Compassion and why being more human is becoming a career advantage (Day 4) | Open to Work

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1:20That's O-L-L-Y dot com. Hello, Anish. Welcome back to day four of our series on Open to Work. We are on the Sea of Compassion. So just as a reminder for everyone, these are the capabilities to help people get ahead in the age of AI. And I saw something you said recently about the humans are coming. Yeah. That's a chapter title. Yeah. And so compassion is one of these skills. Can we talk, this is the one I was really interesting. I was like, oh, compassion, this is doing, should this not just be a baseline? Does this need to be called out? So tell me a bit more about why you felt it was really important that this was one of the five C's.

2:01Yeah, I mean, again, we started by looking at humans across history and how we did what we've done to build the world around us. And compassion is so core to that. I mean, we talk about anthropological research, where we as a species were compassionate millennia ago, where people who had disabilities we know lived long enough that the only way they were able to do that is communities around them supported them and cared for them. The way that we've bound together at scale. I mean, we've gone from a billion to eight billion people just in the past 300 years in the industrial age. But leading up to that, created countries, created communities, like all of that.

2:37Compassion for one another is central to that. The thing I think that was most interesting to me about compassion is it's arguably the one that people could say is not believable the most. Because in the industrial age, where work was asking us to be machine-like, where technical and analytic skills were valued most, where we were managing org charts and organizations entirely around efficiency, entirely around these measurable outcomes of did we do more, better, faster, there really wasn't room for compassion. I think certain leaders understood that to mobilize teams and to adapt as a business, compassion was helpful, but it wasn't something that in the industrial age and in the economy we're leaving behind was the norm.

3:21To believe that compassion is going to matter and that it's one of the five C's, you have to start to imagine where work is going. And so where work is going is one where compassion is going to be critical because the human part of work is going to be the core of work. I think that's already immediately true for leaders. You could be leading a team of three or a company of 3 ,000 or 300 ,000. Compassion is so key because empathy is where it all begins right now. I mean every one of us are going through a moment of bigger change than we've ever been through before. Every company is going through a moment of business transformation at a level it's never gone through before.

3:56The only way that you're gonna bring people along with you and the only way you're gonna bring yourself along is having compassion for self, compassion for others. And then what I found is that the other end of it, the more compassionate you are about yourself and others, the more energized you are about where work is going for yourself and others. If you get to be pro you by being pro human with you first, you almost reflexively start to be pro everyone. Because once you recognize with compassion, who you are as amazing as you are, we have a line from a neuroscientist in there, everyone is amazing as they are, that I start with these strengths.

4:34The old world of work was go address your deficit. You don't have this degree. You don't have that job title yet. You don't work at that big name employer yet. You don't have, you don't have, you don't have, go get, go get, go get. This new world of work is you start with strengths, anyone, everyone. I had a really difficult childhood or I grew up in a really tumultuous environment. Okay, I have resiliency. I have adaptability. I had to change jobs regularly. I couldn't afford to go to college, okay, you've got creativity, inventiveness, like you've had to do that. We all start with strengths.

5:04And once you realize that for yourself, which is compassion for self, first of all, you realize everyone has strengths. Anyone who is human has an amazing story of overcoming challenge in some moment, of reaching a new peak in some moment. Anyone who's human has this, but you have to have that compassion. And so the new world of work makes compassion relevant in ways that the old world of work didn't. So you're not wrong to say this feels not believable given how work was, but I'm here to tell you this is believable in terms of where work is going. I mean, I want to believe it. Like, I want to work in a world where we show compassion for each other.

5:37And also, it's interesting when you talk about compassion for yourself, because what we see a lot in our work, we call it the confidence gremlins, but it's sort of like where people's inner critic has taken control of them. So I really like this idea that actually you have to quieten the critic with compassion for yourself as a starting place feels really powerful. I do wonder sometimes when I was thinking about how do you show compassion to other people in a way that is genuine and not performative? So, you know, how are you today, Anish? That's me being compassionate. We don't want that, do we?

6:08We want genuine compassion for our colleagues. What do you think that looks and sounds like an average day at work? You know, it's funny going back to our courage conversation. That term can feel intimidating and it can feel like it has to be a big leap. Compassion can feel intimidating for people and can feel like it's a big leap. I would actually challenge what you said, which is just asking the question. For some people, it might actually be the right first step. For someone who's feeling really uncomfortable about showing compassion, about how to do it, why to do it, where to start, literally just asking someone, how are you doing, just for the sake of asking it might be like that first step.

6:45I think the key thing that compassion is listening, though. And so we have an example in the book from Neil Priddy who talks about AI use. We have his story represent don't overuse AI or misuse like we talked about previously. But he also comes back and he coaches teams on how to build psychological safety in companies. And one of his simple steps that everyone can do is pick a colleague you work with a lot, either someone that you like to work with and do a lot of work with or someone that you have a really hard time working with often but you have to work with often. and find a moment to just call them and don't talk about work.

7:18Just say, hey, I just want to call and like talk about anything but work. Like tell me more about who you are and why you are who you are or like what are you excited about or what are you into right now? Tell me about your family. And again, you could just go in with these questions. But if you ask and then listen, you'll find cause to start to see this greater humanity in everyone and the multidimensionality of everyone. Like no one person is one thing, including yourself. That starts with how do you get rid of those confidence gremlins. but no one else is one thing. No one is just abrasive in meetings and I don't like to talk to them or is always inspiring and they know something I don't know.

7:53Everyone has multiple things that are going on. My superpowers emerged from some of the hardest parts of my life, sort of the difficulties I had to wrestle through being a child of immigrants and feeling out of place and just family dynamics that pushed me to have to understand how to anchor on self and all the ways I've shifted careers, like all the good has come from hard and bad, but you wouldn't know that unless we talked and you could let me tell you the multidimensionality of who I am. So I actually think you can start with just ask the question and that can be enough if you've never done it.

8:27But if you're able to do that and that feels comfortable, then really listen. And the simple step like we talk about in the book is just call someone. And I think calls are better than sort of video conference because then we're all sort of like aware of how we seem and we're maybe like in our head about how we're showing up. There's something really nice about a phone call where you're just listening and you're walking and they're walking or go on a walk, you know, with a colleague. And there's actually neuroscience research, especially for guys where we're more comfortable being shoulder to shoulder than face to face.

8:57And I think that just makes uncomfortable more comfortable for everyone generally. And so go for a walk or get on a phone call and just ask about things unrelated to the work at hand. We do walk and talks in our company. And yeah, I love it. It's just a chance to kind of connect with people in a different way. And also when you were talking then, I was thinking, oh, as well as asking, like, how are you doing a very simple swap, which could be quite revealing is how are you feeling? Yes. It's the same same length, but you might learn more. And then I had to borrow a bit of brilliance from a friend called Ange Patiko, who's the chief people officer at Universal Music.

9:29And she told me about a really good activity that helps you really open up and you can do it in teams and it's called what's in a name. So most people have got some kind of story behind their name. And you might, you know, maybe Anisha's got a story or I've got a story about why I was called Helen. And it's a really interesting way to learn about people's backgrounds and their families. And, you know, some people in the name that they have at work isn't the one that they were born with. And there's just stories there that you can surface with that, like what's in a name kind of exercise, which, yeah, could be a good thing for teams to take back together.

10:01So if you had one piece of advice for people increasing compassion, what would you want people to do after listening today? I would go back and forth because I just think we're in a moment where we have all internalized a diminished sense of self as humans at work because of the industrial age and how it's asked us to be machine-like. And humans have grown up in systems and environments and cultures that haven't been human-centric. And so just social emotional learning and early child education, That's a new thing. Being a parent, like being a dad, I'm recognizing how new that is and being an intentional dad, how new that is.

10:40I mean, my dad was like 10 of 11 kids and had a handful of conversations with his dad that were mainly managerial. It was like a performance review. And so I'm sort of he was making it up and now I'm making it up off of what he made up. So we don't come of age as humans in an environment that can help us be better humans and fuller humans. And so I think the one thing I would do is try to find a way to be more compassionate to yourself. And that might be hard because it's abstract and it's big. But I think that's where I would start because I think the more that you're building compassion towards yourself, the more you're going to be compassionate to others.

11:19And maybe the exercise I would do, which we're saying for work generally, is write down everything that you love about yourself and that you feel is your strength. and you can't write down job titles you had or degrees you had, none of the things that other people gave you. It can be like, I'm really proud that I overcame this challenge. I'm really proud of how I am, maybe not at work, but as a parent, because I do X, Y, and Z. Like, what are these strengths you start with so that at the end of that, you anchor in a place that not only is everyone amazing as they are, I am amazing as I am, without anything needing to change about who I am right now.

11:54I would absolutely love everyone listening to do that and to come away and say, do you know what? I'm amazing as I am right now. I think that's a very positive outcome of listening to us talk for 10 minutes. Thank you so much for today's conversation. I'm very much looking forward to our fifth and final one tomorrow on communication. Yeah.

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