0:02

Welcome to good intentions, the podcast where we explore the world around us to find meaning and intention in what we do.

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I'm Kelly Harvard, and I'm on a mission to spread positive stories that will inspire you to live a more meaningful and connected life.

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Mimi Niclin is the internationally best-selling author of softening the edge and incredible book about how humanity's oldest leadership trait empathy is changing our world.

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There's so much data that shows that in emotionally intelligent organizations where empathy is high, we see performance productivity and creativity go up.

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Mimi believes the empathy. A scientifically validated skillset has the power to not only change business environments, but to change society for the better.

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This was music to my ears. I can't think of a better time to talk to me about empathy than now.

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Burnout is at an all time high. We're all feeling super jaded.

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After the last year, passion is dropping and the younger generation is leaving the corporate world quicker than they entered it.

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Mimi believes that we are significantly underestimating.

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The powerful role that increased empathy could have on profits, as well as workplaces at large, we had a fascinating discussion about empathy.

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Can it be taught or are we born with it? How can we build empathy within our workplaces?

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And how can we balance the demands of a corporate job with a desire to lead an empathetic life?

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I just loved what made me have to say about empathy, about community and about connection and how it can make a real difference to our world and the way we do business.

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I hope you enjoy our conversation.

1:25

Thanks so much for joining me today. Maybe I'm so looking forward to my conversation, me to one absolute pleasure.

1:30

I'm yeah, I'm really looking forward to it. I'll try not to start off on the wrong foot by being too envious of you being in Sri Lanka.

1:35

I've made my peace with that now. Well, social media does a really good job of making things like really perfect.

1:43

And while Australia anchors nearly perfect, we are still in a locked down, so you don't need to be that envious.

1:49

You can be like, oh, I'll reduce it by half.

1:53

So one of the reasons I'm fascinated as to talk to you is this whole sort of empathy piece.

1:57

You've written this fantastic book called softening the edge.

2:00

And I love the title is how humanity's oldest leadership trait is changing our world, which instantly just grabbed me.

2:05

Why do you think empathy is important in general, but specifically in the workplace?

2:09

Oh gosh, I could talk all day about that.

2:12

Empathy is important because it's an evolutionary skill for human kind, actually.

2:16

So empathy is really the backbone for all of modern civilization.

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As human beings were meant to be together.

2:22

We're pack animals were tribal, right?

2:24

Which is why, of course COVID has been so difficult for the world.

2:28

We're not meant to be alone. We're meant to be connected.

2:31

We did better when we are together. And empathy is the skill set that allows us to collaborate, communicate to connect, right?

2:37

If you cannot understand people, how can you ever be inclusive or connected is critical for our survival quite literally.

2:44

And it's definitely the difference between surviving and thriving in the world today, which is why I'm so passionate about this, because there are so many areas where we're lacking empathy.

2:54

And of course, one of them is the workplace. And having been in the corporate world for many, many years, it's something that I discovered myself through my own experience, that when you have more empathy in the workplace, this is not just about being better and more healthy and more sustainable for human beings, but it earns you money as well.

3:10

So yeah, that led me to write the book, which predominantly talks about balancing humanism and capitalism and how, as you said, this ancient trait that we have can really improve on what places, not just for the people, but for our business.

3:23

Yeah. I think it's not business, but that's pretty intriguing as well. Isn't it?

3:25

Because sometimes there's okay, this, this all sounds great, but what does it really impact on the bottom line?

3:29

And, but you're saying that it does. So, I mean, there's lots of data that shows that emotionally intelligent organizations where empathy is high, we see performance and productivity and creativity go up, but there's also an impact on the bottom line.

3:40

So can you tell us a bit more about that? Absolutely.

3:42

I often say to my audiences, you know, this is not me, me, me just saying these things cause I'm passionate about them.

3:47

There's as you said, Kenny, plenty of data out there to show the connection with high empathy, with output, the capita performance motivations, strategic thinking, creative thinking, fundamentally empathy sits in your prefrontal cortex in your brain.

3:59

So we're all born with it. And uh, not the question you asked, but as an addition, when I get asked all the time, do people, some people have more or less empathy in the answer's no, we all have the same amounts of empathy.

4:10

And when we see higher levels of empathy in the workplace, something that is natural.

4:15

As I mentioned for all of us as human beings, we see all performance indicators go up because fundamentally when people are connected, they do better.

4:23

As I said earlier, we're not meant to do these things alone.

4:25

When employees or teammates feel seen, they feel heard you'll fulfilling.

4:30

Literally the bottom of Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

4:32

This is totally fundamental to performance, to survival, to thriving, as I said earlier.

4:38

So when we see environments that really allow us to be seen and heard and recognized, we'll do better.

4:44

And as you said, that's not just about the people, it's about the money as well.

4:47

How does that sort of translate to the bottom line?

4:49

Is it because people are sort of putting in more effort or the collaborating more like what's the link between the two it's actually both and many more fundamentally they're able to collaborate better.

5:00

Yes. We see communication. We see trust go up because when you have high empathy, you have high rapport, you see higher levels of trust and of course, loyalty as well.

5:09

So we see higher levels of performance on a consistent basis and lower levels of things like absenteeism, sick days do motivation and things like that.

5:17

I say, yes, of course the whole spectrum of communication, but also as, as we both touched on strategic and creative and sort of out of the box thinking, so you see high levels of innovation, design thinking, those types of things.

5:28

And that is simply because when empathy is high, stress is low, self-censorship goes down and when stress and self-censorship go down all brains quite literally can perform on a better level.

5:39

It's physiological because you've removed some of those stress hormones, like adrenaline cortisol, those types of things out of the system, your brain quite literally works better.

5:49

So this is business, but it's also science beyond the humanity.

5:54

I love the whole neuroscience. I think that that's apart from it being fascinating, obviously proving the point.

5:58

It also goes a lot to perhaps, uh, quite in any naysayers you might think, okay.

6:03

You know, does this really work right? Did you find that when you quote science to people, it sort of helps get the message across?

6:08

I think that's why in my book, I spent a lot of time looking at the data and also at the business rationale.

6:14

And as you said, the neuroscience, because these things are fundamental to how we work as human beings.

6:19

They're not optional extras, you know, it's not like, oh, it would be nice.

6:23

I mean, it would be nice, but that's not why we're doing these things.

6:26

We're doing these things to sustain human beings in the workplace, but also to sustain our businesses.

6:31

And as we come out of COVID now, you know, there's never been a time when we need to balance those two things, humanism and capitalism more.

6:39

If we're going to come out of this and who knows how long this is going to last, you know, we've had 18 months, some predictions say yes, some say five, there's a long way to go.

6:48

Right. We need people to be at their best if we're going to overcome what nature is there in our way.

6:53

Mm, absolutely. And, um, you touched on COVID, which I think, you know, we can't sort of have a discussion around this without mentioning it, especially as it's still in the thick of it.

7:00

Like you say, I mean, there's been lots of research about this sort of post COVID consumer, you know, there's things around people being more grateful and trying to find more purpose, being more empathetic.

7:10

I mean, how has the last year impacted on our empathy levels?

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Have you think, do you think it's perhaps a positive or could it be a negative?

7:17

Both actually we've seen empathy, both go off and go down.

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So certainly in the beginning when this was really new empathy was high, we saw people clapping for the healthcare workers.

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We saw people delivering food parcels to their neighbors and leaving things outside of glass doors.

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And you know, all of that imagery, if you roll back your Google to 2020, this time, last year empathy was high.

7:38

And it was a lot of understanding of shared suffering and social context.

7:43

Then as we go into the end of 2020 and early 2021 where Europe particularly, but then after that India and the sub-continent became into like a second, very deep wave, we saw empathy goes down again, because by this point, people are mentally less strong.

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We're seeing a huge increase in mental health problems and wellness problems, emotional wellness problems.

8:05

We're seeing the highest levels of anxiety we've ever seen.

8:08

We're seeing any 400 million people with depression around the world.

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We're even saying things like suicide, go up.

8:14

So we now, by this point have unwell people, not just people that have, or have had COVID as the actual virus, but the associated illnesses and realities of what's been going on around the world.

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Now, when people are fighting for survival, in other ways, areas such as them thinking go down, it's a, it's a self protection mechanism.

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So we then saw empathy, go down, lack of patience, lack of energy around that sort of shared social construct and, and people really looking at themselves with becoming a bit more insular and isolated.

8:45

And of course, we're now going into a new wave as parts of Europe come out, parts of the sub-continent go back in Africa yesterday when, you know, back in, in parts of Africa.

8:53

So, you know, this thing goes on on, and I think what we'll continue to see is this empathetic radar sort of going up and down depending on the emotional wellness.

9:02

Yeah. That's really interesting empathetic radar.

9:04

I mean, that's a terrifying statistic, 400 million people with depression.

9:09

I think I had Dr. Silly from the lighthouse speak a couple of weeks ago.

9:12

And I think she said that depression is going to be the leading cause of death by 2023.

9:17

I mean, don't quote me on that exact stat, but, or the exact year, but it was a terrifying, terrifying statistic because obviously depression impacts you physiologically as well as mentally as well.

9:26

So yeah, there's, there's going to be huge impacts way beyond what we've just seen in terms of the terrible deaths from COVID itself.

9:32

Absolutely. And it already is the highest cost to our healthcare systems around the world.

9:37

So depression and its associated illness is ailments emotional concerns now across our healthcare system globally more than any other single disease or cause.

9:47

And actually, you know, one of the things I talk a lot about, which is associated with this is loneliness.

9:51

So we may be in a health pandemic, but we're actually far deeper into a loneliness endemic and many studies now show that the risk to our mortality.

10:01

So the death risk of loneliness is now higher than obesity or smoking.

10:07

So loneliness is literally killing people.

10:11

And again, this is why I do the work that I do because for so many years, we've let this go by.

10:16

And I think of all the negative things that COVID has brought to our planet, one of the positives is this elevation of the discussion around mental health, around wellness, around, you know, areas such as loneliness and suicide and all of these things that have been so hidden, particularly in the non developed markets, right.

10:35

Just haven't been spoken about for decades and decades.

10:37

And now there's definitely innovation in the workplace and the corporate world.

10:41

And of course in the media, the political world, the public domain, this elevated understanding of what human beings need to survive literally.

10:50

And these areas are so fundamental to who we are as human beings.

10:54

Yeah, absolutely. It sounds like you're sort of moving towards slightly more hopeful points of view.

10:59

I mean, do you feel hopeful about the direction that the work and business might be taking post COVID as well as life in general?

11:06

I think so. I often tell the story when I started writing this book and I got my publisher in November, 2019, which feels like about 10,300 years ago, but was actually only about 20 months, right?

11:20

Less, less like 18 months ago. And when I pulled my mum and I said, mum, someone's going to publish my book.

11:26

And she said, well, dawning, that's wonderful, but who wants to read a book about empathy?

11:30

And I said, well, thanks mum. She was absolutely right, because just 18 months ago, it just wasn't a thing.

11:37

Nobody knew what it was. Nobody spoke about it.

11:39

Certainly no one was speaking about it in the corporate world.

11:42

There was some specialists, of course I've been specialist for many years in the academic sphere specifically.

11:47

And it was beginning to bubble. But even that short time ago, 18 months ago, even my was like, this is wonderful, but who's going to read it because who really cares.

11:56

And then of course, 2020 happened and it wasn't just a pandemic.

11:59

It was black lives matter. It was Joe Biden's election campaign, which focused on two key words, unity and empathy, and many other social movements that happened in the last 18 months that there has been a collective shift to new awareness.

12:12

So I do feel quite positive. I feel positive that I get booked to talk about these things all the time and people like you asked me to come and speak about it.

12:19

I feel positive that my book became a bestseller, which is bonkers as far as I'm concerned.

12:24

Like I feel positive that people won't talk about this because I always say the more the world talks about empathy, the more empathy the world will have.

12:32

The only way that we can start to fill in those gaps is by talking about and elevating understanding of what we need as human beings.

12:41

I couldn't agree more. So I'm glad that you feel hopeful to, I mean, let's talk about empathy in business.

12:45

Is there ever a feeling that empathy?

12:48

Because I get the sense sometimes when I talk about it, um, when I, you know, talk about the, I'm trying to model it or that I think we'd need to bring more of it in, you know, I get a feeling sometimes that it seems a weakness that, you know, you kind of maybe do you lose your edge.

13:00

If you become more empathetic, if you throw the word empathy and sort of wall street, like how does that land, if you throw it into the corporate world, how does that lounge?

13:06

So do you ever feel that that, that is how it's seen?

13:09

And then how do you sort of counter that when you're talking to people about it?

13:11

I think it is seen that way by many people, but really it's just a lack of understanding of what the word means.

13:17

It's really people just actually don't know the definition of, of what it is that you're talking about.

13:21

And I say that with the greatest respect, but empathy is your dataset, right?

13:25

There are no environments, literally none where deeper understanding doesn't improve the situation, emotional, social, familial business negotiations, wall street.

13:35

It doesn't matter, right? Wherever you are in any situation, business or personal, deeper understanding is going to improve your success rate in whatever you're doing, whether that's communication or it's brokering a deal, or it's trying to convert a new client or when a pitch or whatever it is that you're doing.

13:50

Being able to understand your audience, being able to understand your target market, being able to stand in the shoes of the person that wants you to reduce your costs by 50% is going to help you with that negotiation, that discussion or that you know, that conversation.

14:02

So I think that there is a pushback that I do also feel that it's changing again slowly, because if you just Google empathy at work or empathy in business, you will see so much now in Harvard business review and Forbes and entrepreneur and the New York times and you know, the BBC.

14:18

So as I said earlier, that collective awareness from a leadership point of view is definitely changing.

14:23

We've got a long way to go. And I think that there are many organizations that are going to take a very long time to get there.

14:30

They just don't know how to make the change just feels too much not to talk about me.

14:35

But as an example, if I tell you a few of the brands that I've been working with, as you can see, it's changing.

14:39

So standard charter and HSBC PlayStation, the metropolitan police service act.

14:45

So health insurance, you know, these are big global predominant American, but big brands that all asking people like me and many others to come in and talk to them about this.

14:54

So the shift is happening, right? The shift is happening and we have 30 years of declining empathy.

15:00

So we've got a very long way back, but we're making progress for sure.

15:04

Sounds great. So how can we create a more healthy and empathetic environment at work?

15:08

And I'm sure this is like a very long question, depending on sort of who you're dealing with and which client you might be talking to you.

15:12

But I mean, are there any sort of first steps, how do you approach this when you're sort of trying to give clients recommendations of at least, is it mindset?

15:18

Is it practical things? What sort of steps can they take?

15:22

I mean, the first one is really, as I said earlier around awareness, there has to be an awareness within leadership, but also within the people as to why you're doing this, I always say you can't teach empathy.

15:33

You can inspire it because as we said earlier, you're born with it, right.

15:37

You know how to do it. It's a choice you can choose to use that skillset today or not.

15:42

And it is a skillset. So like any skill set it takes practice.

15:46

So the first thing to do, and the first thing that I always do in organizations is normally create the information around the case.

15:51

Basically the case for empathy, why we have the empathy deficit what's been going on in 30 years of, of data and declining empathy levels, the impact that has had on society and of course their workplace and then all the data and the evidence around why it's beneficial for them to embrace that if they haven't bought into it by that.

16:08

And I think you've got very little chance of making any progress, but my experience is that by that stage, they, you know, they have, and that people naturally understand why this is important.

16:18

Once you've done that, there are, there are a whole lot of technical skills that you can do.

16:21

There's something I do put the listening rooms, which is around active listening and teaching, active listening, listening is our super power.

16:27

And yet we don't teach it in schools. We don't teach it in universities.

16:31

We certainly don't teach it at work and we're not great at it.

16:33

Right. Or no, we're not great listeners.

16:36

So what the listening reminisce does is teaches people to listen, to understand versus listening to reply because more often than not, when you're hearing someone, you're like, okay, I'm going to say that next time.

16:46

You know, I want to make my point. You're actually just listening to reply.

16:48

You're not really taking in what they're saying.

16:51

So listening and active listening is a really important part of that skillset development.

16:55

And then yes, there are a whole load of other areas, whether that's mindfulness.

16:58

So there's a lot of work I do around self empathy and then physical things, lots of things with body language, eye contact, smiling, shoulders, like all kinds of different things that you can bring into meetings and workplaces that fundamentally change the understanding of information when you go in and you kind of give this advice.

17:16

If people take it on and they take it on sort of, you know, with a full heart and they take it on quite quickly.

17:21

I mean, does change happen quickly or does it take time to sort of turn the Titanic or is it I'm sure there's no one, I'm sure there's no one size fits all, but sort of, you know, how does that process sort of go once you've made the recommendations?

17:33

I think, again, it depends on the organization and it really depends on the leader and how much the leader commits to making that happen.

17:42

My book is centered around a personal story in the workplace around about three years, story of turnaround of a business.

17:47

And we did have empathy very deeply embedded into our culture, how we work with our clients, how we did our work, or, you know, all of our internal culture.

17:56

But that was because I was the person leading it.

17:58

Right? So every week I was bringing in initiatives and communication and conversation around this is how we do things around here.

18:05

This is why we look after each other. This is why we listen to each other, all of those things.

18:08

So it has to start at the top. I think that's the first thing, but yes, these are quick and instant changes.

18:14

I talk quite a lot about linguistics in my courses and sessions.

18:18

And there are certain phrases and things that you can say that would change your meeting in half an hours time.

18:24

It's immediate because it's language. But the sustaining of those things, as I said, of course, depends on culture, HR and the teams and leadership.

18:32

I always say that what you measure manifests.

18:36

So if you have no measurement in place in your organization to upkeep, maintain empathy is one of your cultural sort of guide posts.

18:44

It's very difficult to keep consistent. I'm fascinated to know about the thing is I can say in my next meeting, are there, are there any, a couple of quick tips you could give us that would help?

18:54

Yes. I'll tell you my Kelly. I'll tell you my favorite one.

18:56

My favorite one is around the word. Why?

18:59

And the word, why is a really important word? Because it's a curious word.

19:02

And one of the key pillars of increasing empathy is curiosity.

19:05

So asking why, and being curious is really, really important.

19:09

However, I like to give an example when perhaps you're working with a teammate who owes your presentation or owes you a document and they say, Kelly, I'm going to give that to you by Thursday.

19:19

And then on Wednesday, they come to you and they say, listen, Kelly, I'm really sorry.

19:22

I know I said, I was going to give you that deck, but I'm not.

19:26

Well, what would you say? You would need say why, right?

19:29

You say, well, why not? You know, you told me that now the problem with the word, why is it's an offensive word, not rude, but on the offense.

19:36

Right? So when you use that in that situation, the person will respond defensively.

19:41

That's tuned into their subconscious, right? They know when that sort of offensive word comes, they respond for the defensive set of answers.

19:47

What I love to share with people is that if you change that word from why to what stopping you all kinds of amazing things happen.

19:56

When you say to someone what's stopping, you you'll see their eyes move probably slightly up or slightly down.

20:02

It depends on when you are processing, but their eyes will move.

20:04

And that's because that accessing their subconscious, it's a different form of information access in the brain and they will go, oh, well, what's stopping me is X, Y, and Z.

20:13

And you will find a totally different set of answers.

20:16

So the empathy, the insight, the connection is entirely different.

20:20

And that's why I say that's an instant marker.

20:22

And honestly, give it a go. It's amazing.

20:25

It works. The toddlers, it works with teenagers. It worked for everybody, right?

20:29

You get like, I have a little girl and it, you know, if I ask you to do something and then I say, but why didn't you do that?

20:33

She's only four, by the way, why didn't you do that?

20:36

You'll tell me one thing. But if I say, what stopped you from doing that?

20:39

She'll say, oh, well, mommy, this, and she'll tell me, she'll tell me an entirely different lot of information that if I didn't have that, you know, as a mum, for example, you could have been irritated because you're that one I told you to do this and you didn't, why not?

20:52

And they say, well, I didn't have time or something irrelevant.

20:55

But if you say what's stopping, you they'll go, oh, well actually the doorbell rang.

21:00

And then this happened, you know, it's amazing.

21:02

It works with all kinds of people that, um, yeah.

21:06

Oh, absolutely. Well, I'll be trying that on daughter, husband, team clients, maybe as well.

21:12

Well, good to know trial. I will report back on that.

21:15

Fantastic. Send me a message. Tell me how it goes.

21:19

Believe me. I will. So I've heard you say a couple of times that, you know, we're born with empathy.

21:22

Cause I wanted to ask you about this. Whether empathy could be taught or whether it's intrinsic within our state, you are saying, is it everybody?

21:29

Because obviously frankly, sometimes you meet people that don't seem to be that empathetic.

21:33

So it's, they were born with it and they lost it or they just didn't have it for sure.

21:39

All humans are born with it. But as I said earlier, it's a choice.

21:43

So using it is totally up to you basically having said that you can inspire it.

21:47

It's a skill that you can hone in that you can practice.

21:50

In fact, the last words of my book, uh, practice creates permanence because the more you practice, the better you become at that because it is a skillset.

21:58

So you can share that skillset with others, you can inspire it.

22:00

You can instill it into teams, you can practice it, but fundamentally it's a choice.

22:05

And what I'm doing, my keynotes, I often talk about a quote by Ford, the guy behind the Ford motor company.

22:11

And he used to say, if you think you can, you probably can.

22:14

And if you think you can't, you're probably right. And what he was referring to is the neuroplasticity of the brain, right?

22:18

If you tell yourself, you can do something you can. And if you tell yourself you can't, well, then you probably can't.

22:23

And I like to adapt that to empathy and say that if you think you can emphasize, you're probably right.

22:28

And if you think you can't empathize, you're probably right, because it's a choice, you know, tell your brain to do is how your brain will respond.

22:35

So you're right. You meet many people that don't use their empathy, but that's just because they're choosing not to, not because they don't have any interest.

22:42

Very interesting. And um, sometimes, you know, we have different personas, right?

22:46

So you might have a very corporate job, but you might be a very empathetic person sort of when you're not in that environment, if you were practicing a lot of empathy outside of work, does it trickle through, into work?

22:55

Does it, does it make a positive, like, can you bring it in?

22:57

I think it does. I mean, to me, it certainly does.

23:00

And again, it's an incredibly powerful skillset.

23:03

So once you use it in your personal life and you see the benefits of it, because you're more connected and you understand people and you have other no less arguments at home or whatever it is that it's benefiting, it makes sense to use it in your workplace.

23:15

I think for me as a female leader and exec, I guess it would be too difficult for me to be two different people.

23:22

I couldn't do one thing at home. And another thing it worked, I mean, there's enough for me to get my head around that lunch time, create two personas.

23:28

But yeah, I think that if you practice it in your personal life, it's going to make it much more easy to use in the corporate world.

23:34

And of course you adapt it, you adapt it to the people you're speaking to the audience that you're with the culture that you're in, you know, whether you're working with the Chinese, the Arabs, you know, the Nigerians, they will have very different sets of approaches to their business and you would adapt that to them.

23:49

But of course that's what empathy is all about, right? It's about understanding.

23:52

So if you understand that business environment, you can use it in a way to connect regardless of boundaries or cultural divides.

24:01

Hmm. Yeah. That's interesting. I'm sure that lots of people listening around in a very, you know, in a corporate environment potentially, you know, how do you balance the demands and the pressures of that kind of job with a desire to lead an empathetic life?

24:13

Because, you know, as we've said, you know, some companies are really on board with it, some aren't, um, and sometimes the demands of the job that you've got might be, you know, a little bit at odds with sort of trying to have this empathetic approach.

24:23

So how can we sort of try and balance those two things, as I said earlier, Kelly empathy is your datasets.

24:28

So for me, there is really no balance.

24:31

It's just a choice. If you want to use it or not, fundamentally empathy is about understanding.

24:36

And it's not to be confused with kindness because I think when I listen to your question and it is a question I get asked often, I'm not asking you to be kind at work, although that would be nice.

24:44

Right. But I think often when people ask me that question, they're like, but I, you know, I work in a bank and it's really cutthroat and it's really hierarchical.

24:50

There's no space. It needs to be nice or to be kind, and I'm saying, well, okay, fine, but that's not my specialism, right?

24:55

I'm not talking about being nice or kind, I am nice and kind at work, but that's not the point.

25:00

I'm talking about empathy. That's about understanding.

25:03

They're very, very different things. Empathy is fundamentally the ability to see the perspective of another.

25:08

So you could be in the most cutthroat horrendously sort of firm and strict environment in a boardroom of 15 people discussing, you know, next quarter's financial objectives.

25:19

You can still leverage empathy. And nobody has to know that's something I've been using my entire career.

25:25

I mean, until I wrote a book about it, I didn't talk about it.

25:27

I just did it. I just made sure that I was always trying to take it to the others in order to do my job better.

25:34

And I would say that it laid me in good stead.

25:37

You know, I think for many years people ask me, what's your tips to how you've managed to climb your career so quickly.

25:45

And without a doubt, it's empathy. It's just that before 2018, I didn't know what the name for that was.

25:50

So I always called it instinct. I always said to people, I don't know, it's just instinct.

25:56

I just have an instinct about how to do things.

26:00

And then in 2018, it's a long story, but in 2018, when I really discovered empathy, I realized that it wasn't instinct at all and it was empathy.

26:08

Oh, that's absolutely fascinating. And I sort of wanted to ask you a little bit about where all this came from, because I mean, I'm assuming you're obviously extremely empathetic.

26:16

I mean, have you always been like this or have you always sort of exhibited or have you always made that choice sort of based on what we've talked about, calling it a choice, have you always made that choice or did it come to you later?

26:25

Did you have to learn it? What's your sort of journey towards this point?

26:29

I think, yes. I think I've always been more prone to making that choice, I guess, as I said, I didn't know I was using empathy for most of my career and I, and I already was.

26:38

So there's certainly some nurture in there.

26:41

You know, that I talk to a lot of parents about parenting and how we bring up our children empathetically.

26:45

And for sure, my parents, again, not sort of consciously, but embedded that in me and my sister.

26:51

That's how we grew up. I talk a lot about my dad in the book and he was a writer and he could just do this, you know, he could empathize with people and I, you know, grew up wanting to be like him.

27:01

So yes, I think it was something that I always found easy to leverage and to use and to be empathetic to people.

27:08

I spent 14 years now being an expat child in the world and looking at culture.

27:12

And I learned very quickly that, you know, there's lots that divide us on paper, you know, culture, religion, context, all of these things, they're just on paper.

27:22

But as human beings, we're all far more alike than we are different, to be honest.

27:26

And the more you see the world and the more you watch communities connect, the more you realize that that shared understanding is something that, you know, that we all have and, and can leverage.

27:35

But as I said, I didn't have a name for it until a couple of years ago when I started to study this and work with it, it was something that was quite natural.

27:43

So my story became about empathy. My life changed in COVID in 2020.

27:47

And not that just in the year that COVID began.

27:49

And whilst it was a horrendous year, I always call it my best worst year because it was terrible, but it was also the year that changed my life and allowed me to talk about these things in a, in a brand new way.

28:03

What was it like launching a book during COVID maybe that must've been an interesting experience and perhaps not how you'd expected it to be?

28:09

Absolutely. Although I didn't have any expectations because I literally never planned to write a book, but that aside, oh gosh, it was a lesson in patience and resilience.

28:18

I would say the writing of the book I did before 2020, I did it in the last month of 2019.

28:23

So the writing of it was actually very easy.

28:26

I read the book in about a month. If I traveled, it was easy for me and I was so passionate about it.

28:31

Right. It was just easy to write about it. Oh, good Lord.

28:34

The editing for me. And I've heard it from many authors is a really, really, really difficult thing to do.

28:39

I mean, I think, I don't know, my experience would be, anyone can write a bit, but whether you could get through the editing is a real lesson of strength, especially in a lot done, but the toddler all on your own, I think that was really, really hard.

28:50

And then patience and resilience going forwards because you're let down for everything launches.

28:54

Even albeit virtual ones were delayed books, didn't get to warehouses in time.

28:59

Of course, everyone in that whole ecosystem, whether it's the designer of the cover or the whatever, any person that was there to help is going through their own realities there, things were slow.

29:09

You know, the book industry was hit incredibly hard in different ways.

29:13

So there's backlogs of orders.

29:16

And so, yeah, I wouldn't recommend it.

29:20

I wouldn't recommend writing a book in a pandemic, but we did it.

29:23

And um, I guess how long has it been?

29:25

It feels, it feels like so long. I felt that this book has been around forever, but it was only September.

29:30

So like nine months ago or something, but it feels like years.

29:36

I feel like I've had this book for years so crazy during COVID as well, discussing this a lot of work, like it's gone slower.

29:44

And then there are studies around this now as well. Apparently the, you know, time that our perception of time is completely changed.

29:50

It's more fluid, it's more elastic. It's gone slow. It's come fast depending on sort of, you know, where you are on the journey of COVID and a different points.

29:57

So I think the whole thing has been, sorry, trust testing for many different reasons.

30:01

And I agree with what you say about sort of resilience and patience.

30:05

I think that's something that we've all had to try and pull out how toolboxes and, um, sometimes you just don't have the energy to open the box, nevermind, pull these things off and right.

30:13

It's quite challenging and remains to be. So I want you to ask him if as an empathetic person has an impact.

30:18

I mean, do you ever feel like a little bit overwhelmed by whether it's work or dealing with the outside world?

30:24

You know, I know a lot of people that sort of identify as AMPATH, so do they face this issue?

30:28

And I wondered if you did, and, and if you do, how do you keep that going?

30:31

How do you get that? I think there's two things.

30:34

First of all, over chronically, I don't identify as an empath at all.

30:38

I don't use that word and I'll tell you why, because it feels to me like a weird word, it feels like you're something slightly odd, quite a little bit left of center.

30:48

You sometimes read it in like retreat language or maybe in yoga or in very spiritual thing.

30:53

And it just, for me, it's a word that doesn't sit at all comfortably with me.

30:57

And I don't like to use it in the public domain because I think it makes exactly what we've been saying this morning.

31:02

It makes us into something that only some people have, and it's not true.

31:06

Everyone has empathy. It's just how you use it or to what extent you use it.

31:09

So that's a side note, but do I find it know having high empathy?

31:13

Do I find it sometimes overwhelming? I think I don't watch the news.

31:17

And it's funny to mention my mom twice in one interview, but she tells me even in my thirties that that's not okay because then you're disconnected from the world and maybe you should know what's going on in the world.

31:27

I find that extremely exhausting.

31:31

It's not like I never watch it. But you know, I remember years ago, especially as a British person, we grew up with the news, always being on, you know, it's on the TV, you watch it before breakfast, before dinner, like we grew up on the news and the media and now I shelter myself from it.

31:46

I don't know if it's to do with high empathy probably is.

31:49

I just find it exhausting. I find the sadness of our world too much.

31:54

So I would rather be ignorant to lots of the things that's going on and use my entity to focus on the change that I might be part of.

32:03

And that's my empathy work and, and helping people learn and be inspired by that, then put my energy into a space where it's going to be taken into a whirlwind of sadness because, you know, that's what I talk about a lot in my presentations and stuff like how long has such deep problems and as individuals, we cannot fix them.

32:24

You know, we actually, in many ways can't be part of the change because they're too big.

32:27

They're too big for individuals. We can only do it as collective.

32:30

So yes, I do find it quite overwhelming, whether that's because of high empathy alone or just sort of my personality and who I am, but yeah, that's, I guess that's life in 2021.

32:41

Yeah, it is. Isn't it? I mean, I love what you say about the news me part of my job office.

32:45

I work in PR, so I have to consume a certain amount of news, but I'm very, very selective about what it is sort of beyond what I need to do.

32:52

And I think it was Shawn ACOR. He's this happiness researcher out of Harvard and they have all these amazing studies about if you watch the news and there's something very negative on it, that that feeling of sadness, it gives you with, you gives you, it stays with you for 10 hours.

33:06

So basically if you watch anything in the morning, like, but that's it you're so you're basically, you're constantly carrying it because if you're constantly tapped into the news, it's just always going to be with you.

33:14

So yeah, that was one of the first pieces of advice he gives to people is start either dramatically reducing or very curating what you consume, because like you say, it's not, it's not about being ignorant.

33:24

You know, I still want to know about, you know, issues that are happening.

33:27

I need to know about that. I want to understand and, and issues that I might want to support, but it's how do you just want to sort of drink from this fire hydrant of red bull?

33:34

That is like, is now our news output every day?

33:37

No, I don't want to do that anymore. And interestingly, I've had, um, recently quite a few quite prominent people that are just coming off Twitter, prominent sort of celebrities, that's it, that's the wrong word, but you know, whether the campaigners or whatever, because it's just too much, the constant stream is not adding any value.

33:51

In fact, it's actually detrimental. Yeah. And it, you know, there is sadly so much negativity out there.

33:57

I mean, I, I do lots of live stuff on Instagram and I would say one in two, probably a one in three, there'll be atrial.

34:05

It doesn't matter who I'm talking to. It doesn't matter whether it's my channel or their child doesn't matter if we're in the UAE, India or Britain.

34:11

Right. At some point in probably every two, yeah.

34:14

Two or three of them, someone will turn off and in a comment and just say stickiness stuff.

34:21

And if no one else they disappear, they're just trolls.

34:23

They have nothing better to do it clearly with their time.

34:25

But yeah, there is, I think social media can be such a force for good.

34:29

I'm a real sort of cheerleader for social media, but at the same time, you know, you're right.

34:34

Like if you're on these platforms like Twitter and Instagram stuff all the time, you do have to work out exactly what you're saying, what the balance of real value is versus, you know, just, I love what you just said about, you know, sort of fire hose of content, but, you know, where's the balance for me having, you know, you mentioned the beginning of, in Sri Lanka, I I've been here about two months.

34:54

We arrived me and my little girl into a really, really challenging situation and locked down and we got sort of, I wouldn't say abandoned, but we kind of, we did, we kind of got banded by the system and we had all kinds of troubles.

35:06

And in that time, social media was so important to me.

35:10

Like never before I've never experienced a kitty, it was just probably never happened again.

35:15

I hope it never happens again, but I needed, I needed social media to get through those two months and not be alone.

35:21

And the outpouring of kindness and love that I got from people all around the world was amazing.

35:27

Yeah, no, it's that I can bring this great sense of community, right.

35:30

So this is what social media can be good for. It's the sense of community of like-minded people, especially like, like you, if you're physically isolated and also if you're feeling sort of just mentally disconnected from people, you can find like-minded people and then, and then have that connection with them.

35:45

So we've touched on some of these things, but I mean, obviously this podcast is called good intentions, so it's all about sort of, how can we try and set intentions for ourselves to try and sort of keep ourselves on optimum level?

35:55

Do you have any sort of practical tips on, I mean, you've mentioned not watching the news.

35:59

Is there anything else that you do that you think would be useful for us to know about how can we keep ourselves at an optimum level and try and sort of get that positive energy, that empathetic ability to tap into it?

36:09

How can we do that in, in the world that we're living in at the moment to believe that most people in most situations have positive intentions?

36:17

I think when you look at the science and you look at the evidence on the whole, as human beings, we do know, and we want to be good kind community driven people because fundamentally not just because we're nice people, but because we know that's how we survive best, right?

36:32

So there is a real sort of reality to that.

36:35

I think that really helps when you're looking for the positive, you're looking to understand those around you.

36:40

You're looking to make sense of some of the bonkers stuff that happens out in the world today to remember that in most situations someone's behavior or opinion is right.

36:50

And perhaps you just need to change the situation or the context in order to find that space.

36:55

The other thing is that empathy is not about agreement and it's not about judgment.

37:00

This is a skillset that takes constant practice is never going to get easy.

37:04

I often get asked, can you empathize with people that have vastly different realities or opinions to you?

37:10

So this week I got asked, can you empathize with a terrorist?

37:13

Right? So with people that are so vastly different in their outlook and opinions to you, and the reality is, yes, you can, you can empathize with anyone because empathy is about understanding and really putting your energy into understanding more people more often is a really helpful skillset.

37:30

And it definitely helps me with positive intentions, with positive outlook, to be able to step back from a situation and say, this is not comfortable for me.

37:39

This is upsetting for me or offensive to me, but it's clearly not to the other person.

37:45

Let me take a moment to think about that, to try and understand their behavior and imagine, imagine why they're doing what they're doing and why we perhaps don't see things differently by the time you've gone through that thought process, you almost always feel better.

37:58

It diffuses your instant response.

38:01

It helps you share that common humanity.

38:03

And as I said, empathy is not about agreement. So it deepens our understanding of each other.

38:08

Super. I like to sort of trying to, um, listening to that other point of view, even though it might jar very strongly with your own and also looking for opinions that are not the same as yours, so that you're not just living in that sort of echo chamber of your own whatever belief or whatever sensibility that is, I think is quite important.

38:27

I mean, we've had a lot of change recently with sort of a different world leaders.

38:31

Are there, are there any great examples of empathetic world leaders?

38:33

Can you be empathetic when you to that level, do they show it at all?

38:38

There are done. The prime minister of New Zealand is probably the most well-known empathetic leader.

38:44

See it very well. So as a PR specialist, you'll be able to see right through it, but she does have a fantastic PR campaign around empathy, but nevertheless, she does believe in, and she puts that central to many of her policies that much of new Zealand's response to the pandemic last year.

38:59

And I don't know if any of your listeners remember when she gave a central passes to the tooth fairy, you know, last year, just ways to create connection with people and understand what children were going through.

39:08

So just send us a phenomenal example outside of political leadership.

39:12

I'd say that sat Odetta is one of my kind of heroes.

39:15

He's the CEO of Microsoft.

39:17

He's been there six years. He has a fantastic book I can recommend called hit refresh, which is about his leadership journey in Microsoft and turning around that behemoth business to the return of a trillion dollars to shareholders so that, you know, a massive success story.

39:30

And I think he mentioned empathy 53 times in that book.

39:32

So for Satya empathy is what, you know, so much of Microsoft strategy with the people, with the innovation with their clients is based on.

39:42

So there are, there are some phenomenal leaders out there and ironically, based on what people assume, and many of them are men, many more of them are men than women actually, but it is a growing a growing change, but yes, just cinder and Sasha to people.

39:56

I talk about a lot. Amazing. And, um, well I wanted to ask you about books.

39:59

So, I mean, obviously aside from your incredible book, you've just touched on that hit refresh.

40:03

Are there any other books that sort of meant something to you maybe in this sphere or outside of that, um, that you could tell us about?

40:10

Cause we love to talk about books on this podcast. I, I still love leaning by Sheryl Sandberg.

40:16

I love that you're smiling and saying yes, me too. It's ironically, someone told me that she has, I haven't actually thought it up on the Silicon tip.

40:22

Apparently she has gone back with some of her advice in that and said that she would have written it differently sort of 10 years later.

40:28

But for me, I've read it three times and I just, it was the first right.

40:33

It was the first of that kind of female driven, empowered leadership.

40:38

And I still think it's the best, you know, for me, I really enjoy that book.

40:43

I recently read the book about the Dalai Lama.

40:46

I can't remember at school totally got out of my head. I will message you so you can put it in the show notes and say to everyone, the book that means you forgot, which is pretty important, but is this one, so yes, I've read quite a lot by the Dalai Lama recently as well, because he talks a lot about compassion and empathy and while healing and perhaps where humanity should be going.

41:04

So if you don't want to read a whole book by him, if you just look him up, he's got some really amazing content in the space from a more spiritual space as well.

41:11

But yes, and I tend to listen to a lot, you know, I think as a single mum with two careers and a book, it's quite difficult for me to find time to read as much as I'd like, but I have been listening to some really great content.

41:22

So I try to mix it up a little bit.

41:25

Yeah, same here. I tend to listen more to podcasts and books, but I've, I've had a few audio books recently that I couldn't get in the, into my hand.

41:31

And then there's a super way. I think it's, as long as you're consuming something, whether you're holding it or listening to it, I mean the, the end result is getting the, to the right path.

41:38

But now I loved lean-in as well. I absolutely loved it.

41:41

And I think the thing that she's kind of backtracked on is that she wrote it obviously before her husband sadly died.

41:47

So I think once she then obviously dealt with life as a single parent, she said, she realized that she just hadn't really thought about that when she was writing it.

41:55

So she was assuming all the women that were reading the book would have a partner and that would have a partner that was able to support whether that was logistically, physically or mentally.

42:04

So she just said she had an and hats off to her.

42:06

She sort of put her hands up and said, yeah, until Dave died, I didn't, I just haven't considered it.

42:10

And that obviously is a big part of her book in terms of, you know, make sure you've got someone that takes on 50 50 and the biggest economic decision you'll make as a woman is the person that you decide to share your life with, you know, man woman or whatever, which I thought was fascinating, but I read it on holiday.

42:23

And then my husband ran out of books to read. So he picked it up purely out of desperation because he had nothing else to read.

42:29

And even he, um, he was just a Gog.

42:31

I always recommend it to my friends, my female friends.

42:33

I also recommend it to men as well. I think men read it just to understand the casual, institutionalized sexism that is endemic in our society.

42:42

You just, especially if you're a man, you might not even see that because you know, you're obviously part of the system through no fault of your own as it's the way it's structured and you know what, I am a single mom.

42:51

And I have to say, even though that's all in there, you know, that skews your partner wisely and stuff, I didn't find it incorrect.

42:59

So it just wasn't relevant to me. Do you know what I mean? Like, as you said, hats off to her for going back and saying, I could have written that differently, but as someone that doesn't have a 50% partner with my little girl, I didn't read that and be like, oh, this book is not for me because she's only talking about women that are married.

43:13

And so I think she's probably done quite a good job because she's still managed to write a book that resonated with someone that isn't in the same situation as her and I still found power and lessons from the things she was saying.

43:22

So I didn't know she'd done that, but I think, yeah, like you said, well, what a brave thing to do, especially after she had been through such a trauma herself.

43:30

Yeah. Agreed. I kind of feel the same way.

43:32

You know, when I first picked it up, I was like, okay, what can this billionaire, you know, women with all the support in the world and she can outsource everything that she needs.

43:39

Like how can I possibly relate to this? And yet somehow yeah.

43:42

Like you say, it was still relatable. So yeah, it's a tremendous book.

43:45

I think you've achieved so much Remi, you know, you've got this fantastic book, this career, you've got your beautiful daughter, you've just moved countries.

43:52

Do you ever look at sort of everything that you've achieved and think, you know, w what's your greatest achievement?

43:57

Um, probably not enough, but if I have to say, I would say my daughter, for sure.

44:00

I mean, my daughter and then my book, I think that, you know, she's my best friend.

44:04

She's only four, but she's, um, I just don't know how I would do without her.

44:08

You know, we really exploring as well together. And I learn so much from her.

44:12

I learned so much things we've spoken about today and patience and wisdom and how to view the world.

44:17

And just before I got on the meeting with you, she's out with another lady that's looking after her.

44:22

And she sent me a video of her picking up the little tiny birds, and she's sitting on this huge, huge stone.

44:29

And just for your listeners to imagine she's on this massive stone in the middle of this reluctant jungle, holding this little tiny bird, it's like a quail or something and she's stroking and she's talking to it, you know, gosh knows what she's telling it.

44:42

You know, I just watched her such grace and just connection to nature.

44:47

She doesn't have any barriers. She's only four of course, but you know, I learn so much from her.

44:51

So she's definitely my greatest achievement.

44:54

If our children can be our greatest achievements, but after off the family, for sure my book, because it changed my life.

45:01

And I believe from what other people have told me that it has impacted if not changed other people's lives as well.

45:08

So yeah, sometimes I do look back and wonder how people ask me all the time.

45:12

How did he fit in? I can't really remember. I'm like, I don't know.

45:14

I think I did it at night. I don't think I slept for two years, but yeah.

45:18

You know, in the end, I guess you read what you say. Yeah, absolutely.

45:22

It's a tremendous book and I hope more people will go out and read it.

45:26

I'm firmly believe. And with you, that sort of empathy is the super power that has this ability to make huge changes at work and in business.

45:32

And, um, thank you. So much for your time. It was a fantastic conversation.

45:35

I really enjoyed it. Me too. I absolutely loved it.

45:38

And it's so nice to meet someone with such a similar outlook and to have this conversation.

45:43

So hopefully we'll have more of them so much.

45:46

Maybe

45:47

Thanks so much for listening to the good intentions podcast.

45:51

You can find links to issues and to books that we discussed in the show notes.

45:55

And you can look for the podcast on Instagram. It's good intentions, UAE.

45:59

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46:01

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46:06

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