Latest / The Curve / The Leadership Expert Rethinking How We Work, Parent & Show Up, with Dr Ellen Joan Ford.

Transcript

The Leadership Expert Rethinking How We Work, Parent & Show Up, with Dr Ellen Joan Ford. · The Curve

0:00
Just a heads up in this episode we'll be touching on some fertility challenges so if this topic hits too close to home
0:06
We totally understand if you need to set this one out or proceed with care
0:14
Firstly, Alan, thank you so much for being on the podcast
0:18
I think this is a particular conversation that has come up in my brain
0:23
Time and time again, you know as a 34 year old woman without kids who really loves her career
0:29
But also as a business owner and I think that
0:32
Yeah, this conversation around kids versus career and and how we can
0:37
I don't know I guess just better support people would also better productivity and output is just this like ongoing
0:43
Big question marks. I'm really excited to speak to you about this today
0:47
And I kind of wanted to get like right into it and just
0:51
acknowledge the fact that
0:53
work and life for most of us feel
0:56
Kind of like they're outside of our jobs and they're this like constant clash between these two probably biggest things in our life
1:05
Why is that and and what is kind of a high level explanation of that
1:11
Feeling that so many of us have where it's like work
1:14
Life and they just sort of don't really go together very well
1:18
So I think one of them is that where you said the sort of old school idea that you
1:23
Came to work and you left your home and your personal stuff at the door and it was this idea that being professional
1:30
Really equated with someone who kept their personal life completely outside of their workplace
1:35
And so that's been in place for a long long time now. I obviously have some issues with that because you know
1:41
We're actually whole people
1:42
We don't just come to work and suddenly completely forget about the fact that we've got things going on in our personal life
1:47
That's actually not how humans work and that does not make them unprofessional
1:51
It's so interesting because I definitely have experienced this but not to the same extent that I know a lot of people
1:59
Have I've been quite privileged in experiencing
2:03
Work in a way where your personality is really celebrated
2:06
And it's actually a huge part of the success within your role
2:09
And I know that that's super unique when Vick and I first started working together
2:12
You know like for her she's worked in the finance space right where it's like you come to work
2:16
And it's very black and white
2:18
You know you're a certain person outside of work as you are inside the way she approaches work is quite like that
2:24
Whereas I used to you know come to work and pyjamas
2:28
When I worked in breakfast radio and you taught you know
2:31
It was almost like your personality was was really ingrained and actually quite integral with the quality of the content and your work
2:39
But I've also seen firsthand people that have experienced a completely different
2:43
Environment why would you say this topic makes you feel angry or frustrated?
2:49
Like what is it about that segregation that's actually quite detrimental to people and also to businesses
2:55
First of all like my background's all in leadership
2:57
So I
2:58
I'm really passionate about if we are leading a team
3:01
Our job is leaders is to get the best out of those people so that we can deliver great outcomes for the organization
3:06
And I know hands down from my own experience leading for my research on leadership
3:12
That people perform better when they actually feel that they can be
3:16
Be there real selves at work
3:18
So that sort of if you think about it from a productivity or an organizational performance or a leadership lens
3:23
I know that people do better work when they don't feel like they have to wear a mask and be on guard to the whole day
3:30
Um, so that's kind of the first reason that it kind of pisses me off
3:33
I'm like what a what a wasted opportunity
3:35
Making people sort of fit inside a box thinking that that's the best outcome for the business
3:40
And and actually it's not but the other part of it so for in terms of what pisses me off about it is
3:46
I do have a particular passion around the experiences of working parents
3:50
We live in a world where we are expected to work as if we don't have children
3:54
We are expected to parent as if we don't have a job
3:58
And I just think there's bullshit. I don't think that's how the world should work
4:01
And it's kind of what started this passion for me
4:03
I'm so glad you brought that up because that's what I wanted to speak to you about and it's kind of
4:08
Personal and awkward and weird given that you know, we have our investors who listen to this podcast too
4:13
But if I'm being completely honest. I do want to have a family one day
4:18
I'd love to be able to have kids but in the back of my mind
4:21
I am worried about how can we be super successful in our career and really care about that and show up in a way that's
4:28
Professional while also having a family and feeling like we can be a good parent
4:34
I just feel like the pressure to do both of those things
4:38
I don't actually know how to merge them
4:41
I'm not really sure
4:43
But I can feel myself being held back from the idea of making that decision to have a family
4:47
Because of the implications that it would have what do you see as kind of like the biggest issues and why we can't seem to reconcile the idea of
4:57
Career and family and how the two can coexist
5:00
It is fundamentally because the the way that we work which is a 40 hour week 9 to 5 construct
5:07
Which is relevant even if people do shift work or don't actually work exactly 9 to 5 all of our employment contracts are fundamentally based on that
5:15
So the 9 to 5 the 40 hour week is so fundamentally institutionalized and how we do and how we do work how we do life
5:23
But that came into play more than a hundred years ago like it's ancient and at the time it was really great social progress
5:32
But it was based on the assumption that every household had a dedicated worker a man and a dedicated caregiver of children a woman
5:40
And so the person who's doing the school pick up is not the same person who's working until five
5:46
The person who is with the kids for my gosh, they get so many school holidays during the year is not the same person
5:52
That's working sort of 48 49 weeks of the year
5:55
And so that is why we have this tension
5:58
And it just it kind of blows my mind
6:00
I'm like if we had a clean slate today no one in their right mind would say yet let's put all the adults on this schedule
6:07
And we'll put the children on a different one
6:09
We don't live in a society where every household has the privilege of having a dedicated person to care for the children
6:15
That's not reality
6:16
First of all, women want to be in the workforce like I love my kids very much
6:21
But I'm a far better human when I'm also working
6:25
Um, so it's part of my identity for many families actually financially they need both
6:30
Parents in the workplace and so if I'm a solo ma so I have to be in the workplace. So
6:35
Yeah, that's kind of why it exists
6:36
It's very archaic and historic and it kind of blows my mind that woman has been in the workforce for decades
6:43
And we haven't really changed the construct
6:46
Such a good point and I think the way that you explained it is really important and even just putting
6:51
That
6:52
time bound
6:54
You know visual of a hundred years ago
6:57
What did family life look like what did work life look like?
7:00
I mean, we're in a completely different system now
7:03
And I think in the same way that COVID although there was so many awful things that came from it
7:08
What was really amazing was just being able to prove that people can work from home like in a really productive way
7:13
Where if we hadn't been forced into that perhaps we wouldn't explored a new way of doing and you know
7:17
The so many businesses now that are able to be remote and people all over the world which is amazing
7:22
But in the same way that we haven't had that extreme shake up in the work
7:26
hours in terms of what a work day looks like
7:29
I mean, I don't know what that would have to take but you would assume the falling birth rates and the amount of people
7:34
They're avoiding having kids and what that's going to then do the economy in terms of having far too many people in old age
7:41
And not being able to support
7:42
Everyone financially
7:44
There's gotta be a shift and there's gotta be
7:47
Changes made otherwise
7:49
Everyone suffers the economy
7:51
Partners children it's sort of it's a whole societal issue
7:54
Which brings me to my next question, which is do you think that this is something that we can all find solutions for
8:01
Do you think that it's something that governments need to be said like how do we think about this as an issue
8:06
But whose responsibility is it to make this up?
8:09
Fundamentally, I do not say this as an individual's responsibility to solve
8:13
You know, I think there's so many band-aid solutions out there to and it's always on the mum
8:17
Which you know that pisses me off as well
8:19
So I'm 41 and I had my kids when I was 32 and 35 and like 20s
8:23
I was already thinking like how the hell am I going to make this work
8:27
Already thinking about what might my future look like is someone who's really
8:31
proficiently ambitious
8:33
Which I think so I'm near vast can relate to and also wanting to be a mum
8:36
Yeah, I just saw appearance around me
8:39
Struggling
8:41
I was like how how do they do that and they don't look like they're doing it in a way that makes them feel good like this
8:48
This sort of idea of guilt I could just see um parents just
8:52
Just guilty all day they either felt guilty because they weren't with their kids or guilty because they
8:57
Would it work and I was just yeah so consciously aware of that from such a young age and
9:04
I mean you mentioned that yourself we are not alone there was so many
9:08
Women who are not even parents at this point who are already thinking about this challenge
9:12
And then the people who are already parents are absolutely living are the challenge
9:17
But it's not it's not the individual's problem to solve and the reason I think it's a collective responsibility
9:23
And I want to make a point of this because I know there's some people out there who make decisions not to have children
9:28
And that's awesome that that's great
9:29
And so they might think well it's not really my problem if someone makes a choice to have children
9:33
Then that's then that's kind of their problem to deal with the reason I call bullshit on that is because
9:39
You just made the point so fear about the falling fertility and falling birth rates
9:43
I should say it is going to be a colossal problem for this world like
9:48
It as you say if we're not breeding
9:50
Not doing enough breeding and not having enough children
9:52
We're not going to have enough people coming into the workforce to then actually fuel the economy and then support all of us old people
9:58
And we get older so
10:00
This is in my mind it's a collective responsibility to solve
10:04
If we want the human race to continue we need some people to do some breeding
10:09
And so the way the system currently is it's making it really prohibitive to be successful as both a parent and a professional
10:16
You then also asked is it sort of government or is it
10:19
corporates? Look, I think there are things that governments can do you know to look at legislation
10:25
But the way that I personally come at it is actually trying to encourage corporates to why this makes good business sense
10:32
So
10:33
Rule them regulations are you know, they're really good
10:36
But not all businesses embrace them with open arms. It's more like a we've got to do this and it's a bit begrudging
10:42
Whereas I like going to businesses and saying
10:44
Doing these things to make it
10:47
At least prohibitive to be both a parent and a professional is going to be good for your business
10:52
So that's where I'm quite a pragmatist so you know, I'm I'm driven by the heart
10:57
I want people to not feel guilty about being a parent and a worker
11:01
But I know it has to make good business sense and so that's I think organizations can play a massive role
11:07
And embracing some of these different ways of working because well, it's good for them as well
11:13
I would love to touch on how
11:15
When you did become a parents you mentioned you've got a five and an eight-year-old
11:20
Did that shift the way that you saw
11:23
Work and success and if maybe you have any thoughts on just that general approach to oh, you'll figure it out as a mum
11:31
You know, you'll have kids and you'll just be able to shuffle it all around
11:34
Yes, a big question. I use a couple of things
11:37
First of all, I just wanted to say that you know, you have kids and you figure it out
11:41
I agree that's not a good enough answer that doesn't help people prepare
11:45
What I would say though because in my research, I've seen woman
11:49
Who have not and they've delayed it
11:52
And then they've missed out on the opportunity because you know, biologically, um, we can't have kids forever
11:58
And I do know that there are people in that bracket who
12:03
Who regret the fact that they didn't have kids because they weren't sure how they were going to work it out
12:07
So I guess I just always want to put that there in that your own personal life is
12:12
Is always going to be more important and love you more than any employer ever will
12:17
So when I became a mum didn't change my priorities
12:20
I mean, you know in some ways yes, obviously my children mean everything to me. I am you know fierce for them
12:27
But if I'm really honest with you Sophie
12:29
It didn't change why I was as a person
12:32
I wasn't suddenly like oh, I'm so in love with my children and I don't care my job anymore
12:36
That didn't happen. I was still like I'm still me
12:40
Yeah, I'm now mum and I have this priority who I you know, fiercely love
12:45
But I'm not I'm not only a mum. I'm actually I'm still Ellen
12:50
I'm still bloody ambitious. I still want to achieve these big things
12:53
I still get pissed off with things out working in the world and I want to be involved in you know fixing them
12:58
My priorities didn't kind of suddenly dissolve
13:01
And after having children
13:03
Yeah, they should coexist and and that there should be a way for it to work
13:07
And I think we'll get to sort of solutions and action-based stuff
13:10
Shortly, but before we do can we just chat about you've done a lot of research like speaking to different parents
13:17
Um, and there's obviously I'm imagining a lot of patterns that come up time and time again
13:22
What other choices do you see parents feeling like they are
13:26
Being pushed into one was that they were forced out of the workforce
13:31
And this wasn't by choice. So I'm not talking about parents who made an exclusive sorry a decision to exclusively be with their children
13:39
These are parents who wanted to be in the workplace
13:41
But just the juggle was too hard. You know, you've got to pick your kids up at three but
13:45
Work expects you to be there till five and for some of them, you know the cost of after school
13:50
Child care
13:52
It just didn't stack up especially if they were being offered you know quite low-paid jobs
13:57
Genuinely, it just did not make financial sense to be able to be in the workplace and be apparent
14:03
And so that was what I call disappointing category number one
14:06
The second one Sophie was parents who were working full time and they just
14:12
Resented all the moments that they missed with their children
14:15
They just felt constantly shut about themselves that they they weren't there for the swimming sports
14:19
They missed the cross country. They didn't get to spend time with their children during the school holidays
14:25
And I remember one woman who she you her children had now left home now adults
14:30
And she just burst into tears and she said I will never get that time back
14:35
She said I worked my butt off for someone who didn't even care about me
14:40
And now the children are gone. They've left home and I will never get that time back
14:44
And I just remember like my heart was just kind of breaking for her and thinking that's a horrible
14:50
Position to be in that you work all these hours and then miss your children
14:54
And then just basically feel horrible about it to that's disappointing category number two
14:59
And then the third one which actually in some ways pissed me off the most
15:04
Was parents that were working part-time
15:06
And so you think oh that feels like a good you know, that's a good balance working less hours
15:11
You get some time with your children great
15:14
But what happened is that they got a contract with less hours
15:18
Therefore less pay but not a reduction in their responsibilities
15:23
No reduction in their KPIs or what was required of them
15:26
And so these parents quite often were actually working beyond the hours they were being paid
15:31
But most prominently they just became more efficient at doing their job
15:36
And that is true honestly if you want something down you ask a busy person
15:40
And so working parents who are on part-time contracts are you know
15:44
Evidence-based are some of the most productive people in the economy because
15:48
Because they have to be they have to get this shit done at least time
15:52
But the the bit that pissed me off about this Sophie is that
15:56
They were telling me how lucky they were
15:58
I'm so lucky that I'm allowed to work part-time
16:01
I'm so fortunate that I am permitted to have this part-time arrangement
16:06
And I just remember thinking there is nothing lucky about getting a pay cut
16:12
To do the same amount of work
16:13
It's this huge portion of society that are raising the next generation
16:17
Being squished into the system that no longer works for them
16:20
I completely understand imagine having
16:23
Gorgeous little two-year-old they're going for their first swimming lesson
16:26
And you can't be there because it's at 2 p.m. And that's technically a work day
16:31
But actually if you're going and working after they've gone to bed and getting the thing done anyway
16:35
Why should that matter? Why can't we rearrange the way that everything is and I'm sure we'll get to those solutions in a second
16:42
But I actually also I just wanted to ask this is controversial for sure
16:47
A lot of the solution-based things that companies are putting in place are around
16:52
Pushing out the timeline for women to have kids
16:55
So paying for things like egg freezing
16:57
Offering what looks like solutions on the outside
16:59
And if I've been completely honest when I first hurt these things and for a long time
17:03
I've been like I would absolutely take your offer to get my ex frozen
17:07
Thank you very much
17:08
If I had if I had the option to
17:10
I'd love to hear your view on that in general
17:13
and
17:14
How that ties so closely to the idea of it being a band-aid
17:19
Not a solution for the broader picture because
17:22
Yes, what you're kind of doing is pushing the ajar for someone having kids
17:26
But by the time they get there the same issues are still a problem
17:29
I think any organization that is trying to do something to support their people was a good thing
17:34
So I don't want to criticize the intention
17:38
I'm sure there are some really well-meaning people
17:42
In those organizations that are coming up with those sort of policies and
17:46
You know opportunities for people to freeze their eggs
17:49
So I don't I want to be careful that I don't criticize the intention
17:53
But I need to be really honest. I I think it's sick
17:57
There is something in it that's basically it's like the bot the organization is saying to you
18:03
This is how much we do not want you to have children
18:07
Because we will not value you as a parent
18:11
We are going to go to this
18:13
Extremely that we will do this you know medical process so that
18:20
We can keep you as a you know a perfect worker who doesn't have those annoying children
18:24
This is how important it is to us that you are not a parent because we do not value parents in our workplace
18:30
And we will go to the length of paying a lot of money so that you can delay becoming a parent so that we can keep you as a non-parent
18:38
It's definitely a band-aid
18:40
And I think it is a really flawed way to be looking at things
18:45
Because first of all if we just been actually just from a business point of view
18:48
So forget about all the humanity that I feel about it
18:51
Just from a business point of view all it does is delay it. It doesn't solve it
18:56
It just delays it and what it does is
18:59
You know the older people get even with frozen eggs it gets harder to become a parent
19:05
And the other thing is you know as we get older
19:08
It's hard to run around after kids so you know if people want to have kids at later age and life wonderful
19:13
But I don't think
19:15
Organizations should be sending this message of you know
19:18
This is how desperate we are to have you in our organization is not a parent because we don't value parents
19:24
We're going to go out of our way to actually help you to stop becoming a parent at this moment
19:31
Gosh it's so interesting because there was um
19:35
Someone at my school actually who sounded a podcast a while ago and
19:41
It doesn't go it's not happening anymore
19:42
But one of the things that I remember seeing a clip on socials was about how it was honestly a really similar response to what you've said
19:49
Where she was like I don't know if she said she thinks it's sick but maybe it was essentially her saying the same thing
19:55
And at the time I remember thinking I just really I really disagree with that and now hearing you explain that
20:01
I completely agree and I totally understand why that's problematic
20:05
I think there's so much
20:08
More to this conversation that we probably haven't acknowledged yet, which is the idea that
20:12
Yeah, as you just said some people don't want to be a parent or later in life
20:16
Some people can't be a parent until later. It is so many different things that come into this right
20:20
So if you actually have fertility issues and you have access to egg freezing and that's something you want to do
20:27
Like there is lots of positives where that could be the right thing
20:30
But what I'm hearing now and I'm rethinking my whole perspective all the way I think of it is
20:35
It's actually more about the idea that
20:38
You're pushing the exact same problem out and actually if someone wanted to have kids at 25 and still have a career
20:45
They should be able to do that and the two it shouldn't be based on your age because I know for me
20:50
I really feel the pressure time wise where I need to sort of do all of my career stuff
20:55
Before I have kids because I think it's just not going to be possible beyond that point
20:59
Which is so sad and so unfair and kind of comes to another question
21:04
I wanted to bring up which is this whole motherhood penalty, which I know we speak about a lot
21:09
But can you just speak to the idea of why this is so much more detrimental to women than men
21:14
But also why in the same way
21:17
Where if someone wants to have doesn't want to have kids they should still be interested in this conversation
21:22
Why is this a conversation that men and women should be having the first one around you know the motherhood penalty
21:27
The reality is the
21:29
majority of the
21:31
Child care is still falling on the mother. I would like us to be in a society where that wasn't the case
21:36
Where it was more normalized that it was more equitable were twin both the mother and the father
21:41
Um a big part of that is the
21:44
The load that mothers are often carrying more heavily than the fathers is it's not just the
21:49
You know doing the pickups and doing the drop-offs and making the lunches
21:54
It's all the cognitive and emotional load
21:57
Like holy shit. I feel like I need a PA just to manage, you know
22:01
What bloody school event my kids have got on and what color t-shirt they need for this day and
22:06
Gotta get them signed up for swimming lessons like there is a lot of cognitive
22:10
Load um that is often sitting with the mums more than the dads if we normalize that people are going to be
22:16
Come parents at some point. It makes it normal that fathers would be picking up more of those responsibilities as well
22:22
The motherhood penalty. It's it's so many different facets
22:25
So some of it's around you're the income that you lose for the period that you're in parental leave
22:30
The reductions in your retirement contributions
22:35
During that period
22:36
But it's also all the little subtle things around the way that bosses still value people that work long hours
22:44
Again, we're quite it with oh, they must be dedicated. They must be committed
22:47
Because they're working so long whereas a mother might be leaving earlier to go pick up your kids
22:53
Instead of us thinking wow she's efficient holy shit
22:56
She's the person we should be promoting because she's amazing
22:59
We are still promoting the person who does the long hours
23:01
So that's another way in which the motherhood penalty manifests
23:05
But then to your further question about why is this relevant beyond parents and I kind of get excited to share this with you because
23:12
For me this absolutely started as a parenting challenge. That was the genesis. So I don't kind of pretend otherwise
23:18
But then when I went into it I was like everybody has stuff beyond work
23:21
I often refer to my little brother who is amazing. I'm ridiculously proud of him. He is an iron man
23:27
Um, and you're in is you know he does not have children
23:31
And he's like I would love to be able to do my training during daylight hours
23:36
So all the stuff that I'm you know wanting to change in the world
23:40
Yes, the genesis might have started. Oh sorry dead start with the challenges facing working parents especially mothers
23:46
But actually it's fundamentally about how do we how do we create great work environments? How do we create really you know
23:52
Capable leaders where we're making sure that all of our people are valued as whole people who might have things beyond work
23:59
Which could be children, but actually it could be other things can we speak about you know
24:03
You've mentioned a few times this extreme
24:07
Ambition and love your work and wanting to show up in a way that's contributing to society which I completely relate with and I feel exactly the same
24:15
I don't work because it needs to give me money although I do need it
24:21
I work because I feel really proud of doing something that I care about I feel
24:27
Motivated I feel a sense of accomplishment all of those things are really it's not just the idea of financial success or external
24:33
success based on achievements
24:35
Can you tell us a bit about your background what led you into the space and how that has really
24:40
Caught a poll to do into focusing on this particular area of
24:45
Hopefully trying to fix the the work life balance that does not exist anymore
24:49
I started in the army. I spent 10 years as an engineer officer so I was leading soldiers
24:55
That was sort of where I cut my teeth in terms of
24:58
My first kind of practice or experience of leading. I realized I was more successful as a leader
25:04
The more I connected with people as humans
25:07
That sounds like a really silly and obvious thing to say
25:10
But it's not always that obvious and so I realized the more I was actually authentic and myself
25:16
And the more I connected with my soldiers in a way that they felt that they could be themselves and be valued as people who
25:22
You know dare to have things beyond work
25:25
We actually achieved better mission success. So that was sort of my I guess grounding in this
25:30
I also learned that we had this obsession with hours in terms of how many hours that a person do what time did they start what time did they finish
25:38
And I realized really quickly especially when I was in operational deployments what matters is output
25:44
It's not how many hours that a person do it's what are they actually delivering that matters
25:49
Then went on to do my MBA and PhD on leadership. So again, that's just my passion
25:54
I love people. I get really excited about the people stuff
25:57
Yeah, a few years ago I did sort of this postdoctoral
26:00
Research specifically on the experiences of working parents and I just got so
26:06
pissed off
26:07
But this is not how we should be doing work
26:10
Um, and I just knew it fundamentally was a leadership challenge
26:13
It's not a case of I didn't start this because I thought oh, you know save the mums. We've got it hard
26:19
Actually
26:20
And we do have a hard but that's not the that wasn't the premise
26:24
It was I think we can do work better to be far more inclusive so people can you know have things beyond work could be children
26:31
Actually could be anything um, and I know we can get better work outcomes
26:34
So that's that's kind of my story of where I got to it
26:37
I do just want to quickly touch on what you mentioned in terms of leading people better when you knew your soul just more
26:43
Because we've had a patch at work at the moment where I've been quite distracted with a lot of other bigger picture things
26:48
You know where working with more brands than we ever have before I've been like in a sort of different part of the business
26:54
And quite separate from our content team like our producer Emily and our social media manager Lucy
26:59
And I really noticed in the last few weeks
27:01
I've made way more of an effort because I have more space to like lean back into that and to work closer with them and to really for us to be this little content team
27:10
And not only has it been way more fun for all of us, but you can tell in the outputs
27:15
It's so interesting we just you know, we brought back our team meetings and we started at the start of those meetings talking about like how we
27:22
Professionally and personally and you know just just spending time whether it's getting lunch together or talking about our weekends
27:29
And those things can sometimes when you're thinking in hours feel quite unproductive or as if it's a waste of time
27:36
But actually I can tell with the output how much everyone's enjoying themselves that that is time well spent
27:42
And and so important to business success as well as human and personal success
27:48
That is just such a great case
27:50
Example people often think of that stuff. It's the soft stuff. You know bullshit. It's it's actually really tough the human stuff
27:57
That is what matters and I you know
28:00
I talked to a lot of leaders in a whole different like that's my business now
28:04
You know, I talked to leaders about how they can improve leadership capabilities how they can
28:08
Develop high performing teams how they can deliver better outcomes
28:12
And I always say you'll never waste time if you invest in your people
28:16
Like it's never going to be a waste of time when your people are thriving your business thrives
28:21
So, you know, you said people are succeeding
28:24
You know shock horror the business succeeds
28:28
I would have thought absolutely wild concept
28:31
So just the one other story I thought might be worth sharing
28:33
So if you when you asked me about my background is almost five years ago when I decided right
28:38
I'm I'm gonna go all in on this stuff. I'm gonna I'm gonna start my own business and go change the world
28:44
Didn't have it all figured out. I just knew I had something to do with leadership
28:48
And something to do with this sort of parenting issue and an authentic leadership
28:52
But at that time I
28:54
Had a baby that I was breastfeeding and I had a three-year-old
28:58
But I ended up being
29:00
Kind of pulled into the heart of this volunteer
29:04
Just massive task getting people out of Afghanistan
29:07
Very briefly. I'd served enough gunnestarm when I was in the army
29:10
There were local people that had worked in my team
29:13
Fast forward when the Taliban took over those people were in danger
29:16
So that is a that is a twenty-second story on that
29:20
But it turned out to be this very monumental task that I was involved in
29:24
And
29:25
Against all odds it genuinely was mission impossible
29:29
Our team actually succeeded. So we our team and we actually managed to evacuate
29:35
563 people from Afghanistan to New Zealand
29:39
Now the reason I wanted to share that very quickly wasn't just to say oh look look at great
29:42
I am because that's not at all way to it
29:45
um
29:45
It was actually
29:47
When I reflected on how the how does we pull that off?
29:50
I realized that this actually was a great case study
29:54
To demonstrate what you can achieve when people actually feel they can be their whole selves
29:59
When people have flexibility and we focus on outputs as opposed to hours
30:03
And so I just thought when you asked, you know, what's kind of my professional journey to this
30:07
I just wanted to add that we story in because it actually for me
30:11
gave me even more belief in why the stuff matters
30:15
And what you can achieve when you're doing it
30:17
God that's so amazing what an incredible story and such a wild
30:22
um
30:23
Almost I guess series of events that have led you to the space you've had so many different perspectives on
30:29
Leadership and on the importance of flexibility and on yeah, just invest in people
30:35
I think it's so interesting all of the different angles
30:37
But yeah, if I look at the examples within our business
30:40
I have recently started booking we get soreness as a part of our um as a part of our I guess
30:46
Office space there's this is amazing hackney rooftop soreness which I love and you get 30 minutes off peak free
30:54
As a part of working there
30:55
So I really have tried recently to start booking them and going and I noticed actually that the girls at work hadn't done it yet
31:01
And I was like maybe they don't know how to book or maybe they don't feel like they can do it
31:04
So like I sat down with the Emily I'll produce the other day and I was like hey book one and it's amazing
31:09
And then she did go and do it and so I was like you know reading through your research and and what you do
31:14
Obviously, you talk a lot about leading by example
31:17
So it's like yes seeing you going and doing the soreness one thing
31:20
But also like trying to give them permission to do it as another
31:24
I love the fact that you were role modeling to your team members by doing the book in yourself
31:29
I see a lot of leaders that I work with who are actually really lovely and want the best for their people
31:34
And they say yeah, no, of course you can have flexibility really happy for that to happen
31:38
But if they don't do it themselves
31:40
The message really is
31:42
Yeah, you can do it but you're never going to become in a leadership position
31:45
Or your careers not going to progressive you actually actually do these things
31:49
And so when a leader role models it
31:51
First of all that shows you know, I actually mean it when I say I'm okay for you to do these things
31:56
I mean it because I'm doing it as well
31:58
But what leaders can often do and they don't intend to do this
32:02
But they're actually
32:03
limiting the
32:05
Dreams that their people might have because they are kind of sending the message that if you want to progress in your career
32:11
And if you want to go into a leadership role you have to sacrifice your life like I'm doing
32:15
Can see I've seen a lot of leaders who have actually been like wow that's quite a gut punch moment
32:20
I never would have wanted to be in a position where I am
32:24
Almost unintentionally demotivating someone to think that they might become ambitious and progress up the kind of the ranks or progress in their career
32:33
So I think that's just why the role modeling but is important and sorry just I'm really glad that you did
32:38
For me in the same way you're fascinated with leadership. I actually did my um
32:42
My thesis on it too and I'm really interested in leadership
32:46
I find people fascinating. I love people. I want people to feel good at work
32:50
It's one of those things like no one gives you a playbook on how to do it
32:53
No one tells you this is how you can make people feel good or how you can
32:56
Inspire them or how you can make them feel like where they're going in their career mean something
33:02
You really only learn by making mistakes and that's something I kind of hate
33:06
Yet it's not a lot of framework or ways to learn other than seeing when it really doesn't work
33:11
You know, but yeah, maybe we go back to the that whole concept of how many hours have you put in rather than what is the output is something that I really
33:19
Have not got my head around personally and I'd love to unpack that more
33:22
I really noticed this in myself. I've got this in grain to mentality where long hours equals hard worker
33:30
I totally do and I know I show up in a leader like that which I really need to change
33:34
So I'd love to know how you think about that or how you can try and reframe the idea of hours this output
33:40
When we were in the industrial
33:42
Industrial revolution and when a lot of jobs were people working at a factory
33:47
The amount of hours they did was actually quite
33:51
tightly correlated to the output they delivered right if you are on this machine for this many hours
33:56
You will probably produce this many widgets
33:59
Yeah, using that word
34:00
There was a much tighter correlation
34:03
But we are in a knowledge age and in fact we're even moving past the knowledge age into that the AI age and so
34:10
That relationship between hours and outputs is
34:14
No, when there is closely correlated as it was you know a hundred years ago
34:18
If we are in a leadership role and we think oh gosh
34:20
We need to employ someone else because we can't keep up with our current workload with the number of people that we currently have in the team
34:27
We need we need someone else at that point. It's really clear to us why we need someone
34:32
We need them because we need these tasks done X Y and Z you know X Y and Z is getting dropped
34:38
So we need to employ someone else to get that done
34:40
At that point we really are very clear with why we want to bring that person in it's because we want them to do these tasks
34:47
But then it's almost like as soon as they start we're like oh what time are you going to shop and what time are you going to leave
34:53
You know we don't employ someone because we think oh I'd like to fill that chair for these hours
34:57
It's no because we want them to do some things yeah
35:00
Definitely because I think what you're saying around outputs really interesting
35:05
When we employed our social media manager we had this big list of things that we really wanted her to take over
35:10
And we actually did put hours next to what we thought that output would be to make sure it would be you know
35:15
The equivalent of a full-time job
35:17
Because obviously it kind of doesn't then make sense to hire someone in a full time role you could just do contracting
35:22
So I think sometimes it's hard because yeah you're hiring them for output
35:27
But let's say someone is doing all that output in 20 hours
35:30
You kind of would be like okay great
35:32
Well, there's actually more output
35:34
We would love for you to do to fill up the 40 hours
35:36
So it's hard when you're then talking about compensation
35:39
As an employer the way that I think about that would be well
35:42
I'm the equivalent or how I think about your pay is in relation to a full-time working week
35:47
Full-time being around 40 hours
35:50
So if it's taking someone 20 I would want to be getting more output than what was originally in that
35:57
Job description scope if that makes sense it does
36:01
Would it be okay if I slightly challenge of course think about reframing
36:05
So I've got a friend who's a dentist and he did this procedure on a patient
36:10
And the patient then got the bill and of course dentists are very expensive
36:14
And the patient was like oh my gosh you're charging me that amount of money
36:17
You were only in my mouth for 20 minutes
36:19
How could you possibly be
36:21
Charging me this much money and the dentist was like would you feel more comfortable about the bill of it took me an hour in your mouth
36:29
And it's like actually well no, I don't want that person in my mouth for an hour and in fact having it done in 20 minutes is great
36:36
I'm not as the patient. I'm not paying for 20 minutes of dental time
36:40
I'm paying for a procedure to be done which requires that expert to have done
36:45
You know years of training and experience and practice. I'm paying because I want this dental procedure done
36:51
Not because I want to you know hire a dentist for 20 minutes
36:54
It's because I want a procedure done
36:56
So my my kind of challenge back to some people is that I think when you are
37:03
Basically creating a role to start with and you're really clear on what you want done
37:08
And you are an important we like I'm comfortable that this is worth paying this much money
37:12
So me as a business owner I'm going to allocate this much money to achieve those tasks. That's the value that I see there
37:19
Then I'm kind of like well, that's almost all that matters
37:22
If someone can do it more efficiently and then be able to have time
37:26
With their kids or have time I don't know surfing or whatever it is
37:31
I'm almost like why does it matter?
37:33
Why and it's because we're still ingrained like bosses will like oh but I don't want to pay them for hours that they're not doing oh my god
37:39
Honestly can't help but that's what I'm thinking right now
37:42
Especially in the world of AI when you have the ability to fast track so that the outputs are
37:48
You know done
37:50
I don't really want to be paying someone five hours a week for those outputs that are say costing me
37:56
I don't know 45,000 pounds a year or something to
38:01
For outputs that are taking someone three hours because they're leveraging AI. Do you know what I mean? Oh, I do
38:07
I'm guilty of myself. I remember once I had an electrician ran at the house to do
38:12
I'm going to say change a light bulb. We should do something more than that
38:15
Obviously, and I had this agreed price with them beforehand the electricians said yes
38:18
It's going to cost you this much money to do these tasks
38:21
And then I got the invoice and it said the amount of hours that been at my house and I was like
38:26
No, they weren't at my house for three hours. They're only different hour
38:29
And so I don't think I should pay that much because they're charging me for three hours
38:33
And then I was like Ellen why do you give a shit?
38:36
I don't care if it was at my house for 10 minutes all the entire day
38:39
I was paying an agreed price that I thought was fair for that particular task that he was going to do
38:45
Right
38:46
But I guess the the challenge that I'm often putting out to other leaders is
38:51
If we clear on the value that we are prepared to pay for that particular output
38:56
Then that's the value exchange
38:59
We could have a person that we pay for hours
39:02
And they take twice as long because they're not as efficient
39:05
And weirdly will feel more comfortable about paying that salary
39:09
Then we would about paying someone who can be more efficient and then go and do something else in their life
39:14
That actually energises them and they come back to work in their own fire
39:18
We are quite literally
39:20
Encouraging
39:22
Under productivity
39:23
We as leaders are thinking yeah, I feel more comfortable paying that seller if I know that they're there for 40 hours
39:29
But I feel less comfortable if they're there for 20
39:32
But why but that's almost a bit why they're doing that same amount of work
39:39
Okay, so I've been thinking about this a little bit more
39:42
And I think I can provide a better or an answer with a bit more clarity
39:46
So first of all if a
39:48
An organization has invested in tall technology and training to create efficiencies
39:54
That I can absolutely appreciate that the employer or the leader would like to see a return on that investment
40:00
And so it absolutely makes sense of that
40:03
Technology tools training has been provided to make a person more efficient
40:06
Then that organization wants to benefit by being able to assign that person more work
40:12
With that though there is a
40:14
Consideration to heads in the back of your mind and with that I often remind leaders is that if we
40:21
Basically reward people for becoming more efficient by giving them more work
40:27
It's really just performance punishment, right?
40:29
And so if people think well why would I bother trying to figure out ways to be more efficient or more effective or more productive
40:36
Because all that's going to happen is I'm just going to be given more work
40:39
It's actually can be very demotivating
40:41
So we just want to make sure that we are motivating people in a way that actually
40:46
Meet their drivers
40:48
One of the things that can make it a bit more palatable for a leader or an employer
40:53
When they're thinking about how do we transition a little bit more from this hours model into an output framework
40:59
Is by effectively sharing the wall the rewards so for example
41:04
If say a savings of six hours had been made across a 40 hour week
41:08
Well, maybe that six hours could be shared between the employee and the employer
41:13
So the employee benefits by becoming more efficient and they get basically three hours as sort of like a gift to go and you know
41:20
Do what they'd like with but the employer also benefits
41:23
Because they can utilize their three hours that they've kind of got to keep
41:28
Um by giving that person some more work
41:30
So that could be a way to sort of share the benefits to make sure that we are really
41:34
Motivating people to be more efficient in a way that actually drives them successfully
41:40
So
41:42
So there anyone who is hearing this for the first time can you just explain what work school hours
41:47
Um actually means and and the problem that it's obviously trying to solve
41:51
Hashtag work school hours that's the sort of the movement that I started it's um
41:55
It's the book that I wrote
41:57
So basically the idea of hashtag work school hours is not as it is not as dogmatic as the title sounds
42:03
What I'm doing you know doing a keynote
42:05
There's usually someone in the audience who can't wait to put their hand up and be like
42:09
Ellen you do want hospitals to close at three o'clock
42:12
Oh, I'm like
42:14
No, I'd not a moron like of course
42:17
Can you hold a better question please? I'm in a TED talk
42:21
It's it's about a set of principles and applying them
42:25
When and where it makes sense which looks different in every industry
42:28
So I've you know, I've worked with lots of different sectors including emergency services
42:32
With how might we apply these principles to get better
42:37
Basically better business outcomes as well as better personal outcomes
42:41
So the first one is around just valuing that people have things they care about outside of work
42:47
I know you know from my leadership experience that when we as leaders
42:52
Care about our people as whole people who have things beyond work which could be children, but it could be anything
42:58
Our people feel that here
43:00
And we feel appreciated and we do better work
43:03
But that is that is just a fact is if an individual feels like they've boss cares about him as a whole person
43:08
They will do better work for that team and for that organization
43:11
The second principle of hashtag work school hours is to look at outputs
43:16
And not and not on the hours part and then the third principle is to provide people more flexibility wherever possible
43:23
So on the on the hours one
43:25
I actually work a lot of hours like I'm bloody passionate about what I do like I'm
43:29
You know, I'm I'm not a workaholic. I'm a lifeaholic
43:32
You know right now it's you know late at night in New Zealand my kids are asleep
43:35
So I often work at night time because I'm a night owl
43:38
But for me it's the flexibility that is the most meaningful thing in my life
43:43
So my life basically revolves around the kids
43:46
I do I do basically sort of work school hours
43:49
But I'm juggling my work around that and I still deliver
43:54
I know really greatly large outputs. That sounds wanky
43:57
I you know deliver great outputs
43:59
But it's that I do them at a time that suits me
44:02
And that's kind of probably the biggest thing of the principles of hashtag work school hours is it's the flexibility
44:08
So instead of saying must be you desk from these hours it's hey, these are the outputs. I want you to deliver
44:14
You go figure out the best way to do it
44:16
So how would you say people are getting that wrong at the moment specifically companies
44:21
Some of them it might be you know core hours instead of being 9 to 5
44:24
Maybe they could be say 10 to 2 maybe they are the core hours that you can operate as a business
44:30
And then you give people flexibility beyond that
44:33
That can be hugely valuable
44:35
I mean to parents definitely it allows for the school run
44:38
But you know lots of other people get benefit from that as well
44:41
Um some of the other ways that businesses are getting it wrong is just yeah
44:46
They just have this obsession with you've got to bet your desk from these from nine o'clock and two or five
44:50
o'clock
44:51
And so if someone you know bucks that trend i.e does a school run at three o'clock
44:57
They are kind of automatically written off as
45:00
List loyal
45:01
List dedicated list committed list effective
45:04
Which is just not true
45:07
Um and then they get effectively discriminated against and then those
45:10
Peac people I say people they usually parents so we're doing these part-time ones
45:14
They end up just feeling undervalued and
45:17
Not doing their best work as a result of it
45:19
Yeah for for anyone that's less saying it is kind of like I still don't really think
45:23
Saying a 10 to 2 working day is going to get the outputs that we need
45:28
Do you have anything to say back to leaders businesses that yeah and maybe on the fence
45:33
Look i'm not genuinely i'm not trying to push my book but i think you should push them all
45:39
But the reason i say that is the book is full of
45:43
Full of examples of how different businesses have been doing it
45:46
So i can't kind of say hey Sophie and hey listeners
45:49
This is the absolute grand plan of how you do it
45:51
i'm saying here are some principles
45:54
And i would encourage you because it will add value to your business
45:58
To think about how you might be able to apply these principles in a way that works for your team
46:03
And how that looks will be different in every single
46:06
Situation but because the book has got so many different practical examples it gives leaders enough sort of ideas to get their own thoughts
46:14
Flow in and be like oh actually i i could do that i could tweak that idea a little bit and implement it here
46:20
I often ask leaders the question would you like to have a team that is massively engaged
46:26
Really is like excited to be at work
46:29
Feels really valued and does the most productive you know competent work they possibly could
46:35
And the answer to that question is always
46:38
It was yes right well it should be yes
46:40
And so i just say you know to leaders
46:43
This is an opportunity for you to enhance that and so ever businesses later is like okay
46:49
I'm kind of open to giving my team a bit more flexibility
46:52
But i don't quite know how that's going to work
46:55
Um i'm a bit worried like you know what are people don't get their staff down or what are people take the pests or what if it doesn't work
47:00
The one of the things i um encourage leaders to do and in fact i encourage individuals to do this when they are asking their bosses
47:07
Can they do things differently is kind of frame it is a bit of an experiment and say hey look
47:13
We we're kind of interested in and you know
47:15
There might be this opportunity to
47:17
give our people better experiences and deliver a bit of business outcomes
47:22
I already contain yeah this is kind of you know talking to the team together
47:25
That there might be some ways we can do things differently
47:28
These are the outputs that i really need the team to do
47:31
What do you guys think about how we might be able to look at how we could make some tweaks here
47:36
And so i often say the leaders is is ask your people and it is amazing how
47:42
If our creative
47:43
People can be when they genuinely feel that their boss wants the answer to that question
47:48
I'm so gutted that they're going to listen to this and i'm not going to be able to take credit for things such a good leader when i post that question
47:54
ha ha ha ha
47:56
Are there any small
47:58
practical actions that someone listing either who wants more flexibility or
48:04
What's try to give their employees more flexibility? Are there any other small tips or tricks that people could try straight away
48:10
I often say the leaders
48:12
You've got financial quarters right our year is already broken up into quarters
48:16
Maybe we could do more to align those with the school terms
48:20
So in New Zealand it's four terms a year
48:21
I don't actually know that's the same in everywhere in the world
48:24
But what if we organize our quarters and our projects kind of to be sort of alarm with the school term does actually really clear
48:32
Because it's almost like aligning the idea of business outcomes or being able to celebrate the end of a quarter when kids are celebrating the end of school and you know
48:40
Just being a bit more inflow. I think that makes a lot of sense
48:43
Yeah, so i've you know worked with a lot of businesses where they just you know
48:46
They often the way they operate is in projects and they have like particularly busy times and then more quiet times
48:52
And i'm like why don't you just sort of align those with a school term
48:54
So it's not saying that the parents are not going to do any work whatsoever during the school holidays
48:59
But if they have a bit more flexibility during that period
49:02
That could make a massive difference to their lives and therefore if they are feeling better and thriving better
49:08
Surprise surprise they'll come and deliver better
49:11
You know outcomes for your business
49:13
Another one is I had a massive insurance company that I was working with and they used to have an 8 30 AM
49:21
Like video meeting with their senior leaders three times a week
49:24
And i just said to them i was like have you ever thought about making that 9 30 instead of 8 30 and they said why is that
49:31
And i said well i am picking up that
49:34
Well over half the people joining that call are actually doing the school drop off at that time
49:39
And that is really stressful and hard for them
49:42
And so they gave it a go they just made an experiment
49:44
They tried putting the meeting at 9 30 instead of 8 30 and they came back to me and they're like holy shit that made such a difference
49:51
The amount of parents who are like thank you so much
49:53
I'm you know literally like trying to join the call
49:56
See later joining at school and just sort of feeling like the
49:59
And so it's like well maybe we could put that meeting at a different time
50:03
So that is such a simple little thing that can make quite a big difference
50:08
And so when I think you know leaders ask your team you might have a team that don't have parents in it
50:12
You know you have teams who've got different things going on in life
50:15
But just say hey teen what are some of the things that are meaningful you outside of work
50:19
Are there some ways that we could maybe look at how we structure our teen meetings in a way that could
50:25
Enable you to do that so you know basically this is me helping
50:28
You this is me you know i'm being a great boss. You know you could do this
50:33
But i want to be really clear that this is the output and this is what we need to deliver it as a result of it
50:37
What i say to parents is think about what it is that you might like right so if just for for example
50:43
Appearance thinking i want to ask my boss if i can do the school pick up two days a week
50:48
That's what i'd like to ask my boss that would make a massive difference to my life
50:51
If i could do the school pick up two days a week
50:54
But i don't know how to ask my boss
50:56
Don't go to your boss with your list of problems and how your life's hard
51:00
Go to your boss with a solution. So don't say oh it's so hard. I'm missing the kids and it's shit say hey boss
51:06
I want to do great work for you
51:08
If i've understood this correctly you want me to achieve a bnc
51:12
This is the standard that you want me to do it to this is the time frame you need me to do it within
51:16
I want to deliver that so i'm i'm going to do this great work
51:20
I just would like to see if i might be able to structure my work ever so slightly differently
51:25
So i can say you know do these school pick up twice a week
51:29
I'm still going to do this great work
51:30
But this is going to make a massive value add to my life to be able to do this these two school runs
51:37
And i want to do this great outputs for you
51:39
The next thing i say to people is
51:41
Then say to your boss can we trial it
51:45
Don't say
51:46
Right can we lock this in now because bosses
51:49
Freak out
51:52
Now i'm giving you team members ideas
51:54
But you know it's we want to do rescue for the boss because the boss might be like oh i don't know
51:59
I don't want to do that and oh if i you know then it's very hard to take it back again
52:02
And what if it doesn't work and what if they take the purse
52:05
If you say to the boss can we make it a trial for the next month that we operate this way
52:10
And at the end of that month can we please have a meeting to discuss how it went
52:15
And so i say to the people have that meeting with your boss and be genuinely open to feedback
52:19
If the boss says you know what you actually missed some things because of this
52:23
Then it's sort of on you is the individual to then come up with a solution
52:26
To be like okay i hear you boss. I've got that issued. This is how we can resolve it
52:31
But it's very much around
52:33
It's it's you make it hard for your boss to say no like you know
52:36
I want to do this. This is solution focus. It's not problem focus. It's here's the solution
52:42
This is how we can do it can we trial it and let's evaluate it at the end
52:46
Honestly the thing that was my heart the most is when i have a parent reach out to me and say
52:52
Thank you. I had one like a dad not that long ago
52:55
And he said to me Ellen
52:56
I got to attend my son's athletic stay for the first time ever because i felt you know
53:01
Basically inspired that i could ask my boss
53:03
Can i go to athletics day? I'm not asking for a handout
53:06
I'm asking to be enabled to do great work for you
53:09
I just want to do things a little bit differently
53:11
And then it kind of becomes normalized because then after the month the boss is like oh well actually that work
53:16
That did actually work just fine
53:18
Maybe we can do it for longer. I'm so obsessed with this and it's actually making me think
53:22
My biggest issue right now is i'm not really able to eat well exercise
53:28
Spend time with my partner spend time with my friends work really hard
53:31
All those that those are all things that make me a happy healthy good version of myself and do good work
53:36
But the main thing that is really hard for me is the idea of exercise
53:40
I find it so difficult when I have
53:42
You zealon meetings Australian meetings you came eating
53:44
So I have like mornings and evenings for me are quite busy workwise
53:48
So for me fitting in the exercise it's really difficult
53:52
I think a really good thing for me to try as a boss for a month is doing my exercise in the middle of the day
53:59
And see how it impacts my productivity my happiness levels
54:03
And just do it as a trial because if I'm doing that then hopefully that also felt like they could
54:09
Do the same. I'd love to finish this conversation. I'm by asking just one last question
54:13
What do you think is a really important key message that you hope can get through
54:18
So the one thing I'd say is
54:21
The best thing anyone can do to be successful in their professional career and also in their personal life
54:27
Is to get great at their human skills
54:30
The more anyone can do to become better at building relationships
54:35
Developing emotional intelligence building empathy forming connections with people
54:39
That is the one thing that will make you more professionally successful and also personally successful unhappy
54:45
That's the one for one piece
54:47
The second one is outputs matter more than ours
54:51
Hands down
54:52
Okay hands down
54:55
What people deliver is more important than the hours that they put in
54:59
I think that this conversation has given me so much to think about as both
55:04
I was going to say an employee but as a worker as well as a leader
55:08
Um, and I think that there will be probably a huge amount of questions
55:12
Um, inspired people people who want to learn more
55:17
If they would like to find out more about the work that you do or get in touch with you directly
55:22
What are the different avenues resources that you have available?
55:25
Yeah, sure. So the best one is my website, which is my name. So it's Ellen
55:30
Joan ford.com
55:32
Um, I'm actually you know genuinely there's a lot of free resources on there
55:36
I I'm just passionate about this. I know not everyone's going to buy something from me
55:40
But I'd love them to get as much content as possible um, so that's my first one
55:44
Um, the second one is
55:46
I've got this this book which I'm bloody proud of it was um actually finalists in the
55:51
Australian Business Awards, so it's a it's a it's a good but that's amazing
55:57
There's good content in this book. So I
55:59
So I don't know this is good for the business or not, but I don't really care
56:03
People if you want to get a hard copy of the book buy it off my website, but not everyone's going to do that
56:08
I'm happy to give people a free copy of the ebook. Okay, awesome
56:12
So if you use the code today zero zero so that's just t o d i y and then digit zero zero today zero zero
56:19
Go to the shop page of my website put in the ebook add that code and you'll get it for free
56:23
That's so kind of you
56:25
I will definitely put that the details of that in the poll culture and notes too
56:28
But yeah, thank you so much for um, your time especially like you're really living by example here
56:34
It's 10 30 pm your time and you're in a beautiful blue dress doing this interview
56:38
So yeah, thank you so much and um, I loved meeting you and I loved learning more about this is deaf like it's really genuinely
56:44
Give me a lot to think about so thank you so much
56:46
Um, yeah, really appreciate your time and the output that it's given me which is a podcast
56:53
Thank you so much for listening to raising the curve these conversations are designed to teach you everything
56:57
You need to know to be better with your money
56:59
Saving to investing to talking with your friends about your salaries or that stuff and if you like what you've heard
57:04
We would love if you could please hit subscribe wherever you're listening and leave a comment
57:08
Let us know what you thought about the episode and it only takes one second and it would really make our week
57:13
Our year yeah, yeah, so please do it. Okay, bye
57:20
Okay, quickly the curve was created to empower and educate you about investing but we are not financial advisors
57:26
Our platform exists for educational purposes only and it doesn't provide
57:29
Personalised investing advice for your individual needs and should not be relied upon to make an investment or financial decision
57:35
And always remember to do your own research before making any investment or financial decision
57:40
We're here for any knowledge and support you need but the final call is always yours and thanks for being here
57:46
You got this yeah, we know you got this