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AIM High: Engaging clients & motivating teams · Two in Twenty

• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: Hello and welcome to another episode of AI High.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_01: My name is Twink Field.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_01: I'm the CEO of White Marble Marketing and your host for these podcasts.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: Today we are going to be talking about how to engage clients as well as motivate teams in this new normal that we've all adapted to during 2020.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm conscious that as we look ahead to 2021, to try and address the feeling of burnout that a number of marketers are feeling.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_01: And just think about how we look after ourselves better.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: And Mary Laura Humble is just a fantastic person to talk about these matters.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_01: She is a senior strategist at a big financial institution, which I'll I'll let her tell you more about her role.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I think she brings a load of insight and sort of techniques for us to start to explore and think about.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_01: Hope you enjoy it.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_01: Mary Laura, thank you so much for joining me today to talk about how we engage clients and motivate our teams in such a strange environment that we've all been adapting to in 2020.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_01: And so I would love, if you may, just to introduce yourself, your role, your background on the subject, and then we can get into some questions.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: Fantastic.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: Well, first and foremost, thank you for having me.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: Very excited to be here today.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: And uh yes, so my background is uh, you know, I'm gonna try and make it short.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um I basically started my career uh on trading floors, uh being a fixed income salesperson uh in various countries.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that took me obviously to the UK, then to the US, and then to Asia, so uh which uh gave me the opportunity to do a lot of traveling.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um and then I um sort of changed a little bit of career.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: I think I have a theme for transition.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I sort of moved into a smaller firm, a family office, uh, and learned about asset management then.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: But at the same time, more and more I was getting very curious about people and decided to start a diploma in executive coaching just out of interest and to learn a little bit more, I would say, about myself and about others.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um and then I carried on my career and I set up my own business for a few years.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, so I became an entrepreneur, which is something I never thought I would do.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, lots of uh highs and lots of lows, but great, great lessons.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: To finally land at a large financial institution today, uh, where I have a fantastic role, which is uh pretty much being part of a consultancy team where we're going to work with our best clients uh around various themes, but my theme is to work with our clients' people right up my street.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I've also since then uh qualified uh as an executive coach with the International Coach Federation, uh, and I spend my time coaching, uh mentoring, which is different, uh, consulting and training clients around uh you know anemia.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: How fascinating and quite unique, I think, in this space.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_01: So I imagine that your leadership and content is in quite high demand at these times.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: Sort of how are you talking to clients at the moment and what are they grappling with?
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so I've been in the role for now six years, and I must say that 2020 has been extraordinary, obviously, for many people, but uh all of a sudden what we do has become very, very important to our clients.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: So uh we reacted fairly quickly by creating content around leading through challenging times and really led with that uh throughout the year in um helping various teams and leaders to think about how do I manage this because this is quite an unprecedented, as we say.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: So we kind of um thought about three areas really to help clients around leading yourself.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: You know, what can I do around self-management, around self-regulation?
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: So we brought a lot of emotional intelligence uh elements there.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: And then we sort of said, well, now you're leading yourself.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: You obviously for most of us have to lead others, whether that's at home or you know, with our teams and so on.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: So again, we sort of zeroed in on motivation and support and how to keep the engagement uh of teams throughout this time.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: And then finally, with we always sort of manage this with a hope uh you know, embedded into uh the conversation and always invited uh clients to consider leading into the future and thinking post-crisis right away.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: What does that look like?
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: What am I going to take away from this?
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: Primary.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: So quite rich, rich material and uh and also I I guess it's sort of material that's sort of useful in life and in you know professional or personal, really.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, definitely, absolutely applicable to both.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I think again, fairly unique, uh, unique, sorry, uh, where in a in a business you know context, you could talk about such really personal um elements as well.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: And that was very much the theme as well of this year, about the human uh aspect uh of this of this, what this crisis did to us.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: There's another thing I could add, if you if you like, is is on crisis, what uh what leaders have learned uh around crisis.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: And uh because I think that's a very, very again um powerful knowledge, and and and if it happens again, maybe our listeners will be better prepared.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um the crisis has three phases, really very well known.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, assess, respond, and recover.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: And uh when we talk to about assessing, what do we assess?
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: Well, obviously, we assess ourselves, we assess our business, we assess our processes, our innovation.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: And depending on what we find during this assessment, it really helps us to um respond better or have a response that's better structured or suited to the um to the issue.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: And then obviously, if assess and respond are done very well, recovery is going to follow through and again as more chances to be successful.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: So, what we've seen, a lot of businesses have spent a lot of time and energy responding, obviously, but they haven't spent necessarily enough time assessing, uh, which means that you know the response wasn't was not as good as it could have been.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: And a key takeaway, by the way, of our of these three phases is you've got to do them at the same time.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: And that's quite a challenge.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: You've got to constantly assess, constantly respond, and certainly never, never forget the recovery element.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: And people who do that well uh will recover super well in 21.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_01: As you say, it's sort of quite intense to be able to sort of do all those three things together and on a sort of ongoing basis, and just um hearing you talk about it uh kind of makes me sort of feel anxious already about the sort of the effort and and um and commitment.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: And and I'm conscious that in talking to our clients and across the industry, there's a lot of conversation about burnout right now.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_01: To have the sense of additional uh workload on top of that.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: You know, how you know what tips have you got for everybody as they think about structuring something in those three phases, but maybe with a lot of fatigue, you know, Zoom or otherwise?
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so I think we could we could we could unpack your question in in two ways, I guess.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: Uh number one is what is helpful?
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: What were the key concepts uh of this uh of this year?
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: So crisis was one, knowing that it has three phases, and I think change was also a key topic anchoring this this theme this year.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, but I would say change that we didn't choose, and that's very, very difficult, right?
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: When you decide to move house, it's it's it's very different uh when the you own the decision rather than when it's imposed on you, which was very much this year.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_00: So I may talk about uh Elizabeth Kablaros, uh, who is a lady who wrote uh a book uh called Death and Dying.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm sorry, so that's uh that's happy, but uh bear with me.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um and there she wrote about the five stages of grief, which I'm sure a lot of uh our listeners know about.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: And that was back in 1969, by the way, which is quite interesting.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and she adapted the concept of the change curve from that.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and I think the change curve is something I would like to talk to you about because I think it's been a very, very important and useful tool uh to manage this year and to manage any change, by the way, whether it's this year or next year.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_01: We'll come back to that then.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_01: I'll store that up as the next question if you're happy to keep keep on your death and dying track.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: So let's keep on the death and dying track.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: So here she she says that you know, change has various phases, just like you know, just like grieve, grieving, and um different responses and emotions are attached to the different stages.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: So shall I take you through them?
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, sounds great.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: So, number one, status quo.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: You know, remember I take you back to March or whatever it was uh when lockdown was announced.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, are you kidding?
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of people were just in shock and denial, and the uh emotion was feeling threatened because this was quite you know unnerving, saying, you know, what do you mean I'm gonna be restricted and I can't go out and everything.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: Then the second stage is disruption, where people, and we still see it today, by the way, anger and fear, right?
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we're seeing a lot of demonstration about anti-lockdown and things like that.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: So we're still very much there.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: The third stage is what we call exploration, where here we start to adapt, we start to actually think well, working from home has some good sides, you know.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: Uh maybe there is a silver lining to this.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: And finally, the fourth stage is acceptance and rebuilding.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: This is where we start seeing hope and opportunities, and where we ideally need to be as soon as possible to be happy, uh, accept the change.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: But obviously, we're human.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: So we're not going to go through these phases in order.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_00: And one day we might be in exploration phase, the next day anger might come and join us, and so on and so forth.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: And is that um what's driving a lot of the burnout, the fatigue is a sort of emotional processing?
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yes, I think it could be, but I think honestly, I think it's the other way around.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's the lack of uh processing that uh makes it extremely difficult to bear, the lack of space creation, the lack of awareness around what we are feeling uh that makes it extremely uncomfortable, uh, and not knowing and not what tools to use to be able to do that.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: And often I guess in that situation, we take comfort in in sort of execution going into execution mode and to sort of delivery because it's sort of something that we do know and perhaps feel have have some comfort around.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, I think the idea of control is what you get into.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that we we we you know when we feel a little bit outside of our comfort zone, we we're going to hang on to something we can control.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: But uh actually when we are in a situation like this, is the other way around, and maybe uh I can I can help you or give a few tips uh if that's useful, of how to better manage these situations when they come up.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: Again, they came up this year, but they might come up next year and the year after.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I would say as an individual is first and foremost, and we're very bad at that, is have compassion for ourselves.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: We're pretty good with others, but when it comes to us, we're pretty harsh.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, just being kind to ourselves first.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: And um, and also as I mentioned earlier, talking about space creation and how can we do that?
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_00: What does that mean?
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I think it's it's it's being aware of where we are, being aware of how we feel, what are we thinking, what we are doing, uh, in order to increase presence, you know, and also in order to say, actually, I'm not feeling that great this morning, or actually, I'm doing far too much.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: Let me take a step back and recalibrate and rethink.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I think if we take that moment, these moments, we can do that all day.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: We can do that a hundred times a day, checking in and recalibrate, right?
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_00: And how can we recalibrate?
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: I've got a really cool little technique I can share with you, uh, which is which is not mine, it's from DeepAck Shopra.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: I've used it with clients so much and it's had a such uh um an impact.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: It's called stop S T-O-P, but it's gonna be uh an acronym.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: So S means stop and actually smile uh because smiling already takes the weight off.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_00: T stands for take three deep breaths.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: And we could do that live right now, actually, if people want to literally take three deep breaths because I love doing it.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: O stands for observe, observe what's happening in your body, your heart rate, your shoulders.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: And most people have said, oh, I feel calmer, you know, it feels already more chilled.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: And P stands for proceed with awareness and compassion.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: So you can see space was created, which gives you choice of how to continue, you know, and choice to maybe let go of a few things you don't control and focus on the one you do control.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_00: Because by the way, that's where we have the most satisfaction.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: So I hope that was helpful.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: But I I thought that was one of our best sellers this year.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: The other tip I can give you is around strict boundaries.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, you know, uh a lot of people have struggled with that, working from home uh and uh working all hours, uh starting early and not leaving their desk.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so I think having the the boundary and boundary can be blocking time in your calendar to have a five, 10-minute breaks in between meetings and avoid back-to-backs, go for a walk, which I did today, the sun was shining, I made sure I went to get some fresh air and things like that.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: So have some what we call non-negotiables uh structure in your day uh because they're very, very important and will help you again to be actually increase your performance probably and efficiency.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we we certainly um find that and just sort of funny things like having your default setting for a meeting being 25 minutes not 30 or 50 minutes not you know 60, and that way you're just allowing yourself to stop to use your phrase or take a breath or have a you know short break.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it makes such a difference.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: It makes a big difference, absolutely.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: So that um did you want to go back to change curve, sort of revisit that, to sort of pick up on that?
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, sure.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_00: So on the change curve, so all well and good.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I tell you the change curve exists, but you know, so what does it mean?
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: And how can you what can you practically do about that?
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_00: So, well, first of all, I think understanding the impact of change on ourselves, on everybody is going to be extremely helpful.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: Helpful to support people in your teams, helpful to support people in your family, uh, and really sort of thinking, okay, basically, nobody likes change, right?
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: So, as a leader, for example, you know, even in a change management context, that's extremely important.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_00: If you want to ensure success in your new, you know, in your new strategy and things like that, you need to understand that concept.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: Now, remember I talked about stage one and two, which are not great, status quo, and disruption, right?
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: Three and four, exploration and acceptance are becoming quite interesting in a change context.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: So the first thing one needs to do is to be able to bring everyone to stage three and four as quickly as we can.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: So, as a leader, if you manage a team or an organization, the best way to do that is by communicating clearly and often with a bit of a reassuring tone, if you like, but really giving clarity to people.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, you know, when there's no story, people make one up, uh, especially in times of difficult times, and it's usually not a positive story.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: So I would say that um that's the key.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_00: That's the key to this knowledge is to be able to control the communication and to be aware of the impact it has on bringing people with you and ensuring a successful change.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_01: And um I think there's never been a more testing time for individuals, but as well as leaders, you know.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: I think you know, people who lead teams or lead companies, there's a real examination of your character and your qualities.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I just um was wondering, you know, what what else uh you might sort of point to in terms of what good leadership looks like in in these times.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, sure.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: I think I think um leaders and have realized, I think they must realize very quickly that a crisis impacts people differently, you know, never underestimate the power of uh psychological factors on behavior and that they're going to be very different, depending also on demographics, I would say, and experience, right?
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: So what we've seen is um that young people, you know, who have been living on their own through lockdown and things like that needed much more help than maybe more mature people who had a family or had you know experienced crises before.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: So it was a very, very uh wide um sort of spectrum of different sides, so never underestimate where people are at.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: And also I would say uh teaming has become a very important theme this year because we were a team, but we were not, because we were not together in the office uh physically, and we were all scattered around the UK or otherwise uh trying to be a team.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_00: So, how can we do that?
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_00: So I think we we've seen also an increased focus on teaming, and um I would say to leaders uh around uh teaming to refocus and recalibrate teaming around four key aspects of a high-performing team.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, aspect number one is vision.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: You know, if you don't have a vision that motivates your people and get them out of bed every day, start working on that because it's absolutely paramount.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_00: A vision is very big, it's very inspirational.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, especially young people, it means a lot to them.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: Vision and values, very important.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, obviously, leadership, uh, key.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: And let me say that leadership is not only top-down, leadership starts with ourselves, as I mentioned earlier on the talk, talking about leading yourself and leading others.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_00: And so leadership is very, very important.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_00: Communication, absolute key, right?
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_00: How often, what tone, and how do I adapt my style and my tone to different styles of behavior, different characters, extremely important.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: And finally, clear roles and responsibilities could be quite difficult to obtain in a virtual setting.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: But that's why I think zeroing in on that as well during uh these times in a virtual world is very important.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: So, but again, we always try to give very clear framework, and that's what I'm trying to do today, uh, of actionable items that people can refer back to and look at it and say, okay, our communication's not so great, let's work on that.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: Or actually, we don't have a vision, let's work on that, and so on and so forth.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_01: That makes a lot of sense.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_01: I was just reflecting on your point around communication, that it's both ways, isn't it, in terms of what the expectations are, and sort of being very clear as as a sort of team leader, but also as a team member, being very clear amongst your peers and sort of reporting back as well.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_01: So there's sort of an onus on all parties to to communicate clearly.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, there is, and it there's also a bigger issue uh around communication, I think is the one of culture.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I think uh culture will determine what type and style of communication there is going around a team or a firm, right?
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and I think what we've seen this year is uh the theme of psychological safety has come up big time.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_00: Uh where you want to create a culture where it's safe to speak up.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and I think if you didn't have that this year, you know, you would have lost a lot of people, uh, lost meaning on motivation, engagement, and so on.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_00: Because if they were not feeling safe to share whatever was in their mind, uh it would have been very a big impact on them on the behavior and a day-to-day uh delivery of their task.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_00: So I think a culture of inclusion, a culture of safety uh really facilitates all types of communication.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: And it starts by the top, it starts with leadership.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: It's interesting.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: And in talking to sort of a number of sort of marketing leaders in the industry about how they are motivating their teams and um look, you know, looking after the individuals that are kind of working extremely hard through this period.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_01: There seems to be a lot more individual focus.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_01: I guess you don't obviously get the passing moments in the corridor or you know, making a coffee that you would in an office.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_01: So the I think the the individual calls going in kind of you know across the team seem to be, you know, you have to be much more structured and thoughtful about it rather than sort of haphazard.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_01: And I and I wonder whether you feel like that's something that will stay, that there will be this sort of much more personal, sort of individual kind of relationships that that um have been fostered during this period that will remain.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think I think it will.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: I think people have seen uh the benefits of of and have got to know each other uh much more intimately and and better for most of it.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: But I think also uh the other side to this is going to be about rebuilding that team culture, right?
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: Because we've gone very, very individual.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and now we want to uh go back.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: So I think it's it's around possibly what I would call leading with intention, right?
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: So these 21, uh, you know, where am I, you know, talking about assessment again?
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: Uh what's been working well, what's in a little bit of deficit, and recalibrating.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: I think leadership is a never ending recalibrating exercise.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_00: Seriously, it's such a dynamic role.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and that's why awareness.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: is is key in that role otherwise um it's very difficult to do it well something else that um i'm not sure we've touched on before but i i've certainly been hearing more about is sort of leadership in vulnerability yeah and that and and that's all part of i guess your same point around psychological safety as well that people can if if you show if you lead in that sort of fashion then then it enables people to to voice their concerns or issues no absolutely I think it's the old saying of leading by example um so absolutely i i leading with with vulnerability as brene brown said uh vulnerability creates connection uh and i think again i would link that to the virtual world anyway right uh whether it's uh a leader with their teams I think vulnerability was absolutely key and also we were going into people's homes we were meeting the children and so on so you had to bring something else of yourself anyway uh and I think actually it is also something I talk about when it comes to uh creating new relationships with new clients in a virtual space you know I got asked the question how do you create new connections in a virtual world and actually uh I saw that that's a great question I think it's uh first and foremost giving yourself a bit more time uh than normal and and leading again with that vulnerability being extremely relaxed and open and not even think about selling anything for the first two, three uh conversations you have and I also would say uh you know listen and be present and really show real interest and be authentic uh and the other thing however again virtual world they are so positive you can leverage your online presence big time right you can uh make sure that people see your LinkedIn profile or whatever else or whatever platform and I know we're talking to people in marketing so I'm sure they know this much better than me but I think that's where actually digital marketing becomes very very handy in being a complement to uh leading a virtual relationship I would say so vulnerability absolutely uh again a best seller for this year let's say yeah and to your point around creating virtual relationships I guess what you're saying there is kind of whether they are within our teams and have a sort of internal sort of emphasis or or indeed you know potentially with your clients in your day-to-day role normally you know and sort of supporting people with their client relationships external relationships as well yes that's right and the other thing we had is uh how do you do that you know I'm I'm tired of Zoom I'm done you know uh yet another one yet another one I'm burnt out and um actually zoom fatigue is real by the way uh it has a huge effect on your brain your brain can't cope you know uh for those who have children you know we we get uh so um crazy about our kids spending too much time on their phones and that's a good reason it really generates fatigue and when it comes to any Zoom or any other uh platform especially the gallery view oh brain goes nuts because it doesn't know where to look uh and also you're missing pretty much I would say I don't know 60% of the of the message because the nonverbals are non-existent right so or if they are they are focused on face a little bit of hand and face facial expression so your brain is kind of like missing a lot of information uh but again I think there is a way to do this I've done a huge amount of Zoom events this year and uh I've made sure I smiled a lot and used my hands my tone of voice posed and so on so you actually develop new skills you know so we all in all winning again on that but um too much zoom well pick up the phone do you remember it's a very good point right we had these things called telephone before and we used to do conference calls right so let's mix a little bit of both uh let's go back to the good old ways of of before uh before uh COVID 19 and also if we can let's have uh walking meetings if people live in the area and things like that the weather's still okay uh and it's uh it's a welcome break for everybody so there's a few tips maybe around that terrific thank you um so I guess um conscious of time Marino and um thinking uh sort of closing couple of questions around you know what could be learned from a crisis like this and so we can move forward positively as we look into I guess next year 2021 and um any final thoughts for our for our listeners more broadly sure I mean thank you for asking this because I think that's key right this is uh Mr.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_00: Churchill told us never let a crisis go to waste and uh in that spirit I would like to uh you know invite you to think about a few questions uh to help you really gain the benefits from 2020 what have you learned about yourself what have you discovered so you know maybe making a good banana bread uh make your focus has gone in has increased you've actually enjoyed being at home and so on and so forth what have you learned and discovered about others and that can be quite interesting you know you know your colleagues better and so on what opportunities for innovation has this crisis brought you know look back all crisis or wars and so on innovation follows big time so it's a massive accelerator as well uh technology obviously has been a big winner of of uh of this crisis and you know this is very important to acknowledge every innovation that has been um that has been created and uh and decide therefore if you want to incorporate them in our business model going forward but let's take the time to wonder uh and um and I think with these three key questions hopefully uh it will help us to look back and say wow that was not wasted uh you know it's been an extraordinary year for many many reasons but I've I've made something of it which I think is important.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely a bit of reflection and sort of consciously sort of logging kind of the the time that we've had yeah that's right yeah exactly so yes um that I would say is this and and um what else I can say I think it's been a you know I mean I can tell you what I'm thinking about this year uh it's been a year of hardship for for for for a lot of people but it's also been a year of opportunities for a lot of people right uh it's accelerated as I say many aspects of our lives and business and it really makes us reconsider how we're going to travel, when we're going to travel, how we're going to work and the future of work is looking changed forever.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's extraordinary actually it's been a real revolution especially for the environment also and for all sorts of other things.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: We talk very much about diversity and inclusion today.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_01: It's at the forefront of people's agenda and it was brought on by events that you know were uh happened this year and uh and I think and I hope uh our listeners will look back uh at 2020 and feel uh privileged and grateful to have been part of that experience because it's not going to happen in in another in a very long time so I think um it's been incredible really well I think that is a perfect point to to finish with such an upbeat sort of reflection and and uh and view on the world so uh thank you again for taking the time today it's been wonderful talking to you thank you so much likewise