Your Mind Matters With Maria Kempinska – Lesley Hetherington & John MilsomHetheringtonYour Mind Matters With Maria Kempinska – Lesley Hetherington & John Milsom

Welcome to your Mind Matters, women's radio and men's radio stations. Now, along with my two guests, my returning guests today, mentor Lesley Hetherington and psychotherapist John Milsom. We will continue our discussion called in two Mentoring versus Psychotherapy or Mentoring and Psychotherapy Part two. Just to recap, in our first program, both Lesley and John set out their views on guidance for both the individual and organisations. That's business organisations, but actually it's any organisation at the moment. However, organisational structure and practice have been forced to change and the impact on the individual and society is exponential and dramatic, comparable to the fallout of World War II. However, the effect for society and the individual is more subtle but equally profound. I am Dr. Maria Kempinska and as a psychotherapist my modus operandi is to understand the individual social and collective psychological terrain and to find positive steps and realistic goals for the individual and everyone within the changes of our society. Before I open up this discussion, my question to you firstly, Lesley, is can you give us a quick recap on your work and also give us an idea of how you would see a positive direction for organizations to take place for a healthier society? I think this is where we need to lead and I think we've all agreed last time that's where we're hoping this change will take us. I know it's very positive thinking, perhaps people might think utopian. However, since that's my mindset, let's go for it, shall we? Lesley? Okay. Hello and thank you. Maria. Yes, I'm a coach, mentor, educator and I mostly work with CEOs of small medium sized companies. But my work's not restricted to that. Basically my ideal client is somebody who wants to improve their world, work and personal for the better. But I am a mentor, not a therapist. I never wanted to be a therapist, although I have understanding of a lot of therapeutic methods. It simply as tools and frameworks that help me to get the individual I'm working with back into the room so I can get on with the work. That's my work and my work is about goal setting and then helping people to plan and execute aligned with their values and their key signature strengths. So to address the question that you were asking Maria about healthier organizations, it is, yeah. So what positive changes can we start implementing or you suggest to implement both for the individual and for the organization? Well, at the risk of sounding just very basic, so basic that some people who are listening to this will want to dismiss it. Look at the quality of your goals now from an organization perspective. That means look at your mission statement. Is it clearly orientated in the value that you create with a clearly identified customer profile and knowing under what conditions you and that customer would do business? So that's at the strategic level, if you like. And then you can come down through the organization and set well formed outcomes at the various levels, including the goals, the well formed outcomes for your systems, which was where we sort of left the last call when we started to talk about organizational system design. And a final comment on this, I like the perspective that says any organization is in fact a social enterprise or should be, because if it doesn't create real value for its clients and doesn't create real value for all its stakeholders, something is fundamentally misaligned and needs direction. Thank you, Lesley. That's a really good way to kick off this discussion. And now John, can you recap on your work and tell us what positive directions you can think of for individuals and individuals within organisations? Because you actually are somebody that deals with a number of people in organisations. As a psychotherapist, I, I know you're a healer and also you've run the spiritual healers organization and worked in business so you have a very good and clear understanding of organizational structures as well. Yes, I work as what I call a holistic psychotherapist and it's simply a way, a word really, I think that allows us to put everything together. So we're not working one element, we're trying to look at it from all sides, all angles and all levels as well. Talking about the spiritual element is important. It's not something that we just don't know about or we don't pay any attention to. It's the important part of how we feel every single day, how we feel about our work, how we feel about our life. So I think that although I work with individuals rather than organizations, we have to remember that every individual is part of a family, is part of an organization, it's part of the structure of our whole social network. So it's important that we look at things from all angles. But as I say, we are working with the individual just the same as we might be working with individual company at any one time. So I think that going back to the question really today, which is more about how we can add value in society or look at the values of society, I think we have to start thinking about what sort of elements we've got that actually can control that or even influence it at some level. I think that Leslie was just saying we have to examine our values and goals. And if we don't have real value, then we are not really contributing in an effective way. And I think that that's very, very true. We have to look at what value is. We have to understand what value is. Because. Because if I've brought something today, I think it's looking at those values and looking how we rate those values and how we understand those values so that the relationships that we have around us work. If the values are wrong, the relationships don't work. And then I think the company also doesn't work. It's such a big question. So I'm going to kick it off and not pussyfoot around the big question that I know anybody who works or anybody who runs an organization will say, and that is, can we have a healthier organization and still have financial success? So before to take forward your point about values and goals, Lesley and John, the values and goals most companies adhere to were religious in the, you know, sort of long time ago. You had the Peabody estate, the Guinness. A lot of them were Quakers or Christians or Protestants, that they all had values intrinsic to their religious belief. Religion has been put to aside for a number of reasons. Spirituality, I still believe still exists, but it's all very, very individual. Our focus has been changed from the we in our society to I and me. It's all about me, what I can get from this. And we touched on this last time about being in the boardroom, and it's what can I get from this? Where do I move from this company to the next corporate company? And of course, we've always had, you know, and very often a lot of the big companies and the way they formulate processes are to do with financial success and only financial success at any cost. But can we, coming back to the question, have a healthier organization and still be financially successful? Leslie? Yes, absolutely. Although if an organization is on the kind of trajectory that you're describing, Maria, where it's turned into all about the profit and all about the competition, it might not be a quick turnaround. Yeah. But let me make one clear distinction, and this is you both picked up on the value a company has having values. And that's absolutely right. However, I was talking about the value they create for the client. Yeah. And if you aren't creating real value for your client and recognizing the conditions under which the thing you offer is valuable to the client and the conditions under which it isn't. So you're very clear about when somebody is your client and when they aren't, then you'll Go. The whole thing is going to start to go down like a pack of cards. Please note, at the end of the day, it is the client who determines whether your product or service and the way you do business is of value to them or not. And that's one of the things that in an ambition to pursue growth at any cost because it's perceived as being attractive to shareholders and it's attractive to ego. And it's what big business is about. That's something that so often gets lost. So does it. Can it create then too much competition would therefore every person who deals with the client compete to just satisfy the client, knowing that you might compromise the integrity of your own company and the individual? Yeah. And the bottom line is, you know, being a successful company isn't all about growth. It might well be about. It is about being responsive and being flexible and being able to change. But at one level, and this is a very simple example, but let's say I can provide a good service to 100 clients and I can do it profitably. Yeah. There's nothing that says I have to have more than 100 clients. Of course, the hundred will not always be the same. Some will drop off and new ones will come. And I need to do the activity required to maintain that portfolio. But there's no necessity economically for me to suddenly become an organization that services 200 clients or 3,000 clients, but that can get lost in this world of competition. And you can often see this if you actually go to a company's mission statement. Yep. And you recognize that a good mission statement is a very simple, valuable strategic tool because it articulates clearly the purpose of the organization in the terms of the value they create. The for whom? What's the profile of the client and under what conditions the business and the client come together to make that happen. And you look at the mission statements of top Fortune 500 companies, and I can guarantee we'll find some of the following fatal flaws. They talk about their position in the industry, I. E. Where they are relative to other companies who would aspire to serve the same customer base. They talk about things are more like a slogan, like, we get it right on time every time. But I defy you to understand what that. Which actually was a mission statement for a company I worked for for a while actually means. I mean, what is it? And who gives a damn? You know, and you can see it. It starts right, fundamentally in the infrastructure. The other thing that happens is mission statements become marketing tools, and they really aren't. They're two different things. They should be aligned, but they're different. Well, then can I take you forward and ask you this, John, in companies then, and from what you're saying, Lesley, and we know company structures have been deconstructed and they become minute silos that do parts of each business. From what you're saying, then should each person that is in charge have their own department, but also be in charge of that 1,000 people and create a system where each department is self contained, if you like, that does everything that understands what's going on and creating a lot of those, as opposed to fragments of the whole business along the platform. So instead of separating accounts and sales and marketing, that that one person would do sales, marketing and mentoring all in one section. So you're totally in control with your staff of servicing that 1,000 clients. And you can grow in that way to have 3,000 or 5,000 clients, but with individuals controlling those individual areas or those individual groups. What do you think? John? I think that sounds like a really nice idea. And I know there are companies that have changed from sort of production line techniques and departmental work to collectives working within their organization. But I think the problem is, I think always the same these things, but a new broom comes in and changes them again and changes them back to their version of where that reality is. And it tends to, I think, change because of financial reasons. It is cheaper to centralized accounts. It is cheaper to do these things. Whether it's more effective and whether it gives more value in terms of things other than money is something that some people can't measure, some companies can't measure that or don't want to measure that. And I think we have to say whether that's valid or not. So when I ran my company and it was dealing with performers, so that Jonglass, when I was doing the comedy clubs and we were developing and each club had to have its own entity, it centralized a number of the elements. It was how do you what parts do you control centrally and which parts do you outsource, if you like, to each club, how much power do you give them and how much do you retain for yourself? But coming back to and this will will be something that I want to just have a balance here between the individual, individual harmony and working and also the financial aspect of working. And it's what keep in to the central body. And what do you outsource, if you like, to those external elements, those external office structures. Right. Was that back to me, Maria? Yes, please. I know you're in Scotland, so I know this is we're all dotted all over the country. For anybody that's listening, John now is down in the south. I'm in London along with Melis, our producer, and Leslie is in Scotland. So we're doing very well on this. Okay, Right. So the thing I would, the thing I would say here is that both models can work and work well. Where things start to go wrong is when you start focusing on maximizing profit. You have to be profitable and you have to be sustainably profitable. And of course you need systems therefore, to track what's going on, track your expenses, track your revenue, etc. But the minute you start to squeeze, squeeze things in order to maximize profit, you're probably on a track where someone somewhere is going to lose out. And unfortunately, the first people who often lose out in that context are the employees. And where you have unhappy employees, you get mistakes, you get an unwillingness to acknowledge mistakes, etc. Etc. And you get in very quickly get into a downward spiraling vicious circle. I think John mentioned something really important when he was talking about companies. He said companies that weren't able to change or didn't want to. And I really picked up on the word want. The willingness to do something differently, more sustainably, the willingness to sometimes engage in delayed gratification and that being creating communication systems where there is enough trust that actually delayed gratification, you'll get the bonus if all this works at the end of the year, is actually something that the human beings who are working in that organization are comfortable with and can trust. Does that make sense? Totally. I'll come on to that specifically. But John, what's your take? Well, yes, I had a specific example in mind when I was talking about that, of course, but we see change and most people find change difficult. Most people look at change as some with an element of anxiety because they have their, their normal way of doing things and it's been successful to them in the past. But other situations around them change and they find difficulty in adapting to that. That's. That's what I meant by that situation. But of course, the trouble is that they're not adapting to the change. They're continuing on their same route. And meanwhile, as Leslie was saying, the company is starting to fail. People are starting to feel unloved within the organization and generally speaking, profits start to fall, but not in the places that they would normally expect. And I think that the, what is sort of, I call it the get a new CEO who is accounts driven to try and increase risk, revenue or something like that, profit Rather, and then suddenly what happens is they do receive more income and more profit in the short term, but it's the longer term situations that really we ought to be looking at and understanding. And I can think of one particular situation where family business, One of the family came to speak to me. He's an engineer and the company had been doing really well over the years. And then a new person came in and took over and increased its profitability from an accounts based point of view. And in that moment, his whole mission was starting to be lost, which was about producing the very, very best situation that people could rely on. I don't want to speak about exactly what it was because it would identify that person. But in this situation, what we have to understand is the mission statement, if you like, that we were talking about earlier was lost. And it became an organization that was just chasing profit, which Leslie was again talking about. And I think in that situation, that company wasn't losing money at that moment, it was increasing its money. But I could see that just around the corner it would become redundant because actually the mission of the company was about being one of the best. It was producing the very best item. And that would have to change at some point because the emphasis was no longer on the quality of the product. Now, I saw that as a good example of how companies can go into decline on the basis of trying to increase their profit. So just to continue with this, what you called it, delayed gratification, Lesley, it's delayed financial gratification we're talking about, really. And therefore, do we need leaders that really understand how to lead companies forward that can say, I want the financial success to be delayed, it will take a little bit longer, but you will sustain it over a greater number of years. And how do you do that as a company in the force of society which was and is now changing, can we change our leadership? Can we change the way we think? Can we have leaders that absolutely stand up to that force that says, you know, we have to have short term gain as opposed to long term sustainability at this moment in time, it has to be long term sustainability because we're not having short term gain. Unless you've created something amazing on the. Or unless you're Jeff Bezos or something like that, because, you know, they've picked up that, that baton and they've run with it, the online baton. Can we now teach leaders and can we give people a little bit more comfort in that way of thinking? Because it is personal and it is very psychological. What do you think, John? Well, I Think there's always that possibility, but we've got some big lessons being learned around the world at the moment. I think if you look in the United States and you look at Boeing, a huge, huge company, a huge employer in many, many states, produce an aircraft that they shouldn't have produced, the 747 Max. And the report a year later shows clearly that there were deliberate errors where the management had fallen down in their reporting structure and covered up items which should never have been covered up because they were to do about safety. And two of these planes crashed and killed three or 400 people. And now all the 747s are grounded and it could bring about the destruction of the company. It could actually bring down enormous company. What changed it? I think it was the method of regulating the company was eased so that they could get their planes out quicker. Then you just look at that example and you can see the failures that have taken place. The healing, if you like, is in the inquiry which is now going forward and allowing people to see the mistakes that were made and how they were made and now regulating against it. So, yes, healing can take place, but it's usually after damage has been done. So do these seemingly draconian messages, regulations, which were then slightly relaxed, do we have to go back to being very fierce with our regulations? Leslie, what do you think? No, I don't think we do. And I can see that that is one way out and through. And it's certainly something that has been done in the past and does work for some organizations. But if we go back to what you were saying, Maria, about even if it sounds idealistic, looking at the positive and what can really be done, and I don't know whether either of you are familiar with what is would now be perceived as quite an old, quite an established book, but by Jim Collins, good to great. Yes, a fascinating book. Fascinating when you look at the underlying premise for the research. Because what Jim wanted to do was he wanted to look at what took companies that were doing really well in an industry. They were good, steady performers and who had suddenly, for some reason or other, jumped to being outstanding performers consistently. And that was kind of the core nub of the research. And when he started his research with his team of researchers, the one thing he'd absolutely said was he didn't want to look at the people issues. He daily didn't want to get into all that squishy subjective stuff. He wanted to look at the hard stuff, like the systems and what they actually strategically did differently. But his research team kept on coming back to him and said, you've got to look at the people stuff. The thing that's happening in these organizations, the difference is people and more specifically the difference is around leadership and the CEO. And out of that, so they did, they went back and they looked at the people stuff. And out of that then he's come up with like a six step stages that turn a company from good to great. But it starts with leadership and it starts with what he describes as a level five leadership, which is a very specific attitude towards being open and taking responsibility. And the easy way to Describe A Level 5 leader is that when something goes right, they look out to the outside environment and their team and they congratulate and acknowledge all the people in the team who were doing something right and for, for doing it right and doing it well. And when things go wrong, they do the other that they look inwards and they take responsibility and accountability going, yeah, okay, I missed that one. I. E. They don't attribute blame onto someone else. They share praise and acknowledgement. Now embedded in that there are skills. But you probably need to look at leadership differently and ask the question, what does it take for me to be a great leader, but much more if I was set off in a different direction, why would people want to follow me? And why would they want to follow me sustainably through good times and bad times? And I think that uncovers a lot of a rather different set of answers. I mean, I could go on about this for hours, but I think I'll finish, I'll leave it at there. I think that's. We'll come back to that because I think leadership is absolutely crucial. And I think when we're going through chaos and change, leadership is so important. And I think we can see that at the moment, I think the world is begging for the right leader. But coming back to you, John, because we're talking both about spiritual and psychotherapy, because psychotherapy, I know in my own experience and with my clients the spiritual element of life always kicks in. When you're in the psychotherapeutic mode, can you then how do you, or how would you include psychotherapy in the training of leaders? Because there's Manfred Ketchupri who does this in Europe and he does that as much as he can. He uses the Freudian model. But it's very interesting. How would you do that? How could you then introduce this for leaders if it's not there already? Introducing something that's not there already is sometimes not an easy thing to do. Right? Yeah. So I'd ask, because nothing's easy, so now's the best time to create something new. Okay, so with. We're talking a hypothetical situation here, in a way, because nothing exists really like this. I don't think it does. But I do have views on how that can enter into society as something which will benefit the whole of society in a slightly different way. Although obviously, I mean, nothing will work in exactly the way you design it. But it has to evolve. I believe, in society. Taking a point there from Leslie, which is about understanding the people in charge. The people in charge have to. In order to be a leader, somebody has to understand and feel as though that person is going in the right direction. I think that's what she was saying, and that's really, really important, because if they do not trust but need to obey that person, we've already lost the situation. So I think what we're back down to is relationships and how important those relationships are and the information that we give people in terms of, yes, I am the person that you can trust. Now, if we look at that in the way that we generally speak to that and the way I would work with clients is that you have somebody come in that makes disastrous relationships. So you start identifying where those disastrous areas are and then work on influencing change in that area. So I have a system that works where if somebody's making very poor relationships, it means that they don't understand relationships. If it's the leader of a company, the person shouldn't be there, really. But if they are there and they have need to understand. Understand how to change the way they make relationships, if they're willing to do it, then it's possible. If they're not willing, then it's not possible. I know this is something. Say that again. Sorry. There's a therapist, Andrew Samuels, who was very influential with a number of political leaders and wrote quite a lot about psychotherapy and society and politics. Can you. John. And then you. Leslie, can you have a psychotherapist who influences leaders that benefit society, companies and individuals? And do psychotherapists and mentors need to change to include everything at the moment, since we are having a global shift on many, many, many layers? John, what do you think? Well, I think, yes, I think we have to introduce it in a slightly different way. I don't think we start at the top. I think we start at the bottom. I think I might have hinted at this last week. I think we start in the schools. Because ultimately what happens is that the people in the schools work their way up and they come out into society a bit later on ill prepared for what needs to take place. So the way to influence society, I think, is, is starting at the bottom. And if you're teaching people relationships in schools every day, if you're teaching them how to relate to each other every day so that they can question what they see around them and come to decisions about whether that's right or wrong, then ultimately those people will be more prepared to enter into society than the people who just accept what they see and copy it. Does that make a point? It does. It's a very long, long, long term point. But Leslie, those good things are long term. I know, I do agree. But what do you think, Lesley? Can you have a mentor psychotherapist that influences leaders that benefit society, individuals and companies? Well, I would. My, my instinctive answer to that would be yes, but given that I'm not a psychotherapist, I probably have to clarify that by what I understand the value or benefit of working with one would be because my understanding of working with the psychotherapist, what I would gain from that would be a greater understanding of myself, who I really am, the ability to face and let go of a number of things that maybe being traumatic that have happened to me in my past who have influenced me, such that I'm more willing to turn up being, if you like, just me, but the best me I can be. And I think that's at the essence of leadership. And whereas I don't disagree with you, John, that there's an awful lot that one could do in the schools and education system that ideally we should be doing now in order to have a better society in the future, I wouldn't be quite so pinpointing that's what we've got to do. Because I would turn around and say wherever you have an individual who takes a different level of, develops their responsibility, that is their ability to respond to the situation that's going on and takes a more positive, constructive view and is open about sharing things with others, which is very much the level five leadership paradigm that Jim Collins describes that creates change and influence. You maybe don't see it immediately, but to put this in very simple terms, you know, if times are bad and you're walking down the street grinning away, some people will think you're absolutely crackers, because how can you be grinning when we've got COVID 19 and some people will be judgmental and say, how dare you go walk down the street looking happy? You ought to be miserable. It is so non compassionate to be happy when things are bad. But for all that, there will be people where, some people that you meet where you're walking down the road happy and because you're happy, you say good morning in a cheerful, cheerful and that makes their day and they're doing just a little bit better because of that. So they go home and they treat something different. So I, I am much more. It is potentially down to each one of us and each one of us can have much more of a ripple effect than we ever think. And if we don't, if we don't do that, well, we just get what we've always got because we're sort of doing the victim bit. Yeah, no, I hear that. Can I. Let me just put a totally different question to both of you then because at the moment what we're struggling with and what we're discussing and there's always a struggle in discussion of getting an answer because there's not just one answer that fits all. And the kind of changes, how do you make a change and change quickly? So there will be, and there are people who are setting up new companies at the moment. And we'll start with you, Lesley. If you were to set up a new company that will employ not just an ic, you know, sort of where you set up a company with a number of staff. And John, I want you to think about this. What changes would you implement both as leaders and in the systems? This is a big question, by the way. Leaders, systems and to create a healthier relationship, healthy based model if you like. Because in universities all the models will change very shortly. So creating a new model that people could adhere to. But what sort of structure could you implement that works both for yourselves as leaders, for yourselves with a company with a vision, and also that actually enhances society and the people that work within that company. Can you think of anything, Lesley? I'm going to sound a bit like a broken gramophone record here, but so much of this to me is about transparency because transparency underpins good communication. But it also starts to show how, how behaviors and results are correlated to each other. And again, we're back to the thing I really said before. There can be so much ego around starting a company, so much focus on the competition as opposed to simply focusing on value to the customer, being honest when you get it wrong and correcting and inculcating that as an attitude in the organization. And let me read you something here. There's a sentence like I've gone into teaching mode, but I think it's relevant to this discussion. I got it from a book called the Speed Of Trust by Stephen Covey. But the example is the company Nordstrom. Yeah. Yes, yes. And it's talking about in company employment handbooks and policy manuals that are hundreds of pages long or longer, completely unintelligible, people don't read them. I know. I've been in that situation, both trying to write them as instructed, but also trying to read them. But the example he gives here is the Nordstrom policy manual consists of only one card. The front of the card reads employee Handbook. Welcome to Nordstrom. We're glad to have you with our company. Our number one goal is to provide outstanding customer service. Set both your personal professional goals high. We have great confidence in your ability to achieve them. So our employee handbook is very simple. We only have one rule. And then on the other side of the card it says one rule, use good judgment in all situations. Please feel free to ask your department manager, store manager or human resource officer any question at any time. Now, I was trying to check out whether that is still the policy in Nordstrom or not, but that's really irrelevant. Can you see how clear and simple that is? But it's doing the one thing that so many organisations do not encourage. It's saying, communicate, ask your questions. There is no such thing as a daft question and also implied. If you are a leader or a manager, you are there to help and support others to your best ability to find the answers if you don't have them. So to lead is to serve. Yeah. And if I go back to years ago when I worked for part of the Mars group and was a production manager making coin mechanisms to go into vending machines worldwide, the thing I got from my immediate superior and mentor was that my job was really to keep the people on the line well supported and happy, whatever that took. I mean, if it took turning cartwheels down the middle of the shop floor to make them laugh, then that was my job. Because if they were happy and looked after, then everything else worked. And I, for whatever reason, I was probably partially my interpretation of what my mentor was saying, but I took that seriously. Now, let me continue with the next level of the story, because I'd been doing the job for about a year, maybe a year and a half, and I went off on holiday for two. Two months. Not two months, two weeks, two months, I wish. And when I got back, not my immediate manager, but somebody much higher in the organization pulled me to one side and effectively ended up disciplining me, for he didn't like the way I talked to the women on the line because if they came in with their. The photographs of their daughter's wedding or something, I would look at him and he was kind of like, you shouldn't be doing that. He then went on to say in the same conversation, you know, you're away on holiday and the line ran without you. And I'm sitting there thinking, yes, absolutely, 100%, that's my job. Yeah. But for him, he saw it as evidence that I was redundant and unnecessary, even though he was recognising that it was the only time a line ever had run smoothly while the manager was away. Does that make sense? Yes, totally. Huge success. A huge sense, rather. Yeah. So so much of it is about serving the people. Absolutely. Right. I couldn't agree more. You've led me straight in as of part, especially with communication. Communication is the core. It is the most important element of every relationship that you'll ever have in your life. You're going to a shop. If you don't communicate what you need from that shop, you're not going to get what you need. So communication, whether it's whatever relationship it is in life, is number one. It envelops everything else. And I think that if I was making this mission card statement to the startup organization that we're talking about, it would involve a few other core qualities that people need to address, and they would be the same as if I was talking about somebody who's trying to pick a person they want to live with. Working with somebody is very much living with somebody. You've got to be able to understand them and. Treat them with understanding and care and respect. So these core qualities of a relationship, in my view, beyond communication, are respect, care, truth, and another word which I use called honor. And if we look at, if we look at those, those qualities and we ask people to make sure that that's what they're doing with the, their customers, with their co workers, with their suppliers, with everybody. I think you start to realize that actually what you've got is a company that, that works in a sort of cohesive way. And the sort of cohesive quality that I look at in most areas and I think, especially in companies, is what I call authenticity. And I think if you go back to the sort of founding reason why we go into business, I think that should be authentic. We should have an authentic product that we are proud of and will do the job that we believe in. And if I was looking at funding or being involved in any company at any level, I would want to know that it was authentic. That probably answers my question that one step further. So I worked for a company in advertising and marketing that did all the marketing for BMW a number of years ago. And BMW as a brand was very clear on what they were presenting. You know, a fast, reliable engine in a wonderfully designed car. But also when you went into the showroom and when you went to the mechanics and the garage, you walked into a virtual kitchen, it was so pristine, so clean, you could eat your food off the walls, off the floor. It was phenomenal. And that was part of their brand. They kept that not only part of their mission statement, but the brand was so strong that every single outlet was designed in exactly the same way. And they did everything from the beginning to the end. This was a number of years ago, but I can see it still exists at the moment. What I'm noticing in business is people buy things off the shelf a lot, including algorithms. And I think I mentioned this last time how algorithms can be quite like many flashes. You can only go one way when you use this sort of template or a white label product. And you can only do this in this way and that in that way. And it really doesn't give you the freedom to incorporate the flexibility, communication, all the problems that can go with the normal interaction of human beings and the care that goes with human beings. My belief is that businesses should go right back to basics and start with everything rather than be so laissez faire with adopting new technologies without really testing them. What are your thoughts, Leslie? Oh, absolutely, totally Maria. But then on the and again I'm going to hop back to Jim Collins book. Yeah, but in the six steps of create taking your company from good to great and it starts with leadership, then it's the team, he calls it getting the right people on the bus, etc. Investing in technology is the sixth step after you know what you are doing and you are heading in the right direction and then you all only invest in the technology which is aligned. I think we if you don't know what you're doing and you're just a bit scared and you're leaping from one thing to the next to try and be successful, you're probably relatively easy to sell some new gizmo idea to almost out of a degree of fear, you know, oh God, if I don't have the most up to date whiz bang website, nobody's going to do business with me as a very simple example. And actually people, and that's where companies get it Wrong. They spend. They. They spend money up front on things that they won't use, they're not ready to use, that then become redundant. And I would start with the people. Every single time. Start with the people and then you start to get things right. Does that make sense? Totally. And what about you, John? Yeah, I mean, you say start with the people. I think we. We can say that when we're talking about developing something, it should be developed from the ground up, if you see what I mean. From a sketch to a machine. But people, especially German motor manufacturers, I can think of. I met in Germany a guy who makes the Mercedes wheels and asked him how many employees he had. He's had two. Metal goes in one end, the wheels come out the other. We don't need anybody else. And that's a simple piece of construction. It's straightforward. But those wheels were, I think, are made near the factory because it was a good idea. I mean, outsourcing is another. Is another thing we need to discuss, isn't it? If we're outsourcing, if we're sending stuff to importing things from China that we've designed and being manufactured there, is it okay to do that? Is the question because perhaps some of the employees are no longer necessary, or are we saying this is the best way that we can produce the product for our client, perhaps at a more advantageous price, or is it a better product as a result of that? There's a question to somebody. You've raised the number of questions in very, very large corporates and all those social organizations. Politics is a social organization. You know, social work is a social organization. Hospitals, schools, all of them. So let's talk about leaders. And leaders we are now, when you go back to university, and they'll be creating new education system, as far as I'm concerned, then leaders, it appears to me, to need more skills. And as leaders grow, we need better leaders. But their skills need to grow. Understanding every single aspect of the company, including the online, you know, sort of technological knowledge, but also methodology, communication, but also absolute conviction of what they do. And when they've got all that, they also need. Do you believe they need to be morally trustworthy? And can a company. So there's two questions here. One is on leadership. Can they have all these skills? Are we looking for the holy Grail here? And can a company equally be moral or have morality and still make money? Natalie, what do you think? Who, me? Since you first. Yes. What do you think, John? I think that it's entirely possible to have the skills But I don't think everybody's got them. I'd say, far from it. A lot of the skills that we're talking about to run the sort of companies that we're talking about, I think could be taught with an element of therapy and an element of input from Lesley. I think, yes, you could make quite severe changes to society if people were prepared to accept that form of guidance or learning. But it's getting them in to do that in the first place. Surely the cultural change which is necessary within the boardroom would be quite tricky. Would you agree, Lesley, think of yes and no. I will go back to that. It starts with the individual. And if we pick up on the education side of it, there's a focus in education at the moment on qualifications. And the reason that that happens is the one part of the system in any academic institution which will be the most robust and the most consistent is the qualification aspect of it. Not because people don't care about education, but because the awarding of a qualification is right at the heart of the institution. And in the case of a university, their legal charter depends on it. The trouble is that when you're focusing on the qualification, which is kind of the acknowledgement, the piece of paper that somebody will give you, that can open up the whole lot of shortcuts. How do I get the piece of paper and out? When you're talking about skills, you're talking about something that you develop for yourself that has much more longevity than the knowledge necessary to do the assignment. To get the tick in the box to be out of the door and run. It also takes. It can take longer to learn and develop. It takes practice and application and it's something where different people will adopt and change and build up a skill at very different rates. And it's. There's this timescale thing which in the current qualification system where you sign up for a six month year, two year, three year, four year program is out of alignment in so many ways with developing skills. Skills, yeah. The other thing is skills are by definition, they're learned at the individual level. But maybe more important, you start wherever that individual's at. You can't jump three steps because it's not about memorization, it's about doing application. You can speed it up, you can do a great job, but it, they. You've got two things here, here that are just almost running in different speeds in different ways. Yeah. It's such a. It's a big question. I knew it would be. I just wanted to put it there just to Finalize, because we've only got a few minutes left. But John, can businesses be moral and still make money? Absolutely. I think it's the best way to make money, quite honestly. It's. I think a moral company has moral employees that feel as though they're in a moral organization. I can think of several where people feel as though they're part of something which is good and positive and adds towards society in a way. I think that percolates down into the employees and their families and their customers. And it's one. One brilliant way, I think, of making money. It may not make as much money as another company, and we've got to decide whether that's important or not. I don't see that. I think we can always make money. Anybody could make money, really, but it's making money with that style and that panache and that authenticity, I think, is where the skill is now. I think that there is a place on the board for somebody like a guiding therapist that can identify little problems, small little problems which come up and gently, diplomatically introduce change by talking to those individuals quietly rather than it being a big problem. I think that that could be quite beneficial. So. And Lesley, in a very short sentence, because we're very close to the end. Yes. Yeah, absolutely. A global company also embedded in it has so many elements of sustainability and it's about transparency. And because one of the things about being transparent, if something's going. Going wrong or if somebody is starting to behave in a way that is out of alignment with everything else, if you have transparency, it's seen and can be discussed and something be done about it. Bearing in mind that that out of alignment might even be in the right direction. Yeah. If you don't have transparency, it all goes wrong. I do think having a therapist as an advisor to the board, absolutely key. I come into the conclusion because this has been such an interesting discussion and discussion. To set up a new company at this time is a lot of work. I think you need to almost be evangelical about it. You need, I think, to really take a company forward, you need to have lot of knowledge, be open to learning and learning a lot. To also have a number of skills, methodology, communication. To be able to find people that you can turn to, to ask those questions is crucial. I think this is where both psychotherapists that will check in with you. Why are you doing this? Are you doing it for you or for the company or for. For society? As long as you guide the therapist, that that's where you're going. And a Mentor. Because a mentor I think also takes you on a different trajectory as well. And I think that's absolutely invaluable and perhaps our model of business and particularly in the boardroom and who do you trust will be absolutely crucial from now on? In a number of things you've already talked about, the lead levels of leadership is crucial. How you communicate with the rest of your workforce, the people that work for you and with you to create an enterprise that is an enterprise that is influential in society, that can benefit them, benefit society and create a product that works in society is crucial. Is there anything you want to finalize with just very quickly, Lesley? No, I think authenticity and transparency and John? Well, I'll just use that one word again, authenticity. I think it works in relationships well because people tend to want to know what I mean by it. And also the word honour in a relationship, feeling honorable and honoring people's space, time, effort and things like that, that I think those are the words I think are important here. So every individual has a place in every single company within that company to make the company work. Just as I presume an engineer. Coming back to your background, which is interesting, Leslie, every engineer places every little cog, wheel and mechanism into something mechanical because it all takes has a very crucial role in that structure. And it's the same with the mind. If you take a part of the mind away, then the rest of it doesn't. Everything has a knock on effect and I think that's very, very important to put all of those together. I just want to say thank you to both of you, Lesley and John, in, you know, sort of being part of this discussion. I do think we need healthier organizations. We obviously need success financially because as we said last time, the small and medium businesses are 75% of our economy in this country. I don't know what's going to happen over the next few months. It's going to be tough. I do believe that people need to be steady and steadied during this time. I do believe leaders need to be much more available to their staff, but also make their businesses work. So structures have to be a little bit more robust. I like that word. Lesley uses that a lot, which is a good word to use. And I also think that people need to be able to communicate and we've talked about that a lot and be quite clear where they're going. If we can direct people in business in a way that actually contains them through this very rocky time, I think businesses will be very successful for. So just to say thank you. To both of you. And this is women's radio station and men's radio station. And your mind matters. And look forward to the next program.