Speaker: Well. Greetings and welcome to our monthly Circle of Fellows. This is episode one hundred and twenty eight. That means we’ve been at this for ten and two thirds years if you’re doing the math. Um, and today we’re talking about a new book, The Seven Seas, the New Communication Compass. And this is part two of our exploration of that book. And we’ll be diving into that. My name is Brad Whitworth. I’m your moderator, and I’m filling in for Michelle Holtz, whom you just saw for a moment. Your regular host, shell, is one of the contributing authors to that book. So he’s here as a panelist instead of the moderator, and he’s joined by two other contributing authors, Cindy Schmieg and Zora Artis and the lead author, Diane Chase. And I’ll let them introduce themselves in a moment, just to set the stage for what it is that we hope to accomplish in this next hour. And don’t forget that if you’re watching, you can jump into the conversation at any time. throws your comments or questions into the chat, and we’ll put them up and talk about them with the conversation. Amongst these four great contributors, the seven seas of communication, the new communication compass, um include collaboration, connection, compassion, cohesion, community congruency, calibration. And in episode one twenty seven, we did cover the ideas behind connection, compassion, congruency, and collaboration. So today it’s chapters one, three, four, and five. And just for the record, I’m the contributing author for chapter two. So we got one, two, three, four, five, all right here on the screen. But I’m going to introduce them one at a time and let them tell you a little bit about themselves and where they’re coming to you from today. And we’ll start with chapter one. Um, Cindy. Hi, I’m Cindy Schmieg. I’m typically in the Phoenix, Arizona area, but today I’m in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Okay. And chapter three is the lead author, Diane. Hello. Hello. Diane Chase from Charlotte, North Carolina. At the moment where it’s gray and rainy, but happy to be here. We’ll bring some sunshine and Zora Artis. Well it’s good. It’s good morning from me in Melbourne, Australia. And it is almost light. And it’s definitely gray and raining as well. Chapter five is Shell Holes. I’m coming to you from Concord, California. Uh, where this morning it was great and rainy. Yeah. Since we’re doing the weather report. Yeah. And I’m in California wine country, where we’ve got some big puffy white clouds and some blue sky and a little bit of sunshine. But we had some rain this morning as well. So, um, before we dive into those chapters, I’d like at least Diane to give a little bit of an overview of the new Seven Seas, and I talk about them as being new because I can remember listening to, um, a past iabc fellow, the late doctor Don Ranley, talking about the seven seas that were designed to gain credibility in writing and included clear, concise, complete, consistent, coherent, creative, and correct. Um, but Diane, it seems to me that the, you know, you really up leveled the game for all of us. We’ve gone from sort of very tactical communication, skill set worries of writing, which is still important. But now we’re talking about communication strategy and how teams and leaders behave. So why the seven seas and how did you pick them? Well, you know, I, I have been thinking about the seven seas as, as of communication, as core leadership competencies. And in our uncertain, volatile world, uh, across many, many areas, it’s really more important to elevate and empower and lead communication in a new way. And I feel like these seven C’s underpinned, again, some of the leadership competencies that are necessary in today’s world, not just in today’s world, but in in the future. Our AI driven future. What is that doing to the way we connect as human beings? And that is more imperative than ever. Because if we can’t build relationships through our strategic, authentic, trustworthy communication, we’re going to be subject to whatever AI determines that we do. So I just feel like a new mindset, a new approach, new thinking, and new empowerment for communication professionals and leaders writ large actually is really important. Well, I think it takes it to another level as well. I mean, it’s not just the tools and the channels and the communications that get put into those channels is really creating the communications environment in which all of these pieces come together. And I think communications people are up to that challenge now. So, um, what I love about the book and where you took this was that we’re talking at a whole new level about a whole different set of communication leadership skills. Absolutely. It really does underpin any successful organisation. Having communication leadership have it as a fundamental in your strategic plan, your business plan, your goals, and it it really drives a purpose driven organisation, especially because it’s how you engage people and you’re going to have greater results, greater loyalty, certainly greater productivity for the long term, if you’re able to connect with people through your communication skills as a leader. And I think it also parallels what’s going on on a number of campuses. I know both at Stanford and Cornell, so sort of from coast to coast in North America, um, communication skills are being taught to up and coming MBA students who before they get turned loose on the world or at least being exposed to the you better master this skill set as a leader and use communications as part of, um, everything that you know, besides finance and legal and all the other sort of functional areas. Um, Diane, I’m going to come back to you to dive a little bit deeper into your chapter three compassion. We did talk about it on the last episode. So people can go over there but don’t want to skip you over. What I want to do is sort of go through the book from the front to the back, and we’ll start with Cindy to talk a little about your chapter on collaboration. And I know, um, maybe you could just start with sort of what’s your definition of collaboration as you wrote about it? Well, I think that’s a good place to start, Brad, and to set up collaboration as a leadership skill is another element of the book. But I think collaboration is more than just sharing information or coordinating details, because it’s about building relationships and understanding multiple perspectives and creating outcomes or results. And to achieve these things, you really need a plan, systemic approach to collaboration. And that’s how you can create collaboration as a leadership skill is through that planned approach. You know, I shared a story in the book about I ran into a guy in a restaurant who was talking about, he got an award for collaboration and he worked at a global consulting firm. And I asked him, oh, what did you do to get that award? And he said, well, I don’t know. Now. I said, well, what was on the award? What did it say? And he goes, it didn’t say anything. It just said collaboration. And I just thought that that organization missed an opportunity to create a planned approach to collaboration, where you could bring employees up together to work on collaboration in the system systematic way. Right? So then through that, collaboration becomes a strategy and you hear companies using collaboration as a value and it can be a value. But without that approach and planning for collaboration, it’s not, it really isn’t going to go anywhere. So that value doesn’t mean a lot. Um, so if you have the approach bringing the employees together, you should get better results. And I know Brad mentioned earlier when we were prepping for the call about collaboration tools such as Zoom, Slack teams. And there definitely collaboration tools. But remember, it requires people to initiate the collaboration on all of these. So we need a human approach to collaboration, where we are all working together and creating that environment or culture that is collaborative. Um, and so you say, why would you need this now? Well, collaboration has always been needed, but there is still that continuing return to the office. So we really need to retrain employees on how to collaborate. I guess that really gets to the gist of what was talked about in the book. And of course, I’ve shared a lot of, uh, points that would help build collaboration, you know, through better team building and getting to know each other, relying on each other to, um. So did the time of Covid help or hurt collaboration? I mean, we have new tools to be able to collaborate and we’re able to have different communities that extend in different ways that didn’t exist. But is it a plus or a minus or jury’s still out? I think it’s going to be a plus, but I think there’s a lag time. We have to learn to use those tools better. And we also have to learn to put the human systems back in place to help us become better collaborators. So when we’re using systems like team, there’s a lot of information. There’s a lot of ways to connect people to people. But the value of the human side of it, you know, building the trust, the relationships, the reliance on other people, gaining all the multiple perspectives that has to come back into play when using those tools. Yeah. Um, Meg, go a little bit out of order here because I want to pull in Chelle for a second and have you weigh in because if anybody knows software and platforms and tools and technologies, it’s shell holds. I mean, you are the go to guy on all this stuff. Are you seeing anything sort of in this collaboration space that’s got you excited or scared? Uh, nothing terribly new. I mean, you know, we’ve seen during Covid the rise of Zoom, which is definitely a collaboration tool. Uh, we see Slack and teams which have been widely adopted, uh, they can, uh, under the right circumstances with the right guidance, be very effective collaboration tools. I think nothing beats face to face, but that’s not always practical. In fact, in bigger organizations, it’s rarely practical. Uh, what I’m seeing is, is AI, which worries me a little. Um, I shared with you all a little earlier an article from Business Insider that talked about the fact that employees are now entering, uh, a question into a prompt box rather than getting up and going to talk to somebody who knows these things. So even within the office, when people have come back because of a return to office mandate, they are still isolating, uh, and interacting with a model instead of each other. And, uh, there has been a noticeable and precipitous decline in collaboration happening in some workplaces. You know, shell going back to a different podcast that you were on and you were talking about AI as more of a hybrid, um, partner or employee at work. And I can see that happening because when I was putting the chapter together, I thought, boy, wouldn’t that be slick if you had a bunch of people sitting around a table or somewhere where you were collaborating on a project and there had you have your AI speaker there, and you could just say, hey, wait a minute. What was the results last year when we ran this ad? What happened then? and you could get that real time information. So to help boost the collaborative results. Yeah, I think that would be great. I have not heard a lot of instances of that. Mhm. That use case, but I’d love to see more of it. Me too. Uh, especially as people start talking to their AI more instead of typing to it. I’ve been experimenting with a tool called Whisper Flow that allows you to engage in that conversation more easily with all of your AI tools. So do we have to speak up? Yeah, you can speak up. Okay. But but it will hear you if you whisper for those open office environments so you’re not disturbing the person next to you. MM. Hence the name. Great name. In terms of the collaboration. Chapter two. What I love Cindy is, is the mindset that this offers opportunity for co-creation, which leads to greater engagement and buy in for whatever it is the initiative, the project, or, you know, the business success overall. Yeah, I see these collaboration tools also following the business model anyway. I mean, at one point, we did have the notion that an organization was bringing people together. And what we’ve seen is sort of a satellite version as companies are sort of exploding the value chain and outsourcing different component pieces and sort of shattering that oneness that used to define an organization. Um, you know, somebody outsourcing their manufacturing or they’ve outsourced their R&D or production or sales is being handled by distributors. Um, it used to be a vertically oriented structure to things in which communications was paramount. I think in some ways this, um, sort of new set of collaboration tools. um, sort of represents the way the environment is changing for organizations out there. So, um, there’s some parallel paths there, but I think what you’ve hit upon so well in the chapter is talking about the human side of it. Um, let’s not put aside these tools, but let’s make sure that we in them along with human behaviors as well. And maybe that ties into sort of the chapter three and compassion. And I want to come back to Diane to talk a little bit about that, because I’m seeing a lot of books that deal with that human side of leadership and management. There’s a one that you guys may have seen out there, love and Work by Marcus Buckingham, uh, a best selling book. And our, uh, iabc friend David Grossman has one called The Heart Work of Modern Leadership. So, Diane, maybe you could sort of talk a little bit about, uh, how did caring and compassion disappear from organizations. And why do we have to write books to remind people that that’s part of the equation? Isn’t it interesting, Brad, how, um, you know, historically in a lot of organizations, it’s been personals personal professionals, professional, never the twain shall meet. There’s a firewall, you walk into the office and you leave your humanity at the door. Those days are gone. And when we are engaging with Gen Z and especially upcoming Gen A, they have no time and they will not tolerate that approach in their work and in their personal lives as well. So again, back to the age of AI, when there’s a loss of human to human connection for a lot of people in their work and even in their personal lives. I know we’ve all seen the research about the unbelievable growth in loneliness that people are feeling, especially younger generations. There’s a there’s an isolation that happens, which is not healthy for across any level. Um, in our work, in our personal lives, whatever it might be. So compassion is, is really, I’m so glad to see it elevated as a core leadership skill and an imperative for working in today’s society. So to me, compassion is action. It’s empathy in action. And it’s, it’s something that takes thought. It takes some skill building in terms of we hear about active listening and, and that sort of engagement, but it really takes caring about another human being, whether it’s caring about why maybe they’re, they’re slacking off in their productivity or their engagement, much less, hopefully not getting to the point of undermining the organization’s goals. That happens as well with disgruntled employees. So being compassionate just means elevating the the critical nature of connecting with another human being in the workplace, as well as outside of the workplace. And it takes that idea of, um, sort of employees are our most valuable asset and said, you better walk the talk. It’s not just the words that are important, it’s the actions that take place. And, and you do see some of that in some places. But I think, um, one of the thought I had was, you know, years ago, it was like, don’t worry, the company will take care of you. Um, and there was a little bit more concern and there was a little bit of sort of, um, motherhood and apple pie kind of stuff wrapped around it. Um, and then it seemed to have disappeared where people were distant and it became more businesslike. And nobody I actually had an HR person said, I can never afford to have anyone as a coworker, as a friend, because I might have to take an action against them. So I distance myself from people and I thought, what a shame that they don’t know who their coworkers are and want to be close. Um, wow. You mentioned in the book the Covid period. Um, and maybe you could just explain a little bit of how that may have, uh, sort of opened our eyes to the human side of some people that were more remote and more distant. Mhm. Well, um, back to that disengagement and that isolation piece, which is impacting mental health and, and just productivity, feelings of well-being, personal and professional success. I think again, um, it was kind of a double edged sword in a way, because it created that sense of isolation for a lot of people. introverts were in heaven. But at some point that’s not healthy either. You have to have relationships. You have to connect with another human being. It’s really important. And, um, so the other side of that is that people were beginning to say, you know what? I’m not really going to spend my time and my effort and my talents with an organization that doesn’t see me as a human being and value me as a human being, appreciate what I do and who I am, not just in the workplace, but outside of the workplace. I’m coming to my work with my own set of experiences, my current challenges, and I want to feel I mean, the old, you know, cliche understood and heard and supported. So, I think Covid elevated compassion because of that. And I work for a company that actually measures, um, whether employees feel known, feel loved and feel proud to work for the organization. So the fact that this is a metric that’s sort of being looked at on a regular basis and how leaders are being judged sort of says, yeah, there is room for that in the workplace these days. Um, let me move on if I can, to chapter four and Zora. Um, and I think the sort of the intro to your chapter that sort of like, am I reading about the same Richmond or not? There are many of us who got hooked on TV’s Ted Lasso, and we quickly discovered it really wasn’t a show about sports or Premier League football. It was really about leadership. It was about communication. It was about caring for people. And it all was revolving around this fictional team called AFC Richmond in the UK. But your chapter is about cohesion, is about a real team. Um and it’s the Richmond Football Club. So same sort of name. It’s based there in Melbourne with you and it’s part of the Australian Football League. So different version of football because we do have different versions of that around the world. We have different rules. Um seventeen thousand kilometers away from Ted Lasso’s fictional team. But maybe you could explain how this case study that you have done for this book is about shared leadership and organizational transformation that you describe in the chapter. And what’s, what’s the story behind this case study and what makes it so relevant to this conversation we’ve had about leaders and comms professionals? Thanks, Brad. And I love the fact that your organization does that, that metric as well, because I think that’s something that Richmond Football Club would actually do as well, although I’m not quite sure, but the word love was mentioned quite a bit when I interviewed the CEO. The Richmond Football Club, which is also known as the Tigers, is is a a rules football team. It’s one of the oldest, most supported clubs in the country. And it’s, you know, over one hundred years old. And by twenty ten, the club hadn’t won a premiership, which is what you would call a championship. And in, in in thirty years, they had a huge debt. They had a declining membership down to about thirty, zero zero zero, a fractured culture. And they had this reputation for moving on coaches really quickly because they they weren’t delivering results. So it’s very it was very much performance focused leadership. And it was known for not being a finals contender. And most people had written them off completely. So what happened over the next decade was totally remarkable. And I’m going to admit, like I am a huge fan of this club. However, I looked at it with immense pride and I rode the waves with them for decades. So I had that sense of feeling. And those who are members and supporters of this club had been through that roller coaster of emotion. So for so long. So over the next decade, they had they had set out this huge vision, a really big vision that by twenty twenty, they would, um, win three premierships. They would eliminate all their financial debt and they’d grow their membership from thirty five to seventy thousand. So by twenty twenty, they had won three premierships in four years. And the final one was in twenty twenty. They grew their membership to over one hundred thousand. They eliminated all their debt, and they built what is probably one of the most admired organizational cultures in Australian sport. And then, just as importantly, they face a significant transition where their key leaders and their players moved on and they had to start to rebuild from the bottom of the ladder in twenty twenty four. But what was really interesting, in twenty ten, the CEO created this amazing strategic narrative that he it was a rallying call to the the club, to the organisation, to the players. And he put it out there. And I’ve included that narrative, which he wrote himself in the book, and it’s really quite powerful. And of course, the narrative leaked at some point. And he was just the media just went to town on him. They basically attacked. They said in an interview, one one of well known media commentator said, aren’t you embarrassed? And the CEO said, no, I’m not embarrassed. I’m proud. We have a vision to come to compete and to be the best on and off the field. If we’re not locked into that, we might as well pack up and go home. And he was incredibly passionate. He never let go of that. And that was quite amazing. Um, but what I want to really focus on here is that this is not just a story about sport, it’s about how organizational transformation can happen and how you can, and how you can create that alignment and the cohesion that you need. So it’s not a story about a visionary CEO, although he absolutely was. And he was there for fourteen or fifteen years. It’s not a story about the brilliant coach. And he, he was amazing. Uh, and they stuck with him even though they were losing for the first six years. They were showing improvement, but still losing. And they had a determined president. And the president, um, Peggy O’Neal, was from the South in America, and she had migrated to Australia and wanted to connect with Aussie. So she found herself a team, and that was Richmond. And she became the first female president of an Australian rules football club, which was quite incredible. So all three were really exceptional. But what Brendan Gale, the CEO, was determined to say was that the whole story is actually about shared leadership and that ownership and the accountability that’s distributed across the whole organisation, the vulnerability and the trust that they’ve built really quite deliberately and carefully, the love and the commitment that they had for each other. And they talk about love. And it was for it was that commitment to something bigger than themselves. And they had this incredibly deep connection to their members, to their partners, and to their community. And then they also have that financial and organizational foundation that they built that was made that performance possible. Um, so it’s a story that about any team or organization that needs to perform, to endure and to fight back when things get hard. Well, in your chapter, one of the other things that you do include is this idea of a cohesion cycle that shows organizations are not static. They, they move. And, um, there are four phases and maybe leaders know about them or maybe it’s not even taught in schools, but, um, could you say what these four phases are? And I think one of the things you point out is that a lot of organizations get tripped up and one of them that they tend to go wrong on and, and it has a cost that goes with that not knowing about cohesion cycle. Mhm. Well, when I was, when I was working through the story and looking at what what is happening with cohesion and performance and having that winning culture, but having a healthy culture as well. Uh, and looking at how Richmond went through the fight, through it. It occurred to me that cohesion is absolutely, absolutely not linear. And so I created this cycle because it’s very much cyclical and it’s got four phases. So the first one is creating that shared meaning and momentum. So getting people genuinely aligned around purpose, direction and moving forward, moving as one, building the cohesion and the culture. So establishing trust, uh, the behaviors and the ways that they were going to work today, work together and then sustaining that high performance, which is really maintaining alignment and avoiding complacency. And then the final, um, part of the cycle is the dynamic realignment and the renewal. So it’s adapting when the circumstances change, while you’re still staying grounded in your values, who you are. And that last phase is what I think is where most organizations struggle, because that renewal is asking something different of leaders and the people. It’s asking them to let go of, of what has worked and to sit with that uncertainty and to rebuild. And a lot of organizations don’t necessarily have the patience because it’s about speed or potentially even the self-awareness of where they’re really at. And so the cost of that is quite real. So they’ll either cling to something that made them successful or trying to protect that past rather than focusing on that future, or they might panic and make really reactive decisions that undermine those foundations that got them there. Right. So you’ll see them lose their way to a degree. So when you’re in uncertainty, you need to be able to work through what’s shifting around you with things that aren’t, that aren’t within your control. You need to be able to manage and move with what’s emerging. And that’s that added adaptation and the resilience, um, that Richmond has been putting in place. And it shows what that looks like. So once cohesion fractures under that pressure, rebuilding is a much, much harder task. Um, and when I spoke with the CEO and also with the, their high performing psychologists, high performance psychologist, doctor McLeod, it demonstrated that it’s really hard for them, but they have the real belief and they know what it takes. And the psychologist, doctor McLeod, she actually mentioned that it was really important for the team to learn how to fail. Well, because all the others who weren’t in the championships to date knew how to do that better than them. So they had to relearn things and I had to learn from that failure. So it’s a story that’s really telling you about how you can rebuild as well. And so everyone’s on board. They told their story. They’ve been telling their story well since twenty twenty four. They hit the bottom of the ladder. They’ve been rebuilding. Everyone’s on board with them within the organization, their community, their members, the players, everyone’s on board. So as they’re going through that phase, that ugly scrutiny that they used to get in there, the earlier years of the transformation just isn’t there anymore. So as comms people, what you can learn is that you can have a clear, honest narrative about where you are in that cycle, and that changes how people experience that journey, uh, with you as they move through that with you. Oh, and you’re going to have to keep us posted on the comeback. And I’m sure as a fan, are you a member? I am. Okay, well, send us the scores and keep us posted. And maybe there’s a new chapter, a new book in that. And then for those of us that are, we’re stuck with Ted Lasso. There is a new season of Ted Lasso coming. In case you haven’t seen all the sneak previews that they’re running. Uh, Ted goes back to the UK to lead a women’s football team. So, um, more or less, with the excitement going on there, and this Richmond Football Club has a has introduced a women’s team as well. All right. Well, maybe they’re, maybe they’re borrowing some storylines from your part of the world. Perhaps. Yeah. Um, let’s turn things now to shall. We’ve heard a little bit from you about some collaboration technologies and a few other things, but your chapter was focused on community. And I think you start out by sort of going, you know, there’s this standard standing belief out there that the reason companies exist is to create a profit, to make money. And some might argue that if you don’t have a profit, your company’s not going to be around very long. So it’s not really a nice thing. It’s really a good thing to have, but it’s not the only thing. And maybe you could explain where you’re coming from and how that sets up what’s coming in the rest of the chapter. Yeah. Well, I’ve heard this from a number of CEOs. When talking about a corporate purpose. They say our purpose is to make money. Our purpose is to return a profit to the investors, to the shareholders, to the owners, whoever they may be. Uh, and my answer to that is this is every company. How does this differentiate you in the marketplace? How does this help people understand who you are and what you do? And this is why we have statements. We’ve all heard about value statements and vision statements and mission statements and purpose statements. And I think a lot of organizations go through these as rote exercises without planning on taking them very seriously. I think the smart organizations are the ones that recognize that the profit is an outcome of living their mission well and living their purpose well. If they do that well, they’re going to make gobs of money, along with effective strategic planning and financial controls and the like. Uh, but if all you want to do is make money, you’ll do just about anything to make that money. It doesn’t focus you on audiences on customer segments, uh, or on marketplaces. So if we look at the profit motive as an outcome of, you know, primarily the organization’s mission, uh, then it’s a lot easier to define the approaches that we’re going to take to, to making that profit. And you talk in the chapter also about communities. And you take a sort of I mean, one of the cuts you looked at was this whole notion of generational differences and how they impact, um, the definitions of community, but also sort of the way we go about communicating with these different segments. Yeah. And in fact, it’s a very timely topic. Giving an email thread I was reading just this morning from among Ibcs fellows, uh, and there was an interesting, uh, contribution from one of the fellows who noted that they were no longer participating here in Circle of Fellows. Uh, because the younger demographic, the ones in their twenties aren’t going to sit and watch an hour long panel discussion. And we’re not going to appeal to that segment with, with this show. Now, I feel that that’s not mutually exclusive that the this Circle of fellows panel discussion, um, has value. Uh, even though we do need to find better ways to communicate with the younger demographic, but, uh, especially these days, given the influence of digital media and social media, uh, and the tendency to watch snackable content, we used to call it, uh, maybe ten or fifteen years ago, uh, bite sized content. I was just reading, uh, within the last couple of weeks. I didn’t know these existed before this. Their clip forms, uh, these are companies that pay freelancers to take long form content and create short thirty, forty five second clips out of them that the owners can then post to YouTube shorts or Instagram reels or, uh, wherever TikTok, uh, and monetize those clips. And I was talking at work about this with somebody who said, yeah, I never watched Saturday Night Live. I just watched the clips that get posted. Um, so it’s a real thing. Uh, the attention span is very short. And, uh, one of our new fellows who was in the classroom was saying in this thread that it’s hard to keep the students attention for more than a couple of minutes, that they’ve got their phones out. Uh, and they’re consuming this, this bite sized content rather than paying attention to, to longer form content. So as we look at connecting with communities, whether it’s internal or external, I think that demographic cut is, is really important. And by the way, Brad, um, since I think I’m the one who can see this, we have a comment from, uh, Mirko coming in. Yeah. It says, do you have any suggestions for prompting genuine conversations between colleagues of different generations? Because in my experience, chit chatting about Taylor Swift isn’t enough to bond. Yeah, that’s a fascinating question. Uh, and what if it’s the Grateful Dead? I mean, we can all bond there, right? That appeals to generate. I mean, there are new Deadheads coming on the scene all the time. Uh, Bob Weir believed that it was, uh, that they’d be listening to this music in three hundred years. So, I mean, I think that’s a fine way to, to bond with, with people. Uh, no, I think it’s important that there be some resources available in the organizations to help generations understand each other. Uh, there was a book many, many years ago about communicating with generations. And they had a, a series of, of matrices, uh, that, that explained exactly what the influences were from each generation and what their communication preferences were and the like. Um, I think, you know, updating that and making something like that available. Doing some training, uh, having some opportunities to connect with people from different generations, uh, is important, uh, by and large in the workplace though. Um, I think there’s, there’s more that the generations have in common than, uh, distinguishes them or sets them apart. Uh, and I think when we’re working on a team, when we’re working toward common objectives, it becomes less of an issue and less of a challenge. Yeah. I’ve said oftentimes when I was doing some global communications work that you get people together from all different parts of the globe, and there would be sort of like, you don’t understand us. You don’t speak our language. You don’t know our culture. Um, there’s no hope for you. And it’s like, we’ll get that out of your system because yes, we’re all different. Uh, I think that is not just different countries from which we come. It’s also we’re all wired differently. We’re made up differently. But get out of the system and let’s focus, as you said, on the things we share. And usually the list of what we have in common is, um, a whole lot longer than the, what is different about us because we are all humans. Um, so I think the other one that I would love to ask you about is that some of the values that you talk about in the book that are sort of, there’s the old school corporate values of things like quality and customer service and value for money that tend to show up as objectives for an organization. But they’re also being they’re not being thrown aside, but they’re being joined by others that are as important, if not more important, to other generations. Is that a way of sort of shaping what it is you said? Yeah, I think it is in some organizations. Uh, some are sticking with the old types of values. And then there are those where the values are just words on the wall that have no bearing on the reality in the in the workplace and lead to a lot of cynicism. Uh, employees, uh, but in organizations that take it seriously, I have seen a shift toward the adoption of, of values like trust and community. In fact, uh, community is one of the values of the company where I work. And it’s taken very seriously, both internally in terms of the community of employees and, and sort of the subcommunities that exist within that population, but also the communities in which we work. Uh, you could also look at the marketplaces we’re in as a kind of community, but, uh, if, if you have a value and you know, what do we mean by values? It’s basically, uh, these are the things that we believe that are going to drive our behaviors and our decisions. They’re our are core beliefs as an organization, and if we believe the community is important, then we are going to make decisions around how our decisions affect those communities. We’re going to bring the communities in to some of those decision making processes, and we’re going to support employees in their embrace of those communities, both internally and externally. I think if you believe in communities internally, you’re going to support the creation and the sustaining of employee resource groups. Those those sub communities can come together and engage with each other, but also be a resource to the organization about, you know, our needs, our differences, what we can contribute, what we’re looking for out of the organization, um, as well as providing the time and the resources to go out into the communities where we work. Um, and, uh, make a difference there. Uh, so yeah, I think the same applies to, to things like trust and some of those other values that, that we didn’t see, uh, twenty five, thirty five years ago. You mentioned the word trust there. And I know that Cindy had sent me a note earlier saying that one of her observations from looking at all the chapters and, uh, the whole book was that trust seemed to show up in all seven of the C’s. And maybe, Cindy, you could sort of, you know, how did you see this and connect the dots across the chapters and maybe after you have a chance to talk about it, we could get the lead author of the why did she trust all of us? Right. Well, as I tell my students, trust is needed in every relationship. And we always talk about trust is the ultimate value that communication can bring to the company. Because from there, like shell said, profits result in that in in terms of communication and collaboration, though, if you trust each other, you are much more likely to share information. So you better collaborate and you also want the other person to succeed more likely. So I think that that’s where the core of it comes in is that that trust is so important because it is the top of the pyramid in getting something accomplished between people. And Diane, did you see that as, uh, a subtheme coming through? Doesn’t trust doesn’t start with C, so we couldn’t include it. But, um, how key is it? Absolutely, absolutely. The future of communication depends on trust now more than ever. So trust is just fundamental to success. We are in an age of such a dearth of trust across our relationships in business and outside of businesses. And I think that stems somewhat from Covid. Um, the whole, the whole fake news and all of that really started to spiral spiral, um, this, this lack of trust. And that’s why there’s so much fear. And I believe so much polarization because we’re not trusting each other and we’re not actually communicating with each other in a way that opens up dialogue. We’re coming with our opinions and trying to, to get people to believe what we believe without first understanding where they’re coming from, why they care about what they care about. And back to the whole community building thing. What is it that we can do to find out the motivators we each have Uh, in our lives and build on those and, and build that trust, which is going to lead to all kinds of positive outcomes. Mhm. Can I jump in here, Brad? Please? Um, a couple of things. It occurs to me, and I’ve said this numerous times when I’ve run, uh, when I’ve worked on facilitating workshops with, with organizations about building, uh, culture and values and defining the behaviors and all that sort of thing. And when trust comes up as something that they want as a value, I push back on them. Because to me, trust is something that’s earned through someone’s experience. Um, with, with you, whether it’s as an organization, as a leader, as an individual. It’s not something it’s, it’s that person is granting that to a degree. So it’s not a value per se. It’s an Outcome and the behaviors, uh, it’s what makes you trustworthy. So, you know, are you, have you got that? Are you behaving with integrity? Um, you know, with congruence? Uh, is it, uh, are you accountable? Responsible, all these sorts of things. Do you deliver what you say you’re going to do? So it’s, you know, going back to Jane’s chapter, for example, that is that’s quite foundational. So I would, I would push back on that. And at the moment, what we’re seeing is there’s a huge gap in organizations between leaders and employees, and trust is breaking down. And when trust is breaking down, the employees don’t hear what the leaders are saying. They don’t listen. And so you have to really work on creating the right conditions for people to trust you. If I go back to my chapter in the book, uh, there was an Example of in at the end of twenty sixteen, uh, that football club had again was, you know, deteriorating performance and everyone started to jump on the bandwagon and attack them. Uh, instead of getting rid of the coach, they, he had gone, he had been sent to Harvard to do, um, some work on leadership. He came back and he did the triple H sessions with them. So he increased. He created an environment where he started first and he they shared stories. So they did three stories each. Every single leader in the in the team did that as well as every single player. And then that spread through the whole organizations. So they shared a story about a hero who shared a story about a hardship, some sort of defining challenge, and they shared a highlight for them. So some a moment of joy or an achievement. And they shared that with each other and that vulnerability, that space to be to share something about yourself that’s quite personal, that means a lot to you really created this environment of trust. And that’s where they lifted. And it did that through the rest of the organization. So and it just helped them work better together. They were able to collaborate better. They really had that sense of belonging and community. So trust is fundamental and Cindy is absolutely spot on. It is the common thread that runs through the whole thing. Now we have touched a little bit about on AI, um, artificial intelligence. And um, I loved what film filmmaker Guillermo del Toro famously said a while ago about this. He said, I’m not afraid of artificial intelligence. I’m afraid of natural stupidity. Um, which okay, there’s a lot of that going around these days. What I would love to know is a little bit about, um, you know, we’re now putting things into prompts. Are we going to start putting the seven seas into prompts to help us solve some of these issues that we’ve been talking about across our organizations? And do leaders have instant, you know, if I just give it to copilot, it’ll take care of things for me. Or is AI not a help in things that are so close to human? It could be a thinking partner for you across the seven seas, but at the at fundamentally what we’re talking about is fundamentally human, basically. So, you know, it’s built like a lot of the stuff that we’re talking about, whether it’s, um, collaboration, connection, cohesion, um, compassion, all of that is built through conversations. And that’s very much human, not necessarily the conversations with the AI. It can help you, but it doesn’t give you that it’s not that nuanced. That’s something extra. That’s something that’s unexpected, that will come through a conversation. I mean, people come into the workplace and into relationships because everyone is is unique and different in their own way. No two brains are the same. You know, you’ve got, you know, we’re all built on our own lived experiences, our cultures, our biases, all of that sort of stuff. And we’re bringing that into the conversation. The AI is not going to predict that. Absolutely. That’s that’s back to the human to human connection that still is going to be the differentiator. And humans will really still be driving creativity and innovation. They’ll bring judgment. They’ll bring relationship building that an artificial intelligence platform cannot just just spitballing here. Uh, I could see, uh, just theoretically Taking a PDF of the entire book and training my model on it, and then launching an agent internally to look at the email, uh, archive and look at what has been happening in Slack or teams and other collaboration platforms to identify trends that either, uh, support or, uh, represent examples of the opposite of what is presented in the text of the book so that the humans in the organization can take action on that. But, you know, it provides the context for identifying issues, uh, things that you might be able to leverage, things that you might be able to correct, but you wouldn’t know about them if it didn’t have the context to identify those trends. Uh, based on the principles of the book, just one idea of how that could work. Isn’t that the C in calibration? Yeah, I love celebration authors. Not here. Yes, I would like to add a point to that, that if leaders are going to lead authentically, they can’t rely on the AI to do it for them. They can rely on AI for the background, the information as well described, but they still have to put themselves out there to lead authentically. MM. Is there. Interestingly, I, Neville and I just did an episode of our show about a study that found that increasingly, leaders are delegating decision making to AI, which makes you wonder why they’re getting paid, what they’re getting paid, if they’re not bringing their experience and their thought leadership to, to bear on, on decisions and just delegating them, um, abdicating them to a model. Well, that depends on the type of decision, doesn’t it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, is there a place that one can go besides reading the book to learn how to Navigate the seven seas and how do we get leaders to behave that way? Are they teaching this in schools? Are there classes besides reading? What else is there? I listening to this podcast. Yeah. There you go. I think, um, I think this is a massive opportunity in our world today for, for decision makers across an organization, not just communication professionals, but especially communication professionals to step up to lead. And this is where we can get traction with all of the wisdom from this work, with the thought leaders in our profession and communication to, to really take the strategic approach and underpin that with some tactical keys that can be implemented inside organizations. So, Diane, you have to be happy about this launch in the book and and the impact it’s had so far. It’s your first book. And I know it was not an easy process to get it out and about, but you did reach that number one spot in the Amazon leadership training category. Um, if one is if people want to get a hold of the book, how do they do that? And then any plans for a follow on? Oh great question. Well, you know, the ever present Amazon is the place to go to get it quickly. I, I will be in Toronto at IBC World Conference with some copies for anyone who would like to. And I’ll actually be giving some away at the crisis SIG on Sunday. So if you can be there for that. Um, I have several to give away there. Um, so Amazon there certainly reach out to me on LinkedIn. That’s kind of where I, I live most of the time. And yes, a second edition is rumbling around in my head because I know, um, all of you have had thoughts since since creating your chapters about how even in this short amount of time they have evolved, your topics have evolved somewhat. So, um, stand by. I’m going to, I’m going to give away a couple of copies in my, um, session on the Monday when I’m speaking. So, um, hopefully people come along to that and they can grab one of these awesome books. Okay, we need to get autographs from one another when we’re in Toronto because autographing doesn’t work well. Remote control. Oh, you could auction off a copy of the book that had all our autographs on it. Oh, that would be an achievement. I think there’s an auto pen that does that, right? It could be a collector’s item, for sure. Yeah. Put it on a baseball. Yeah. I’m delighted to have had a chance to converse with all of you and sort of probe a little bit more into what’s in the book. Certainly would encourage anybody to pick this up. And one of the things that I always like to put a plug in, it’s the conversations that take place in the circle. It is books like this that you, if you’re looking at doing certification, um, through the G, triple C for your career, these are the kinds of topics that you need to at least be aware of. And, you know, this sort of discussion and listening to people who’ve been at this for a little while are going to help prepare you for that next step in your career. So a little bit of a plug for, um, the global communication certification, uh, Council and for the book. Um, and with that, I think I would love to just thank you guys. Cindy Schmieg Zoro, artist, Shell Holtz, um and the lead author Diane Chase for taking part in this wonderful conversation. Our next episode of The Circle of Fellows will be taking place in June. Stay tuned. We’ll get you the exact time and date and watch the normal channels. One twenty nine is the episode number. Shall. We’ll be back in this seat, and it’s going to feature members of the new class of twenty twenty six Iabc fellows. Um, and they’re actually being introduced at IVC World Conference. So give them a day to decompress after that and then they’ll be on the program. We also have to thank Anna Willy, who’s our executive producer and our chief fellow herder. Um, and I want to also thank you guys for joining us and, and watching through this session and for the Iabc Circle fellows. I’m Brad Whitworth. Hi. Thanks all. Thank you. Thanks, Brad. Thank you.
