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Bonus Episode: The Red Thread, Featuring Sonya Shelton · Humanity Working

• 0:12
  SPEAKER_01: Hi everybody, welcome back to Humanity Working, and I want to thank everybody for their patience as our podcast has been a little bit more intermittent over the last few weeks and months.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: I think we're probably pretty much getting back into a rhythm now, and what I wanted to do was just take a couple of minutes to talk to you about that rhythm before we get going with today's interview.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: Over the next week or so, if you listen when these podcasts come out, you're gonna see a whole slew of interviews.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: These are interviews that we've recorded over the last few months, and they've all kind of got a theme which is really centered around, I would say, leadership behaviors in this new world of work.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: The first one that we're dropping today is with Sonia Shelton, and it's a really, really interesting one that I hope you will enjoy.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: Now, once we've gone through that mini-series of interviews, then you're gonna see the podcast really revert to what is becoming, I would say, its DNA now, which is the effect of AI on the world of work and what we as humans need to do in this new world of work.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: And specifically, one of the things that I want to make sure that we cover on this podcast is an understanding that the world of work means different things to different people.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_01: So, for example, if you are the leader of an organization, you might think of AI as being a tool that allows you to understand your business better.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: You might think of AI as being your tool that allows your employees to become much more productive.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: But if you are one of those employees, you might think of AI as being the thing that allows you to be much more efficient at work and maybe allows you to leave work an hour earlier each day.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: But you also might think of it as the thing that makes you much more effective.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_01: And of course, if you are a traditional knowledge worker, then the idea of efficiency and effectiveness is gonna be very important to you.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_01: But if you're, for example, a more creative employee, then you might have more of a mixed relationship with AI.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_01: You might think that part of the joy of work is the creative process, and maybe AI is taking some of that away.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: So we're gonna really explore some of these themes.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'll be doing it regularly with the discussions that we have with Matt.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna be looking at some of those big questions about AI, which we've started already, and we're gonna go through a few more of those.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_01: And then we'll also explore exactly that concept with a really interesting new set of guests that we've got coming on.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: Alright, so hopefully that gives you an idea as to what's coming up.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: I hope you enjoy it.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: If you know anybody that is really interested in the way that AI is affecting the future of work, then turn them on to this podcast, particularly the episodes that we have coming up.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_01: But in the meantime, let's get back to this really interesting interview that we have coming up with Sonia Shelton.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_01: Now, Sonia has a book that has actually been out for the best part of a decade, but is really, really timeless and looks at some important um leadership behaviors.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we discussed some of that in the book, but we also discussed some of more recent thinking um around how culture and strategy need to come together to build companies that are really sustainable over the medium term.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_01: So I love the conversation.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: I hope you do too.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: And uh with that, let's get on with it.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: Hi, welcome to our humanity working interview series.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_01: Now, if you spend any time studying leadership, you might have come across Sonia Shelton's work and specifically her Amazon bestseller, you're an executive, but are you a leader?
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um it's totally worth a read.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um, it captures um, I'd say, like, an enduring set of capabilities that are essential in anybody who wants to not just have a title but successfully lead a team or an organization.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: And let's face it, if you're gonna retain that title, you need to successfully lead a team or an organization.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um, Sonia and I first met a couple of years ago, and we nearly recorded a podcast back then, uh, but we've caught up again recently, and I realize that we we just really had to get her on uh because her thinking has evolved recently to reflect this new world of work up to and including how organizations need to be built.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: So a couple of years late, but better late than never.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the podcast, Sonia.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_02: I'm excited for our conversation today.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I am too.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh let's dive right in.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so you you wrote the book that I'm referring to, we'll include a link to it in the show notes, obviously.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: But you wrote that book about a uh about a decade ago, I think.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_01: And many of the themes in it are absolutely timeless, but we've had a huge technical transformation since then, massive societal shifts, and there was that little thing called a pandemic.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_01: So, from where you sit, what do you think has fundamentally shifted about work in the last few years?
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_02: So I I think it's you know, back then when I wrote the book, it was about leaders focusing on alignment, right?
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_02: Having one vision, one voice, one direction.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_02: And I think as things have evolved, you know, through pandemic, through AI, through a lot of economic uncertainty, you know, back then we used to do three year strategic plans, right?
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_02: And now I advise my clients like, let's hit some strategic areas of focus and really be agile as we're as we're going through the process, because things are changing so fast that we really can't see um as far into the future as we used to be able to.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_02: And and because of that, both leaders and organizations, how they do on the humanity working side, um, needs to change and evolve to accommodate that.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's wild, isn't it?
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it used to be my job to help create those three-year, sometimes even five-year plans.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um and now I look back on that and go, did that ever make sense?
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not but it but it but it certainly doesn't make sense now.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um so you've touched on it a little bit, but given those shifts, um what do you think if if you were to think about it in terms of almost like leadership traits, a lot of that book that you talk about really you could you could refer to them as leadership traits that are uh that are referenced in the original book.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: What do you think leadership does need to look like now, especially compared to how you outlined it in your book, but also the models that many leaders have grown up with, as it were?
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so I I think all of those, so I wrote 50 chapters.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_02: That sounds crazy.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_02: If they're three pages each, right?
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_02: So one one is what is that leadership capability or skill that's necessary and why why do what is it and why do you need it?
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_02: And then an example of a case study of how it's was put into practice, and then the coaching questions that I would ask around that to develop it, right?
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_02: So it was really designed to yes, you can read it from front to back, but you can also just say, well, this is what I'm dealing with now, and I need some coaching on this, and have it really be a quick tip.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_02: All of those 50 things still apply today.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's it's that's it's a yes and, right?
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_02: So it's all of that.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_02: And now there's other things that we need to do in addition to that to deal with you know the environment that we're in.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: Some of those traits, like authenticity, like vulnerability, um, have almost become non-negotiable, right?
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: The excuse is not, is no longer, well, I'm just not that kind of leader, right?
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: That's not really um that's not really an option anymore.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: A, do you agree with that?
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: And B, what do you what do you think about that that evolution and almost like why we are where we are?
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_02: I think as humans, that's the only way that we can keep up with with the pace of change.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_02: Like things are changing so fast.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_02: And when thing, you know, in times of change, we know that people feel unstable, right?
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_02: So if you're trying to be, if you're a leader and you're trying to be performative, yeah, that doesn't create a sense sense of stability, that doesn't create a sense of safety, that has people sort of questioning questioning that lack of authenticity as truth or not.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, right.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and whether they can trust you.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_02: And when we're we're, you know, almost like when we're running so fast, we have to be able to trust each other, right?
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_02: Right?
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_02: Or or we don't have time for all the games that used to be played and and things like that because things are just moving too fast.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: Gosh, that is in that's interesting and I think profoundly important.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um I went back over some polling we did of employees.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_01: This is about a year and a half ago, something along those lines.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_01: And um we we did something very simple that ended up being really kind of profound.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_01: We asked employees to describe their feelings about work in a single word.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: So they had to like select a single word.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_01: And the only prompting that we did was that we wanted something that was like a like a feeling like an emotional response.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: So not like accounted, you know, or something or something on those lines.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um and I suspect that what we did a year and a half ago would not really have changed, but the types of words that bubbled up on aggregate were words like tired, exhausted, overwhelmed, um uncertain, ambiguous, scared, you know, like a lot of those words, and very little of excited or passionate or thrilled or any of those any of those types of words.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that that's when you when you think about what that takes to be a leader in in an environment where the people you are leading are often expressing those types of sentiments, which are sort of like single-word acknowledgments of a form of low-level burnout, then simply kind of like trotting out a phrase that you're excited about X or excited about Y when they can see in your eyes that you're not, or um or simply urging people to do more with less for the seventh year in a row is is not gonna is likely not to cut it anymore, right?
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and and I think to to build on that, you know, we're seeing the research of the millennial generation, 80% having anxiety about work.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_02: That's astounding, right?
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_02: And um, and I think it is part of this speed of change, uncertainty, they don't there's no stability there, right?
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_02: And and change used to be, you know, when I wrote when I wrote the book, change was an event, right?
• 12:21
  unknown: Right.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_02: Change is how it is, right?
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_02: It's every day, every hour, there's something new and um that we have to deal with, have to take on.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_02: And if you feel like you're on a treadmill and you're you're running and running and running, and you're not stopping to say, what have we accomplished?
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_02: If you don't have a direction or a purpose that you can connect to that makes this all worth it, you're just gonna get tired, right?
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_02: It's just like it's like running on a treadmill going nowhere.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_02: There doesn't seem to be a destination, and that's not fun.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_02: Right, right.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_02: That's not gonna bring in those words that you brought that you meant mentioned, like exciting, passionate um things like that.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I think this is I've been struggling with this a little bit myself in terms of trying to to figure out what all of the what all of this means, because you could look at this and go, well, you know what?
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, in general, people tend to get a little bit more cynical as they uh as they progress in in the workplace.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um and you could look at certain aspects of the workplace and say that they're a lot better.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there's a lot more flexibility in the workplace than uh than there used to be.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of people get to do work that is potentially much more meaningful than it was when you know when you just had a very rigid, very strict uh job description.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um and we do occasionally hear, particularly from senior ladies, was like, what's everybody moaning about?
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_01: In my day, it was you know, X or X or Y or Z.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: Why can't they have the level of of uh passion or excitement that they that employees once had?
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um But I think it I I kind of think it is fundamentally different.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_01: Do you think the flexibility and the freedom that we've created in the workplace is it?
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_01: Is that all good?
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_01: Or is there is there an aspect of it that is causing employees to to struggle with going to work excited each day?
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_02: I think it varies.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um I think it it varies by individual, I think it also varies by how people are leading.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_02: So what I what I've what I've seen, you know leading or managing people who have that flexibility.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_02: Like if they're working remote, um if you know, if it's a hybrid situation, if the you know, the all the different permutations that we see of workplace now, you know, I hear leaders talk complain like we we don't have that personal connection that we used to have when we were all in person.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_02: And and and I think that what's missing is the being intentional about that personal connection.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_02: If you have if you have uh uh employees that are are dispersed, you have to create, you have to intentionally create that conversation that happens as you're walking into the conference room for the meeting and everyone's chatting, right?
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_02: To to you have to be intentional about that as opposed to, okay, it's on the hour, let's start the meeting.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_02: Here are the here's the agenda, here's the objectives.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_02: Not really giving people a chance to connect.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_02: Um so I think there is in in this environment things that we used to take for granted that we have to be intentional about now.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's exactly right.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_01: You used to get some things for free that you never really sp you never really thought about or spoke about.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_01: So, for example, there would be a personal, in-person, human connection between employees that worked in the same space at the same time, was something we never used to even have to think about or talk about because that was a that was a built-in feature of the way of the way that work was.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_01: What's really interesting now is that if you walk into a workplace today, even if you pull everybody back into the office and you walk into a workplace today, and then you'll see people with their uh with their headsets on, and they can talk to the people uh they can be sat next to the to a human being that's within three feet or four feet of them and not be working with them, and sometimes not even communicating with them.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: I've mentioned it on this uh on this pod before, but we've we've encountered people who have worked for months or years or more and not communicated with the people that are in the they're in the same physical space as them.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_01: Because at least from their perspective, there was there was no reason to.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_01: And so we are in a that's just it's just it's just one example of a situation where it's fundamentally changed.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_01: So I love the way you've I love the way you phrase it because it is there's what's what's changed is like everything.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_01: The what, the when, the where, the why, the have work, it's all changed.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_01: And we and because all of those things have changed, that's changed what we get for free and what we need to be intentional about.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_01: Now, you talk in the um you talked in your original work, and I know you've you've mentioned this in in your work since, that a lot of the uh a lot of that ability to be able to lead people effectively starts from within.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_01: I want to touch on that a little bit because um it relates to a couple of of the other guests that we've that we've had on recently that have really, really spoken about this.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: I can't excite and engage and rally people around the mission unless I've I've found my reason and I can't fake that.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um so let's start with something super simple.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: If you're working let's say with a leadership team versus an individual leader, but if you're working with a leadership team and you're looking to to create the adaptive strategy that is going to help the organization move forward and excel, and you're looking to start with some with injecting some kind of passion for the leadership team around it.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_01: Where do you where do you start?
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and I and I I like how you asked that question because it does touch on I think an insight that I had in this evolution of work that we've seen where you know it was before, you know, I might be we might be brought in for strategic planning, who are is a different conversation than working on leadership or organizational culture or even organization design.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_02: And what I realized is these things, these functions don't talk to each other in an organization.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_02: And we think about culture as something that's completely separate from the business.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_02: And and but for a powerful culture really should uh enhance the business performance, right?
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_02: So um, so I say that to say that's where we start, right?
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_02: We start with what is your purpose?
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_02: What's you know, what is your why?
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_02: And and we look at that at three concentric levels.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_02: So working at a leadership team, you know, looking at it from a personal individual perspective, right?
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_02: What is your superpower?
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_02: Why do you do what you do?
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_02: Um, how do you deliver on that?
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_02: Why, how do you internally process information?
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_02: What do you want other people to expect from you?
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_02: So that's our first, our first stop is looking at that.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_02: Why at the individual level, even at the leadership team level?
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_02: Why do we exist as a leadership team?
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_02: What are we trying to do together as a leadership team?
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so that that starts to break down silos, starts to see themselves as a leadership team, not a group of individual leaders that are leading separate parts of the organization.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_02: And then what as an organization is our purpose, right?
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_02: So, so why do we exist as an organization?
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_02: How do we deliver on that?
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_02: What do we want our customers or clients to expect from us?
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_02: And the reason why we start there is exactly because of what's happened in the environment.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_02: Because I realized when the most stressful things that happen in our personal lives, um some of the most stressful things, something like getting married, something like moving to a new house, those are very stressful events.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_02: But we, and you know, and there's stress involved, but we know the destination of, we know why we're stressed, we know why we're doing, we see the other side of how happy we're gonna be on the other side of it, and when we get there, and and and started saying, like, how can we build some of that into how we look at work, right?
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_02: And how we look at business to say, you know, if we have a really strong purpose, then those.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: Stressful moments have meaning, right?
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_02: And and and and we have the resilience to be able to get through it when we know why we're doing it.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_02: And um and it and sometimes doesn't even feel like stress.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes it can feel like excitement, right?
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_02: And like like if we didn't if we didn't know why, it would feel like stress, but because we know why, we're excited about what we're doing, even though it's hard.
• 22:23
  unknown: Yeah.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so we always start with purpose.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's almost in a sense creating that startup feeling within a larger, larger organization, right?
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_01: Like how we in in our own tiny little way, how are we how are we going to change the world?
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: And um and it's difficult to do a startup without any sense of uh without any sense of purpose.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_01: You get found out very, very quickly.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but create that that feeling of excitement as to what the future can be can be can be, I think, extraordinarily powerful.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um you mentioned about the intertwining of of culture and and strategy there.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_01: I I know that you've you've mentioned before that that whole culture eats strategy for breakfast is a is a thing you do not subscribe to.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_01: So you want to talk about that a little bit?
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, yes.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm a big fan of Peter Drucker, but we disagree.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_02: Um I I don't believe that culture eats strategy for breakfast.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_02: I don't believe that strategy eats culture for breakfast.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that is why in most organizations they see they see each other as very separate, right?
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_02: Um and and depending on who you're talking to, one is more important than the other.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_02: Um but I what I say is they need to have breakfast together, right?
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_02: So so how can how can you bring these things together to support each other?
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_02: So even when I was just talking about purpose, you know, it sounds like, oh, it's just all about the team and all about the team connecting to the purpose and having that passion for the purpose.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_02: Well, it's also about the customer.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_02: Because if you you you know, a lot you have a lot more brand loyalty when people are are buying from you and they're connected to your purpose.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_02: They understand why you exist, they understand that you care about them, um, and the and the world that you're trying to create for them, right?
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_02: Whatever it is that you do, right?
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then they and they start to feel that too, right?
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_02: So it's an internal and external purpose um that builds the business as well as strengthens the culture.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_01: This this got me thinking, actually, when I was rereading the book, there's this sort of discipline around organizational design that can uh can encompass, although it's not fully restricted to, but can encompass things like what's your organizational structure, for example.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_01: There's this discipline around organizational strategy.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: There's this discipline, which is largely sitting inside HR around culture and human growth and and things like that.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_01: And then there's this discipline around leading around the behaviors of leaders, which is typically you know, senior executive coaching and and and things like that is how you how you kind of go about making sure it happens inside an organization.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_01: We separate a lot of these things out, but in reality, I suppose when you think about it, um elements like organizational structure are deeply entwined with the the way in which an organization is going to function and deeply entwined into things like the culture of an organization.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_01: Some organizations have a chief culture officer, or they may not call it that, but they have something equivalent to that.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_01: But maybe that's a bad thing, right?
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: Because that that structural decision to have somebody who's in quotes responsible for the culture is also isolating it from something that should something that should be permeating the uh the entire organization.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: So I know with the I with your red thread leadership model that you use now, I find that really interesting because it encompasses some things like the like the structure of the of the organization and the processes that are that are inside the organization.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_01: But at its heart, it's partly how organizations should be built, but you could think of it from a different perspective perspective as a set of things that leaders do, leadership behaviors.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_01: So do you spend a lot of time thinking about how these things are are separate, should be separate, are intertwined, should be intertwined?
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I th I think it came from probably a frustration, frankly, of what culture means.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_02: You know, it's it's that um you know, that old story about the elephant, you know, that the people touching the different parts of the elephant think it's something different.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's describes culture to a T.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: People think it's well before we go before we go any further, I'll tell you what.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: Why don't you tell me what uh to illustrate that?
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: Why don't you tell me what you think it is, and I'll tell you the definition that we use.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so so I think it's it is everything that touches behavior.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_02: Right?
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_02: So so so in the in the red thread model, we start with purpose, as I mentioned.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then we go so there's five P's.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_02: The second P is plan.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_02: So that's your vision, your strategy, your goals, that impacts culture.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_02: And then we look at processes, um, whether processes are are efficient, functional, understood, clear, um, that impacts impacts culture, right?
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_02: So if processes aren't clear and you have bad behavior happening, right?
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, um, it's not because of the people, it's because of the process, right?
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_02: And um, and then looking at positions, which would be organization design, um, how decisions are made, uh, how how people are rewarded, how they're um, how they're promoted, those how they're hired, all those decisions around positions also impacts culture.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then there's the I think the common definition we call, we call passion.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um others might call engagement or um or just might call culture, which is which is around the the emotion, right?
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_02: Like how am I connected to the organization?
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_02: How am I connected to my role?
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_02: Um, am I am I passionate about what I'm doing?
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_02: Am I passionate about the company I work for?
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_02: And all of these things can be measured, right?
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_02: So, um, and we do measure them.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_02: So it is really all of those aspects, um, because I think what sometimes frustrates leaders is is they focus on the behavior part or they focus on the benefits or the perks or whatever it is, and say, well, why isn't that making people happy?
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_02: But maybe it's a process breakdown and that's causing arguments or conflicts between people that they're not even thinking as part of culture.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_01: We're hugely aligned on that.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_01: We we define culture is how people behave in the organization when no one's looking.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_01: And but very, very much we've seen that the things that can influence that are incredibly multifaceted.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_01: And if you're thinking that, I don't know, putting just putting a new procedure in place that if people read will they'll forget a day later, um, will change how people behave, or even you know, raising salaries might change it, or adopting a policy of you know, around vacation days will change it.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_01: They may well change it, but they'll change they can easily change it in ways you do not expect.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_01: There may be a whole bunch of uh unintended consequences associated with it.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_01: Part of the reason why I love your model is that, as I say, it captures a set of things that ultimately leaders need to do inside organizations in order to be able to have an impact on how the organization functions.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_01: When we started this discussion, you were you know, we were talking about how that holistic human experience has changed inside organizations, and it is radically different to what it used to be.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_01: Um if you're if you're working with with leaders today and you're thinking about uh you're thinking with them about what the experience is for employees, middle managers, senior leaders inside organizations, um what do you what if anything do you think is fundamentally different about that feeling of going to work now?
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I think um, you know, one of one of the phrases I use a lot is clarity polarizes, right?
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_02: So that people understand if they're in or if they're out when you're clear.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_02: And and what I find is a lot of times leaders are just trying to make everybody happy, and so they don't really say, right?
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_02: So they don't make they don't create role clarity, they don't create vision clarity, they don't create purpose clarity.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_02: Because what if somebody doesn't like it and then maybe they might leave, as opposed to saying this is where we're trying to go as a business.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_02: And the clearer we are about that, it's a gift to that person if they're not on board to give them the clarity so they can go do something they can be passionate about, right?
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_02: And um, and we can help them with that.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_02: But the the but the key that I see, uh especially now, I think with you know, with that burnout, with anxiety, with all the uncertainty and the speed is just a lack of clarity and willing to um make a decision, take a stand, right, right, and and say, say this is this is who we are and where we're going.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_02: And of course, we're gonna have to make adjustments along the way as as we um as things change in the environment and the business changes, we always have to be flexible and agile and all those things.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_02: But this is the direction we're going, and this is who we are and why we do what we do, um, even to the values, right?
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_02: And and um and being willing to be okay with people not being okay with that, right?
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_02: And and so so I think it is, you know, when I designed red thread was was really around, you know, how can we make this connection between the head and the heart and to each other, right?
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_02: So so there's um there's red thread comes from different cultures, have different ways of describing it.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_02: One of them is, you know, the um, I think it's Theseus goes to find the minotaur and and has a red thread to get him outside of the maze, right?
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_02: So how can we get through this maze of complexity and speed and uncertainty that we're that we're dealing with?
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then in Asian culture, they say there's a a vein that runs from your heart to your hand, and then it turns invisible to connect to all the people that you're supposed to make magic with, right?
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_02: And so so those so like those two examples are why I called it red thread and and also kind of the heart of of what it's about, right?
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_02: To be able to um to be able to make sense of the environment that we're in, to be able to have that purpose and where we fit, and then also to be able to connect with each other to make it happen in a way that is more fulfilling and um and can also be a lot faster when we're clear.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_01: I wanna I want to go a little bit deeper on that clarity concept, actually.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_01: It reminds me of the discussion we we had recently with uh Bob Johansson from the Institute for the Future about about this exact issue.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um The Institute for the Future's work is very closely centered around uh around this concept of banny now, brittle, anxious, nonlinear, and incomprehensible.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um the sort of you know, update to VUCAR, I guess you could call it.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_01: There's this interesting challenge here, whereby many, many businesses are to the point about three-year plans of uh of earlier on, are navigating a whole bunch of elements that are reflected in what I just said brittle, anxious, nonlinear, and incomprehensible.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_01: So they're they're never they're navigating a business climate that is deeply, deeply unpredictable.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_01: And if they're pretending that they're not, then they're kidding themselves and or and or others.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_01: So what Bob talks about, which I think is extremely important, is that there's a difference between certainty, which feels really good in the short term and can be a bit of a sugar high, and it's what a lot of political leaders try to provide us with, and you know, and all of that kind of stuff, but also what a lot of business leaders try to do.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and clarity, which is this is a clear-eyed, um truthful, realistic assessment of where I believe we're at and what we need to uh and what we think we need to do in order to be able to get there.
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm curious, I believe, and I'm curious to get your take on this, that that like I don't have all the answers can be part of delivering clarity.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh do you agree with that statement?
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_01: And what do you think the implications are for leaders if if you do uh agree with that statement?
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_01: What do you think the implications are?
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, so I a hundred percent agree with certainty versus clarity, and and and like you said, those those three-year plans um don't exist anymore.
• 37:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so we might not know how we're gonna get there, but we can say where we're going.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_02: Right?
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_02: So and we can say who and and why, ideally.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_02: Right, yeah, right.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_02: And we can so we can say, here's our purpose, and this is what this is what we want to create in the world.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_02: This is who we want to be in the future, and we're gonna map a direction towards that, and that might change.
• 37:46
  SPEAKER_02: Right, right.
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_02: How we get there might change.
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_02: Um because, you know, if if you imagine we're going on a trip and say we take a car, right?
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_02: The then okay, we're gonna take a car.
• 37:58
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, there might be some road closures, there might be some traffic, the GPS is gonna tell us where to go, or maybe we need to stop because we're tired, right?
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_02: So all of those things happen when you're on a journey, right?
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_02: And and not being afraid of them and to say that, yes, these things are gonna happen.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_02: We may not know even when they're gonna happen, but this is the direction that we're going.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_02: That's the clarity I'm talking about, right?
• 38:23
  SPEAKER_02: So so that, and then people can know if I'm making a decision, does this move us forward to where we're trying to get to or not?
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and and I think what I'm seeing increase probably in the past two years, I would say, but um definitely more in the past year, is leaders being afraid to make decisions.
• 38:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 38:46
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, because they don't have the certainty.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_02: So they're they're providing, they're not providing clarity because they're afraid of not of being uncertain and not having the certainty.
• 38:59
  SPEAKER_02: And just to say, like, this is where we're gonna start, and then we're gonna see what happens.
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_02: That's that's the agile leadership way, right?
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_02: Is to say, okay, we're gonna try something and then we're gonna adjust, right?
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_02: And um, and we recognize that things might happen that make us throw that away altogether because something's changed, and that's that's where we are.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_02: But our our where we're our destination, where we're trying to get to, and our vision is consistent.
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know, it's so funny.
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_01: I uh I wonder how much of this is we might have always been wrong about how we did this stuff, and it's just like this new environment exposes just how wrong we are.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_01: Because the the mental model that I've seen best work for leaders is is almost like you're the you're the captain of a of a ship in uh let's say an old old school sailing ship, um, and you're going around the Cape of Good Hope on your way to India from say Portugal or something along those lines, right?
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_01: If you're if that's what you're doing, there's the expectation of your crew that like the boat's gonna get blown off course, or you're gonna have to do some different things in order to be able to accomplish the overall uh the overall goal that you have.
• 40:37
  SPEAKER_01: And at some point, who knows, you might not get all the way there, and you might have to land at some at some other port and do something different, right, associated with it.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_01: But the you're not gonna have a successful captain of that ship who's like, well, it's gonna be smooth sailing the entire way, and there's not gonna be a and there's not gonna be any wind, and uh, and if there is, you can fire me, right?
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it it doesn't work.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_01: So I think my point, I think my point here is that we sort of would behave in the past as though things were entirely predictable when they probably never were, but we would be wrong enough infrequently enough that we could sort of get a that we could sort of get away with it.
• 41:26
  SPEAKER_01: And now that is entirely and completely exposed.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_01: And so we have to behave in a different way, but most many leaders are are deeply uncomfortable doing that, hence they get caught in the things like the analysis paralysis because they want, they feel more comfortable projecting certainty versus clarity of mission.
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 41:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and I I think using your analogy, the the ship is I know it's the same with planes, so I'm guess it's I'm it's probably even more so with chips, right?
• 42:04
  SPEAKER_02: But most of the time they're off course.
• 42:07
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, right.
• 42:09
  SPEAKER_02: They're constantly adjusting to what's happening, right?
• 42:11
  SPEAKER_01: So and ironically, back in the you know, 17th or 18th century, they wouldn't even entirely know where they were at various points.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_01: And that is true in business, right?
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_01: We don't always exactly because our metrics are retrospective and and sometimes we don't see you know business headwinds until you know we're two months into them or something like that.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_01: So so sometimes some of our measures are retrospective versus prospective, and so we don't even really know where in the where in the ocean we are at any one point.
• 42:42
  SPEAKER_02: And I and I think that's key, is I think that um sometimes, you know, yeah, like you leaders want to be so buttoned up, right?
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_02: And they and have it all together and have all the answers.
• 42:55
  SPEAKER_02: And part of the issue is that people put them on this pedestal like they should know everything, right?
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_02: Um so they want to live up to that, right?
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 43:06
  SPEAKER_02: But the reality is being able to say, we don't know, but we're figuring it out, or we will figure it out.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_02: Um, we don't know, but we know where we're going and we're we're working on getting there.
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_02: And um, or we don't know, and here's when we think we'll know more.
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um just to be able to do that actually creates a lot of stability in an organization where people increase trust as well, which is I know is a key pillar for you as well.
• 43:39
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_02: And and to say the the um like I've got you, right?
• 43:47
  SPEAKER_02: I'm real, I'm with you, I've got you.
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not pretending that it's something other because the pretending, again, back to authenticity from the beginning, right?
• 43:55
  SPEAKER_02: Is that that perfor perfor uh performative way.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_02: People see through it.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_02: They know.
• 44:02
  SPEAKER_02: They can feel it.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_02: They can feel like you're you're towing the company line or or using a uh corporate communications sentence about it.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_02: Um and they can feel that and then they start making things up.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_02: So if you just if you're just clear and just say this is how it is, and you're willing to be vulnerable um and and transparent, then that actually creates more trust and stability in the organization because they're not spinning trying to figure out what's really going on.
• 44:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_01: Here's what we know, here's what we know, here's what we don't know, here's what we're gonna try and find out, all of that kind of stuff.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um okay, so a lot's changed as we've as we've discussed.
• 44:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um and a lot of your work, as you say, is now sort of centered around the the things that leaders need to need to build, if you like.
• 45:01
  SPEAKER_01: If you were to design an organization from scratch Um And for the environment that we face right now, um what would be the principles or the structures that you would insist on right from the s right from the start?
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_01: Because many organizations, when they first begin, they defer a whole bunch of stuff until they're big enough to worry about it.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_01: But I want you to sort of imagine that you're inside an organization that's not a startup necessarily, but a larger organization, but you're pretending as though you're starting from scratch.
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_01: If you started from scratch, where would you where would you start?
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_01: What would you focus on first?
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_02: So again, I would focus on purpose, right?
• 45:45
  SPEAKER_02: And those those first two, purpose and plan.
• 45:48
  SPEAKER_02: So like why do we exist?
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_02: Um what makes us different?
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_02: And and what um where do we want to take this?
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_02: Like where we where do we want to go?
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_02: What's our time horizon?
• 46:01
  SPEAKER_02: It doesn't have to be you know a 20-year vision, it can be a one-year vision, right?
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, right.
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_02: Um but clearer about where we're going and then designing everything else around getting there.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 46:13
  SPEAKER_02: And um and what I find is really empowering people, when you're clear like that, you can empower them to question is this getting us there?
• 46:27
  SPEAKER_02: So this happens this happens a lot in process, where you know, there's processes there where you know I hear this.
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, the um, I think I even talk about it in the book, right?
• 46:36
  SPEAKER_02: Where like, oh, we've been doing this forever, we've always done it this way.
• 46:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 46:40
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, why did you do it this way?
• 46:42
  SPEAKER_02: Well, because Maria liked to see it this way, or she liked to get this particular report.
• 46:47
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so Maria doesn't work here anymore.
• 46:52
  SPEAKER_02: So so why so what is this actually doing?
• 46:56
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I don't know.
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_02: Nobody ever, we just do we just continue to do it that way because that's how we've always done it.
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_02: Um but really to to empower people to question every aspect to say, is everything that I'm doing moving us in this direction?
• 47:11
  SPEAKER_02: Um and and I am empowered to question, and it's okay for me to question if this is valuable use of my time or is this the right process?
• 47:21
  SPEAKER_02: And then at the the next level, which is something I'm really focused on with organizations who are ready for it, not every organization's ready for it, is to really create synergy among teams, to say this is beyond collaboration.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_02: It's more about I'm looking at your goals and seeing how I can benefit from helping you with your goals so that we both win and the customer wins, right?
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_02: So, so really trying to um build more of that shared ownership in how we work together and how that can really create exponential results when you have it's not just I'm helping you and I'm collaborating with you.
• 48:02
  SPEAKER_02: It's really like, how can how can I help you in a way that also helps me and helps the customer?
• 48:07
  SPEAKER_02: And um and that's also gonna differentiate us and and it's a lot of fun, and it's um and it's gonna help us get to where we're going faster.
• 48:18
  SPEAKER_01: Hmm.
• 48:19
  SPEAKER_01: So interesting.
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_01: I've noticed in some of your work you've talked about how like old school views of of what collaboration is don't really apply anymore, and I I could not concur with that more, at least in part, because the way in which we collaborate in this new world of of technology driven is very superficial in many ways.
• 48:50
  SPEAKER_01: And then your discussion about purpose, uh I got a very simple question for you, and I'm curious to see whether you've seen what we've seen.
• 48:59
  SPEAKER_01: When you ask a company a question of along the lines of either why do you exist?
• 49:08
  SPEAKER_01: What is your purpose?
• 49:10
  SPEAKER_01: What do you want to accomplish?
• 49:12
  SPEAKER_01: Or even what do you do and why?
• 49:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um do you find sometimes even at a senior level inside organizations people struggle to answer that question 100%.
• 49:28
  SPEAKER_02: And in fact, the most common answer I get are purposes to make money.
• 49:34
  SPEAKER_01: Which I suppose which I suppose at a at an incredibly superficial way.
• 49:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean, that's sort of the definition of capitalism, I suppose, isn't it?
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_01: But it's but it's but it's the same, but it's the same for every for for any profit-making enterprise.
• 49:48
  SPEAKER_01: So it doesn't really tell you, it tells you everything and nothing at the same time, doesn't it?
• 49:51
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 49:52
  SPEAKER_02: And my comeback is always, well, okay, great.
• 49:55
  SPEAKER_02: Let's go to your customer.
• 49:57
  unknown: Yeah.
• 49:57
  SPEAKER_02: And we're gonna say, we want you to buy this because we want to make money and see how that goes.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 50:07
  SPEAKER_01: But that's that's actually really profound.
• 50:09
  SPEAKER_01: Uh just a very brief story.
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_01: We um when I was in my last uh role at at Microsoft, it was um uh I was doing an internal startup inside Microsoft, and it was centered around clinical research.
• 50:24
  SPEAKER_01: And um for four or five months we kind of struggled with um with our framing our purpose in the in the right way.
• 50:36
  SPEAKER_01: And what we realized after about four or five months is like every articulation, every version we come up about it was about us.
• 50:44
  SPEAKER_01: It was about, oh, Microsoft could, you know, if we if we do this right, then Microsoft could get a new line of business and some additional Azure revenue associated with clinical research, which they've never had before.
• 50:59
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 50:59
  SPEAKER_01: And we were, even though we were dressing it up in certain ways to for our uh for our customers, what they were sensing was like, oh, Microsoft's interested in this space because it basically doesn't make any money there today and it would like to tomorrow.
• 51:13
  SPEAKER_01: Well, to your point, right?
• 51:14
  SPEAKER_01: That didn't actually particularly land.
• 51:17
  SPEAKER_01: And and so we we actually had to go through and do an exercise that is very similar to what you're talking about and ask ourselves why what was the underlying reason why we why we wanted to create this, why we wanted to uh to build this, and it turned into accelerating the speed with which we could uh bring life-saving therapies to market.
• 51:41
  SPEAKER_01: And the moment that we made that that shift, um, which in in those circles, you you there's a time thing that's called from lab to jab.
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_01: And it just basically means, you know, from when the idea arrives to the point at which you know it can actually start saving people's lives.
• 52:00
  SPEAKER_01: Once we started focusing on that and talking about that, then the our business tripled.
• 52:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um and and it seemed like such a simple thing because it was all it was was about how we spoke about stuff, but it relates back to the to everything you're talking about around authenticity and and all of those kind of things as well.
• 52:23
  SPEAKER_01: All right, I got one last question for you.
• 52:25
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 52:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um so years and years back, you were uh a senior executive at Disney.
• 52:35
  SPEAKER_01: Um and um and I know you know from talking to you that that some of the the principles that that um that are in your your book are infused by that um uh by that time at Disney.
• 52:54
  SPEAKER_01: And as we said, many of those are are timeless.
• 52:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um But we're now at this moment where all of the stuff that we've been talking about is changing work, plus AI, automation, robotics, or reshaping really how work gets done.
• 53:16
  SPEAKER_01: But you've always consistently throughout all of this stuff emphasized things like purpose and clarity and connection and and uh and things of that nature.
• 53:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um how do you think you would talk to your your former self at Disney and what would you tell your former self at Disney to focus on in this moment?
• 53:42
  SPEAKER_01: In this moment, to make sure that the sort of human elements of leadership are kept at the center as AI becomes a bigger part of how organization operates.
• 53:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I think um there's a couple of things.
• 53:57
  SPEAKER_02: First, I'll preface it with I worked at Disney in times that were the best of times and in times that were the worst of times.
• 54:07
  SPEAKER_02: In that I was there when Disney's culture was exalted as the the one to look at, and and in a lot of ways it was, right?
• 54:22
  SPEAKER_02: And um and on the other side, I was there during a shareholder revolt when a member of the Disney family ousted our CEO.
• 54:31
  SPEAKER_02: I was the head of internal communications globally in a company going through basically a divorce, right?
• 54:37
  SPEAKER_02: So um, so I'll preface it with that context to say to say I I think it's really about I I would I would tell myself then in the best of times to pay attention to why this works.
• 54:55
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 54:56
  SPEAKER_02: And and that's sort of a lot of the things that I've developed since has gone back to what was what were we doing?
• 55:02
  SPEAKER_02: What was that about?
• 55:03
  SPEAKER_02: Why was that successful?
• 55:05
  SPEAKER_02: Why was Disney so successful at that time?
• 55:10
  SPEAKER_02: And why were why was everyone looking to that company to try to figure out what we were doing?
• 55:16
  SPEAKER_02: Right, right.
• 55:17
  SPEAKER_02: And so um, so a lot of what I've done is sort of go back to those times and say, what was happening in the company?
• 55:23
  SPEAKER_02: What did we do?
• 55:24
  SPEAKER_02: And um and then I think I would tell uh myself in the worst of times, pay attention to this moment because this is gonna start happening a lot for companies and you can help, right?
• 55:36
  SPEAKER_02: So I so I think it is, you know, it was a very stressful time in the Shareholder Revolt.
• 55:42
  SPEAKER_02: There was a ton of uncertainty, right?
• 55:45
  unknown: Right.
• 55:45
  SPEAKER_02: There was like uh um everything was up in the air.
• 55:48
  SPEAKER_02: We had no and and a lot of distraction and a lot of anxiety.
• 55:52
  SPEAKER_02: And um, and so it was almost like those two things prepared me for for what I would do in the future.
• 55:58
  SPEAKER_02: Um and and I think it's you know, really being clear about that and and um and paying attention when things are working and asking the question why and not just celebrating and paying the tension, paying attention to when it's not working and asking why and and figuring out how to get out, right?
• 56:18
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much for joining us today, Sonia.
• 56:20
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.
• 56:21
  SPEAKER_02: I loved our conversation.
• 56:22
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks for having me.
• 56:26
  SPEAKER_00: Humanity Working is produced by Matt Neal.
• 56:30
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• 56:36
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• 56:39
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• 56:46
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