Are You Wasting Your Talent? (Why Moral Ambition Matters)

0:00I do think as you go through this, for most people, it is quite confronting. I think it will encourage you to ask some provoking questions. It is a really good read. Actually, it's a really inspiring read. But at the same time, sometimes those people who have changed the world can make you also feel like I'm so far away from that. Yes. so his definition of moral ambition this is what i'm like prepare yourself it's the longing to make a difference and to leave a legacy you don't do good things because you're a good person you become a good person by doing good things okay we've got heavy yeah but i would say that the majority of people they're probably not necessarily consciously thinking about some of these world's biggest problems every day yeah i'm probably not going to work every day going i'm so ambitious the bullshit job thing.

0:48I have a little bit of friction with that term, but I think I understand what he's trying to do, which is saying... Hi, I'm Helen. And I'm Sarah. And this is the Squiggly Careers podcast, where every week we get curious and use our conversation to turn that curiosity into action to support you in your squiggly career. And we're borrowing brilliance from lots of different things. It could be people. So we've done one with Richard Feynman, a physicist. It could be books. It could be objects. And we're taking it in turns to sort of lead the conversation. So Sarah is leading us through her curiosity today.

1:25What are we going to be talking about, Sarah? So today we are talking about moral ambition. Deep, deep breath, everybody, I would say. Is it hard hitting? Yes. Yes, it is. Okay. By Rutger Bregman. And so yes, it is. That is my starting point for this is it is quite confronting. I do think as you go through this, for most people, it is quite confronting. Maybe some people, though, will just feel really smug. So if you are doing something incredible and saving the world in every which way, you'll feel really good about yourself for the rest of us. I think it will encourage you to ask some provoking questions.

2:08and what I have tried to do today is take the concept and go right what could everybody do um and it is you know it is a it is a really good read actually it's a really inspiring read but at the same time I don't know you know sort of those sometimes those people who have changed the world can make you also feel like oh I'm so far away from that um so is it but but it is it is reading the book is very time well spent it is a really good book what made you what made you buy it pick it up um i was like oh i wonder what moral ambition is i recognize rucka bregman's name from humankind which i think i did read some of but i i didn't ever connect with it i've not i've not really read it like i couldn't tell you all the key themes um and so i was like oh i'm interested i'm interested in kind of what that is and if you're wondering what is it so his definition of moral ambition so this is where like this is what I'm like prepare yourself um the will to make the world a wildly better place uh it's the longing to make a difference and to leave a legacy and so it it is really ambitious in terms of like what you're asking of yourself definitely um and he does have this really good quote which I think this is more maybe reassuring um you don't do good things because you're a good person you become a good person by doing good things so we can all do that right you all it's not like some of us are listening to this now and go i'm a bad person yeah i think it's kind of it is very much about your action and the book does start with this statement where he says a full-time career consists of 80 000 hours 10 000 work days or 2 ,000 work weeks.

3:58How you spend that time is one of the most important moral decisions of your life. Okay, we've got heavy. Yeah, I mean, it's not going to get loads lighter. It might do as I try to kind of come up with some actions for us all. What is interesting is the real emphasis on doing. So you could read books like this and be like, oh, it's very thinky and reflective and you need to think really deeply all of those things would be true but he does put a real emphasis on the people who are very good at being kind of morally ambitious they do take action it's like what counts is are you prepared to do something and he talks about this belief behavior gap so you know like you believe something is the right thing to do but do you behave in a way that reflects that and he said loads of us have lots of belief behavior gaps like of course you do um like you could say so if i well i'm like you are gonna have to say some things here about yourself where you're like oh okay um so you know like for example i still eat meat and on like that that's a good example of the belief behavior gap of going well actually if you wanted to do more that was good for the world you would you would stop eating meat so you can feel smug about that you don't eat meat so there you go um can i just ask when we're talking about moral ambition because i think it will frame how i think about what you're going to share are we talking about like those you know like making the world a better place because we're not eating meat or we're not you know we're we're aware of our i don't know carbon footprint or the resource we're consuming are we talking about that or does it if i if that doesn't connect with people does it also relate to like an average day at work and how you build relationships what's the um so i think he he does direct people to like working on the world's biggest problems so there is definitely like that zoomed out point of view and um he has got a website called moralambition.org where he actually describes some of those like collective challenges sometimes by um a set of countries sometimes they're like a world problem um to give some examples of things um that like we could we could we could all we could all work on yeah so things like um tax making making sure kind of tax is fair though so those are big problems kind of global problems he does as you get into it at least hint of hint to kind of what individuals can do and that it does kind of matter for everyone kind of within your own context he is pretty scathing of um he has this like matrix of not so idealistic idealistic not so ambitious ambitious and he basically says people are in four categories um and so if you're not so idealistic and you're not so ambitious um i mean he describes this as like you're doing a bullshit job basically um then you get into idealistic and not so ambitious you're like a passionate part-time part-time or maybe you're like an online activist if you're ambitious but not idealistic um you're a corporate lawyer you're a consultant you're in finance or tech both of us have worked in both of those industries this is what i mean you're like okay um which you know is interesting and then he said if you're idealistic and ambitious um you should have moral ambition and there is a good link to the key concepts in the book a good guardian article so if you're like i don't know if i want to read the book yet or i just want to get like started i would really encourage you to read the Guardian article which is free and there's kind of no paywalls and you do get a real feel for a kind of a bit of a starting point yeah my initial my initial thoughts are like I'm very I'm very open and I'm very intrigued and I'm looking I'm looking forward to learning but I would say that the majority of people are kind of in probably what he is phrasing as a sort of bullshit job thing you know like they're probably not necessarily really consciously thinking about some of these world's biggest problems every day.

8:11I'm probably not going to work every day going, I'm so ambitious. They're sort of, you know, they're going to work. So I feel a little bit like, oh, I don't know. I don't like the bullshit job thing. I feel I have a little bit of friction with that term. But I think I understand what he's trying to do, which is saying the world is spending a lot of time at work. And if we put that to work on something bigger, it would be better. So I'm going to hold that in my mind. his big argument would be there is loads of talent being wasted rather than well spent you know like are you doing work that matters that makes a difference that feels meaningful i think your observation is a really good one you know like the majority where within that matrix is like the majority of people who are probably like a bit idealistic and a bit ambitious because i think That's where most people would be.

9:06Maybe, but maybe not you and I. Like, I think in some ways I would, by his categorization, you and I would have both at times gone in the ambitious, not idealistic one. Yes. You know, you can't, like, I worked for a big bank. You worked for a big global tech company, which is why, like, as you are reading, it does make you think, all right, crikey. But I don't feel, he isn't trying to beat you up. I would actually say those some of the things that I have picked out, I like deliberately provocative because I'm like, it's interesting, right? He is an optimistic read and he is encouraging and he does give you loads of good examples of people who have made a difference.

9:50So I think you can get to this point and be like, well, that sounds really daunting. That's not doable. but in the book he does say the majority of people who end up making actually a really significant difference start really small they rarely start from scratch and usually you're learning from other people so it's not like you have to create a massive movement or save the world by yourself or completely re-engineer everything it's often just like one you know like one small action kind of leads to another leads to another i think the thing that he would always want people to be doing is just doing something you know like not being passive being active rather than passive okay so talk to us about what what we can do i'm ready you're ready um hopefully if nothing else i think it isn't it it's something to be curious about you know like you said like feel really intrigued by um so what could you and i wrote in capitals do i was like right crikey what am I going to do what one of the phrases he does use which may or may not reassure people is like you've got to demand more of yourself and I was like okay I actually do think though since reading the book I have demanded more of myself so I mean it sort of worked so I'm going to give some examples so number one you can volunteer we can all volunteer more or start volunteering in some way and actually what's good about volunteering is it's good for you like we know there's loads of there's loads of research that we've talked about before around um your own happiness how healthy you are um it's really good for your kind of mental health and obviously really good for other people too it's kind of that point like givers gain more you do come back to that actually this idea of like having a giving mindset yeah and that volunteering can be anything and i think it can it can also serve quite a few different purposes it could be a way of you exploring something that if you do want to do something different volunteering is a great way to start understanding that world so if you I do think some people might read this book and go right I want to do something dramatically different if that's you I think volunteering helps you to get there some people like me will read it and think okay I don't want to do something dramatically different but I do take the point that I could probably demand more of myself so what might that look like and it means you get to spend time with different people and a practical way of making progress on the question is I think is like how can I contribute the most you know like where can I volunteer my time my skills in a way that's going to be really useful because I think this is all about being useful rather than necessarily just like following your passions you know he's quite anti the following your passions statement So I guess just thinking about that in terms of volunteering times in ways that we could be useful, things like speakers for schools to inspire young people to think differently about how they enter the workforce or helping other businesses in our ecosystem, as in other businesses that want to make careers better for everybody, just giving them some of their time to help them sort of start and scale their ideas and thinking.

13:06or you and I kind of both work in sort of trustee roles. So giving our time to other organisations that are kind of working on something that we're passionate about and contribute to, but it's of no commercial benefit to us. We're trading time to help them do what they're trying to do. That sort of thing. Yeah, totally. And I was like, right, okay, how would I make this really concrete? Because I was like, right, we're going from really quite a big zoomed out idea here to something quite zoomed in. So I gave myself a score. I was like right if if action one is to volunteer start build expand your volunteering what would I give myself out of 10 at the moment in terms of my volunteering about how much of a meaningful contribution do I make through my volunteering um so I gave myself a five out of 10 so I'm not starting from zero um which I think as you go through this it's quite good to recognize what you already do before you beat yourself up too much and to your point I was like well I do volunteer my time for some mentoring every year um through a program i do volunteer my time for three organizations who i believe are making careers and work better for everyone um some of those are completely voluntary organizations as well so i feel like you kind of double your impact perhaps that way for some of them are commercial which i don't think feels quite the same but then you can start to challenge yourself to go right if i'm demanding more of myself what else could you and I do what else could amazing if do given our mission and our ambition is to make careers better for everyone so I don't think it's a surprise so I read this book for the first time in the summer we are now actively exploring quite a few partnerships where we could support people with their careers that we don't support today and I don't know if I would have had those conversations or been as proactive if I hadn't read the book and I think that's sort of the point so that's not dramatically different to what you and I do today but I think it's pushed me and yeah to kind of go further I think you know just giving where you started from about like the 80 ,000 hours and you know those metrics I think I would rather than maybe a score I do like your score but I think I might even go one bit further with that and almost do like hours percentage of my time yeah I think I would go to hours hours a month or hours a year and think well how do I redesign my week or if you know if I was in a corporate you could I speak to my manager because lots of lots of companies that I've worked in have had sort of policies where they can support volunteering hours and I'd maybe try and like lock that in and formalize it so it's becoming part of my part of my work yeah and it's sort of like the thing you know some companies do we're always going to give 10 of our profits away you could be like well I'm always going to give because the thing that's not talked about loads in the book is like it's also money he does he He does talk about privilege.

15:51So as in if you're privileged, it's often easier to make some of these choices. Certainly historically, he gives some examples of like people who've not everyone, but some people who've done some amazing things. Like hundreds and hundreds of years ago, they were quite privileged. So they sort of could, you know, they could make those. They have they could they have their means to make those arguments. But what there's not a lot of discussion of is like, OK, but most people can't give up loads of time or money to do lots of volunteering. because you know like everybody still has mortgages to pay and rent to pay and things so I think your point is a really good practical one because you could say well if I if I don't do any of this at the moment what would one hour a week look like yeah and I think connecting that with something that you care about I think this could be to do with work but I don't think it has to be um I was reading actually do something with kids right yeah like I was thinking schools schools kids volunteering for like reading time I was reading in my local magazine that the local food bank near where I live are have more requests for food than ever before but a 25 % down year on year on donations even though they get loads they're still they're still not kind of getting enough to meet the demand um and so you you might read and that connected to me I've worked on food waste before when I worked in a supermarket and I was like oh okay I don't think I am quite new to this area it's like oh I didn't realize that was there I was like I wonder if there's something I could do there just and that's completely separate to work my mum recently dressed up as a daffodil um in order to collect money for charity yeah in the supermarket and i think she was that you're not allowed to like shake but i think she yeah she's very happy you're not allowed to shake you're not allowed to shake are you so i think she just smiled dressed up as a daffodil with a little please please yeah please put it in the bucket so that's doing doing action one um yeah Do we feel a bit more concrete, a bit more doable than we did 10 minutes ago?

17:41Yes, I think volunteering is a way that you can do good and making that concrete by either giving yourself a score or setting some hours aside. That feels, I feel absolutely fine with that. I feel good about that. So action number two is expanding your impact by one person or group. So I like this one because I feel like we can all do this. now he describes this as your moral circle and there's sort of a diagram of like I know there's a diagram like when you frame it I'm like that sounds great and then the terms I'm like oh that sounds heavy yes okay um so your moral circle imagine like concentric circles and it starts in the middle and it's you and then it goes out to like your loved ones your friends people you work with neighbors people in the community be the country people animals you know you can kind of going and so I was like oh okay this one I can get to quite quickly because you could just literally think about your role today who do you already have a positive impact on and how like what does that look like and on if you were just going to extend that by one person or one group of people like where would you go first like who else would benefit from kind of what you've got to give so I could think of one for you straight away because this this happened last week so i was like oh okay so this was helen doing this so you already do in squiggly careers in action in our weekly newsletter you will sometimes do a helen how-to for our community and i'm like great people love those and it helps them with how to do something and then last week uh you were talking to our team about a gpt creating a gpt and you offer to do a helen's how-to for our team so actually you do something externally that actually you don't do for our team at the moment and everyone's face just lit up they were like yes please please do me a hell and hell too and so that would be a really good example of you extending your impact by like basically looking inwards rather than outwards just with with that example it's a question on that point you know because i've kind of the way you described it i sort of saw sort of moral circles like concentric circles yeah you have you you have family friends kind of going out is the aim to have more people in an existing circle so can I help more friends can I help more family or is the aim to kind of go further out so helping friends of friends or you know like outside my company people yeah it's a good question I think what he's trying to get you to is like a who else so rather than help the people you currently help more deeply which you could obviously also do it's kind of like who else are you not supporting um that you could and so then you go out and you're kind of uh hitting more people in more places so it would be like us saying whose career are we not making better and how could we help those people because they're not the people that we help today um and so for example i i could also think of one quite quickly which i was like that's always quite good if you can think of one i mentor people through a program one-to-one but then this week um I'm going to an event that I've been to before and I'm actually kind of hosting a table of 10 people so that I can help more people at once and also connect those people together so I've expanded my impact from one to one to one to ten um so you know that's not that's not dramatic that's not unrealistic and again this is where you see these things get to you that idea came after I read the book I think because you then start to think I was so I mean a trying not to beat myself up too much but I was trying to challenge myself you know to kind of go well what would be what would that look like for me expanding my moral circle also in a way that feels realistic you know with like my time and my effort and those kind of things um but back to positive impact I think you do have to this is not about just knowing more people so it's not like I can't just extend my number of connections.

21:39It's in a way where you are giving. It's like, you know, it is back to that, like, people helping people. So, you know, we would always talk about that's a great way to build your network. And I do wonder, he would never say this, and I suspect this is like his worst case scenario. But if you go through each of these, I do feel like I could make a pretty good business case for each of these being useful for your squiggly career. you know like volunteering new people to borrow brilliance from um stretch your strengths in different situations like extending your impact is a really good way to like use your strengths in a new way to discover new people you know it's very people helping people um that's really not the point of the book and that's not why he wrote the book no no but i can i can get there we're trying to save the world we're trying to save careers um yes third action so third action I actually didn't have a good answer to, but I liked the action.

22:31So one of the points he makes is there are hardly any, what he calls like zeros. You know, like people who completely start from scratch and think, I'm going to create this thing. Like most, it's like 99.9 % of people are not that. Because people are already doing something good? Or no? Because it is very hard to be the first one. So you know like the first person to speak out against slavery. Okay, I've got it. Okay, so a different thing. Not because we're already doing something good. Someone hasn't done the good thing we might try to do. Yeah, and because it's actually quite hard. Because when he talks about like being a zero, you are typically going against something that is very accepted.

23:17And everyone does. And this is just how we do things. It'd be like somebody going now, well, we're all just going to stop using cars. that's just yeah or we will stop flying that just feels you know like so it's so it takes a lot of bravery a lot of courage you've got to be incredibly visionary and typically put it with a lot of people saying a lot of people disagreeing with you but i mean it's almost kind of good news because actually if you read some of those examples and some of them are in the book they are inspiring but they're really far away right because you're like well yeah that feels really tricky so most of them most of us we're not a zero and we don't we don't have to worry about it but what is helpful to have is spot a specific role model so we act once others have led the way majority of us are really good followers but you have to have someone or something to follow and then actually people really innovate people are often inspired by something or someone else and then like they come up with like brilliant things and so I think one of the things to do is to start the search if you don't already have one for like what's the answer to that for you because actually when I thought about it I can think about role models in the work that we do so I can name people whose work I admire or who like people where I'm like I really like how they do what they do but if I am connecting this back to being morally ambitious like how they have maybe approach building their business or kind of they're kind of more connected to something more kind of purposeful in that way I was like oh that's a bit harder um so there's somebody I know I was thinking oh I really like so my friend Tom runs a company called Nice and Serious and what I love about Nice and Serious they do um they do morally ambitious work actually they're they're a good example so they're like a creative agency who do morally ambitious work and they have a filter for who they decide to work with they have some brilliant policies they've got like a really good period policy that they talk about um he writes a really good newsletter called agency in progress and every time i read that i'm like oh i feel like they're always stretching and challenging themselves you know to do they do good work for good brands or good businesses often charities or social enterprises those kind of things and i was like oh actually that's um um that's a good example of the sort of business I want to build um so I was starting to get there but it took me it took me a little while and that's obviously a little bit of an individual but a bit of a business too because then what you can start to ask yourself is okay well how could I how could I learn more from like I see Tom every so often but probably like only every couple of years and I follow nice and serious but I could dive into their world a bit more um yeah think about how they work.

26:06I could ask them more questions. You could volunteer. I could. I could close the loop. You know, I could go and do a squiggly session for nice and serious. And in return, just ask them loads of questions to be like, oh, okay, so how do you make some of these decisions? What about you? Could you, can you, it took me a bit. Yeah, I was just listening. Oh, well, I was listening and thinking, you know, how you framed it. And I was thinking about Alex Hurst and Lizzie Penny because how they've involved Hoxby. So I think now it's just Hoxby. When I first sort of became aware of them, It was Hockesby Collective and their initial, you may not kind of have the words quite right, but my perception initially of their purpose was about sort of creating a new way for people to work.

26:44So bringing, you know, people with lots of different skills together who wanted to work in a with lots of freedom in a sort of freelance way, bringing people together on projects. But actually, over time, they've really taken what they have learned from managing this global community of people that want to work differently. and then they wrote this book called Work Style and now they're sort of influencing policy to create better work for people and I think that they are really good role models because how they are evolving their business and how they are pivoting towards purpose I find that quite inspiring that the business you are today isn't the one you always need to be and you can build on these principles over time to get closer to this purpose-based outcome that you want that was who I thought of when you were talking but that took me a moment so again you might have someone listening you might be like oh i already know i know the person i know the company i know the community i was thinking about cook as well you know who worked with for ages that's another that's a good example just shows though doesn't it you have to like start talking about it and thinking they are they are cook are a very good example um again i love how transparent they are i love how morally ambitious they are with like who they recruit they recruit a lot of ex-offenders and they've really stayed committed to that and james timpson I mean, now you're going on, I could probably...

27:59I think because initially, when I think role model, that sort of probably wasn't my filter. And so actually it's just taken me a little while to you're asking the question from a different angle, which I think is a good thing. So I really hope everyone listening is okay and hasn't found it too overwhelming. It's funny, I recommended this book to Kath Bishop, who's been on the podcast before. Kath wrote a book called The Long Win. She's brilliant. And I knew she was like, I've already bought it. You know, like I knew she was going to like it. And we both said afterwards, we were like, it really does make you pause for thought.

28:36And I think every so often you do need a book that challenges you, provokes you, prompts you to really ask yourself some difficult questions. And I don't think that's a bad thing. Not, you know, we don't want everything to be easy, right? No, and I think not every book, I mean, a single book transforming you It's probably a bit of a, I mean, a bit of a stretch of book, but a book that makes you think differently and question yourself. I think that is a good outcome. I always say to myself, like, it's a good book if I've made notes in the margin. And I think if I would read it, I probably would have made a lot of notes.

29:12If you've got any feedback on this new format for us, because it is slightly different, let us know. And don't forget that we also have got our new Thursday episodes, which are squiggly shortcuts. So very specific, very action orientated to help you in your squiggly career. our email is helenandsarah at squigglycareers.com let us know your thoughts on this episode let us know your feedback on the format and any other ideas or topics that you'd love us to cover thank you so much for listening everyone we'll be back with you again next week bye for now bye everyone