Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Speaker A: Hello, everyone, and welcome to the next edition of the Work Healthy Podcast. I'm John Ryan, and today we have a first. You may remember our episode with Dr. Alan Watkins where we discussed emotional literacy and regulation. Well, the feedback was fantastic. And then I noticed that Alan has written a book about change, a topic that has intrigued so many. So. So I've invited him back and I can promise a fascinating journey for you, particularly if you're into movies and the like, and the hero story. You're going to really enjoy this. We're going to discuss why we avoid change, why we need to get better at making other people comfortable with change, and the type of resistance that can happen to imposed change. We'll talk about the phases of change, how we need to get out of our comfort zone, the disease of meaning, and finally creating a more effective and sophisticated version of ourselves and what it takes to do that. I first asked Alan whether the management of change in today's world is probably one of the most valuable skill sets.
[00:01:06] Speaker B: I think change capability is absolutely critical at an individual level, at a team level, at an organizational level. But we see it as one of five capabilities. Most organizations in our experience, are quite obsessed with technical capability and operational capability. That's what they hire for, that's what they promote for, that's what they tend to track. But you also need strategic capability. You know, how do you build the future? You need leadership capability and, of course, change capability. So we pull out change capability because the ability to change faster than your competitors, faster than the market, and faster than the world. The world's changing very quickly, so you can only stay ahead by being really good at change. So really delighted to dig into change as a topic.
[00:01:57] Speaker A: So has change got a bad name, a bad rap?
[00:02:00] Speaker B: I think human beings are just naturally anxious about change, you know, in fact, if you look at the narratives around change, particularly in business, you know, you hear all these phrases, oh, steady as she goes, don't rock the boat, all of that. So humans are naturally slightly averse to change, which is sort of bizarre because there's this sort of cliche about change is the only constant. As people, we change, we grow up, we mature, we get old, like it's the constant of our lives. But most human beings are pretty ambivalent, and the markets don't like change, you know, I'd rather know, you know. No, don't surprise me with bad news, you know, I'd like to know. So I think in business, business, because it's not that change capable, is pretty nervous about the phenomena of change. So rather than seeing it as a great opportunity, I mean, if things didn't change and your competition was beating you, it would be a pretty depressing place. Right. So the fact that the world's constantly changing should be embraced and seen as an opportunity and not as a threat.
[00:03:01] Speaker A: Right. But before we jump into the individual and the need for us to change and the steps you've identified to help deal with that, I wonder, what advice can you give to organ organizations to manage the change process more effectively?
[00:03:14] Speaker B: Yes, I mean, it's always a disaster if you impose change because all that happens is you create much higher levels of resistance that would naturally occur. So you need to engage people in the process of change. But again, because people don't understand the phenomena of change, they don't understand the four phases and 12 steps, if you then try and impose it, it doesn't go well.
So if you teach people to understand the nature of change, you know, what the four phase of 12 steps are, then, you know, you get that engaging conversation. You can flip it from, you know, people feeling done too, and they see it as a journey. You know, this is an exciting, you know, building the future type journey.
[00:04:01] Speaker A: And that's interesting because I always remember when you talk to people about, let's say, negotiation, and lots of people turn around and say, I hate negotiation. Right, because it's messy and it's difficult and all of that. But what I had always found was that the truth was they had no sort of framework to use and they didn't know the rules of negotiation. So that makes it very difficult. But when you do know, then you're in a much better position to actually go in and effectively negotiate. So it's probably the same with change, would you agree? And you mentioned journey, and there you effectively, in this book you've actually utilized the concept of the hero's journey so brilliantly.
[00:04:44] Speaker B: Yeah. Joseph Campbell, I mean, one of my four sons is called Joseph, after Joseph Campbell. And Joseph Campbell was a self taught man who lived during, lived through the great depression in America in the, in the late 1920s, in the early 1930s, where I think for about five or eight years there were literally no jobs. So he spent eight hours a day reading books. So he became a world expert on mythology. In fact, you know, he was one of the main inspirations behind George Lucas doing the Star wars franchise.
He and George spent a lot of time together. He also became a professor of comparative religion. So if you wanted to understand, you know, stories that societies tell themselves and tell others, Campbell was The man. And so his great gift to the world was this thing called the monomyth, or the hero's journey. And it's all about change. So I wrote a book, Step Change, the Leader's Journey, which adapts some of Campbell's brilliance to the corporate world.
[00:05:47] Speaker A: Interesting, because, I mean, it's like, in some ways, it nearly ruins every single film that you watch from now on, because you hold on a second. They're all using the same approach to these stories. But that's just the reality of it, isn't it? It's the hero's journey. It's going on nearly in every film you've seen.
[00:06:05] Speaker B: It's going on in the good ones. In fact, the ones that stand the test of time actually follow the sort of narrative arc of the hero's journey. The ones that look dated don't. So actually, it's almost a sort of thing of sustainability, because the hero's journey is allegorical. It talks to all of us, because we as human beings are on a journey from birth to death, right?
And so, you know, we go through these phases, you know, phase, the four phases. The first phase is waking up. So we wake up repeatedly through life to various things, and we can dig into that.
And then the real area of change is when we have to grow up. But between waking up and growing up, there's another phase, which is owning up. We have to own up to the fact of change. We have to take ownership for it, because if we don't own the change, if the change is imposed on us, like you mentioned before, it doesn't work. So we have to wake up, own up, grow up. And if we grow up or change or develop, then we can show up at a whole new level. So. So those are the four phases also described in the book as, you know, the phase of discovery, the phase of decision, the phase of development, and the phase of delivery. So those are the four changes.
[00:07:29] Speaker A: Because I remember one of the previous podcasts we did was with Jim Lehrer, wonderful psychologist, expert human performance, and he talked about most people sleepwalking their way through life. So I think that kind of waking up that you're talking about is absolutely brilliant. So I suppose to dig into those steps would be great. So the first one on being very hopeful or probably just in that comfort zone where we're just happy with where we are in our life. But you don't think we should stay there?
[00:07:59] Speaker B: Well, no, because there's no change. Right. If you're sitting there in a state of either ignorance or complacency there's no reason to change, everything's fine. And in fact, that's where most of these great movies start. You know, what's called the real world. As Campbell described it.
It's not really. It's a view of the world, right? So you see, you know, Neo in the Matrix sitting in his little business cubicle thinking he's in the real world, but he's not. He's in the Matrix, sort of just unaware, which is a metaphor for how most people live their life. You know, they're just trolling through, going through the motions, as it were. Or as Keats said, the lives of quiet desperation. You know, people just going through the motions of their life, not even awake to the fact that they could be so much more. Life could be so much more. There's so much more to discover and experience, but they're not aware. They're just trying to get through the day or the week or pay their mortgage, you know, living stereotypical lives. So in that comfort zone, there's no reason. That's step one, you know, comfort zone. There's no reason to change. And so. So nothing happens until there's a disaster for most people. Sadly, most people only wake up if a disaster besets them.
[00:09:18] Speaker A: Yeah, it's interesting. It's kind of this plaguing sense that I should be doing more. Right. So I'm just wondering when we have the likes of social media, the likes of Netflix or whatever, there's so many things that can distract ourselves from the pain and that discomfort that we may resist the temptation to change. Do you think that social media, Netflix and those distractions, life are a big, big problem?
[00:09:41] Speaker B: Oh, completely. But that's the step three, right? So step two is we feel a bit uncomfortable, right? So it may not be a disaster. It might just be some nagging discomfort.
So, you know, our life's not quite working. Oh, I'll just watch Netflix. Or, you know, I feel uncomfortable. I've got fomo. I've scrolled through my social media feedback and I've seen all these people having much better lives than me. And I'm sort of in discomfort and so I'll carry on with death scrolling just to distract myself. Or I'll, you know, vegetate on the couch to distract myself. I mean, we've got very good at step three. There's a whole variety of distractions, you know, sex, drugs, rock and roll, midlife crisis, have an affair, you know, get wasted at the weekend. So alcohol, drugs, these are all anesthetics. Or distractions. Shopaholism, you know, workaholism, gym aholism, you know, they're all designed to unneath ourselves against the pain, the discomfort of our lives not quite going as we want.
[00:10:47] Speaker A: Then what is that moment that actually takes us to sort of say, I've no choice. I have to change.
[00:10:54] Speaker B: Well, so once we've sort of got to step two and we're in some discomfort because some data has arrived, or in Star wars, you know, that's a little video of Princess Leia pleading for help, you know, or in Harry Potter, a letter arrives with an. From an owl, you know. So once there's a disruption in step two, we naturally resist with all the things we just talked about.
So to get from step three, the resistance, to step four, which is where the resistance starts to subside, usually a guide shows up, you know, and this is Obi Wan Kenobi.
You know, it might be Hagrid, it might be Morpheus and Trinity. A guide, a coach, somebody turns up to help you overcome the resistance. Because a lot of people just live their life either in the pain of step two or in the resistance of step three. So sometimes they need a helping hand. They start to trust the guide or the coach who says, look, there is a different way. There is a promised land. There is an unplugging from the Matrix possible.
And they're into step four, and then they get to step five, which is the decision point, the red pill or the blue pill, you know, that's the moment of decision.
[00:12:17] Speaker A: Yeah, but just that kind of going back to sort of those classic films where you have these people turning up kind of to help them through those moments. But in real life, what does that look like?
[00:12:29] Speaker B: Well, it can simply be a corporate coach, if indeed the coach knows what they're doing. A lot of coaches just bolt on more skills in your discomfort, and there's no real change.
So. But a really smart coach that's usually developmentally trained will help you break through and basically, metaphorically, unplug from the Matrix or leave the Shire, you know, if we. If we use that film or, you know, travel outside Kansas, if you use, you know, Dorothy and the wizard of Oz. So the guide might be all sorts of different. It might be actually a corporate coach. It might be a parent, it might be a colleague. It might be somebody, a helper of some sort who is. Knows where you are and can take you further on the journey.
But there is this moment, this what's called the threshold moment, the crossing the threshold with all of Its rites of passage. At step five, if you don't commit to the future, there is nothing that changes. So step five is that commitment to change. And even at step six, nothing's changed yet. Step six is the preparation for the journey ahead. So real change doesn't start till step 7 of 12.
[00:13:47] Speaker A: I'm just wondering about that. So would you say that most people, I mean, I don't know if you have any data even to back this up with. 50% of people just sit there and not actually take that risk of committing to change and making that change happen. And are they just sitting and maybe wallowing in an unhappy life?
[00:14:10] Speaker B: Well, they may be worrying. I mean, I would say it's probably 90%, you know, so they look around themselves, particularly people who are super successful, and all the evidence looks like they're winning. You know, I think you'll find I've got the biggest bank balance, Alan. You know, I think you'll find my three houses and four yachts. Yeah, but why are you unhappy? Why are you restless?
You know, so most people haven't really committed and, you know, done the discovery process to find out what's truly possible. So they've sort of settled, they've accepted less in many ways and interestingly, they're not even that curious. They think this is it, this is all there is. And they sort of tried to make peace with that. But actually there is so much more to discover about who we really are or what we're truly capable of.
And you know what this, this experience of being human on planet Earth is really about.
If they can bump into somebody who's done the journey, who knows what the 12 steps are, who can help them, then you can really help. You know, whether it's a CEO, a cfo, you know, anybody, even people who don't work in, you know, educationalists, sporting people to wake up. There's another whole level, in fact, there are multiple levels, you know, that the England team soccer team could achieve or you know, even Djokovic could achieve. You know, there are many more levels for us to unlock, but you need somebody who understands the journey, the dynamics of the journey and who themselves are highly change capable.
[00:15:48] Speaker A: So I'm just wondering, you know, would you say most people, I don't know if you have any data to back this up or maybe 50% of people sit there and they're not actually taking the risk of committing to change and making change happen. And maybe they're just sitting there and wallowing in an unhappy life.
[00:16:04] Speaker B: It's extremely common, extremely Common, in fact, I would say that's the norm. But Joseph Campbell had a phrase that in that discomfort, which is taking you back to step two, you know, it's people beginning to wake up, beginning to have that hang on a minute kind of thought.
He called it a call to adventure. I mean, I think for many people, you know, I describe it for most people's experience is a disease of meaning, is people start to go, is this all there is? I mean, I'm living according to society's rules. The 2.2 children, the house, one holiday, two holidays every year, Good corporate citizen, da da da da, da da da.
And they somehow feel empty, unsettled. I mean, they've got enough money, but they're not blissfully happy. You know, they can't point to anything specific which is making them unhappy. They just have a nagging sense of, you know, something's not quite right. That's the disease of meaning.
And sometimes that has to get much worse before it gets better.
[00:17:11] Speaker A: I'm not sure if it's because I'm in my 50s, but I'm meeting an awful lot of people in their 50s and they kind of have this head down, working hard, you know, living the life that everybody lives where get a house, get a mortgage, get your kids through college, get married, whatever, and suddenly they get to around the 50s and they're kind of going, hold on a second, this is a bad deal, but I've just given up my whole life to the corporation, all of my best years. Do you. Do you find that there's a lot of this going on, that people are just really madly unhappy at a particular stage in their life? And if you're talking to somebody who's maybe 25 rather than somebody who's 50 on that stage when maybe it's too late, what would you be telling them?
[00:17:53] Speaker B: Well, it doesn't matter whether you're 8 years old, 25 years old or 55 years old. You have to understand the four phases and 12 steps, because they're the same if you're 8, 25 or 55.
And so developing change competence means understanding and going round those steps. Now, once you've done one or two or three revolutions, you start to understand the dynamics. You know, how do you get from step two to step three, three to four, four to five, seven to eight, eight to nine and so on. So you start to develop the ability to move faster through these 12 steps and you develop that change competence. And that's, you know, if you change yourself in one way and then you're onto a new cycle. It's still the same 12 steps, but it's just a different focus, a different level of sophistication or so on, but still the same. So I would give the same advice to a 25 year old as I would to a 55 year old, which is develop an understanding of the dynamics of change, become more and more change competent. So you can not only get yourself through much faster, but you can lead others through to a much better experience.
[00:19:08] Speaker A: Yeah, it's fascinating. In the book you say that if you're the same person you were a year ago, you've kind of failed.
[00:19:15] Speaker B: Yes. So one of the sort of thought experiments is if you look back at the person you were just six months ago, John. And if you're not slight six months. Right. If you're not slightly embarrassed, you're not changing. Right. And of course, most people narrate a story to themselves and I've done this with corporations is, you know. Well, you know, have you really changed in the last year? And of course every. Oh, yes, yes, I've changed a lot. And da, da, da. And the story they tell you is they've changed some things of what they're doing, but they haven't changed who they are. So this is what you might call it, change. What is it that I'm doing? But what I'm talking about is I change. Have you changed as a human being? Not as a human doing. You might change what you do. You know, you go to a different supermarket each. That's not a real change. You're still the same idiot you were. So I'll often tell the joke of the proudest day of my life, right. Which is, you know, when my wife said to me, alan, you're not the man I married. And I'm going hurrah. Because frankly, I was an idiot when she married me. You know, hopefully I've matured a bit since then. We've been married 34 years. You know, hopefully I've grown up a bit since. Yeah. So. But ironically, many leaders wear no change as a badge of honor. You know, they'll tell stories of, well, this is me. I've always led like this. I've always believed, blah, blah, blah. And they're really sort of extolling the virtue of no change. In my view, that's a disaster. The real badge of honor is how fast and how quickly I've changed, how much more mature I am today than I was even six months ago. How much more compassionate, how much kinder I am, how More inclusive, how more perceptive I am than six months ago. But most people don't think about those things. They might think about what they're doing differently, but they spend very little time or they have very little understanding of them as a human being. And the difference that from now to from previously.
[00:21:18] Speaker A: Yeah, that's really deeply understanding who you are as an individual. And we'll talk about the cave in a minute. But it really is the concept that your whole business is built on deep sense of coherence.
[00:21:31] Speaker B: Yeah, well, coherence is part of that.
I mean, I'll often joke with people that you'll hear in leadership circles. Many people have what I call leadership Tourette's.
You know, they keep. They spit out these words, authenticity being one of them. You know, authenticity. You know, leadership's all about authenticity. And they spit it out like they've got Tourette's. And I'll often say, well, authentic to what? Who are you being authentic? I mean, do you even know who you are?
You know, and they go. And I go, well, look, ask me this, and this is a really fun question to ask a CEO.
What's the point of you?
It's a great question. They go, what do you mean go? Well, I'm a businessman. I'm here to make money. No, no, no. That's a byproduct of you doing your job. Well, that's not why. I mean, you're a very clever person. You could make money doing lots of things. Why do you do this?
And it wakes them up to the idea that they're not doing it for the money. I mean, the money's nice, but that's not why they do it. That's not the point of them. So once you take money off the table for the reason why people do anything, because it rarely is.
They go, oh, right, well, what's the point of me if it's a businessman? To make money? No, it's not that.
Procreation, again, that's the point of the species. The purpose of any species is to procreate, right? To be a good husband and father. No, that's the point of men.
Oh, what's the point of me? Most people have no idea, John. They don't know why they're doing anything because they've not thought about it carefully. So that lack of purpose, they're not really clear what their purpose is. Why are you here?
[00:23:10] Speaker A: Okay, so now I'm in sort of the process where I've become uncomfortable. I know there's something wrong. I'm restless I'm kind of going, somebody maybe in my life, a friend is sort of saying, actually, why don't you go on this journey? And suddenly I'm prepared for the journey and now I'm about to.
[00:23:28] Speaker B: Well, this is, this is step seven, the work.
And the work has to work, right? I mean, I've seen many people on their 25th retreat in the sort of Appalachian Mountains or, you know, on the beaches of Tonga or something, and they're stills. And you think, well, it's not working, the work's not working. I mean, the point of the work is it changes you, right?
In a good way.
So just the fact that you go on these retreats or these experiences doesn't mean diddly squat. The work has to work, which is usually why you need a guide to, you know, challenge you. Is this work actually working? Are you becoming more enlightened? Are you becoming wiser? Are you becoming more compassionate, kinder, you know, are more perceptive. Is it actually working? And so the work looks very different for every single person. So when we're coaching leaders or teams, the work's quite different because different people have different life experiences, they've got different limitations and so on. But having said all of that, there's some basic things that pretty much most travellers need on their journey. Some basic things that most travellers need. And one of those is much better emotional regulation. Because, you know, it can be scary, it can be intimidating, it can be confusing, it can be overwhelming, it can be anxiety making. So if these emotions arise and they get the better of you, then you get immobilized, you get lost. So the ability to lean into these difficulties, you know, and do the work. In Star wars terms, you're kind of in the trash compactor. You know, you're getting, you're up against the trials and tribulations, if you want to use a biblical term, 40 days and 40 nights, you know, you're doing the work. In fact, most big movies spend a lot of the time of the film in these trials and tribulations, because this is where the jeopardy is, this is where the fights are, it's kind of drama. So you've got to do the work and the work has to work. So one of the main pieces of work is to get some basic upgrade to your emotional regulation skills and then move into a much deeper understanding of your identity, who you really are, not who you've been told you are by your parents or your caregivers, but who are you really, you know, so who do you need to be authentic to what's your purpose here? What's really going on here? What's the journey really all about? That's the work, and it's very delicate work. And oftentimes poorly trained coaches can just take you round and round the mulby bush. But there's no elevation, there's no scaling the mountain. You know, you just keep going around at the same altitude. You're not developing any depth or any more sophistication. You're certainly not leveling up. So you need somebody who really knows how to guide you to a new level. And that's the work.
[00:26:33] Speaker A: And that's the sense of the deep work as you describe it, going deep into the cave. And, like, most people probably never go there.
[00:26:41] Speaker B: No, in fact, on the first two or three revolutions, you can go the work at step seven and the deep work is step eight. So the first two or three, you could probably skip the deep work. But at some point, if you really want a breakthrough, you've got to go into the. What's called the innermost cave, where most people fear to tread. And so the work's tricky. The deep work is super tricky.
And again, you need a guide that's been in the cave, you know, because you might have to fight off, metaphorically, the cave trolls. And, you know, you may have to slay the dragon. And so this metaphor of the slaying of the dragon in order to find the treasure. Now, the dragon that you're really trying to slay, John, is you.
You are the dragon. It's that earlier version of you. It's that less mature, more insecure version of you. That's what you're trying to kill. You've got to kill the old version of you to discover the treasure. And by the way, the treasure that you really seek in your journey is also you.
You are the treasure you seek.
And so that's what you're really hunting for.
[00:27:50] Speaker A: Interesting, because we talk about this faulty code. You're sort of saying that basically, when in those first maybe six or seven years of our lives, when we're not in control, we're really trying to find ourselves, really what's going on. We've been affected hugely by things around us, and some of that isn't good for us, and that plays out in the rest of our lives. Do you see that all the time?
[00:28:13] Speaker B: I mean, the Irish are almost world champions at this, you know, with the Catholicism and the guilt. Right. I mean, you know, talk about. I mean, they've almost sort of nationalized it, you know, that ability to, inflict guilt on children, you know, that you are a sinner. You know children, because they've yet to develop until about the age of nine or ten, any critical evaluation.
So children believe everything you say. I mean, they take things literally. So if you say to a four year old child, you're clumsy, you're clumsy, you're clumsy, you're clumsy, you repeat that all the through the age of five and six and seven, by the time they get to eight and nine, they believe they're clumsy, whether it's true or not, because they've not been able to critically evaluate the level of clumsiness. So who we believe we are is often who we've been told we are by our parents and caregivers. It's not like there was ever a moment in your life, John, where your parents said to you, okay, John, you're going to have a certain level of guilt, you know, good Catholic boy, a certain level of guilt and a certain perception about yourself. And this is what you're going to believe about yourself. Could you just sign here and agree to that? Those terms and conditions never happened. You just took on all those beliefs without your permission. It was just embedded in all of us. So the deep work is often you start to uncover, hang on a minute, why do I believe this about my, where does this belief even come? And who taught me to fear this? You know, who taught me to be worried about that? I mean, where did that even come? And of course, the answer is usually childhood. So you have to start to go back and unpick some of these things. Some of those learnings are very useful, but an awful lot of them are actually what we call limiting patterns.
[00:29:53] Speaker A: Yeah, it's all very deep, isn't it?
[00:29:55] Speaker B: Because.
[00:29:55] Speaker A: I know, I think we always said there were only two things that we fear as children.
[00:29:59] Speaker B: No loud noises and falling. So we're born baked into our genes. And this goes back to, you know, when we were swinging around in the trees, right? So a loud noise is a predator.
And falling out of the tree, you hit the ground and you're going to be eaten by a predator. So children, all children at the age of six months are born with those two fears. So if you make a loud noise near a child of six months old, it cries, it's scared.
If you pick a child up to hold it about 45 degrees and then drop it, it has what's called a morrow reflex, so its arms go back, it's scared of falling. So those are the only two fears we have when we're born Every other fear, fear of success, fear of failure, fear of spiders, fear of anything. Somebody's taught it to you. Right.
[00:30:46] Speaker A: And that may not be that helpful for me personally. It's claustrophobia, unfortunately, my mum passed that on to me and that's been difficult to get rid of. That's been a fascinating journey for me.
[00:30:58] Speaker B: They're deeply rooted right deep into our psyche. So it takes some very careful painstaking by a very skilled person to go into the cave and find your particular dragon and slay that dragon so you can discover the treasure. The treasure is John 2.0. That's the treasure you seek. And of course, you come out of the cave, you know, blinking into the light, out of all the darkness and the shape shifting and all of that stuff with the treasure, which is the new version of John. And so once you come out of that, having done some of that deep work, the next step, step nine, is to consolidate. So there's this new version, this nascent version of John, and you now need to embody it and consolidate that. That's step nine. So once you've done that development, then finally you're into step 10. You're into the phase of delivery where you can deliver back to the world. You can show up with this new version. So that starts at step 10 is the return. And the return might be Monday morning, back to work. It might be as simple as that.
But if you can return to work with the new version of John, then you can deliver at a whole new level that maybe you didn't even think was possible.
[00:32:15] Speaker A: And am I going to really confuse people in this new workplace when I turn back up as a completely different person?
[00:32:22] Speaker B: Well, you have to tell them. Well, they might. That's not a bad thing, right? They're going, oh, my God, who's this person? The new John has shown up, hopefully a nicer, more thoughtful, more perceptive version of John. So the point the work's got to work, that is, you make positive progress. It's not a regression. If you regress back to a nastier version of an earlier version of yourself, that's not the work. The work is a better version, you know, a more sophisticated version. So hopefully they may be slightly confused in the early stages. This isn't a John I've ever met before. And it might trigger a curiosity like, what's happened to John, Right? So that might start to step 12 inspire them. My God, if John's changed this about himself, maybe I could change something about myself. So step 12 is you inspire yourself to another Revolution of the wheel, or you inspire others because you start to realize as you become change capable, that change is possible. In fact, change is advisable. And in fact, change is enjoyable if you understand what it's about.
[00:33:36] Speaker A: And from, you know, reading between the lines, it sounds like as if you've personally been through a couple of major changes yourself.
[00:33:44] Speaker B: Well, I mean, I Left medicine after 12 years and all my colleagues going, oh, my God, you're nuts. You're giving up a very secure career, you know, good status in the community, you know, a terminal salary, pension scheme. John. I mean, they don't do that anymore. I mean, the junior doctors would strike forever for that. But I gave all that up because it wasn't my journey. My journey. I knew I had enough awareness that I wasn't here to be a doctor for the rest of my life. My journey lay elsewhere.
[00:34:14] Speaker A: What was it, what was the trigger for you that actually made you come to that point, that you actually said, hold on, there's a different version of me that I want to be?
[00:34:24] Speaker B: Well, understanding my purpose from a very early age.
And so the week I qualified in 1986 as a doctor from Charing Cross Hospital, that was the week I surrendered my pension scheme. I knew the week I qualified I wouldn't spend forever as a doctor. Now, it took me 11 years later before I actually left the medical system, but I knew the week I qualified at the age of sort of whatever it was, 23, that my future didn't lie as a medical doctor. And one of the reasons was I realized when I went through that training, you know, my purpose has always been about reducing human suffering at scale.
And as a medical doctor, you know, when I was a consultant on the ward, you know, you got 50 on the ward, 150 in outpatients, 200 lives. You couldn't get past 200. Oh, it couldn't be a GP. You got 2000, 1800 you never see because they're healthy. So you keep seeing the same 200 again. So you could never get to scale. I could never reduce human suffering at scale if I was a medical doctor. Now, some of our corporate clients have got 300,000 employees. So we change the quality of leadership that potentially affects the lives of 300,000 people. If you include the families, that's a million. If you include the supply chain, that's 5 million from one company. And we work with 100 companies. So it enables me to operate and try and reduce human suffering at scale in a way I could never do as a medical doctor. So it Was a, that was a big part of it.
[00:35:53] Speaker A: And when you talk about going through change, obviously change doesn't just affect you, it affects the people around you. Can I, can I ask, in that moment, obviously your parents, if they were still with you, they liked maybe a son, a doctor, and suddenly that was a big moment for them.
[00:36:10] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, I think they thought I was mad also and, but you know, I was very clear so, you know, to use a co op to Clint Eastwood, I don't know why these movie metaphors, you know, a man's got to do what a man's got to do, you know, so I was very clear of what my journey was about. And I think if you're a good parent, you support your children in them being themselves. And so all I've really, John, is followed the journey that was there for me. The road ahead kind of opened up and I walked that path. So that's all I was really doing, being myself, which I was very clear about. Now, my parents didn't understand. I mean, for many years my dad kept trying to persuade me to go back to medicine, but there was no chance, there was no chance of that. I mean, I haven't missed a day.
You know, there hasn't been a day in the last 25 years where I felt, oh, I wish I was still a doctor on the wards. Not one day.
Because I love what I'm doing now. You know, I'm able to help people on a global scale in all market sectors and try and, you know, develop more enlightened leaders who create less suffering in the world.
[00:37:23] Speaker A: So that's the fascinating individual journey, but just finally the organizational journey. What are the big messages that you'd like to get across to organizations who maybe aren't particularly good at going through change?
[00:37:36] Speaker B: Well, again, it's the same phases to wake up, own up, grow up and show up. So one of the most important things for organizations to wake up is the improved, improved profitability or improved revenue or scaling or growth if they want to go further and faster.
The ability to do that doesn't lie where they're currently looking. They've got to wake up to the fact that the way that they're even thinking about it is not complete, forgive the pun, is that actually what we tend to do is we think of the world objectively. Stuff out there, and this is certainly true in business, is most business leaders I've encountered over the last 20 plus years have what we call an IT addiction. They're addicted to task, target, goal, metric, outcome with quite Significant justification. That's why you get hired and fired. And so they think if they want to improve the outcome, they've got to do something differently. That is true, but what's the fastest way to do something different? And that's be different.
So if we can help individuals to be different, then you will do different.
If you're not being different, then what tends to happen is you just keep doing the same thing, you know, with minor variations. The biggest game changer is to be different. So one of the thought experiments I'll often say to CEOs and C suites is to say, look, imagine as a neuroscientist, I can teach you, which I can, for your brain to go four times faster than it's ever gone in your entire life, Would that be useful? Oh, my good. That would be a game changer. You know, I'd be done in my working week by Tuesday lunchtime if my brain was going four times. I said, now imagine I add not only four times the speed, but three times the quality. I you think the quality of your thinking is three times better than it's ever been in your. Would that be useful? Oh, my God. That would also be a game changer. So I go, okay, so if we want to go four times faster and three times the quality, you know, we've got to figure out how to do that. You've got to be different. So when was the last meeting that you had with yourself to figure out how to be four times faster and three times.
What do you mean, a meeting with myself? When was the last time you had a meeting with yourself to figure that out?
I don't have meetings with myself. Why not? I'm too busy doing things.
You know, we're addicted. So the very thing that we're after, which is moving at greater speed in a changing world, we think the answer to that question is to just work harder, do more things. And it's not. So. If I could get organizations to wake up to their IT addiction, the answers they seek, ironically, do not lie in the world of it. Most of the answers they seek lie in the world of I, My sophistication, and the world of we. The interpersonal dynamics, the culture, the relationships between them and others. So the acceleration is in I and we. Now, if that person becomes four times faster and three times the quality and the relationship dynamics in the leadership team double and treble in strength and levels of trust and so on. You absolutely smash the it. So the answer to the it problems in the world is not more it. It's often I and we.
[00:41:09] Speaker A: Well, I really hope you enjoyed listening to the wonderful Dr. Alan Watkins. Wow. And his step Change program. Join us next time on the Work Healthy podcast when we further explore the relationship between health and sustainable performance. I'm John Ryan. Thanks for listening.
