty and you weren't sure how you could communicate this to your staff?
Ina Atanassova (06:48.181)
Yeah, so really looking backwards, I have the feeling that 2020, March, was definitely the first time when everybody working in HR was questioning what will happen tomorrow. I clearly remember the day when I left my laptop at work because that was how we were doing it. You leave your laptop and then your next day you expect to be in the office at nine o'clock. Everything starts as normal.
But apparently, 13th of March, if I remember correctly, 2020 was not that day. That day, everything changed. And I remember our team freaking out what will happen. Back then, I was working for a company that was producing glasses. And we had a lot of stores, like in-person stores, where you go when you buy glasses, as well as online shops.
And everybody was wondering, what do we have with all these 300 people that are supposed to go to work? You know, not about strategy at all, not about processes, performance, whatever. It's purely, how do we do our job? And I do remember how turbulent the next two, three months were evaluating who needs to stay, who needs to go, what will happen tomorrow, how many people will need. And I have the feeling that after 2020,
every company started taking recruiting way more seriously and thinking few times before they approve a headcount. And this actually made a lot of changes in the way we work, in the way we see workforce, in the way we plan. Because before that, the economy was in such a a rise.
I think that the last time we had a crisis was 2008. And since then, everything was just going up and up. And if there were some fluctuations, they were not as big. And after 2020, I can definitely see how people are very cautious what will happen today. Do I have my job secured? But we're lucky enough to live in Germany and have way more security than some other folks out there in the US, for example. So yeah, I think that was the...
Ina Atanassova (09:04.783)
really the big change and all the processes, the way we do HR is influenced by what happened in 2020.
Emre (09:13.45)
So I completely get that. I mean, we've seen it all. We've like, this is something that has been discussed so much by everyone. And we've seen it all. We've seen how that affected the world of work. But so as an HR professional, how do you operate in the face of great uncertainty?
Ina Atanassova (09:35.072)
Yeah, I have the feeling that the most important thing for myself personally at least is if we are just transparent. Of course, you can't tell everything to your employees what's going on. But if you're able to give them enough information so they know that the company is going through something and you are always there to share with them as much information as you can, there is trust that is built.
So giving them the certainty in uncertain times that you are there for them as a company, that you are there for them as an employer is extremely important. Probably explaining in a little bit more details than you would do it otherwise why these changes are needed and what is really the impact on a personal level, not only for the department or for the team, but really going and digging into
the uncertainties that each and every one individual has is how I believe we should operate as HR professionals and also staying flexible. So I have the feeling that HR was so stagnant in the past, or at least when I studied in the university and I talked to my professors and stuff, I could see how stagnant everything is. They just don't want to change anything.
I have the feeling that HR should approach the business with certain dose of flexibility. Do not promise the changes won't happen, but being mindful how many changes you do. Basically, what is the scope? You can't change, for example, the org structure every six months, or you can't change the process every second month. At least if you make a change, stick to it at least one year so people can feel certain that
things are not gonna fall apart in the next few months.
Emre (11:34.318)
Yeah, I think that is perfectly true. And yeah, I think one thing that sticks out very much from what you've told us is transparency is a huge part of it. You have to, you can't pretend everything is all right. You can't pretend everything, like you have concrete answers to everything. But I think there also has to be a line walked.
Ina Atanassova (11:57.705)
Mm-hmm.
Emre (12:00.59)
You know, one thinks of like the scene from the office where Dunder Mifflin is going out of business and Michael Scott just reveals the entire thing to the company, yada, yada, yada. That's, uh, yeah, that transparency is a key aspect of it. So coupling this up with, because a huge part of people and culture is keeping your team, keeping everyone driven and motivated. So even across, like even in times of uncertainty.
Ina Atanassova (12:25.887)
Yep.
Emre (12:30.53)
How does HR keep their teams motivated?
Ina Atanassova (12:36.597)
So I have the feeling that this is not only job for HR, right? The way I see HR is, HR is such a key function that mainly works with people managers. And if your people managers know what they're doing, if they're well-trained, if they have the empathy, if they're well-prepared, then the individual contributors will get the support they need.
there is no chance that a team of five, six HRs is able to serve a company of 200, 300 people. So the way I approach it is what I can do from my side at least is not only train my people managers, but also give them, for example, templates and tell them, hey, look, when you have a new joiner, the first week when this person joins, you have your 101. And you have this template that I have prepared for you.
You can always change it. You can always adapt it to the needs of the conversation. But what I would like you to cover is understanding a little bit more. What does this person need? What are the motivators that this person has? Is it career change? Is it career growth? Is it stability? Is it just digging deeper in their expertise of what they're currently doing? Basically, what does motivate them? What kind of feedback they would like to get and how to get it?
After that, what I'm doing as an HR on the other side is when we have a performance cycle, I always have questions that are around what are your career aspirations in training needs assessments. For example, I ask, what is the way you would like this training to be delivered? Is it in person? Is it on demand? So it is really about sharing the responsibility between HR or talent development manager in my case at the moment.
and the people manager, and we both can observe if the motivators align, if they stay the same over time, because motivators change. If you have a family, your motivators will be probably a secure job. But if you don't have a family and you're corporate driven or career driven, then you might need to grow in your career as head of director, whatever it is. Everybody has different needs, but I really have the feeling that
Ina Atanassova (14:54.025)
people's motivators change. And over time, we need to observe this. And mainly, this is job for the people managers. And HR is the supporting function to make sure that these things are checked, that these things are discussed.
Emre (15:09.422)
I love that idea and it is very true how we motivate employees, how we make sure the team stays driven depends very heavily on the individual and tailoring your efforts to motivate employees to that individual level is, I think, something that everyone should be applying in their day-to-day work life. Overall,
I mean, that can be difficult sometimes, especially if the organization is a lot larger. I also like, so you provided your people managers with templates so they could understand what motivates their team.
Ina Atanassova (15:54.421)
Yep.
Ina Atanassova (15:59.894)
So I basically prepared for them one-on-one templates depending on which stage of the onboarding phase we are. Because they are not always aware of what is probably the right structure, when to ask which question. And I have the feeling that in the beginning to get to know someone, it will be very important, as I said already, to build trust. And in order to build trust, you need to tell
Emre (16:15.298)
Mm-hmm.
Ina Atanassova (16:28.337)
what is your preferred way of working as a manager, but also to understand and to show readiness to adapt your management style to the needs of your individual contributor. Maybe another thing, because you did mention it, it's definitely a lot of effort, right, to do it for every individual. And now I am here in my role of HR professional who has experience in startup scale-ups. And this is the environment that I love.
I cannot imagine how you do these things in bigger organizations. I do know on paper how things are happening, but then you are basically losing this one-on-one relationship with the people. I am HR, but at the same time, everybody knows me in the company. Everybody knows that they can come and talk to me. I'm not just an email or somebody that you can find on Teams.
But speaking realistically, of course, there are a lot of things that the HR team can do in general for the whole workforce, things that are not so individual, right? There are, for example, training budgets that are indifferent from the individual needs of the people. So these things are there and they're there for everyone. Or when we talk about benefits, when we try to implement benefits,
We do not particularly care if 20 people really want a gym or 20 people need a bike. We'll decide for one of both depending what we heard more or what makes sense more from a tax perspective. So there are two different approaches here. One is the overall, the general thing. But if we really talk about real motivation of individuals, then you need to go to the individual level.
Emre (18:21.87)
All right. I love that. yeah, building those frameworks and just having the overall side and the individual side is really important. you mentioned trainings because right now the trainings are also a part of your role, right, as a senior talent development manager.
Ina Atanassova (18:42.131)
Yes.
Emre (18:44.454)
And training programs, a lot of the human resources professionals I've met over, you know, this podcast, I'll say that they have a love and hate relationship with training programs. Sometimes like when it works, they're just fully on board. Sometimes it can just go off the rails and just not be effective whatsoever. So in your opinion, what is the key?
Ina Atanassova (18:46.227)
Yep.
Emre (19:13.784)
to making those training programs effective and making them stick.
Ina Atanassova (19:19.625)
Yeah, a really good one. And I'm not quite sure if there is one size fits all, right? For every company, there are different things that work. At the moment, I have the feeling that for smaller organizations, again, probably the best approach would be when you have decentralized training approach, training strategy, and for a little bit bigger organization to have something that is centralized because
Emre (19:25.459)
huh.
Ina Atanassova (19:48.476)
you just won't have the capacity to serve on specific needs. Probably one very good approach at the moment, especially mentioning that probably every organization and every HR manager that I talked to in the past few months are working with limited budgets, basically made me think about a strategy rethinking the way we approach training specifically at Maltego.
Because in the beginning when I joined the company, we had a very common way of doing it. Everybody gets a certain amount of money per year and then you book a training on your choice because you have, let's say, a thousand euro per year. However, what I saw is that not everybody uses it. People typically do not have any idea what they want to do with it. And there are other people who have way too many ideas and then they get frustrated that they
are limited to the certain amount of money that you give them per year, So what we did with the team last year was we sat down, we saw what is the budget for 2025, and we said, in order to best balance the needs of the people and the needs of the organization, because HR is not only there for the people, right? We're also there for the company. In order to fit the needs of the organization, we will reverse the process.
We'll look at the goals for 2025, and based on the goals we have, we'll drop them down to team level and then to an individual level. And based on what each individual needs to achieve, we'll see where they're lacking on skills and knowledge, and we'll support them to meet their targets. Because when people meet their targets, it means, of course, more incentives for them, first of all. Second of all, they will acquire
a skill that was probably missing in the beginning of the year and preventing them from meeting the goals. Or maybe if we even upskilled them, they will be able to overachieve the goals. So we basically turned it in a way that is win-win-win. The company wins because everybody meets the goals. The individual meets because they definitely get a training at some point of the year. And then everybody's happy, right? And I have my budget used.
Ina Atanassova (22:09.429)
I have career development plans and eventually the organization is at a better place to start 2026.
Emre (22:17.602)
I love the way you guys operated through that because I have seen, I've been through a similar version of the, you know, the training or, you know, wellness benefit, you know, benefit that can be spent a certain amount of designated budget that you can personally spend on trainings or anything else, yada, yada, yada. I've been on the end of that as an employee. And while it is, I mean,
We have to admit that it is a lovely gesture. is a lovely thought. And I think it's coming from a very positive space and I love it. I blew mine on surfboards. I personally blew mine on surfboards and it's like some of it on a surf camp and because picking the right training program associated with it, finding the right train while it sounds easy enough.
Ina Atanassova (22:58.771)
Okay. Yeah.
Emre (23:13.952)
It is still a difficult process finding the right one, vetting them, making sure you're spending that money on that, that, that, and that in and of itself is work. you guys, yeah. And finding the right training program, finding it, it does require some professional mindset, some professional perspective, you know, matching training programs with employees. It's not because.
Ina Atanassova (23:27.014)
It is here.
Emre (23:42.402)
There are so many different programs out there. Online courses, everything, they are a dime, a dozen. And more often than not, before you purchase, you only get like quite a bit, just a bit of a glimpse into how they work. So, I blew my training budget on something on this online course. Wait, it's not that good. it's not. It does take a lot of vetting. So what you guys did where you...
Identified everyone's own like core competencies that they need to advance in their career within the organization, pinning those goals together and then saying, Hey, look, these, these, trainings, these can be helpful in your career development. I think that is the way to go. That is a brilliant way to approach it. And was there some trial and error involved in you guys coming up with this system? Was it, you know, first it didn't work. Was there any?
Trial and error.
Ina Atanassova (24:43.231)
So I have the feeling that where the trial and error actually is still ongoing is to fine tune which teams to prioritize because the whole thing is about timing. I am one talent and development manager in this company. Of course, I have my team supporting me, but we don't have any other talent and development manager at the moment. We have HR admin, have recruiter, we have the head of the department and so on.
which means that I need to somehow divide the teams. So we basically took a decision that in the beginning of the year, we'll prioritize the go-to-market teams. Now we are prioritizing the product and technology teams. And in the end of the year, we'll prioritize finance and operations or general and admin, whatever we call it. I have the feeling that we did the right. That was the...
right decision for this year, but I really would like to hear the feedback from everybody in the end of 2025 to really understand if things are going as smooth as we think they are. Because sometimes HR thinks that they're doing the right thing, everything seems calm on the surface, and then it's like, see, as deep as you go, the bigger the...
the dissatisfaction is exactly the right hole is exactly. So far, I have the feeling that this is really the key. We can't do it all at once. And sometimes this could bring frustration. For example, one team, if they see that we are doing it with another team, they start asking, but when is our turn? And we very clearly communicated a schedule in the beginning of the year to set the expectations. Everybody knows when is the time their team to be assessed.
Emre (26:04.546)
The rabbit hole, yeah, I get it.
Ina Atanassova (26:33.617)
I just think that we are doing the right things. It's still a way to go to fine tune the process, but I believe this is a pretty good approach.
Emre (26:47.906)
I think this decision plays into how do you manage employee training and development with limited resources, with limited budget. think this pretty much plays into that. And so now my follow-up question to that would be, you said you guys played this little prioritization thing where the go-to-market team were trained in the beginning of the year and then
Ina Atanassova (27:00.628)
Yeah.
Ina Atanassova (27:13.045)
Mm-hmm.
Emre (27:16.994)
than it was product.
Ina Atanassova (27:19.315)
Yes, yeah.
Emre (27:20.11)
So what was the thought process behind this prioritization? Why was, you know, why did you guys prioritize the go to market team first? And I don't even know if that's a priority thing as well. Cause when you say prioritize, you mean, uh, there might be people might understanding as, these people matter more. That's what, no, I don't think that's that. think there's some, uh, method behind. I don't think it's prioritization, but it's scheduling. So let's change that. So.
Ina Atanassova (27:34.013)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Ina Atanassova (27:44.233)
Mm-hmm.
Emre (27:49.804)
Why did you guys schedule it in such a way?
Ina Atanassova (27:50.046)
Yes.
Ina Atanassova (27:53.942)
Yeah, so there were two reasons why we did it. In the end of 2024, we did hire a lot of new people for the Go to Market team. And keeping in mind that all these people are different, they bring different methodologies, different ways of working, this is really, really nice. But what we wanted to do is to have everybody more or less on the same page.
For example, if we hire someone that is a little bit more mid-level and then we have someone that is more senior level, for example, the mid-level one can be missing some hard skills that the senior level has. Then we'll focus the training for this mid-level person to develop those hard skills that are needed to meet their yearly goals because you know, in go-to-market, everything is about meeting the goals, meeting the numbers.
And having in mind what numbers we have to meet in the end of the year, we said that the first team that needs support is actually the go-to-market team if we want this year to be very successful for us. Because the product and technology teams, they were pretty stable over time. They didn't grow that exponentially. They actually grew a lot in 2022 and 2023. So they're pretty settled. They know where they're going and so on.
but the ones that had more turbulent times were the go-to-market people. That's why we scheduled them first in the beginning of the year to align on skills and knowledge and have the foundation to build on product and technology, general and administration and so
Emre (29:33.474)
I absolutely love this. And I think, if there's any takeaway from this particular episode of the show, it is this, because I see this so much in the world of work and I've been a part of it. Even when I was a teacher, I mean, I've been through so many different teacher training programs. I have members of my family who give, you know, these trainings to companies and what we see, what I've seen, what
Everyone sees when it comes to training is this huge issue of training for the sake of training. We've had this so much, right? Training. Training can be very easily just the compliance exercise for people in culture departments where you say, where you do it just to say, Hey, look, we have completed these, these, these, these trainings by the end of the year. That's why we did it. And yeah, good, good job. That's perfect. But, I mean,
Ina Atanassova (30:12.257)
Yeah.
Ina Atanassova (30:19.497)
Mm-hmm.
Emre (30:33.228)
A lot of research has shown, and this is something we've very recently discussed in the podcast with our guest, Cecile Pompei. She also brought it up where most of the trainings purchased by workplaces, 15 % of it is, you know, just kept. 15 % of it of the information is actually retained. That's the word I was looking for. So a lot, and training is expensive. Training can be very expensive.
Ina Atanassova (30:58.238)
Yeah.
Emre (31:02.752)
So how you guys structured it around individual goals, development targets, and just how can these trainings help our employees reach these concrete company goals, associating training programs with individual and organizational goals? I think that is the key takeaway from this episode. And I'd rather say it is.
Easier said than done, right?
Ina Atanassova (31:34.472)
Yeah, definitely it's easier said than done because the process is not as simple, right? You need a lot of support from the people managers. They are the experts. They are the ones that actually know the skills and the knowledge needed. And I am the supporting function in this whole process. And then the interesting part is that we really give the opportunity every individual to assess themselves against those skills and knowledges.
and then their manager also assesses them. And then we basically put the two graphs, one on another, and we can see where the gaps are. And we decide, OK, if five skills are missing, for example, out of 15, or they're not as developed, which are the top two that we need to focus this year? Because there is no budget for five, right? And this is how we do it. But only saying it, you can already imagine how much work this is.
Emre (32:31.982)
I completely understand it. And if you are a listener, would you like, would like to implement a similar structure in your organization? I personally know of a software you can use. If your organization is in the Microsoft ecosystem, the highest rated employee development and individual development plan software in the Microsoft Teams app store is Team Flect. And we offer quite a lot of the services that Ina mentioned and Ina was not aware of this plug. I'm just.
putting it in at some point because that's what I do. But yeah, all jokes and like the commercial plugs in the episode aside, it is something we focused on a lot in our product as well, managers identify these competencies and map out training programs around it. And one thing that we really tried hard to focus on was the collaborative aspect because the employee putting in their development goals and the manager coming in with, you
their feedback and then building training programs around that. But I think one last question that I would love to ask you about this is, what was the selection process for the training programs like? Because like we said before, there are so many different training sources out there. There are so many different programs and just different things to choose from.
How was your selection process? How did you find the right ones for your team?
Ina Atanassova (34:04.295)
Yeah. So, again, it depends. If you have on-demand trainings, very much depends how good the marketing team of the platform that you're buying is. If they put a good job together, if they have really good materials, then you're going with it and you just hope that it will be a good one. But I can talk more about the trainings that are in-person or live trainings because this is where it gets interesting.
The rest are just subscriptions and you can always cancel it, especially if you go with a monthly one, it's not such a big deal. Every talent development manager out there will probably agree that over time, you start working with certain vendors and you know that you can rely on them. You know that these people are there for your sales training, for your account management training, for your business development training, whatever it is. Over time, you start building connections and those ones are your trusted partners.
It doesn't mean that they will always fit the needs of the organization that you're working in. But I can definitely say that over time, I've built connections and I know I can rely on those. And what we do then is of course, every senior manager comes with their preferences, with their vendors that they worked with, right? This is the name of the game. What I do is we meet with their vendor, they meet with, let's say, my vendor.
And then the one that makes a better offer, the one that makes a better discovery call is the one that wins the deal. And this is what I find very fascinating that very often you think that you found the right vendor and you're fully convinced, you trust them, but then someone comes and shows you another one that is even better than the one you already know. So it's always a matter of
getting to know people, connecting, having a broader, let's say, partnership network and having things in your pockets that you can always pick up the phone, call them and be like, okay, we need this type of training. Can you please deliver? Because I am so stressed when I need to research for a new training that I have no idea about. And then...
Ina Atanassova (36:25.149)
Of course, you go to Google, you go to Copilot, you put the needs, and then there are like 20 websites that look exactly the same, that pitch you exactly the same things, and then you're really overwhelmed. This is where I include the people managers and I'm like, okay, I need help. What do we really need? So it's always a lot of work when you need to find some new providers.
Emre (36:53.736)
And I guess my last, last question is so far, how has, mean, we're halfway through the year. So how has the feedback been for your training program so far?
Ina Atanassova (37:05.621)
Mm.
Ina Atanassova (37:11.125)
So as I told you, I'm fully transparent, right? I'm not going to tell you that, yeah, everything was just amazing and great. I particularly remember one team where we had a training. Half the team was super impressed and really fascinated. And the rest of the team said, OK, they just repeated well-known tactics, well-known methodologies. There was nothing new.
And I have the feeling that this is always the case with training. You can't make everybody happy. There will be always people who are happy with it. There are always people that are unhappy. But even if a training brings positives to three people in a team, instead of 10, let's say, you already did your job because you have three people that upskilled. You have three people that will do more tomorrow than...
what they were doing yesterday and the rest will just keep doing what they know best and that's it. And not everybody is open actually for learning and for changing and for growing. Even if we say that's modern, this is the way to develop ourselves, that's actually not true. Some people are just fine where they are with the skills that they have and that's it and we have to accept it.
Emre (38:27.502)
I love that. And I'm sure the input from those employees who said, was just, you know, regurgitating best practices, no matter what, I'm sure that is going to have an impact, not just on, you know, the training programs next year, but also like the upcoming training programs that you've structured for the rest of the year. And yeah, I love how honest and transparent you are about this. I think
Ina Atanassova (38:50.985)
Yeah.
Emre (38:57.108)
I don't even want to dilute the message from this episode because I think we've just reached this perfect place, space around how training programs are structured and how training programs should be structured going forward. And, you know, I just want to say thank you so much for coming on this episode and sharing your stories with me, with our listeners, even if they don't decide to use it. I know I am like literally after this call going to RHR President saying, Hey,
I just heard these cool things about training programs and guess what? You don't need to wait for the episode to come out because I'll just bombard you with new ideas now. So thank you so very much for that. And where can people find you and how can they reach you?
Ina Atanassova (39:36.245)
Hehehe.
You're very welcome.
Ina Atanassova (39:44.382)
Yeah, so probably the best place will be LinkedIn. One thing to note, my family name Atanasova is with a double S because my father was so thoughtful that one day I might live in Germany to put it with double S so it's not Atanasova. So yeah, you can find me on LinkedIn, Ina Atanasova with double S.
Emre (40:06.094)
Perfect. And if you're listening to us on iTunes, Spotify, wherever you found podcasts, leave us a like, subscribe. It really helps the show out. And you can find me on LinkedIn very easily because my last name is literally the word, okay. You know, thanks so much for coming on the show. This has been the Team Check-In HR Expert Series. Have a great time, everyone. Bye-bye. All right, you know, thank you so much for doing this. This was so fun. And I have to say the little Team Flex product
plug I did, it just came out of me as a force of habit and we do it for the regular podcast a lot. But the plan for this one was to not have any of our product plugs in there. So I will probably edit that part out. did it and I said like, wait, this, wasn't the series for that. I remember it. So I'll be chopping that part off. I just wanted to let you know.
Ina Atanassova (40:41.823)
Yeah.
Ina Atanassova (40:56.837)
Honestly, whatever works for you because I listened to lot of the podcasts in last few weeks, right? And yeah, yeah, yeah. I come very prepared. I also listened to Anatoly Gaj. And just leaving it there. was... anyways. But the whole thing is that you are always trying to sneak it in.
Emre (41:03.143)
my god! my god!
Ina Atanassova (41:24.453)
And today you surprised me, you know, because sometimes it's just, you know, that the podcast is ending and you have to do it. But actually today came so naturally that I was like, okay, that was a really good one.
Emre (41:24.674)
Uh-huh.
Emre (41:31.351)
Uh-huh.
Yeah. Yeah. I'm so happy to hear that. Yeah. That's what I try. I try so like the way I do it, I've tried to very much try to keep it conversational and you don't have to stop about Anatoly because that episode is still giving me Vietnam flashbacks. Like sometimes when I close my eyes, I can still hear that guy talking.
Ina Atanassova (41:58.311)
I'm like, who even wants to work there, you know? Like, that's the anti-HR Bible, you know?
Emre (42:10.507)
It was-
Ina Atanassova (42:10.549)
But you know what? I loved when you said, well, I hope that my employer is not listening to this.
Emre (42:19.246)
Again, was so tough. Also, if you've noticed, I worked so hard to get a single sentence in on that episode. That guy was a machine gun, just churning things out left and right. And it was just, I had some questions for him, I had ideas. And at some point, he was going and I was checking the time and I'm saying, okay, at some point I can just wrap it up.
Ina Atanassova (42:30.28)
Yeah.
Emre (42:47.852)
Yeah, my god, I can't believe you brought that episode up. That's perfect. Yeah, but overall...
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